- º gº - s tºx r; : sº º: ºlas - - sº º: ſº º º-º: §::::::::::::::3%; ~ - º sº fº gº 3: º º - - - - - - - §§ § : § ºś º: $...º.º.º. º §: º º º tº: £ºš --- d - º º |º *º - sº - - - --- A. --- - º º :::::::::::: §: ſº - :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: sºººººººº. - º tº ººz. - º º - - º Fº £ºš :::::::::::::::::::::: sº - rº º - ſº º - tºº. º º - º sº 3. c º - 3::::::: º: ---- - º - º º cº-º º º: §§ §§ º Hºº º Bºº º sº º: tº: Bºº º º: º º º Fº ºś *ś º W º jº sº j-, §: Rº: º: - º º 3. º º: 3. *::::::::: w - º:S: §: º - º sº §§ &sº sº $: : sº g º 3:3º - º - sºrt º sº º sº - § ::::::::::::::: º º d §ºś sº ~ - B ſº F º #3:3:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: sº 5. fix ‘tº- - - - - gºººººº-ºº: - º :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: & º - º - - **** º - §º sº Sºś ºf 㺠º ------ 3: § Sºś º::::::::::::::::::: º º - º º: § §:::::::::::::3: ſº § § º ...: :::::::::::: §: º - - - --> º: º º ºne-º-º- + - º - ºr º ºº: §§ &: ºf: - º: §§ &ºº º º Rºº. - §§ s Wºº § a. Sº ſº t º º º º º º D wº bºº º º zº º - Er - -º-º-º-º-º: ------ 29 ; sº º §§ ºº: wº § & § ºš º sº - º tº: º: º: - º sº :§§ º º º Xº Vº º c º $º º º: º - sº - ſº º: *...* º º § º ºś º --ºx-º-º: gº º ºś º: º fº § § § º:::::::::::::::::::::: º::::::::: º & - - º ſº º * * º º - º º - jºº - - sº - º º º § §º &º º § º: º & § º §. ::::::::::::::::::: §::::::::::: 㺠º: º G º º º º º º - º º §§ š: - Fº º º * Sºº gº kº - - - sº º sº º º - º sº - º *:::: - § º: & §§ §: § - - - Yºs º º gº º ºriº -- - - - - - ºw º - º - - § º :::::: º:§º. § - º §:§§ º §§ º sº º: º º: #º: º §: Sºrrº-Tº º º: ..º.º.º. ºpºlº º --> *º- :::::::::::::: - -- º §§ § º: §: §: 3º: º ſº §: - sº ~ - - tº: - º §: º § Sº º • &º º º - º º º ºº:: º º: § § §§ º § º - § tº: -- º 㺠º rº- º d --- Kºś º º §§ & º º º - ºś º § §§ º § º º: º ºrºs º: - jº º sº º §§§ - - ºrs º: º § ::::::::::::::: ::::::::::::: º º º º º - sº º: ׺ º º: - - T-5 š - º sº tº: - º º º #: § º: : º sº § - º º º §º - - º - sº º º §§ sº : º º º - º º - : sº º º: º -- º: º º:3 º º : º ſº º 6. sº sº ---, -- º º º: º º - - º sº º a º §§º gº º - & 3: º *Gºº - º Yºr º ºrº º §3 º º sº Cº-º-º-º: º: º §º º º º º § ". § sº - º - º £º: Pºrºººººººº. º º: tºº. gº: º º 3: tº: º [. ºr. § º º sº º &: º e & §: º: U º Mº º lº sº L sº *:::::::::::: º: º ºº:: º º ºrvºº-ºº: º º w º rºº º: ºś º:ºººººº. §º sº º: **** º & YººHºº º sº ºr º º º ºº:: sº º º: N &::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: tº: º º - Kºº §§§ º º º: ºº: gº º: §§§º::::::::::::: º: º: º ...sº Kº-ºº: º - Bººtº: tº: º B ºś - - - - - - º ſº ºº: Fº § º-º- - º & •º º ºº: º §: Kºº º - º §§§ º: Rº º º: sº Fºr - - º: Qº-º- º º º:::::::::::::: E- ºº:: º § §: º : sº º 3: - º Sºº Fºº r - º º > º - - - ºr-º- º º ***** º º º º º º ºf ºw º § f º º º º sº ~~ Fº º sº º : º Sºº º º trºº º ºº:: º - - - º º: º º º sº º: ſº º, º § º - º: :::::::: :::::::::: º Sºś º º w º - ºº"º º - º gº - - §: - º º º º º º ***t - - - ºr: Fººtº: sº §: º º §§ - sº ºgº - º: § *** º º : - º º º - ---. ::::::::::::::: º º º º º º 3. º: º: º --- - - º º - º: º: § º ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: §§ º: $º º: º º - - º º - º: º Sºś §º: º: º cº sº º ºº: L sº [. º ſº º: ſº ſº Fº ºš : º - º: f* º - zºº Fº: --- º º Sº º º º ºś º Nº º: º: § º ºś. º §: º Hºf; §§ - §º Sºś - º §§ º º º º &: :::::::::::::: º º §§ º: º §§ --- ºº::::::::: º º sº i. kº º: º : ; º 3 º: : § : : # º: E º sº* º º # : º º -# ; § # : §: º º 3: º § § §: : : tº º º 3. jº º ** º º §§§ º: : § -sºº # º : § § § º § ; § # tºº§ § § $: : º § º º º º º : 3: º: g:§ É § : tº: º º § § ă § Cºº º º º: º ºzºº. º: º sº º º gº º : ; : sº º §§ ::::::::: º§: E. º &º: Nº. *º º ; sº *º º É º . Pº -º:sºº: § § § § § 5 º º : º £º a. º º º * 3. º § º: - *: ſº t - - **sº sº - ºº:: ñº - sº º d - ..º.º. º º - - º § G ºf º ºr tº sº ſº § ºš § º # - - - £33; §: º º - º P : §: § s º & º: º º º: º § ſº §§§ 3. º º º 3. § *** : * º f º: § § 3. E § 3.3 sº º: º § § Yº § : § § º§ § § º: º : º §§ ź.3% ºś - º:::::::::: wº Wºº ºf: º jº §§ tº-r - § #: - - : § ; &º A” º § & § º º º º º Frº : º º - º lº zº ; gº £ºrº º: º ſº º: º :::::::::::::::::::::::: ſº...º.º.º. º ; ºº- ; : : § º º º *: tº sº #: § 5 tº º § º : º: º: º º ºt º §: º º º º: - º ºś # º Cº § § : § º º º # § § à º:§ § º:§ º: § [.#- º º º º ; º: - §º: sº # º * § ºº & º º tº: ; - -- ſº &ººg - º - - - §º º - sº sº ºf ºº' º º §: :::::::::::: L. - & §: - *::::::::::::::::: º º º #: :º §§ 5. §º: E. ::$º: º t Fº: º º §: Rºº. lºº ::::::::: º º ſº º º w - º: - sº º º º §:º º £º : §§ : º º - º: º: tº: º ºś §§§ § # º tº. - º º º: § § sº º §: sº - º º º º: :* ºr §º § º sººººº-ºº-ººººººº… §§ - º º § £º $º Kºšº º Kºść § º Rººs º º º tº: : º sº º º § # ºš: §§ *E. º º §: % #º sº a. §§ §§§ §§ ; ;: g Fº º *: º º w ºE. s: § º: * º º º g - ºº:: sº §§§ º º E. §§ š º º r o º §§ §§ Fºº §ºš § §: º : ; ; ; º: º º dº º -º: §º § § ſº º º Fº § - §§ § § §§ § :º: §: § §: a" º st : & §§ § º º º W. º º º º § sº sº º - § sº : º : #3 § § §: º º C º § § - *º # # É § ; º : § ; º § : §§ * P : sº #3; ſº ſº §§ º §§ K? º: Bº - §§ º # : : 3.; ; § - º - - §§ º § §§ º §º § § § º § § º º º ~ - º § º ſ § § º §: ſº sº * -- º º - | º: §§ - § i § § º # 3. º Fº: ######$º §: :::::::::::::: #; *:34 Ş.. ... --Taſm Jºãº f{2 Sºciºsº - - riº ń. H i ſº U D C C C C [. §: i : = -º-º-º-Hºrrº. |º]]|TW d A D D R E s s DELIVERED A.I. * - N. THE CONSECRATION OF THE W 00 D LAW N C E M ET E R Y * IN CHELSEA AND MALDEN. i ON WEDNESDAY, JULY 2, 1851. ‘. By G E O R G E E. E L L I s. º & * ...' . * | iš, - #|||||ſt 㺠sº ſiſ. # i. Bºsºz - - - *ś ------, -ºxº~ f ="cº-º-º: º BO STON: PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON & SON, 22, School. STREET. - | 1851. 9% 2^ % 2. \---> * * A D D R. E. S. S IDELIVERED A.T THE CONSECRATION OF THE W () () D L. A. W N C E M ET. E. R. Y IN CHELSEA AND MALDEN. ON WEDNESDAY, JULY 2, 1851. B Y G E O R. G. E. E. E L L I S. B O ST ON : PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON & SON, 22, ScHool, STREET. 1851. A. D. D.R. E S S, WE have come together from our living homes to set apart these fresh acres of the earth as a resting-place for the dead. The most cheerful influences of nature are around us and over us. Our theme is not a cheer- less one, save to the unthinking and the undevout, who omit from their view of life its divine element, and see in its close only the termination both of happiness and of hope. Our theme has lessons as bright and soothing as are these present aspects of nature: the heart is sensitive to some precious emo- tions which no other theme can stir. The cool water- course flows beside us; the trees wear their summer garb ; the sun is performing his flaming ministry of life; the birds enjoy their brief day; the glorious expanse above us spreads as wide as does our largest hope. We have been educated by the spirit and the lessons of a faith which has rolled away the stone 4 from the sepulchre, and brought immortality to light. Appropriate rites, the solemn hymn, the uplifted prayer, the thoughts and words which the occasion and place call forth, the calm and seemly spectacle which we now make and look upon, are to leave a spell upon these scenes. We trust that these acres will find no other use than as the last bed for mortal clay, while the present bounds of civilization remain. Though very near to us are now incessantly in motion the thousand sounds of the busiest scenes which the surface of the whole earth can present, their din and turmoil are silenced here. The dead and the living will not be too far apart for such communication be- tween them as necessity and sympathy will require. But these green slopes which skirt the horizon are the proper boundaries of this spot. There are still some broad acres amid these busy regions which have witnessed only the toils of healthful husbandry. Their annual crops have nourished the living. Birds and squirrels have still a home here, and we give them leave to remain. We have come to consecrate this broad enclosure, its green turf, its forest-thickets, its water-courses and fountains, its quiet seclusion, and every shrub and flower which shall grow here. And what is the con- secration of this spot? Now, while the sod has as 5 yet been pierced for but a single grave,” we conse- crate it by devoting it to its destined purpose; for that is to our minds a sacred purpose. We consecrate it by passing over its fenced bounds in the hushed and meditative mood which our thoughts here wear. We consecrate it by connecting with it now those lessons, tender, sad, and yet elevating, which, we trust, will be deepened year after year in unnumbered breasts, – each lingering over its own most cherished parcel of earth, the shrine of its own remembrances and loves. Henceforward it will receive a fuller con- secration from the dust which it shall gather, and from the mourners who shall follow it hither. When, from those clustering homes which sweep the horizon around us, shall have been brought here, one by one, the honored, the useful, the cherished, the little babe or its mother, the father, lover, bride or friend, the silent forms of the youthful or the aged; and when from those homes these buried treasures, not forgotten, though mysteriously veiled, shall draw hitherwards the meditative steps of survivors, –then shall these scenes be truly consecrated. All that is deep and constant in human affection shall prove its power here. That little secret stream which fills the tear-channel of the human eye, and which is dried up only when they * The first interment was made in these grounds on the afternoon of the day preceding that of their consecration. Ö 6 that weep are themselves bewept, shall here pour forth its precious drops. Each sod shall by and by re- ceive its nutriment from those tears. The harvests of every autumn shall increase their gatherings here. And when the spring unlocks the fetters of winter, faith shall here brighten and console the hearts of the submissive and the trustful. The prayers that shall here be breathed into the air will be as many and as fervent as have been caught by the walls of the oldest temple. And this will be consecration. The most ancient records of man's life on the earth present us with three chief tokens to mark the posses- sion of a portion of its surface as an abiding-place of human families: the well of water, the altar of wor- ship, the tomb or cave for the dead. With what an impressive power, — the force and beauty of simple truth, – does that combination of the well, the altar, and the tomb affect us! They lead us back upon the tide of ages, and bring us to the first habitable spot of the earth. The altar rising above the soil, the well and the grave beneath it, express to us the three great natural wants of man. Life's chief necessity, its di- vine law, its inevitable issue, are thus presented to the eye and to the mind. Amid our ten thousand wants, behold the three which crown them all, and one of those three the body's lonely and everlasting couch The well-spring gathering its crystal drops from the 7 secret depths of the earth, and receiving them back again when man had used them and a heavenly distil- lation had renewed their purity, was a token that near to it grass would grow, and man and beast find sus- tenance. The rude altar-stone, which no tool had touched, was raised upon some overlooking summit: kneeling around it, the patriarchal family called upon themselves the name of God, and thus recognized that everlasting, that universal truth, the basis of all clear thought, knowledge and science, as well as of all reli- gion, —that this earth, and all its elements and tribes, depend upon the loftier influences of the sky, and owe allegiance to the unseen Centre and Source of power, when comes forth the energy that controls and blesses. When the life that had been nourished by food and water, and kept mindful of a Divine oversight by the altar, came to its appointed close, there lay a cold and changing body, a forsaken tenement; and the mourn- er said, “Let me bury my dead out of my sight.” Then the dust returned to the earth as it was. There is a charm in those pastoral images which come up before our minds, as we read of the ancient wells of Canaan. The fervor and glow of true worship, as an exercise apart from all but the heart's own atti- tude, kindles through our spirits, as we read of the altars upon Horeb, Bethel, Carmel, Zion, and Gerizim, and upon every other summit over which the pilgrim- 8 ages of the patriarchs led them. But what can sur- pass in tender pathos that scene and those words in which the aged Jacob, dying in Egypt, turns away in loathing from its mummy tombs, as he remembers the resting-place of his family, and gives to his sons a commandment concerning his bones: “I AM To BE GATHERED UNTO MY PEOPLE : BURY ME WITH MY FA- THERS IN THE CAVE THAT IS IN THE FIELD OF MACH- PELAH, IN THE LAND OF CANAAN, WHICH ABRAHAM BoughT witH THE FIELD OF EPHRON THE HITTITE, FOR A PossESSION OF A BURYING-PLACE. THERE THEY BU- RIED ABRAHAM, AND SARAH HIS WIFE ; THERE THEY BURIED ISAAC, AND REBEKAH HIs wifE; AND THERE I BURIED LEAH.” The tent for the living was movable; but the well, the altar, and the tomb were permanent. It was through those three tokens of an inalienable possession, as the vouchers of a title, sure and suffici- ent as our modern deeds, that the patriarchal family, returning from an accidental though protracted so- journ in Egypt, claimed their inheritance in Canaan. Wells, altars, and graves, the earliest, the universal tokens of man's presence on the earth, the most essen- tial objects of his interest, are also the most enduring of his works. They multiply as do the tribes and numbers of our race. They retain the same rela- tion to each other and to human life, and the same proportion as of old; for men everywhere need them 9 all alike. Where we find things so inseparably related and connected, there is ever a sort of sacred beauty in their union. This relation is to be recognized here. The water already flows in a pure stream; the altar of prayer is to stand on yonder rising ground; and all around us are to be graves. * To these hidden repositories of the earth have been committed, age after age, unnumbered multitudes. How much of the earth itself is already a cemetéry ! How large a portion of its material elements has been wrought into human bodies' The idea of a transmi- gration, of a perpetual circuit of spirits, from one to another form, higher or lower in the scale of organ- ized life, if but a mere fancy as regards the intelligent essence of man, is plain fact as regards the substance of human bodies. I have spoken of these as fresh acres of the earth, as yet unfamiliar with the pro- cesses and trophies of man's decay. But how know we that ' Who can tell what remains of races, before our brief historic age here, may mingle with this soil? It may be as the poet writes, that— “This green mould, the mother of bright flowers, Was bone and sinew once, now decomposed; Perhaps has lived, breathed, walked as proud as we, And animate with all the faculties And finer senses of the human Soul! And now what are they! To their elements Each has returned, dust crumbledback #9.jºsë; The spirit gone to God!” :... "... : : * : 10 How healthful is the chemistry of nature's labora- tory, which can thus dissolve with a gentle but irre- sistible force all organized forms' How beautiful are those patient processes of the elements, as they work on kindred materials their renewing toils | God open the eyes of our understandings, and quicken the sen- sibilities of our hearts, that we may enter into this rich wisdom, and be led up to him, its Fount, its Teacher | w The whole large compass of human thoughts and feelings has exhibited itself in the modes of disposing of the dead. Passion, affection, fancy, and supersti- tion have had in this their freest range, and the phi- losophy of humanity might be illustrated by the views and usages connected with the departed of our race. Dread horrors have deepened the gloom which rests over the last rites of mortality. Barbarous ceremo- nies and cruel sacrifices, howlings, incantations, and the appalling frenzies of real or feigned despair, have settled over the funeral forms of the darker heathen- ism. The word funeral— derived as it is from the word which signifies a torch — still perpetuates a memorial of the ancient custom of midnight burials. Many of our sad images of death come from those bar- baric fashions which we have put aside. And then again, by that inconstant action of the human mind, so marked in:#Tº devices and conceptions of bewil- 11 dered man, these horrors vanish; these barbarous rites, these appalling solemnities, pass like dark clouds lifted up from some sunnier portions of the earth, some tribes or peoples of a gentler and finer fancy. Some of the most delicate and beautiful conceptions of poetry, some of the fairest fashionings of a dream- ing brain, images and visions which wear the hue of remotest distance under the haze of light and shade, cover with the mysterious charm of classic draperies the naked form of death. Yet even of these, while they contain enough of higher sentiment to prove their affinity with the workings of man's nobler part, we must admit that they are mingled with mean ‘ima- ginations and puerile fancies, to prove that the spirit was venturously groping amid things all unknown, and unillumined by the faith which turns to a heaven- ly country. Comparing the ancient heathen devices with the simple proprieties of Christian burial, we are reminded that these funeral rites have been burdened with all the gloom of superstition, and have been cheered by all the radiance of the spirit's brightest hope. The various methods which have been employed through all time for the disposal of mortal remains, range themselves under one or another of three lead- ing purposes in the minds of survivors. The first designed to resist or delay the dissolution of the body, 12 and had recourse to embalmment. The second sought to hasten that dissolution, and, to that end, heaped the funeral pyre and applied the torch. The third method committed the body to the earth, and left it to the appointed processes and dealings of nature. The poor devices of Egyptian art to avert the waste and dispersion of the elements of a human body required a violent dealing with it which was inconsis- tent with the purpose itself, and have been defeated and sadly mocked in the result. The organs of life and breath and thought, the heart, the lungs and brain, indeed all but the mere muscles and bones of the dead body, were withdrawn, that their places might be sup- plied by gums and spices. So that, after all the toil and pain, the linen bandages and the sealed coffin preserved only a part of the wreck of a human form. Preserved it ! yes; but how long, and for what a fate at last! For a fate far less meet and seemly than the gentle and sure dealing of the kindly earth, which would hide the shame, and manifest only the glory, of man. Some of those mummied relics have been torn from their ancient vaults to be made gazing-stocks in the museums of modern cities: these are supposed to be chosen specimens of the royal, the priestly, the mighty, and the honored, because of the splendor of their encasement. But for the millions of the com- mon dead which heap the catacombs of Memphis and 13 of Thebes, of Luxor and of Karnak, the necessities of the living have found a use. The wretched Arab wanderer will prepare his evening meal this night by sº a fire kindled from these pitchy relics of the elder race of Mizraim. Two reasons have been imagined for this Egyptian custom of embalmment: one, that it was designed to prevent the distempers or plagues which would have attended the corruption of the dead in the crowded regions of a hot clime; the other, a fond belief that the spirit would yet return to its forsaken body, and that, so long as its parts could be kept together, there would be hope of its re-awakening to life. The latter reason is most conformed to what we know of the religious opinions of that race and age, and of their influence upon the customs of those who held them. But who that sees, as we see, the disappointment of that doting purpose, the preservation of the body, could have the heart to entertain it now Or who would risk his hope of future being on so slender a chance for its fulfilment The rich melodies of the old Greek and Roman poetry describe to us the funeral flames which dis- solved into ashes the old heroes of those classic isles and lands. Achilles consumed to ashes the remains of his friend Patroclus, which were deposited in a golden urn beneath a mound, till the ashes of Achilles 14 hiſhself were mingled with them, and the friends met again in the shades. Hector was burnt before the walls of Troy. Great generals, monarchs, and re- nowned men, were honored with all the spectacles and ceremonies which could exalt these obsequies of flame. Luxury and ostentation in ancient Rome magnified the funeral rites, by burning the dead with polished or fragrant wood, and pouring upon the fire libations of wine. The ashes, gathered in an urn, were deposited in the sepulchre beside the vase that held the tears. Chaldea exposed the flesh of the dead to chance or to beasts, and was anxious only to preserve their bones. The Scythians hung their dead in the air. We read of tribes who have used the sea for a burial-place, while others have shrunk from its awful caverns. The just conclusion, from all the various opinions and customs of different people through the whole recorded history of our race, has now settled upon interment as the natural disposal of the dead. No embalmment will preserve the body; and, if it would, wherefore should it be preserved 7 Corruption cannot inherit incorruption. There are no objections to the funeral pyre, save that it is unnecessary, as doing at a price what nature will do freely, and that it wears the show of a harsh process with mortal clay, whose shapings and features have been dear. Scripture doth not sentence us to ashes, but to dust, in our burial: 15 *Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return.” So have Jews and Christians, who revere that Scrip- ture, been content to allow the dust to return to the earth as it was. Turning with loathing from all barbarous rites, from all artifices and dreary decep- tions of the sight, we have learned to adorn with simplicity our Christian burials. The separated and consecrated spaces are called by Germans the “fields of hope; ” by the Dutch, “God’s acres;” but best of all by us, our burial-places. The necessities of the times, the changed circum- stances in the modes of civilized life, have demanded these cemeteries. Village churchyards and city bur- rial-grounds no longer suffice. But let us not forget or be insensible to the uses—the good uses—that are in them. Our own English ancestors on this soil were but little influenced by considerations of taste in the selection of fields for the interment of their dead. Their religious views, and their relative estimate of all such matters, would not dispose them to give much heed to the adorning of the body's resting-place. Con- venience was the chief consideration with them on this point. It was not their general custom to con- nect the graveyard with the meeting-house. On mark- ing out the bounds of a new precinct in the wilderness, and allotting woodland, upland, and meadow to the planters, they generally selected some dreary spot, 16 whose sandy soil would make the labors of the spade easy for the burial of the dead. Yet those rough beds of earth have in their keeping much precious dust. & But those churchyards, as they are so truly called in the smaller villages and hamlets of old England, how beautiful they are In such retired spots as those in which the population does not increase, and the proportion between the consecrated ground and the numbers of the villagers is such as to allow to the few that die each year their own graves, there is a charm about the churchyards which our cemeteries will never have. If the dust of the sleepers is there dis- turbed, it is only that that of rude forefathers may mingle with that of their descendants; and this is but a kindly violence. Time and nature, year by year, sweeten and smooth enough of the soil to give a peaceful bed to the scanty number who “fall on sleep” with each round of the seasons. It is all kindred dust, and the children are gathered to the fathers. The old church rises with quaint and massy repose, seated firmly amid the graves which tell so touchingly of human instability. Within, the aged walls and the oaken benches have gathered impressive associa- tions. Occasionally, the lofty monument of the lord or lady of the manor, or the knightly effigies, will perpetuate just enough of worldly distinctions to show 17 that they are vanity. In the yard around the church, full, but not crowded, are the tablets, headstones, and memorials of the humbler dead. Who that has ever lingered about some of those ancient hamlet church- yards, at the close of the Sunday service, has not felt the Sweetness and pathos of their power . The villa- gers are spelling out the names of their remote ances- try, or recalling the memories of the recent dead, whose animosities are hushed, whose love only revives. In the lone corner by the wall, rest the chance way- farers, the strangers who have died in the hamlet, with a mysterious or a sad tale connected with their end, but with no kith or kin to follow them to their unhonored graves. Yet the traditions of the hamlet transmit their story; and it is told and heard by some, each pleasant Sunday of the year. The ancient yew- trees cut in fantastic forms, and the ivied tower, afford a shelter to the rooks, who succeed to as many genera- tions of their own tribe, on the same spot, as do their living human companions. Rich in all that can adorn a landscape, or mingle wise mementos with the soil of the earth, are those quiet rural churchyards. Sooth- ing and holy are their influences to the heart that is touched by the common sympathies of humanity. We owe to one such lovely spot as choice a gem of poetry as is to be found in the English or in any other language, – Gray's Elegy in a Country Churchyard. 3 18 Nor is it to be regretted, that every long-inhabited city contains some ancient and crowded spot, whose whole contents are human dust, decaying tombs, sink- ing stones, and a wild growth of vegetation. These, too, have their use. If no longer disturbed in their reluctance to afford room for more in their thick-set graves, they are wise monitions, solemn sights, for a city. They tell of a fashion which does not change; the fashion which bids us all to put off these bodies. They answer a better purpose, and with a more gra- cious method, than did the grim human skull which was set upon an Egyptian banqueting-table. The deep, rich foliage which they will nourish may shade the failing memorials of the dead, and cover with a garment of beauty the beds of their repose. The healthful air will draw through them. The timid bird, whose instinct has been deceived in them as if they were rural spaces, may find in them a place for its nest. The falling leaves of autumn will impress their instruction. Winter will spread over them its white robe of unsullied snow. Spring will there year- ly teach the sublime lesson that life is born out of death. Let our city burial-grounds remain, unused indeed, but inviolate; tastefully arrayed, and kept in seemly order. They seem sometimes to be the only memorials of mortality which some who live in cities cannot shut out from their view. But when the silent, 19 the sleeping population of a city outnumbers its living crowds, it is time to part the region around between them, and to prepare cemeteries like this. A burial-ground still in use in a large city is an offence and a harm; for then it will rather repel than so- lemnize the living, while it scarce secures repose to the dead. The ideal of an appropriate resting-place for the dead is not difficult to define to the mind, nor to real- ize by the wise use of the means which we have at our service. A pure taste, a healthful sentiment, an instructed mind, a skilful hand, may plan and execute. Such an ideal will exclude and admit certain features, emblems, decorations, and details, according to rules which carry with them their own warrant, or are readily approved when weighed and considered. The first aim should be to exclude all garish tokens of display and vanity, all theatrical embellishment, all excesses of mere sentiment, all coarse and repulsive emblems of the mere materialism of death. Though we say that the grave equalizes all mortal distinctions, we do not say so truly. Some signs of the distinc- tions and rivalries of life will find expression here: it cannot be otherwise where wealth and poverty shall have their graves. Such distinctions, so far as they arise from eminent excellencies of character, or honor- able fidelity in discharging the higher trusts of exist- 20 ence, ought to be recognized here; for they are part of the wisdom of the grave. Good taste, yes, something more simple even than that, will forbid the obtrusion here of all eccentricities, all that is barbarous in the shapings of the monumental structure, or boastful or ill-toned in the inscription which it may bear. Death needs no artificial skill, no ingenuity, no conceit, no parade, to invest it with effect. All such exhibitions will but detract from its solemnity. And, even as to epitaphs, there are some suggestions which may be spoken in a still tenantless cemetery, better than where in single instances good taste may have been violated. Flattering titles, superlative praise, and even some expressions of grief or hope, do not become the monuments of the dead. In the sacred privacy of a saddened home, a father or a mother may be spoken of as “the very best of pa- rents.” Brother, sister, or friend may there be extolled as excelling all others, known to the fond house- hold circle, in purity, goodness, or fidelity. But, if the superlatives and encomiums which express these domestic partialities are inscribed upon stone and obtruded upon strangers, they may not always awaken the right emotion. So also, when those who have not lived or died in the esteem and good report of their associates are committed to the earth, near affection may have treasured some remembrances of kindness, 21 some good intent, some struggling effort, even in them; and the softened hearts of the mourning may prompt an epitaph — as often an obituary — which will not harmonize with general repute nor with the grounds of Christian hope. Modest silence is better then than the ventures of charity, or the prominent suggestion of the large compass of the Divine mercy. The great hope of affection may be as strong if held within the heart, as if it were chiselled out in marble. The phi- losopher Plato restricted the longest epitaph to four verses, and suggested that the poorest soil was most meet for human burials. We may approve his former counsel rather than the latter. The epitaph of the emperor Adrian's horse is preserved; but his own has perished, - not, we may surmise, because of its mo- desty or its justice. The rules of exclusion, which good taste and the harmonies of propriety and consistency will enforce in such a cemetery, will not trespass upon the large liberty which individual preferences may exercise for variety. Variety will be desirable here as elsewhere. The colors of the stones from which monuments are hewn are various: so may be their shapes, and the emblems which they bear. Flowers and trees are diversely fashioned, robed, and dyed: so may be their groupings and effects. The slender or the solid structure, the broken shaft, the consecrated cross, the 22 simple headstone, the single memorial of a whole household with the record-page of the family Bible transcribed upon it, the urn, the vase, the withering flower, the chrysalis, the inverted torch, the winged globe, the serpent, coiled into a circle, – the ancient emblem of unending time, – these do not exhaust variety, though they express so much. It is, however, to be remembered here, that the effort after singularity or novelty, whether shown in dress or manners or literature, or scientific or philosophical or religious speculations, most frequently fails, and in matters of taste produces the most tasteless results. While much will depend upon the exclusion from these consecrated acres of all that is unbecoming and inappropriate, there is here a wide scope for the heightening of natural beauties, and for the introduc- tion of the decorations of a chaste art. True, we do not have here some of the more striking features of bold and grand scenery; with its sheer precipices, its overhanging mountain-brows and hill-tops, its deep, dark ravimes, its abrupt declivities and ascents. But neither, on the other hand, is this a flat level, a tame, unvaried field, barren and drear. It is admirably suited for its destined purpose. This broad enclosure scarcely in any portion of it presents a level surface. It is varied with gentle undulations, and with that rolling line of beauty which attends the ascending 23 smoke and the moving cloud. It bears thousands of forest-trees in full growth, amid whose roots the Secret springs of water play, and flow to feed ponds and jets and fountains. Distant hills surround it, and from yonder tower may be seen the waters of the harbor and the bay. There go the ships, bearing upon the inconstant element, and under a heavenly pilotage, the freighted burdens of precious wealth from shore to shore; making them so fitting emblems of the voyage of existence, whose port of departure is life, whose course is over the ocean of time, whose harbor is eternity. When taste and skill and affection shall have dis- played their efforts here; when these fresh road-ways shall have been worn by travel, and the little by-paths which are to course between the family enclosures shall have been marked out; when cultivation shall have improved the natural, and judiciously introduced the artificial, beauties of shrub and flower, of the quarry and the mine, then will the judgment stand well approved which pronounced these acres adapted to this use. More than a hundred acres are here devoted to the burial of the dead. For what a multi- tude will they afford repose ! How can we exaggerate the importance or the lessons of a spot of earth which is to gather such a congregation of the living and the unborn 1 24 There is range enough in what is natural and sim- ple to secure variety in the arrangement and adorn- ment of this spot, to effect all that is desirable in impressions through the senses, and to excite those musing exercises of the heart and the spirit which convert outward objects into inward food. The chief dependence for such effects must be upon nature, its own true and unchanging features, its bolder outlines, its more delicate shapings, its sublime grandeur, its beautiful emblems, its ever-interesting processes to the observant mind. The earth itself, which is the scene of all man's mortal joy and striving in life, gives him a bed of silence for the everlasting repose of his body. The ancient heavens whose glorious canopy was spread above, before man's little round of life began, will still bend over his place of sepulchre; and so far as they are high above the earth, and larger than its compass, will those heavens for ever suggest a home for all departed spirits. God teaches us all by nature, and we are made wise by constant communion, by sympathy and harmony, with it. All nature should indeed be consecrated to man, and may be consecrated. Nature may stand to man as a vast enduring temple, reared for God; the ever-rest- less waters daily renew its baptism ; the smoke of happy homes, and each kind breathing of every true heart, is its incense; its ten thousand scenes of indus- 25 try and duty are so many altars; all faithful lives are accepted offerings; and these resting-places of the dead are like the holy crypts of the sanctuary beneath its more trodden ways. Here at midnight, during the storms of winter, will be heard the beating of the angry surf upon the lashed beach ; and, if the ear of the living is here to listen, how deep will be the con- trast between the hushed repose of those who sleep beneath, and the wild fury of the tempest ! And what is such a contrast, compared with that between the dread loneliness, the stormy passions, of a heart without hope, and the peaceful trust of the spirit which looks upon death as the appointed way for entering on a true life! And where do the changing seasons have such power to impress us as in an extensive and well- ordered cemetery : The seasons of the year—how touchingly and instructively will they bear in their various lessons to the heart | Here will humanity in all its ages, from the one day or hour of infancy, as its all of earthly life, to the aged of a century of years, find the same repose. The aspect of existence to each will have partaken of all the changing sights which mark a revolution of this earth around the sun. To some, existence will have been only spring- time, a bright inconstant promise, a budding joy, a seed sown in a cold furrow and denied a propitious 4 26 growth. To some, life will have been a summer glory, all bloom and fragrance, and half-formed fruit, and half-realized hope, but with no maturity, no gath- ering-in of a perfected harvest. Autumn and winter, too, will apply their similitudes and parables to the ripened sheaves and the seasonable fruits of those who reach or pass the appointed bounds of life. For life and nature illustrate the same high wisdom. Nor do we deceive ourselves when we yield to the hope, that, by gathering around a place of graves all becoming adornments, we may do very much to refine our own sensibilities, to relieve death of some of its derived horrors, and to quicken the longing aspira- tions which sustain our faith in an hereafter. All nature hath a death and a resurrection, and every dying seed perpetuates its own life in the fruits of its decay. Human language has not expressed a more profound or cheerful truth than is conveyed in those words of the Saviour: “Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but, if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” The cypress-tree should not have been made an ornament and emblem of death; for, though its dark and silent leaves are expressive of melancholy, and the wood is almost incorruptible, the tree bears no fruit. That is but a coarse and 'superficial judgment which thinks to impress good lessons by presenting 27 the repulsive images of mortality, the frights and horrors of death. Those rude devices which were formerly carved upon gravestones—the grinning skull, the scythe of time, the wasted hour-glass—were more apt to provoke to a passionate indulgence in lower pleasures, while life lasted, than to rouse the finer sen- sibilities, whose faithful exercise will redeem our brief day. We must learn to free death from all these repulsive images. To this end, it is desirable, that, when a human body has once been interred, it be left untouched for ever. Would that there still prevailed some of the old ritual horror of defilement to guard our sepulchres! Would that the dead might have the same undisturbed possession of their resting-places, which the law secures to the living on the soil which they have occupied for a brief term of years' Let us hope that the consecration of large cemeteries like this, with the common interest which they impart to a large number of persons in their care and good ordering, will help, with other influences, to substitute Christian for Pagan views of death. Thus, then, would we consecrate from this time forth these verdant fields around us. We give them up to the dead, and to such services to the living as it is in the power of the dead still to perform while their bodies shall slumber here. This is no place for parties of pleasure, or for scenes of revelry. Let the 28 remains of the humblest and the loftiest find here an inviolate repose. Let the untutored utterances of sorrow from the lowly, as well as the more decorous reserve of the refined, be regarded as expressing the same sentiment of the same human heart; and so let the rudest memorial, as well as the stateliest monu- ment, be hallowed. Let the adornments be chaste and becoming. Let the spirit and influences of this ceme- tery instil soothing and elevating sentiments into the heart of the chance visiter from the living world, while they relieve death of all its needless gloom. Let the sacred calm of retirement which shall settle over these consecrated fields be a type of that peace which the blessed gospel of the Lord Jesus offers to those who “ sorrow as not without hope.” Let the holy sentence inscribed upon the gateway comfort the mourners who bring their dead hither, and pro- nounce the great hope of all who shall sleep here, — “I AM THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE | * 29 QBrutt of £pertiget; CONSECRATION OF WOODLAWN CEMETERY, JULY 2, 1851. I. CHANT – PSALM XXIII. *sº II. R. E. A. D. IN G T H E S C R. I P T U R. E. S. BY REV. J. P. LANGWORTHY, OF CHELSEA. III. PRAYER. BY REV. WM. I. BUDDINGTON, OF CHARLESTOWN. IV. O RIGINAL HIY MIN. BY REW. J. H. CLINCH, OF BOSTON. FATHER we consecrate to thee Valley and hill and rock and tree: Here may thy soothing spirit rest, Thy peace be felt, thy love confessed. Here let the blight of Winter's wing, The living breath of opening Spring, Speak to the soul that looks to thee Of death and immortality. Here may the mourner, 'mid these glades, These peaceful walks, these solemn shades, Behold their charm o'er sorrow thrown, And feel their spirit soothe his own. Remote from crowds and strifes and woes, In Nature's solemn, deep repose, Let the dead sleep, — the living come To weep in silence o'er their tomb. Let homes for living men be made In streets where crowding thousands tread; The patriarch’s “cave and purchased field’’ For death more fitting mansions yield. 30 Through our sad chambers, day by day, Death's dreaded form will force its way; But let his graves without be spread, - Bind not the living to the dead. “Place for the dead : " the living cry; Free air, wide space, around us lie, – Fit home of death, if Thou but deign Here, in thy peace and love, to reign. V. ADIDRESS. BY REV. GEORGE E. ELLIS, OF CHARLESTOWN. VI. HYMN. BY H. W. FULLER, ESQ. OF ROXBURY. Now smooth we here a sacred bed, And plant our city for the dead; Not with vain pomp or festive cheer, But, Lord, as dust to dust draw near. Here shall Affection watch the hour When Spring may drop her earliest flower; And Love, with gifts and perfumes sweet, Shall deck and hallow this retreat. Here may bright Hope her chaplets bring, And o'er these glades her radiance fling; And, when dark night breathes sad and still, Here trim her lamps, – her dews distil. When Grief, unsolaced, comes with gloom To linger round the garden-tomb, May smiling Faith “the stone remove,” And Joy celestial beam above. Then, Lord, appear ! the victory give — Thou to thyself thine own receive : Grant, as we pass Death's portal through, The heaven of heavens may fill our view VII. PRAYER AND BENEDICTION. BY REV. LEVI TUCKER, OF BOSTON. 31 THE WOODLAWN CEMETERY. THIS Corporation was organized Aug. 31, 1850. Since that time, it has been engaged in the preparation of the grounds, avenues, and structures proper for a rural cemetery of the first class. The spot selected contains about the same number of acres as Mount Auburn, and is admirably adapted to the purpose, – with a fine soil and forest-growth, and with artificial ponds and fountains of much beauty. The Gothic gatehouse and lodge at the entrance, facing south, are remarkable for their dignity and grace. The two receiving-tombs are also fine specimens of work; and a rustic winding-tower of rocks — seventy feet in diameter at the base -— has been commenced, and raised about twenty feet, to constitute an observatory of a picturesque and striking character. This is to be covered with ever-green ivy, and with moss and climbing roses, between which visitors may wind their way, ascending to the top. If lots are early taken, so that they may be graded and sodded at once, trees and shrubs may be planted in the fall, and the whole place be made attractive in the spring. A neglect of a few months, however, may lose, the next year's growth and flowers. The grounds are now enclosed with a picketed fence of chestnut- wood, about seven feet high ; and every care will be taken to prevent trespasses. At present, all visitors are permitted to walk or drive in a proper manner in the grounds, without any ticket of admission; it being presumed that all will observe the proprieties of the place. Lots are conveyed in fee-simple, under proper rules and regula- tions. They are not subject to taxes or attachment, nor can they be assessed for improvements. They may be transferred, but not divided. The Superintendent or his Assistant will always be found at Woodlawn. 32 ºſtttgttgg. JAMES ADAMS, Charlestown e © e © tº President. BENJAMIN A. Gould, Boston. GEO. W. WARREN, Charlestown. JACOB SLEEPER, 2 3 DANIEL WHITE, 5 5 THos. WIGGLESworTH, jun. , DANIEL A. WISE, Malden. ALBERT C. BowkER, East Boston. ISAAC STEBBINs, Chelsea. H. WELD FULLER, 35, Court-street, Boston . Treasurer & Secretary. JAMES CRUICKSHANKS, Woodlawn . * e Superintendent. TIER M S FOR LOT S. Lots, 15 feet by 20 feet (300 square feet), exclusive of borders . $40 Select Lots on Main Avenues, exclusive of borders tº Ç º 50 Half Lots, in the places assigned therefor . * wº tº § 25 For Single Graves. Single Grave in the “Stranger's Rest” e © º g tº I0 5 2. ,, “Field of Ephron,” for an adult . & º 7 5 3 53 2 3 for a child over 5 and under 12 years 5 35 33 33 for a child under 5 years of age tº 4 33 ,, “Bed of the Innocents,” a garden for young children . e ge © * e º 6 At present, the best mode of reaching Woodlawn from the city is by crossing the Chelsea Bridge or Ferry; turning off, to the left, at Washing- ton Avenue, near the planing mill. This is the shortest, but most hilly route. By turning off a little sooner, opposite the Suffolk House, Chelsea, and taking the Malden Road, the hills are avoided, without much increase of distance. Woodlawn may also be reached by crossing the Malden Bridge, and turning off, to the right, at Oakes’s Corner. Distance, by the best line, from Boston, about 43 miles; from East Boston, 24; from Charlestown, 3; from Chelsea, 2. ****3:...sºr *… #?... * · * *…*** • * »） *** * x ）; ** ºf * , §§ # § f* st- 、、 、、• • &#:;;,,，,,，,，，, *-+* → §§§）; *（?:-） + }*）'，':'， :）.- *:tº . ūſiņš，3}, ...“:： ¿¿.* | ... ！? :） - sº j** ...: 3: ". # 3% t; #"; ; r; *...* ſºſyº• ſ’. *** * , º , Łº*șł. *** **…*¿¿.*· №fſ， „ſº №j - №w :）.* §§^, ººº,…?-- ſą， šį*-…” ¿??¿ $ * : „， '*）（.*）.. …***- - 、* s: * f · · · · · · ··ș ș.|×（ſ.~ 5！* „· . ;· T ·}----|-· · · ·|-，* - * .·+ *· *· · · ·:·- *， ·- ： -- ',·*|----- ^ \）;• r|-|-··-·-#· -· * .· · ·E· } ·· · · · · · ·· · · ·* …* ±∞.' .-~· §· . ·· · · ， ， ,|-·~ . , ， -· ·' .· · · · · · · · · * · · · · ·Y **<\ . -OO... •. . '• ’ . . . . .; = ， œ ·！{· · · · · · · · · · Þ-. . . . *· · · · ZZQ , ! -- , ' +→ , ، ، ، . . . . . . . . . . . . . a - ||| ~ | ¡ ¿->*- · · • •}=+.· o; ·§, ’· · · · · ·<%. . ' – ·· - · · · ·... *;- -C , !§ ||||’’ ;· · · · · ·- ~ .. *> ` ， -）， ’’’• .P|-• ’ “ - -ſå } |*: ~.·'. ,.i.·F=*·-Q ！}=} ~~ ~~* …s=-. . .·|=-£– 0，2 $ eo ºſſ, .- 1 ， º √ № · · · · · · · H， , z . . . .\ . º ſº · · -to ' -Š – º | . ， ? = . ， ， - . . . ≤ ≤ ≤ Ī ī ， ? 3 o 8 – || …, ） （ ， ، ، ، ، ، ، Ê ， ， ، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، ، Ě ' ’ .• O • <ſ. ’ . . ،º, ， ）.·- .f.„*· · · -±· *|- ö ·| 2-- <=R^ ^ .-£+）}“）“）.·' .·. '- · ·-· ſa ~^-Z>----- º , ， ,·»· · · · · ·-….’ `-*~-, ，<í,:№-·. ^ ~ . № . "· · · ·Þ+ ·→· · · · · · · · ··, ’�* … » ， s.ŹN- 'ſ,:' º ~ ~ .·-→|- º , — • ^ . .· ，• • •' .~+-e*→ -£|-*« :« … * *:-~. •---- * ·* •w={ | （ ） ··. , ， ' ， ， ， , , ， ， ， , ， . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .' ? （ ） || | * , , , , \ . . . . . .=- | ., ， ， , ， ,， ！O |-C （， , , ,· · · · · · · · -， , £& º 2°22, 22. :* --> º TRINITARIANISM N OT T H E D 0 GTRINE OF THE NEW TESTAMENT, _- TWO LECTURES DELIVERED, P A R T L Y IN R E W I E W O F §th. Jr. jumfington's ſistoutst on tºt (Irimity, H O L LIS S T R E E T C H U R C H., J A N U A R Y 7 & 14, 1860, B Y T. S. K. I N G . PRINTED BY REQUEST. B O S T O N : CR O SBY, NICHOLS AND COMPANY, 1 17 W A S H IN G T O N S T R E E T. 1860. Geo. C. Rand & Avery, Printers, 8 Cornhill, Boston. L E C T U R. E. I. “For though there be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, (as there be gods many, and lords many ;) but to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him ; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him. Howbeit there is not in every man that knowledge.” — 1 COR. viii. 5, 6, 7. I SHALL ask you to consider with me, in two lectures, the Scriptural evidence for the church-doctrine of the Trinity. It will be accepted, I think, as forcible evidence that I have no strong tendency to disputation about this doctrine in which the general faith of Christendom is moulded, if I say that, during a ministry here of more than eleven years, and an experience of fifteen years as a preacher, I have never written a discourse or lecture, or any portion of one, bearing directly upon it. I have not felt, and do not now feel, a desire to attack, or call in question, the forms in which the major- ity of Christians cast, or imagine that they cast, their faith concerning the constitution of the Infinite Personality. It is chiefly by the instinct of defence that I am moved to ask attention here on the controverted doctrine. In common with thousands, I have read recently the elaborate discourse e by a clergyman long prominent and honored in the Unitarian body, now preacher to the Cambridge University, in which he sets forth, not merely his belief in that dogma, but his convic- tion that it supplies the only scheme of faith that will produce a Working church, a sound piety, and even a lasting and practi- 4. cal belief in the personality of God. Fresh interest will be excited, of course, in the great subject at issue between Trinitarians and Unitarians, by this transit of an eminent preacher from the minority to the majority; and we shall do nothing more than pay proper respect to the volume in which our faith is cast off and arraigned, as well as to our own sys- tem of belief, if we make serious inquiry into the Scriptural supports for the doctrine of the Trinity. The clergyman of whose book I speak, lays great stress on the fact that the Trinity is so generally believed in Christen- dom, and has been the faith of all centuries. In all ages of the church, he says, “the strong thinkers” have been, upon this point, “essentially and persistently as one.” And he Quotes the names of twenty-eight prominent theologians belonging to different ages, countries, and sects, represent- ative men, who are divided by no differences on this article of belief. Yet, in looking at the list attentively, a very interest- ing fact appears; no name is quoted earlier than the fourth Christian century. Where are the names of the fathers before the year 300, who were sound upon this dogma 7 What great teacher or saint, during the first six generations after the apostles, can be produced, who is in accord with any strict and sound Trinitarian theologian of the modern Prot- estant church 2 The evidence from general belief, from the consent of thinkers in different countries and divisions of the church, however even then it would fail of being conclusive,’ would be of immensely greater force if we could find the for- mulae of modern times endorsed and published by the teach- ers nearest the apostolic age. But what if that evidence begins to grow faint as we ascend beyond the year 300 2 What if, . above that period, no theologian or preacher can be found who has framed a definition of the Trinity which would be called safe by any ordinary council in this country 7 Now this is the fact. Of the twenty-eight theologians whom Dr. Huntington quotes, the two most learned ones in the 5 English branch of the church are Dr. Cudworth and Bishop Bull. Yet Dr. Cudworth affirms that the Christian fathers of the first three centuries plainly taught the subordination of Christ to the Father, and did not believe in any such coequal- ity as would exclude inferiority and dependence. And Bishop Bull, who has written the most able defence ever made by an Englishman of the Trinitarian dogma, though holding the theory of subordination, declares that almost all the Christian “writers before Arius' time (320) seem not to have known anything of the invisibility and immensity of the Son of God; and that they often speak of him in such a manner as if, even in respect of his divine nature, he was finite, visible, and cir- cumscribed in place.” ” Petavius, too, a Jesuit, proves by a * I do not mean to say that the earlier fathers of the church taught the system which usually goes by the name of Unitarianism. It would be uñjust and foolish to conceal the fact that their scheme of thought was very different, — almost as distant from Unitarianism as it is from Calvinistic Orthodoxy. Nor can any one deny that after the year 200 there was a steady tendency towards such formulae as were voted by the councils of Nicaea and Constantinople. But I do not understand how anybody can read the full collection of the evidence by men hostile to Unitarianism, - by Peta- vius, Burton, Dorner, Bunsen, – and claim that the Christian writers before the time of Origen held any scheme of the Divine Personality that is in harmony with the popular Trinitarianism of to-day. Dorner acknowledges that Origen (who died A. D. 254) was the first who tried to solve the contradictions of his predecessors as to the substance and rank of the Son, and to put the doctrine of the Logos in a shape that would harmonize with Trinitarian ism. To Origen we owe the dogma of the eternally proceeding generation of the Son from the Father. Yet how far Origen was from holding the Trinitarianism of to-day, may be seen when we quote his declaration that “Prayer, properly speaking, is to be offered to the Father only. We first bring our prayers to the only Son of God, the First-born of the whole creation, the Logos of God, and pray to him, and request him, as a High Priest, to offer up the prayers which reach him, to the God over all, to his God and our God.” He declares, also, that “the Holy Spirit was made by the Logos, the Logos being older than the Spirit.” No wonder that Prof. Burton calls this “an unfortunate passage ' " Still further he states his belief that “the power of the Father is greater than that of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. That of the Son is greater than that of the Holy Ghost; and again the power of the Holy Ghost surpasses that of all other holy things.” We might quote a chain of passages from Clement, of Rome, who touches the life time of St. Paul, to Lactantius, A. D. 310, to prove that not one of the fathers within these dates was acquainted with the Orthodox Trinitarianism of modern times, which claims to be the faith “once delivered to the saints.” But it might, perhaps, be said or thought that we did not fairly represent the faith of those early centuries by the 6 thorough discussion of the subject, that the great Christian writers of the three first centuries believed that the Supreme God brought the Son into existence to employ him as his instrument in the formation of the world. And Petavius accuses them of entertaining thus opinions unworthy of the dignity of the Son, and altogether absurd. Still another Trinitarian scholar, M. Jurieu, a learned French Calvinist, maintains the position that the teachers of the first three extracts. It may be accounted of more value if we quote the testimony of Bunsen, whose learning will not be questioned, and who will not be suspected of partiality for Unitarian conceptions of Christianity. In the first volume of his great work, “Chris- tianity and Mankind,” the history of the church is rapidly sketched in outlines of the thought of the chief theologians to the close of the seventh generation from the Cruci- fixion. And he tells us that “the doctrinal system of the Ante-Nicene church is irreconcilable with the letter and authority of the formularies of the Constantinian and in general of the Byzantine councils, as much as these are with the Bible and common sense.”— (Preface, page 19.) The problem of the divine nature, he affirms, was solved “illogically and unhistorically ” by the councils of the fourth century “The latter view having triumphed by a persecuting and often unscrupulous majority, the victorious hierarchical party canonized, in the course of the two next blood-stained centuries, the confession of its intellectual bankruptcy into a confession of faith, and made submission to it the condition of churchmanship and the badge of eternal salva- tion.”— (Page 81.) Again, “if one reads all that the old Protestant schools have said on it (the first verse of John's gospel) during these 250 years, there is scarcely any- thing, philosophically speaking, but chaff to be found in it. The text (‘the word was God,') is explained by theological terms and formularies, which at least must be taken to be conventional, till they are shown to be the necessary and only possible deductions from the sacred text. Now this has never been proved; and I have no hesitation in saying that no honest and intelligent criticism can prove them to be sufficiently war- ranted, biblically or philosophically, for exclusive acceptance; nor are they strictly reconcilable with the true, genuine, uninterpolated writings of the fathers of the first, second, and third centuries. I speak advisedly; for I have read these writings with a sincere desire to understand and appreciate them; and in judging them. I use nothing but the liberty, or rather I exercise the duty, of a Protestant Christian, searching for truth.”— (Page 408.) Once more: “The theological system built up since (the time of Origen) is conventional; it is based upon misinterpretation and upon council for- mularies, which were a wall between the theologian and scripture as well as reason. These formularies of the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh centuries, are the confession of a failure, and have made the most sublime part of our theology conventional and hollow.” — (Page 307.) Professor Huntington is as unfortunate also, in claiming a persistent unity among those who have defended the Trinity since the fourth century, as in appealing to the universal voice of the church in its behalf. There are, and have always been, differ- ences, as marked between defenders of the Trinity in their conceptions of that dogma, as any that separate Trinitarians from Unitarians. 7 centuries held the inequality of the Son with the Father, and his birth in time, and asserts that the mystery of the Trinity remained without its right form or shape until the council of Constantinople, in 381. — (See Emlyn's Tracts, vol. II., pp. 277 et seq.) Now, of what importance is the concurrent belief of the great branches of the Christian church in a doctrine which begins to fade just as we approach the centuries when the tra- dition must have been purest—if it is only after Christianity was “improved and beautified by synods and councils" that the chorus commences 2 The fact is, the only creed known to the first three centuries was this: “I believe in One God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth; and in Jesus Christ, his only Son our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried : he descended into hell; the third day he rose again from the dead; he ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of God, the Father Almighty; from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead. I believe in the Holy Ghost: the Holy Catholic Church; the communion of saints; the forgiveness of sins; the resurrection of the body; and the life everlasting. Amen.” Not a word here of the Triune Deity, of the constitution of the Divine Personality, of coequal constituents in the Infinite Oneness; not a word of any feature of that clear Trinitarian scheme of thought, with its adjuncts and corollaries, in which alone Dr. H. sees “the sublime working-scheme of revelation and redemption,” and which he says has been so widely believed, that it is “irreverent towards Providence " to sup- pose that it is “unfounded in revelation and truth.” All this, of course, is of trifling consequence, compared with the testimony of the New Testament. Here the question must be brought for settlement, whatever the teaching of the church up to the year 100 may be. But it is right to sift all Sweeping statements about the unanimous voice of the church 8 in favor of modern Trinitarianism ; for they are not true. The last fifteen hundred years are of immeasurably less con- sequence than the first three hundred. And it was not until the year 325 that a creed was formed, affirming the eternity of Christ; while no creed establishing the proper Deity of the Holy Ghost was voted until A. D. 381. There were most strenuous and bitter struggles and contests against these dogmas. And yet neither of these creeds contains any such statement as that the Father and the Son, or the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, constitute numerically but one God. This declaration was reserved for a still later period, during the settling shadows of the Middle Age. Let us come then to the testimony of the New Testament. Do the documents that constitute the New Testament reveal a Trinity of coequal persons, emerging from the ineffable and veiled Godhead, so that we can know of no Deity independent of that threefold distinction ? This is the doctrine which is emphatically stated to us in the volume to which I have already alluded, as the basis of the Christian religion and revelation. Now let us take notice that the question is not concerning the mystical nature, or even the Divinity of Christ. The question is not whether the New Testament reveals the pre-existence, the miraculous birth, the Superhuman and even superangelic rank of Jesus; nor whether it declares to us that the Divine quickening and grace have been poured into humanity through a nature interpenetrated and transfused with the Divine essence, so that he was the image of God; and poured out the Spirit of God upon the world. We allow points to be confused, too often, in conducting this inquiry, which ought rigidly to be kept separate. Proofs are often passed to the credit of the Trinitarian formulae, which weigh only in behalf of the super-earthly origin and rank of Jesus. I freely admit that no one can fairly read some of the books of the New Testament, and deny that they 9 teach the supremacy of Christ in the hierarchy of created natures, and the dependence of the world upon his voluntary. assumption of human nature for its spiritual life. But the passages that establish this view are not pertinent, let us remember, as proof of the Trinitarian doctrine. It is a very delicate and very difficult matter to shape a statement of the origin, rank, and work of Christ which shall harmonize all that the New Testament books present to us concerning his pre-existence, his birth, his relation to the Infinite Spirit when here, his exaltation, and his position in the conscious universe throughout eternity. If ordinary Unitarianism has not fairly interpreted and fully reproduced the predominant Scriptural doctrine on this point, let it be impeached by any sect or theologian who is willing to stand by those documents, disconnected from any other creed, and without additions from church history. But let us see to it that lines of evidence are not crossed, and that proofs are not carried over to one doctrine which can be rightfully summoned only for another. - The simple point is this: Does the New Testament clearly reveal the Tri-personality or Threeness of the Godhead, so that, as Christians, our idea of the Unity of God must be composed of three constituents? and do Christ and the Holy Ghost, coequal in dignity, personality, eternity, and infinity, form two of those constituents? Is this conception of the Godhead the core of the Christian faith, as we gather it from the New Testament, so that we may call it “the sublime work- ing-scheme of Revelation ?” - If it is, of course one thing is certain: we shall find it dis- tinctly asserted, in the pages that bear the first impress of the organic thought of the church. It should be in their warp. Revelation, certainly, will not attempt to work independent of its “working-scheme.” . And let us look first at the three earliest Gospels, — Mat- thew, Mark, and Luke. In all the teaching of Christ through. 2 - . 10 out their pages, do we find any declaration of a threefoldness in the Divine personality or essence 2 Not a word. The Jews were Unitarians. They needed the disclosure of the Trinity in positive and explicit speech, if they were to be drawn at all to belief in it; and yet, throughout all the con- versations of Jesus up to the Crucifixion, as recorded in the first three Evangelists, no hint is given of any doctrine other than the old Hebrew faith in the absolute oneness of the First Cause. The Trinitarian formula is not mentioned. The high- est doctrine which Christ announces is his Sonship,-that he is the Anointed, the Son of the living God. Now, whatever this means, it is never for a moment connected with any claim of equality with the Father, or any recognition of other than con- stant spiritual dependence; nay, it is not even connected with any statement of his pre-existence. Not only does Jesus, in these biographies, affirm and imply by his teaching and his whole spiritual attitude the doctrine of the Unity of God as the Jews had always conceived it; not only does he declare that “there is none good but one, that is God,” and give a model of prayer, which recognizes no second object, or even medium of worship; not only does he conceal from his disciples the mystery of a union of two natures in his own personality, and struggle and pray in Gethsemane, as though he needed strength from the Father, and not from an equal Deity veiled within his own form; but he expressly declares that his knowledge is limited. “Of that day and that hour knoweth no man; no, not the angels which are in heaven; neither the Son, but the Father.” One would think that it would be difficult to bring such a passage into fellowship with the requirements of the Trinitarian definition. Dr. Huntington puts it to an entirely original use. He tells us, “For him who has all power in heaven and earth to say, ‘ Of that day and hour knoweth not the Son,” is condescension indeed! It brings God near as in his unabated attributes he could not be brought.” “Condescension ''' But is it true? Must 11 not the Son, who is “rooted for ever in the Godhead,” be omniscient 2 And if so, could Christ honestly say that the Son, whom he discriminates from man, and from angels, is ignorant of a date in the future spiritual history of man 2 This strange silence of the first three Evangelists as to Christ's Deity, or a Trinity, did not fail to attract the notice of the earliest church-fathers after the doctrine of the Trinity was established. Chrysostom, the eloquent preacher of the year 400, did not hesitate to say that Matthew, Mark, and Luke did not comprehend the depth of the Gospel. They were “like little children who hear, but do not understand what they hear, being occupied with cakes and childish playthings.” It was John, he said, who taught “what the angels themselves did not know before he declared it.” The doctrine of the proper divinity of Christ, he maintained, was not published at first, “ because the world was not advanced to it. Matthew, Mark, and Luke did not state what was suitable to Christ's dignity, but what was fitting for their hearers.” And several of the other fathers declared that the proper divinity of Christ was thus concealed through his personal ministry, in order to elude the vigilance and hostility of Satan. They generally maintained that it was John to whom was committed the un- folding of the Deity of Jesus. And to-day the principal quotations against Unitarianism drawn from the Gospels are selected from that of John. Yet where is there a statement of the Trinity — that there are three coequal persons in the Godhead—to be found in it? Is it in the first chapter, among those vast vague verses, that tell us “in the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God?” But the Holy Spirit is not mentioned there. Those verses, if they are obscure as to their positive philosophical contents, are plain enough as to what they exclude. And if they were written to unfold or suggest to us the mystery of the Divine nature, the 12 Trinity must be dropped as an Evangelical doctrine, for the third personality is not even hinted. But we shall be referred, perhaps, to the conversation in the 14th, 15th, and 16th chapters, where Jesus promises his disciples to send the Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, by which their minds shall be enlightened, and he shall be glori- fied, after his crucifixion. But is there any allusion in those chapters to the Comforter as a portion of a three-fold Divine Essence, of which Jesus himself was another portion ? Nay, grant that a separate personality and divine rank must be ascribed to the Comforter, are we not forbidden to imagine that an infinite Tri-personality is to be discerned in those chapters, by the very terms in which the office of the Com- forter is outlined 2 “He shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak; . . . he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you.” Is this a reve- lation of a person coequal with the Father in the Godhead 2 Perhaps Dr. Huntington will listen more attentively to a voice urging this argument from the ancient church. Novatian, an ante-Nicene father, quotes this same passage, and says, “if he received of Christ the things which he declared, Christ is then greater than the Comforter; for he would not receive from Christ, unless he were less than Christ.” In another passage of this discourse, Dr. Huntington, speaking of the Holy Spirit, says, “if he is personal, no considerable number of men have ever been found to question that he is God, nor to hesitate at the Tri-unity.” We cannot understand the logic, even if the fact of the separate personality be demonstrated. Indeed, the writer above quoted, and the “considerable num- ber of men,” in the first six generations after the apostles, who believed in the separate personality of the Spirit, never heard of such a hypothesis as Tri-unity. tº Moreover, if the four chapters in John, of which we are speaking, reveal that doctrine, it was the first time that Jesus had unfolded it to his personal followers. It must, therefore, \ - 1 3 have stood out pre-eminent over all other addresses and inter- views in their minds and memory. Is it not strange, there- fore, if that was the truth they derived from it, that none of the other evangelists has reported it, or any fragment from it? Surely, whatever else they might have left unrecorded, they would not have omitted that, — surely it would not have been left to a single reporter of the conversation of Jesus to save the basis doctrine, the very “working-scheme " of rev- elation for the world. . The Gospel of John abounds, equally with the others, in expressions of the dependence and inferiority of Christ. The strongest language in it, used by Jesus himself, which is in har- mony, at any point, with the Trinitarian doctrine, is in the verses, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father,” and “I and my Father are one.” Yet if the other equally strong language, “My Father is greater than I,” “The Son can do nothing of himself,” “As the Father hath life in himself, so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself,” were not sufficient to check the Trinitarian inference, another passage is conclusive, by showing in what sense Jesus used that mys- tic form of speech. He prays for all that believe on him, “that they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: . . . I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one.” Is not this just as strong an argument for the lifting of believers into participation in the Godhead, as the other verse is for lifting Christ to that awful height 2 Let me say, however, that I do not believe the Gospel of John teaches the mere humanity of Jesus. I admit that many Unitarian interpreters have put a forced construction upon much of its affirmation, to make it accord with the lowest form of Unitarian belief. To me it declares plainly the pre-exist- ence of Christ as a super-mortal nature, dearly beloved of God, made of the Divine substance, who came to declare God and reflect him, as it were, in a darkened world, and to 14 infuse the divine spirit and love by a life of obedience and sacrifice in the world, as the organic centre of a sanctified Society on earth. But how different is this from the Trinitarian doctrine, which is never stated in the whole of John's Gospel, or even from the conception of the proper Deity of Christ. Dr. Hunt- ington tells us, in one of the most surprising statements of his volume, that if we believe on the authority of John's Gospel that Christ “came forth '' from the Father, “came down,” “left the glory he had with the Father before the world was,” acknowledging thus a personal pre-existence, we must see that the passages “establish a proper Divinity.” (He means Deity.) He tells us that there is no middle ground. It is just this kind of hasty and indiscriminate assertion that has been the bane and disgrace of Scriptural interpretation. Instead of striving by patient and exhaustive study of the facts of a book to see what its theory really is, theologians have often narrowed a controversy, or an interpretation, to one of two hypotheses, not stopping to conjecture whether, by refraining from hypotheses and looking steadily at the facts, the Biblical doctrine might not turn out different from any of the moulds of their fancy or pre-judgment. I do not believe that there is a single sect which to-day reproduces fairly the prominent points of the apostolic theology, and the conception of St. John's Gospel, or that even thoroughly understands it, — and simply for the reason that interpre- tation begins with one of two theories in view, theories which have grown up since the apostolic time, and were not dreamed of then. Any man who wishes to restore in his own faith or preaching the scheme of Christology in St. John's Gospel, must abandon the Trinitarian conception, and the equal deity of God the Son; drop all such notions as that Christ must be God if he is not merely man; and gain a view of him as the imparting agent of the Divine life from God to man, and to that end leaving a native glory and joy, in which 15 he was the dearest but dependent object of Infinite affection. That Gospel is equally opposed to the humanitarian and Trinitarian theory. But before we pass from the testimony offered by the four biographies, we must not overlook the passage at the close of Matthew, which is regarded as a very strong support, if not the corner-stone of the New Testament evidence of the Trinity. I mean the command of Jesus: “Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” Dr. H. lays great stress on this pas- sage. It is the text of his discourse. Jesus uttered it just as he was passing from the world, to his Apostles, and in it he gave the substance and sum of his religion. “That central and sub- lime verity,” we are told, “on which the whole matter of the Gospel rested, was to be condensed into a brief, comprehen- sive, significant sentence.” “Our faith is summoned to the three persons of the one God.” “There is nothing in the situation, the relation, or the contents of the Divine formula to suggest that either of the three is less than the others, or less than God.” But now read that formula in the light of these statements. Does it state that such is the constitution of the Godhead 2 Does it say that these are three personalities, included in or issuing from the Infinite substance, making it three to human thought, and yet only one numerically and in essence 2 It says nothing of the kind. It does not imply or hint any doctrine of the absolute personality. It does not commission the Apostles to baptize, as Dr. Huntington asserts, “in the Triune name.” It offers a formula which suggests the great forces of the Christian religion, the Fatherhood of God, the Sonship of Christ, the gift of the Holy Spirit, and is silent as to explanations. Will any Trinitarian Scholar say, that hear- ing those words uttered for the first time, he could attribute 16 no other meaning to them than a declaration of the mysteri- ous three-foldness or tri-personality of one God? They may mean any one of a score of conceptions, and what particular meaning they bear must be determined, the first time we hear them, by the general system of thought of the person from whom they are published. - Now this is the first time that such a formula appears in the teaching of Christ. It is the only time it occurs in the whole New Testament; and are we to fasten at once upon a significance developed four hundred years afterwards, and say that is the only sense it can possibly bear 2 It has been asserted that this must represent the Godhead, because baptism would not be offered in any other name than the Highest. But the Jews were baptized into Moses, and the Samaritans were baptized into Mt. Gerizim. Some have asked this question: Would Christ, if he is not God — if he is only a man — have associated himself with God in such a solemn phrase and symbol? But suppose that he is far more than man, though entirely subordinate to God, and is the channel through which the Infinite character and grace are published on the earth. Then is it surprising that his name should be interwoven with the paternal name and the quicken- ing spirit in a formula of baptism into his religion and church 2 Paul says, “I charge thee before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, and the elect angels, that thou observe these things I’” Here created natures are put in fellowship with the Almighty in a religious statement. The Apostles say in one of their letters missive, in the book of Acts, “It seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us.” What do we say to this intertwining of Divine and mortal judgment in one phrase ? Paul says, “In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit.” Did he make himself equal to Christ 2 The salutation in the book of Revelation is, “Grace be unto you, and peace from Him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the seven spirits which are before 17 his throne; and from Jesus Christ.” Are the seven spirits part of the Infinite Personality ? It has been a favorite position with those who have gone deeply into the argument for the support of the Trinity, that Christ reserved the doctrine during his earlier ministry. His hearers and his intimate disciples, it has been said, could not have borne the splendor and the terror of the truth that the Incarnate God, the second member of the Infinite Three, was in familiar converse with them, instructing their ignorance, heal- ing their sick, reclining at their tables, taking their little children in his arms. In order to give his religion the oppor- tunity to mingle itself naturally with the feeling and thought of Palestine, Christ, it is affirmed, was obliged to veil his glory till the close of his earthly manifestation, and there- fore it is, we are told, that throughout the bulk of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, so little appears that seems to be in harmony with the proper Deity of Christ, or with the Trinity. If this is so, of course the revelation will be the more potent and dazzling when it is made. The contrast will be the greater on account of the former darkness; and we shall surely find all the Evangelists in agreement as to the time and form of the stupendous announcement, — the falling of the veil that had screened the Infinite from their gaze. We shall find unmistakable traces in the sacred books of the date and method of that disclosure. Some have supposed that Jesus made it at the Last Supper, on the institution of the communion rite, in the conversation about the Comforter and the prayer that followed, as related in the 14th, 15th, 16th and 17th chapters of John. But strangely not a word of that discourse or prayer is narrated by either of the other biographers in their accounts of the Supper. We can explain this discrepance and omission on no other theory than the Trinitarian hypothesis just stated. If the disclosure of the Deity of Jesus and the Triune éonsti. tution of the Infinite was first clearly made at that time, 3 18 is it possible, I ask you, that it should have been overlooked by the three Evangelists who first wrote the account of Jesus’ ministry, - and that it should have been reserved for John to recall it, who did not prepare his Gospel, according to the admission of Trinitarian scholars, until a generation later 2 Can dhy satisfactory answer be made to this objection ? It seems to me to shut out the possibility of explanation. Others maintain that it was after the resurrection, and just before the ascension, that Christ unfolded the mystery of his person and of the Godhead. The announcement was made in the formula of the great commission — “Go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” Still we should expect to find all the Evangelists agreeing in the disclosure of the mystery. We should expect to find it the focal point of light and power on their pages. But we are struck again with the fact that only Matthew records this formula as having been used by Jesus. Neither Mark, Luke, nor John alludes to the utter- ance of any such phrase by Christ at the close of his career, or any statement concerning his own Deity or the Threefoldness of God. If, as Dr. H. tells us, “in every respect, it was the natural and fitting time for the decisive, explicit communication of the one essential characteristic truth of his religion;” if now “we listen with breathless anxiety to hear what Christianity means;” feeling that “now, if ever, Christ will distinctly proclaim the doctrine of Christen- dom;” and especially if this doctrine, so solemnly uttered, be the Trinity, which has never before been stated by Jesus to his disciples, is it possible that it should have been omitted by Luke and John, as carelessly as if no such conversation had - taken place 2 Is it possible that Mark should have recorded the general command of Christ to teach and baptize, but have left, as he did, the Trinitarian formula out of his record? Do not these facts prove as clearly as moral demonstration can be made out, that the baptismal command did not represent to 19 the Apostles the doctrine of the Trinity, for the first time clearly stated by Jesus to his followers? And yet the strength of the case is not exhausted yet. If the phrases of the great commission, at the close of Mat- thew's Gospel, was the comprehensive statement of the Trinity into which believers were to be baptized,—if it was the new and clear revelation of Jesus, at the conclusion of his minis- try, of a mystery concealed wholly or in part from his disciples until then,- we shall surely see the effect of it in the first preaching of the Apostles, after Jesus passes from the world. The Book of the Acts will be one continual and blazing com- mentary upon that revelation, last made to the apostles, of the Deity of Christ and the Trinity of the Godhead. If the first three Gospels are obscure, that book will be luminous, and will crush any possibility of Unitarianism in the church. Some Trinitarian scholars, indeed, have maintained that it was not till after Christ's ascension, till the day of Pentecost, when the Spirit was given to the Apostles, that they were fully enlightened as to the great mystery of the Godhead. But now what shall we say when all the speeches of the Apostles in Jerusalem, just after Pentecost, contain no state- ment of the Deity of Jesus, and no allusion to a threefold personality, or any mystery in the constitution of the God. head 2 And these were sermons preached to Unitarian Jews. Read those opening chapters of the Acts, and see how the burden of the speeches is the resurrection of Jesus, “a man approved of God among you by miracles, and wonders, and signs, which God did by him in the midst of you,” by the power of God, and his exaltation by the Almighty to be the Prince and Saviour of men. Would it have been possible for Peter and Stephen, with the truth just revealed to their minds of the Deity of Jesus and his equality with the Father, to make the addresses recorded in the first half of the Book of Acts, – addresses from which hundreds must derive their first impressions of Christ's rank, - which not only do not state 20 the doctrine, but from which it could not be inferred, and whose theology would not be considered sound and evangeli- cal, if made by a young Orthodox candidate before the mild- est Orthodox council of New England? - But follow every Apostle in his ministry through the pages of the Book of Acts. In no sermon or speech of any speaker, in any missionary tour, is the Deity of Christ stated. Jesus has been raised from the dead; Jesus is the Christ; Jesus has been appointed judge of the world, and is to return to rule over Christendom; the Divine Spirit is given as the result and seal of faith in Christ's Messiahship; — I ask you to read the Book of the Acts through continuously, and see if these are not the exhaustive ideas of the Apostles in their first preach- ing of Christ to the world. We are told that the baptismal phrase was given by Christ to the Apostles, at the close of his ministry, as a statement of the Trinity, and the creed into which converts must be baptized. Yet, not a single instance is recorded in all Peter's and Paul’s tours of the use of that formula in baptism. That ordinance was always adminis- tered in the name of Christ alone. The phrase, “Father, Son, and Holy Ghost " does not occur in the whole record of the early missionary preaching of the first teachers of the church. And if that Book of Acts should be taken out of the New Testament, and handed over as a dictionary to a theolo- gical professor in Princeton or Andover, the Trinitarian creed of either of those institutions could not be drawn from it by any recombination of its verses. It has often been said that Paul's speech on Mars Hill, the first publication of the Gospel in the most cultured city of Europe, is entirely Unitarian. It is so unevangelical that it could not to-day be accepted as a Tract, to be issued by the Tract Society, as a statement of Christianity, any more than the Sermon on the Mount could. It has not in it any of what are called the distinguishing doctrines of grace. And all the speeches are equally destitute of the Trinitarian doctrine. It 21 is doubtful even if the pre-existence of Jesus, his superiority in rank to a great prophet supernaturally raised from the dead, and made the Spiritual Priest and ruler of the race by the Almighty, could be gathered from that whole book. How- ever this may be, the doctrine of the oneness and simplicity of God, as the Jews had always understood it, is not disturbed by any allusion. . The only reference, in the sermon of Dr. Huntington, to the Book of Acts, is his quotation of this passage from one of the addresses recorded in it : “The God of our fathers raised up Jesus; him hath God exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.” On this passage Dr. H. makes this comment: “Is it not right to ask him who gives repentance and forgiveness of sins, to do it?” Grant it; but does the asking of spiritual help from a glorified nature whom “God hath exalted,” prove that being a mysterious, indefinable part of a threefold God? Suppose that the Apostles thought it right to pay spiritual honor to the risen Jesus, does that prove him to have been in their conception the uncreated Deity ? They certainly believed him to be the Son of God in a very exalted and peculiar sense; but the question before us is, did they believe him to be God the Son 2 And further, did they believe him to be one of a Triune Infinite, each equal to the other, each pos- sessing a separate consciousness, and all forming but one Substance and Will? Until evidence and passages are brought to establish this point, the needs of the Trinitarian position are not met. - And on this point, we repeat, the Book of Acts is not only silent, but opposed. It must be accounted opposed, if it is simply silent. For, according to the Trinitarian hypothesis, here is the great mystery announced by the ascending Christ as he has closed his ministry of humiliation, that he has been God veiled in the flesh, and that the Father and the Holy Spirit are coequal with him in a union which makes only one being; 22 and the Apostles, educated rigid Unitarians, who receive it, and who go out to preach the new Gospel, never state it in Jerusalem, in Samaria, in Joppa, in Antioch, in Macedonia, in Athens, in Ephesus, in Rome! In a dozen years of earnest preaching by various men, it does not appear. No record of any baptism into the three-fold name is given. They speak always of Jesus commissioned and exalted by the Almighty, after his death, to be the head of a universal church. And there is no account in any act of worship, of any prayer or hymn commencing or closing with adoration to Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Could this be true of any missionaries now going to various countries to preach the Gospel for the first time? Would the salaries of any six or twelve men, of whom such reports came from Burmah or the Sandwich Islands to the American Board, be continued to them another quarter? I have been thus particular with this document, because we generally conduct the discussion about the Trinity or the Atonement too loosely, by quoting texts from different books, some bearing on one point and some on another, bringing them together as a worker in Mosaic makes a bird, or a figure, or a temple, out of various kinds and bits and colors of stone. This would be a tolerable method, perhaps, if the New Testament was one book, written in chapters by one man, continuously, and with one object steadily in view. Then the defect of evi- dence in one chapter might be compensated by fulness in another. But each book is a separate production. And the Book of Acts, following directly after the first three Gospels, in date far earlier than the Gospel of John, is the record of the first preaching of Christianity for a dozen years, by per- sonal disciples of Christ, and by Paul, in their earliest enthu. siasm, when its characteristic doctrines must be brought out clearly to hearers in different countries, who listen to it for the first time. And if the doctrine of the Trinity is not there; if the Deity of Christ is not stated in any of its pages; if no ascription of praise to Father, Son, and Spirit, goes up from 23 any of its chapters; I confess that I know not how a more fatal blow can be dealt upon the assertion that it forms part of original Christianity. If I were to become a Trinitarian, it could be only on the Catholic ground that tradition is supe- rior to Scripture, and that the Holy Spirit from time to time enlightens councils and popes to bring out and clear up doc- trines that were concealed, or not amply stated, by the earliest promulgators of the word. In the lecture next Sunday afternoon, I shall ask you to con- sider the teaching of Paul on the same doctrine. And I wish that you might all, during the week, as I have during the last week, read the whole New Testament through carefully, to see what is its teaching on the point—is God three, or is He One 2 Is Christ subordinate to him in heaven now, as once on earth; or is he coequal in power, majesty, and underived life 2 Study it reverently, study it faithfully, study it in unbroken charity to all that hold, or that pass to, a different view. And that we may not close to-day with a controversial tem- per, let us consider, in the language of one who has written one of the most powerful discourses against the Trinity in English literature — James Martineau of England — the value of Christ to a Unitarian, even if he holds the humanitarian scheme: “Him we accept, not indeed as very God, but as the true image of God, commissioned to show what no written doctrinal record could declare—the entire moral perfections of Deity. The universe gives us the scale of God, and Christ his Spirit. We climb to the infinitude of his nature by the awful pathway of the stars, where whole forests of worlds quiver here and there, like a small leaf of light. The scope of his intellect and the majesty of his rule are seen in the tranquil order and everlasting silence that reign through the fields of his volition. And the Spirit that animates the whole is like that of the Prophet of Nazareth; the thoughts that fly upon the swift light throughout creation, charged with fates unnumbered, are like the healing mercies of One that passed 24 no sorrow by. A faith that spreads around and within the mind a Deity thus sublime and holy, feeds the light of every pure affection, and presses with omnipotent power on the con- science; and our only prayer is that we may walk as children of such light.” * LECTURE II. LECT U R E II. “There is one body and one spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism ; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.” — EPHESIANS iv. 4, 5, 6. IN the lecture of last Sunday afternoon, we treated the evidence bearing on the doctrine of the Trinity, which is yielded by a careful examination of the four Gospels and the Book of Acts. To-day our chief object is to pass in review, for the same purpose, the Epistles of St. Paul. - We are considering the doctrine of the Trinity especially in relation to the recent assertion of it in a remarkable discourse, by the preacher to the Cambridge University. This is his con- densed statement of the doctrine, as he holds it, having aban. doned for it the Unitarianism which he once preached, but which he now impeaches as at war with Scripture, and incom- petent to nurture a sound piety and a working church. “In the transcendent, removed, and awful depth of his Absolute In- finitude, which no understanding can pierce, the Everlasting and Almighty God lives in an existence of which our only possible knowledge is gained by lights thrown back from revelation. Out of that ineffable and veiled Godhead, - the groundwork, if we may say so, of all Divine manifestation, or theophany, - there emerge to us in revelation the three whom we rightly call persons, – Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, — with their several individual offices, mutual relations, operations towards 28 A- men, and perfect unity together.” Holding fast the prime and positive fact of this unity, we have given us, as an equal maker of faith, the Threeness. We know of no priority to that Three- ness; of no epoch when it was not; of no Deity independent of that threefold distinction. A question at that point takes us over into realms utterly inscrutable to thought. We con- ceive of God always, not as Absolute Being, but as in relations, in process, in act. And in such relations, process, act, we behold him only as Three: — the Son eternally begotten of *Dr. Huntington's theory of the Trinity, carefully scrutinized, displays a singular in consistency with itself as well as with the Scripture he adduces in its support. He makes Father, Son, and Spirit equally manifestations of the obscure abyss of the Godhead. He tells us that “the qualities of the unutterable deific substance are present in each.” “The eternal Son,” he says, “is seen remaining rooted for ever in the Godhead, having the basis of his being unchanged, deific, uncreated.” “Christ comes forth out of the Godhead as the Son, the Saviour.” Of course, then, the peculiarity of his scheme is that “the Father” is no less a form of manifesting the unspeakable Deity than the Son. They “emerge” equally as theophanies. And yet he tells us, in the same paragraph, that the Son is eternally begotten of the Father, — a theophany from a theophany— contradicting thus the statement that he issues, equally with the Father and Spirit, from the infinite substance which is their common base, the “God in whom they are all one,” from whom “these three personalities issue forth to take up their merciful and glorious offices.” Dr. Huntington seems to have been conscious of this ill-adjustment of parts in his scheme. For he tells us on the 371st page, that by “thinking patiently ” we shall see that “human language could not so well represent these infinite realities as by using the same term, “Father,” sometimes for the absolute Godhead, and sometimes for that rela- tive paternal person in the Godhead brought to view only when the Son and the Spirit appear.” But after “thinking patiently ” we cannot imagine why the New Testament could not state Professor Huntington’s theory as clearly as he has done it. We cannot conceive how human language can so well represent any utterable realities as by con- sistently stating them. If the Son, as Dr. Huntington clearly enough states, is a direct emanation, like the Father, from the Godhead, we do not see why the New Testament should use the word “Father” for the absolute God, speak of the Son as issuing from him, and thus confuse the whole subject, But if the New Testament, as is the fact, does not say anything at all about Father, Son and Spirit emerging as three personalities from one deific substance, we cannot conjecture where Dr. Huntington found the material for his theory, especially his authority for calling it “the working scheme of revelation and redemption.” We may be told that the whole subject is such a mystery that language and reasoning are not competent to contain or outline it. Why then make a theory about it? Why not leave the whole matter where Scripture leaves it, with no Triune statement or suggestion? If a theo- logian offers a theory of the mystery, we expect that to be self-consistent through the compass of one paragraph; he cannot protect that from scrutiny by the plea of mystery. 29 the Father, not subordinate in nature or essence, nor created, nor beginning, but consubstantial with the Father:— the Holy Ghost ever proceeding from the Father and the Son, not in time, nor made out of nothing, but one in power, and glory, and eternity with them both.” This doctrine, which Dr. Huntington calls the working scheme of Revelation, we have sought in the four Gospels and the Book of Acts, written by Jews who were educated in the strictest Unitarianism, and published first—with the exception of John's Gospel — in Unitarian Palestine. We have not found any such doctrine there. We have found passages that imply a very high and mysterious rank for Jesus Christ; but we have not found any language in which this confession of the Cambridge preacher can possibly be stated. All the Scriptural phrases from those books which he could quote to sustain such a position, would not even suggest his doctrine to one that had never heard of it, let them be put together as cun- ningly as the most partisan Trinitarian theologian could arrange them. While the positive and repeated expressions of those books, and their drift, are at war with such a Triune definition of the Godhead. - We are now to seek the testimony of the Pauline epistles upon the same point. But before such an inquiry, let us glance at the books of the New Testament which remain after those epistles, the four Gospels, and the Acts are examined. Study the general letter of James to the Jewish Christians. Ask yourself if the doctrine of the Trinity which I have just quoted could be derived from that ? The Holy Spirit is not mentioned in it. The Deity of Christ is not stated or implied. Yet it deals with the questions of prayer, justification, the tests of discipleship, and the reception of spiritual blessings from heaven. It would not be possible for an Orthodox clergyman to treat the themes which the Epistle of James un- folds, without using the characteristic phrases of the Trinitarian dogma. He would be suspected of heresy, or his discourse 30 would be pronounced unsavory, if he did not. Yet James wrote his epistle to men who had been trained as Unitarians, and who would have needed to be confirmed by Apostolical authority in a Trinitarian faith. A very distinguished living scholar, not a Unitarian, says of this epistle and the writer of it, “Real justice and practical charity to the brethren, true humility and thankfulness to God, no longer under the servi- tude of ordinances, but under the perfect law of liberty; these were in his eyes the substance of the message which Christ brought to man from God.” Look next at the Epistles of Peter. There is no statement in their chapters of three persons in one God. There is no ascription of praise to the Holy Ghost. In two or three pas- Sages the Spirit, or the Holy Spirit, is spoken of, but in ways inconsistent with a belief that it is a separate Divine person- ality, much less a coequal person in an Eternal Three. And so far is Jesus from receiving in these epistles the title or rank of Deity, he is declared to have been raised from the dead by the superior power of God, to be “on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him.” Who made them subject unto him, if by nature he is “one in power, and glory, and eternity with the Father ?” The Epistle of Jude has no Triune statement, distinguishes the Lord Jesus Christ from God, and closes with an offering of praise, not as a Trinitarian epistle would to Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, but “to the only wise God, our Saviour.” The letter to the Hebrews, which is considered very strong in support of the Atonement, but which was not, probably, written by Paul, or any Apostle, cannot be quoted to originate any Trinitarian hypothesis concerning the Godhead. It not only contains no offering of praise to the Holy Ghost at the close, where God is invoked, but it distinctly denies the coequal rank of Christ with God, while it affirms his super-earthly nature. It begins by saying that God hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by 31 whom also he made the worlds. The Son is the brightness of the Father's glory, and the express image of his person, “being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.” “Therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows.” “When he bringethin the first-begotten into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him.” I will not quote other verses from the epistle that affirm deci- sively the fact that Jesus obtained a higher honor by his earthly suffering and love than he wore before. I need only quote these passages that declare the native dignity and splen- dor of his rank to show that Trinitarianism is opposed by the epistle to the Hebrews. For, imagine it said of a coequal member of the Trinity (before the incarnation, so that we can not say the language is used of his mortal nature,) that he is anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellows, and has obtained by inheritance a more excellent name than the angels The Epistles of John are often appealed to in proof of the dependence of the world upon Jesus for its spiritual life, and of the intimate, mystical union of Christ as the Son with the Infinite Father. And there is one verse in the fourth chapter of the first epistle which declares that “there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.” This is the only Trinitarian verse in the New Testament — the only explicit assertion of a oneness in the Godhead composed of three constituents. And this passage is spurious. It is acknowledged to be such by the great Trinitarian critics themselves. It would be omitted by any council of trustworthy scholars from the Protestant sects, who should be called to decide whether it should remain in the Bible. It was foisted upon an early manuscript by some partisan transcriber, who thought, most likely, that the New Testament ought to be made more emphatically Trinitarian. You will look in vain for any recognition, in what the Apostle 32 John wrote in the epistles, of the three-fold unity of the Di- vine nature, or the separate personality of the Holy Ghost. And now the Book of Revelation is to be spoken of. In this tremendous poem the throne of God is described, but no Trinity is depicted as revealed from it. No Trinity is symbol- ized in any of its fire-sketches of the scenery and sanctities of heaven. The worship of the invisible world, the praise of angels and the redeemed, is interpreted to us in verses such as earthly pages never caught from any other pen. The Almighty and the Lamb are adored in the choruses; but they are not worship- ped as one, and the Holy Spirit is not celebrated in their praise. Indeed, the book opens with these words: “The reve- lation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto him, to show unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass.” Take notice that it is Christ in heaven, not on earth in a mortal body, of whom this dependence on God for knowledge is affirmed. And Christ is called in it “the beginning of the creation of God,” “the prince of the kings of the earth.” He is represented in it as saying: “To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also over- came, and am set down with my Father in his throne.” Is this a Trinitarian book? Would a Trinitarian poet of modern times, flooded with the ecstasy of devotion, and pouring out his imaginations of heaven and its worship, presume to depict a throne over which no Trinity brooded, a sanctification inde- pendent of the Third Person of the Godhead, a universal hal- lelujah, and no breath of it lifted to the Holy Ghost 7 I do not pretend, of course, that in the books scanned thus rapidly, there are not very difficult questions to be examined as to the relations of Christ's nature and office to the Divine love, the gift of the Divine Spirit, and the regeneration of the world. But I maintain that whatever doctrines they may teach, they do not teach the Trinity of the church-creeds of to-day, and are fatally inconsistent with the formula of the Divine nature, which I quoted from the discourse of the Cam- 33 oridge preacher, and in which he embraces the Trinity as the only Scriptural scheme. And these are documents which should not only be in harmony with it, but which should be the sources of it, — in which it should appear as unmistakably as in any modern creed. We come now to the thirteen Epistles of St. Paul. Do they announce or support the ecclesiastical doctrine of the Trinity? Sitting down to an exclusive study of those letters, putting aside the interpretations and developments of later genera- tions in the Church, have we a right to say, are we compelled to say, that nothing but the modern conception of Three Di- vine Persons as one God will correspond with the earliest thought and worship of the Church, so far as Paul instructed and controlled it 2 r Do not let us confuse points here, or be drawn to side- issues. Paul affirmed a very high doctrine of Jesus Christ. He believed and taught with fervor and joy that the spiritual life of the race was dependent on the advent of Christ from heaven, his assumption of our mortal flesh and lot, his death, resurrection and ascension. I can have no controversy with any Christian who draws this doctrine from the great Apostle. His letters affirm that Christ is to be praised and worshipped in Some degree by the whole creation. But do they declare that he is God underived in his being, as Dr. Huntington says, “not subordinate in nature or essence, nor created, nor begin- ning, but consubstantial with the Father,” so that he is to be worshipped as God 2 Still further, which is our special con- cern here, do they teach that God has revealed himself, and is to be adored as a Tri-unity, and that worship is defective which is not paid to God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, three persons and one Deity ? Without the slightest fear of disproof, I say No. They make no such statement explicitly, and they do not imply such a conception. They not only do not declare or include such a doctrine, – they oppose and forbid it. 5 34 It would require a very long discourse even to state clearly, in modern language, the relations of Christ's life and his tri- umph over death to the doom and the redemption of humanity, as St. Paul conceived them. But we must pause a moment upon his doctrine of the Spirit, which is inwrought with the whole web of his theology, and with his practical application of Christian truth. As a Pharisee, before his conversion to Jesus, Paul believed in God as the Monarch of nature, the distant Lord of the Hebrew nation, judging them by a law which he had published through Moses and interpreted by Prophets, promising them a national Messiah, whose rule and favor they were to deserve by ritual obedience — but not coming near to them himself, and pouring out no spiritual blessings upon the vast Gentile world. As a Christian he believed, not only that Jesus had assumed a human nature, and died to express the love of God and break the bondage of evil, but that by his ascension he had opened a perpetual fountain of grace for humanity. The Spirit of God, the very light and love which the Infinite had kept shrouded from the race before, was poured now into every soul that vitally believed in the risen Jesus. There was no abyss any more between God and man. The Divine radiance that was in Christ in his for- mer state, and that was continued to him while in a mortal form, was now imparted to every soul that joined itself to him by gratitude and trust. So that a man, as a Christian, in Paul's view, did not pledge himself to walk by a written reve- lation or the recorded example of Christ, but received the inward illumination from the Divine Spirit flowing through Christ into his soul. By that Spirit we are enabled to say “Father” to God, as Christ said it on earth, and says it now in heaven. We are aided to pray: we apprehend some of the deep things of God: we discern what eye had not seen nor ear heard, nor had entered into the heart of man before : we know that we are sons of the Infinite : we are “heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ.” - 35 Sometimes Paul calls this diffused grace the Spirit of Christ, sometimes the mind of Christ, sometimes the Spirit of God, again simply the Spirit, then the Holy Spirit, and often in our version it is rendered the Holy Ghost. It was this which gave life and unity to the Church. This was the life of God re- ceived into human nature, to cleanse, quicken, comfort, and inspire. By it the fellowship was completed between Souls on earth and Christ, and the Infinite Love. “Ye are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.” Paul's doctrine of the Holy Spirit is the affirmation that the deepest divine life is communicated to human nature as a present possession by a true Christian faith, so that we are brought into organic fellowship and oneness here with Christ, and derive truth at first hand from God, not at second hand through a Bible, and at third hand through creeds or ecclesi- astical corporations. It is the Quaker doctrine inflamed with a passion like Luther's. The Church has lost in great degree this meaning of it, and stumbles over the majestic sen- tences into the conception that they teach a separate God, mysteriously one with the Father, but distinct in consciousness, office, and will. - Dr. Neander, the most learned Christian student and scholar of our century, himself Orthodox according to a very mild and genial type, in his history of the Planting and Training of the Christian Church, has devoted a considerable portion of the vol- ume to a systematic exposition of St. Paul's theological scheme. He has no title over any page for the doctrine of the Trinity, thus showing that he found no such dogma as the Tri-person- ality of the Infinite in the domain of the Apostle's thought. But at the close of the book, in another connection, he defines 36 Paul's essential thought to be that the Father through the Son, dwells in mankind who are animated by his Spirit. Pre- cisely the conception of the Holy Spirit which I have endeav- ored to state. This, and St. John's doctrine of the Logos, Dr. Neander, a Trinitarian, calls “the intimations" out of which the reflective intellect has sought “to elevate itself to an original triad in God.” But it may be said that the frequent use of phrases by Paul in which Father, Son and Holy Ghost are invoked or adored, shows that he regarded them as three persons, and coequal, at least in their claim to human homage. Now without dwelling on the argument that if Paul believed in three Divine Persons, it by no means follows that he believed them to be equal in rank, and portions of one Deity, let me ask you how frequent Paul's use of such a form of ascription or invocation is. A great many Zealous Christians, regular readers of their Bibles, it can hardly be doubted, believe that such expressions occur often in the New Testament. Probably thousands of intelligent disciples would answer “Yes,” if they were asked whether the doxology “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost,” is a Scriptural sentence. There is no such lan- guage between the covers of the Bible. - Indeed, it is to be feared that Dr. Huntington has not attended carefully to the testimony of the New Testament on this point. He speaks of many passages in the Gospels and Epistles that teach the separate personality of the Holy Spirit, which can be wrested from their obvious meaning only by violence. And he calls attention to “the Apostolical bene- dictions, which were evidently intended to be what they have So generally proved, the familiar repositories and often repeated symbols of the great central facts of Christian theology.” He calls especial attention to one of these as proving the personality of the Holy Ghost. It is at the close of the Second letter to the Corinthians. And how many more do you suppose there are 2 Not another. It is the solitary pas- 3'ſ sage in the whole New Testament where Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are combined in any formal expression of worship. And this one Dr. Huntington quotes wrongly. More than that, he lays the stress of his argument on a word, which he italicizes, that does not appear in our version. He quotes it: “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost be with us all evermore;” and calls particular attention to the word “fellowship” as attributing to the Holy Ghost a separate consciousness and personality. But Paul said, “the communion of the Holy Ghost.” It is the common partaking and consciousness of the Divine Spirit which he invokes for the Corinthians in connec- tion with the grace of Christ and the love of God. This is exactly in harmony with the interpretation we have given of Paul's conception of the Spirit, as the life of God communi- cated to man, dwelling in each heart, and uniting the church in a common life. Once afterwards Dr. H. quotes the passage in his discourse with the same error. Of course, I do not mean even to intimate that, in calling attention to the Apos- tolical benedictions in support of the Divine Tri-personality, when there is only one which uses the three-fold element, and in wrongly quoting the vital word in that one, the writer intended to trifle with facts. Such a suspicion would be not only uncharitable, but absurd. It shows, however, the loose way in which the Scriptural evidence for the modern doctrine of the Trinity is too often studied and arranged. It is not the only instance of inaccurate citation from Scripture in the discourse. But the mistake will not be a misfor- tune if it shall lead Dr. Huntington to see that he has thrown out several sneers at the manner in which those who deny the Trinity treat the evidence, and that he has not made one generous allusion to the use of Scripture by Unitarians, amongst whom he was a favorite and honored preacher for many years. The benedictions of St. Paul, at the commencement and 38 ending of his Epistles, and the short bursts of praise into which he rises at times in the midst of his reasoning, are opposed to the idea that he was a Trinitarian. “Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ,” — this, with the variation of a word or two, is the salutation at the commencement of all the thirteen Epistles from his pen. At their close he invokes blessings from God, or the peace of God, for his brethren, and often unites the name of Jesus in a subordinate way. But there is no address to the Holy Spirit, no supplication from the Spirit, no conjunc- tion of Father, Son, and Spirit, in any direct homage or petition. In the one instance, out of some thirty ascriptions and benedictions, where the Spirit is introduced, the associated word implies that the Spirit is not a distinct Divine Being, but the communicated life of God to the church. Could these facts be stated of those Epistles if they were Trinitarian doc- uments, the fountains of the Trinitarian scheme for the whole future of Christendom 7 As to the spiritual life of believers, Paul uses the conception of Father, Christ, and the Spirit; for the Father communicates his Spirit — the same which Christ is filled with— to the souls of men as their light and strength. But when Paul rises into language of direct worship, he drops the Spirit from his ascriptions and prayers, because it is the Father communicated, and of course is not to be addressed as a separate Person. But, still further, the Trinitarian dogma, so far as St. Paul is concerned, is opposed by the unequivocal terms in which he speaks of the rank of Christ. It is a very high position in the universe which the Apostle attributes to Jesus, but nothing like the rank required by the Trinitarian hypothesis. Dr. Huntington tells us that in Scripture “the Eternal Son is seen remaining rooted forever in the Godhead, having the basis of his being unchanged, deific, uncreated.” No such language, and no language that has such meaning, can be drawn from the Chief Apostle. Dr. Neander confesses that Paul “ascribes a 39 truly divine yet derived being to Christ.” It is plain that Paul believed in his pre-existence, but there is no passage in which it is stated that he existed from etermity. According to Paul he is the Son of God, not God the Son. Whether the Apostle believed the human soul was made of any different substance originally than was given to Christ, we cannot determine from his Epistles; but he certainly teaches that all really Christian persons receive into their natures the same effluence from God with which Christ is filled, and become Sons of God substantially as he is. He teaches that Christ in his pre-existent life was the highest object of the Divine affection, a love that implies dependence and a return of filial emotion and obedience. He was the image of God, the one highest and perfect form for receiving and transmitting the rays of the Infinite glory. Through him, Paul declares, that God created all things; but it has been seriously doubted whether he means by this that Christ was an instrument for shaping the material world. It has been sup- posed that he referred rather to Souls, and the plan and gra- dations of the moral world, celestial and earthly. This point must always remain in dispute, as there are not passages enough to settle it. But the verses in Colossians, where the statement is made with more fulness than elsewhere, favors the latter view, since in defining the “all things ’’ which were cre- ated by Christ, he says, “whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers.” There is hardly a page of St. Paul's writing that does not declare or imply a separate and therefore finite consciousness, reason and will in Christ, not merely when on the earth, and in a human form, but prior to his advent, and after his ascen- Sion. For it is not the doctrine of the Incarnation as ordi- marily taught in the church which Paul promulged. God did not take our nature and undergo humiliation and taste mortal woe. He expressed his love in yielding the dearest object of his unfathomable affection to the buffets and hatreds of the 40 world and the doom of evil in the flesh. This was God’s sacrifice, — “he spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all.” And through him, the consummate form, and thus the largest channel in the universe, of the Divine Spirit, God poured redeeming life into humanity on earth. There are two or three passages in the Pauline Epistles of which the Greek reading or pointing is not settled among Scholars that have been made very prominent in the contro- versy as to the position of Jesus in the universe. Too much importance, we think, has been accorded to them. They would still be doubtful passages if rendered as the Trinitarians demand; and doubtful passages, in unsystematic writings like the Pauline letters, must be construed in harmony with clear and positivé ones. As to the power and rank of Christ, we have from Paul positive declarations concerning his origin, his resurrection and the rank received after it, and his position after the Mediatorial mission is finished, which are conclusive against the doctrine of his underived being, infinite Lordship, and Eternal coequality. Paul tells us explicity in the first chapter of Colossians that he is “ the first-born of every creature.” Whether this means the first-born creature of God, or first-born being before every creature, it settles the fact that Paul did not hold to the Eternal Existence of Jesus.* There is no other passage in which the Apostle deals with this question. Second, as to the resurrection, it is always declared to have been wrought by the power of God acting upon Christ as upon a finite Nature, — Christ as one unmixed personality on one hand, and God as one quickening power on the other. On the Trinitarian hypothesis, Christ should have raised himself, and * As Tertullian wrote, perhaps with this passage in view, in the third century, before such Orthodoxy as that of the New England standards had been dreamed: “God is both a Father, and also a Judge, yet not therefore always a Father and a Judge because always God. Since neither could he be a Father before a Son, nor a Judge before Sin; but there was a time when both Sin and Son were not, which make the Lord a Judge and Father.” - 41 ascended by the force of his native Godhead. But this is never asserted in Paul's pages, as it would have been if he had held the underived, intrinsic Deity of Christ's nature. As the letter to the Hebrews hints, so Paul seems to declare, that Jesus, as a reward for his earthly service and suffering, was lifted by the Infinite love, to a greater height of glory in the heavens than before his assumption of the flesh. For the Apostle speaks to the Ephesians of the working of God's mighty power, “which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come.” And once more, to the Philippians, after referring to his death on the cross, he says, “Wherefore, God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name; that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Dr. Huntington quotes from the first of these passages, and asks, “Can this be a creature ?” What else, we answer, if he was raised from the dead by God’s power, and lifted to the position far above “all principality and power, &c. 2” He quotes part of the second passage and exclaims “is not this a being to whom prayer is to be offered 7” Praise certainly, Paul would answer him, if it be offered “to the glory of God the Father,” and not to an underived, coequal Infinite. If he were that, it would not be said that God had highly exalted him. Tor it is not the human nature, but the veritable soul of Christ that is thus exalted. It is after the resurrection, when the flesh and its limitations are put off. And thirdly, Paul expressly tells us what the final relation of Jesus to God is to be, after every knee has bowed to him. In the 15th chapter of the first letter to the Corinthians, he 6 42 speaks of the resurrection and the close of Christ's admin- istrative office. “Then cometh the end when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father. dº And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.” If Scripture alone were the source of our creeds, can one think it possible that modern Trinitarianism could survive this pas- sage 2 Christ becomes visibly subject forever, and God the Father is all in all ! Dr. Huntington quotes this passage, and thus explains it: “The Son, in his character of Sonship, is re- taken, so to speak, into the everlasting, almighty, ineffable, undivided One, where the distinctions of office which had aided us so greatly in apprehending the glorious Trinity are lost to our sight.” This is the most astounding specimen of exegesis which has ever fallen under my observation. Those that tam- per with Scripture by rationalistic dissections are generally re- ferred, by strict Orthodox believers, to the woes denounced at the close of the Book of Revelation, against those who add to or take from the words of the book. Where is anything said or suggested in 15th Corinthians about the melting away of the Trinity, and the reabsorption of the Son into the absolute God- head 2 It is fiction. With such license as that a man might go through Scripture and strike out every instance where “not” occurs, thus reversing the morals of the New Testament. In fact, Dr. H. does precisely reverse the sense of Paul by his in- terpretation, or rather metamorphosis of the passage. Paul says that Christ stands higher in administrative rank before the close of his mediatorship than he will afterwards. Dr. H. makes him say that he stands lower now, and is to go higher then. Or rather, he makes Paul say, that the Christ, known once on earth, is to be annihilated; for when the Son is retaken into the undi- vided Godhead, where is the once visible Christ to be found 2 Of course, Trinitarianism requires some such wrenching of this clear and fatal statement of Paul. And yet only on the third 43 page after this handling of the Unitarian Apostle's affirmation, we find Dr. H., in reference to a Unitarian theory of the Holy Spirit which he does not fairly state, exclaiming, “how des- perate the shifts of a determined theory !” We have thus grouped and surveyed the evidence afforded by the books of the New Testament for the doctrine of the Trinity. Of course, within such restricted limits, it has been impossible to treat any portion of the subject in an exhaustive way. But I have carefully abstained from any excessive state- ment in presenting the testimony as it had revealed itself to my reading. And perhaps a better conception can be gained of the quality and force of the warrant or opposition in re- gard to the doctrine by a general outlook over its field, than by microscopic scrutiny of passages drawn at random from its vari- ous books. We can tell in such a way, at once, whether any passages jut up from the broad landscape of its teachings, compelling us to accept the Trinity of God as its dominant idea and revelation. - We have found no such passages there. There is no such word as Trinity in its chapters. There is no statement that the unity of God is composed of three elements or personalities, or diverges into three forms. None of the words or phrases in which Dr. H. clothes his faith, or in which any Orthodox Trinitarianism has been or can be defined, is to be found in its whole compass, (with the exception of one verse, confessed by Trinitarians to be spurious). The words “Triune name " . are not there, nor “Three in one,” nor “Eternal Son,” nor “consubstantial,” nor “equal in power and glory” applied to God and Christ and The Holy Spirit, nor “rooted for ever in the Godhead,” nor “God the Son,” nor “Very God of Very God,” nor “Light of Light,” nor “eternally begotten of the Father,” nor “coequal persons,” nor “threefold distinction.” There is no offering of praise to Father, Son and Holy Ghost, and no direct address to them in any formula of invocation or 44 appeal. The last document of the New Testament, the Gospel of John, was written about as late as the year 100, so that the Christian Church had then been nearly seventy years — two generations — under the guidance of Apostolic teaching; and yet no combination of words appears in the compass of the New Testament books, such as is required to be signed in every Orthodox theological school of Christendom, and is expected in the ascriptions and doxologies of worship in the vast majority of the churches of all lands. A man has to go outside the Bible for all the expressions in which Dr. H. announces the foundation of his newly-acquired faith. And if a man says, “I believe in the Bible; I accept the whole of the New Testament; but do not believe in the Tri-personality of God;” the theologian who pronounces his faith unsound, or incomplete, must set up not merely his interpretations of the Bible, but his bold, explicit additions to it, as the tests of truth and fellowship. - Dr. Huntington in one passage of his discourse, the most emphatic passage in it, for he prints it all in italics, after speaking of some of the declarations in the New Testament concerning Jesus, requests a Unitarian to put this question to himself: — “Whatever I may make these words mean now, would they ever have been chosen and used in the first place on any other belief than that Christ is properly and truly Divine, Eternal, Almighty, as the Church of his Heaven-guided people has believed and taught 7” We take up this challenge, deliberately and without hesitation. We seek its test, and we reverse its state- ment precisely. We say the Scriptural affirmations and omis. sions, as we have quoted or stated them, are such that they. could not possibly have been made by teachers who believe, with the modern Protestant Church, that Christ is one of three persons in the Godhead, and that he is Eternal and Almighty, or of higher rank than the appointed medium and minister of Infinite Grace to Souls who are to partake of his very sub- stance, and be sons of God in fellowship with him. 45 The doctrine of the Tri-unity is not a doctrine of the New Testament. Some of the wisest Trinitarian scholars and theo- logians have confessed that it cannot be derived, in any of its accepted and required forms to-day, from the express language of the Evangelists and Apostles. They confess that it must be reasoned out, inferred, developed from intimations in the New Testament. Intimations ! That is, when the doctrine first broke upon the awe-struck souls of men who had been Unitarians before, they did not state it clearly; they did not state at all that there are three equal Divine beings; they did not utter in any logical, lyrical, impassioned, or reverential Sentence, that those three are one ! The most learned church historian of modern times, Dr. Neander, of Germany, has not hesitated to speak of the Trinity which is now maintained, as an idea to which the reflective mind has sought to elevate itself, rather than a clear publication of the Bible. Dr. Huntington quotes this admirable man as declaring that the doctrine of the Trinity is the fundamental article of the Christian faith, – the essential contents of Christianity summed up in brief. This is another instance of a strange carelessness in the use of au- thorities, in which Dr. Huntington, writing a discourse so im- portant, should not have indulged himself. Dr. Neander does say that he recognizes in the doctrine of the Trinity “the essential contents of Christianity, summed up in brief,” that is, summed up in human phrase and shaping; but he expressly states on the same page, (History of the Christian Religion and Church, vol. 1, page 572,) three sentences before this declaration, exactly the opposite of Prof. Huntington's quota- tion. He says, “this doctrine does not belong to the funda- mental articles of the Christian faith; as appears sufficiently evident from the fact, that it is expressly held forth in no one particular passage of the New Testament; for the only one in which this is done, the passage relating to the three that bear record, (1 John, 5,) is undoubtedly spurious, and in its ungenuine shape testifies to the fact, how foreign such a collo- 46 cation is from the style of the New Testament Scriptures. We find in the New Testament no other fundamental article be- sides that of which the Apostle Paul says, that other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, the annunciation of Jesus as the Messiah; and Christ himself designates as the foundation of his religion the faith in the only true God, and in Jesus Christ whom he hath sent.” ” Dr. Neander was a Trinitarian, (of a very different type, however, from the common American Trinitarians). He believed that his doctrine of the Trinity is properly developed out of the Bible. But in his judgment it is there so dim and latent, that it cannot be accounted a fun- damental article of the Christian religion. We leave that point to be settled between the first volume of his church history and Dr. Huntington, who has unfortunately, but of course not intentionally, misquoted it; while we repeat our affirmation that the doctrine as now held, and as inter- preted by Prof. H., is not only not clearly stated in the New Testament; — the elements of it are not there; — and that it is impossible it could be there at all, crowded as those pages are with references to God, and Christ, and the Spirit of God, unless it should lie there clear as the sunlight, as clear at least as the creeds of Christendom. I have no time, and no desire to follow Dr. H. in the argu- ment he has made to show how necessary the doctrine of the Trinity is to the other salient features of the Orthodox the- ology. Perhaps it is necessary. If it falls, very likely the modern interpretation of the Atonement and divine govern- ment must fall. If so, it is only necessary to consider the Scriptural sources for that doctrine, and the work of criticism upon modern Orthodoxy is accomplished. % While these pages are passing through the press, we notice that attention has been called by a well known and accurate scholar, through the columns of the “Christian Register” of January 21st, to this mistake of Dr. Huntington in quoting from Neander. The accomplished critic shows, also, that in the American translation of Neander, the word “strictly '' is introduced into the text, thus weakening a little the force of Nean- der's declaration. The American version makes the passage read—“This doctrine does not strictly belong to the fundamental articles of the Christian faith,” while Neander wrote unqualifiedly, “This doctrine does not belong,” &c. 47 But I must say a word, before closing, upon two or three intimations in Dr. H.’s discourse concerning the method of testing the Scripture evidence for the Trinity. It is often affirmed by Orthodox theologians that opposition of the heart, hostility to divine grace, blinds the intellect to the evidence in the Bible for the Deity of Christ and the Trinity of the Godhead. This position is one of amazing arrogance; yes, I am ready to say, of intolerable insolence. Used by one stu- dent of the Bible to another, in a course of serious inves- tigation as to the teaching of Scripture, it is an insult as manifest as the smiting of the face, or any other gross person- al indignity. For one, I will never allow it for a moment, from any man who addresses to me an argument, or with whom I am conducting an honest discussion. - It surprised and pained me, in reading Dr. H.’s discourse, to find him verging to this position, and using language, now and then, that can hardly be construed into any other signifi- cance. He speaks of seeing the truth of Christ's Deity in Scripture, “which was lying all the time plain and persuasive to the eye,” “through a happier admission of God's grace,” and declares that, to all the ordinary objections of science and logic, the believer has only to answer, “I know in whom I have believed,” and then may quote such words as “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, because they are spiritually discerned.” In a previous volume, “Ser- mons for the People,” page 265, a similar indignity is of: fered to Unitarian students of Scripture by the contemptuous and insufferable statement that our interpretations of passages that refer to Christ “will satisfy, till some special exigency of spiritual experience dissolves them in its potent alembic.” Does Dr. H. mean that the constitution of the Godhead, whether the Infinite is one or three, is a question to be spirit- ually discerned ? Is he willing, or not, to stand by the fair, full, exhaustive testimony of Scripture, logically distributed and combined 2 And when none of the words, affirmations, 48 praises, or prayers, demanded by the Trinity, are found in the New Testament, the fountain of all our external authority for testing what Christianity is, will he retreat from the terrific force of the facts, and advise a partisan of the doctrine to retreat, into the position that he knows, internally, that Christ never began to be, that he is sure, by an inward witness, that the Godhead is composed of “God the Father, God the Son, - And God the Spirit, three in one P’’ This is what his expressions mean, if they mean anything. Let us refuse to believe that he deliberately puts such an unmanly, arrogant sense into them, but that they are used loosely, with no intention of affirming so gross and repulsive an assumption. - - The doctrine of Trinity, or strict unity, is an external doc- trine, to be tested by the logical meaning of Scripture. An abandoned man, if his intellect is clear, and his reason unprej- udiced, is competent to decide that question. Spiritual things are spiritually discerned. But spiritual things, brethren, belong alike to Trinitarian and Unitarian schemes of faith. They are the internal things of our poor dogmas. And by the inward eye, and the sensitive spiritual affections, we come into the communion of the Spirit, the fellowship of Christ, the love of the Father, though we never can harmonize their rela- tions logically, in a conception of the Infinite Being. ºxyºrº----- ~~~~5: …~" ... "…: . Žt 22. *** º * f - * > * - – Ø , ºffº, J. ºr - * - 23° ºf *Awº . - 2’ - * A ...?" - -* - f * -- T. **...*.*.*----> 3. • ***re, *” Ž 22, 4, ... rºe, e.g. * - * - * } } Łº - º' ~ * = 3 *-* 'py jpſ ints siliſim lºtſm? Chimi 9 A S E R M O N PREACHED AT THE DEDICATION OF THE FIRST UNITARIAN CHURCH IN MARIETTA, OHIO, ON Tavasoax. Jose 4, 1857. BY GE OR GE E. E L LIS. gºjiti, an appenbir. BosTON: CROSBY, NICHOLS, AND COMPANY, 111, WASHINGTON Street. ..", . . . . A f 1857. jūſ ūſtā Ātligion httºmt (ſhristianity ? S E R M O N PREACHED AT THE DEDICATION OF THE FIRST UNITARIAN CHURCH IN MARIETTA, OHIO, -- ON THURSDAY, JUNE 4, 1857. gº-º-º-º-º-º-º-º-º-º-º: B Y G E O R. G. E. E. E L L I S. Cºffiti) an appenbir, BOST ON : CROSBY, NICHOLS, AND COMPANY, 111, WASHINGTON STREET. 1857. MARIETTA, June 5, 1857. DEAR SIR, - The undersigned, Trustees of “THE FIRST UNITARIAN SocIETY IN MARIETTA,” respectfully request for publication a copy of your Sermon, preached yesterday, on occasion of the Dedication of our Church to the worship of God. Wé take this opportunity to express, in behalf of this Society and of other auditors, the deep satisfaction afforded by your Discourse, and our belief that a wider dissemination of its views is desirable, in further aid of the cause it sustained. Wery respectfully, your sincere friends, NAHUM WARD. T. C. H. SMITH. WM. S. WARD. Rev. GEORGE E. ELLIS. B O S T ON : PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SON, 22, SCHOOL STREET. S E R M O N. EPH. ii. 20: “YE ARE BUILT UPON THE FOUNDATION OF THE APOSTLES AND PROPHETS, JESUS CHRIST HIMSELF BEING THE CHIEF CORNER-STONE. IF we are Christians, that is our foundation; and, if that is our foundation, we are Christians. On that foundation, — of Christ as the corner-stone, with pro- phets and apostles wrought into the solid structure, — this temple has been reared; with that foundation for our faith, we have come to dedicate it. Its com- pleted work is the crown of many hopes. An earnest, responsive sympathy with the zeal which has here accomplished a long-cherished purpose has drawn some of us hither from far-distant scenes of our life's common duties. We meet you here as brethren, held by the ties of a precious faith, – precious in those elements of it which all Christians, of every name and sect, believe; precious, too, to us, because more satisfying and powerful under any peculiarity of view in which we may interpret and apply its divine truths. 4 To those most interested in this occasion, it is one of a pure religious joy. The grateful tribute rises first to God, to whom the gift is offered. It is itself the altar and the offering. Prayer consecrates it; anthem and organ, and the music of the heart, celebrate its dedication. We give it to God, that he may return it to us, with such a testimony that he accepts the offering as his children may find in making it one of many means for approaching him, knowing him, and being reconciled to him through Christ. Walls, win- dows, and ceiling; rafters, roof, and tower, — as parts of the fabric, all resting upon the corner-stone beneath; its conveniences and its rich decorations, – answer to all the Christian sentiments, truths, lessons, and hopes which compose that blessed gospel-faith sent into this world by God through his Messiah. The temple receives its formal consecration in these becoming services within its new walls. It will receive, as we hope, a more real consecration from its uses, when it has helped its worshippers to realize the sublime truth announced by the apostle, that they are themselves temples of the living God, if so be that the Spirit of God dwelleth in them. Therefore do we rejoice over the solidity of this structure. It has about it the signs of permanence. For, though our faith is not identified with place or structure, with hill-top or temple, its holy truths win power from associations with cherished scenes and sanctu- aries. When, therefore, the air within these walls 5 shall have echoed for years to holy lessons, and they have been hung around with the memories of pious counsels and devout emotions in the soul; when childhood shall have received here tender and sacred impressions, and shall have carried them into life's maturer years identified with this sanctuary, - then it shall receive a real consecration. These first hours of holy observance within its walls are privi- leges to us. We may not hope that the throng now gathered here will ever again crowd its seats and aisles. Curiosity brings some of you; Christian cour- tesy has attracted others, who usually worship in other temples. When these hours are past, some of us must go our own ways, which are far off. Let it help our faith and charity, that strangers and friends have thus been gathered for the first time in a temple to be consecrated, through Christ, to God. The fitnesses of the time and occasion require that our thoughts should now be engaged upon a Christian theme, treated with reference to what is peculiar and marked in the circumstances that engross our interest. I should fail to meet the sympathies of the occasion, if I did not invite you to a course of thought more or less defined by the characteristic views of religious truth to which this edifice is devoted. Of itself, it is a tribute to that natural desire of all intelligent and sincere Christian believers, of every creed, to have the distinctive principles of their creed recognized in the cherished temple of their worship. We love 6 most that way of worship in which mind, heart, and soul may join. We can yield to any spell of power which engages the devotional element within us; for that is the voice of God's Spirit, and every human spirit may answer to that divine ministry. A Chris- tian truth or appeal, let it come from whom it may, will move us. If mingled with error in its statement, we can still discern between the truth and the error, and leave to an instinctive faculty within us the win- nowing of the wheat from the chaff. If Christian truths or appeals are uttered in a way to jar upon our sensibilities, they will still preserve the power of Christ, and the weakness in them shall be accounted to man. But when men become the interpreters of Christian truth, and stand between us and the oracles of God, then we feel a craving which bids us choose be- tween interpreters and their methods. For our steady, continuous religious training on the weekly sabbath through successive years, we naturally wish for the help and strength that come from full sympathy in our way of worship. It is natural for us thus to em- phasize what is most peculiar in our views. Justly, then, may we make our common Christianity the main theme, and what is peculiar in our views of Christianity the emphasis and boast of discourse on this occasion. So far as it may be allowed us to gra- tify ourselves, without the cost to others of any rude assault upon their convictions and preferences, this occasion must recognize and exalt an unpopular form 7 of gospel religion. The sectarian name by which it is known to those who dislike it may mean much or little; but to us it means a great deal, and signifies and intimates much more. And yet I shall rather take for granted, and proceed upon the recognition of, what may be distinctive in our views of the gospel, than seek to raise an issue or an argument upon mat- ters of controversy. My aim shall be simply this,—to show how, by our views, religion becomes Christianity; how what nature teaches to us of truth about God, ourselves, and our relations to him, is converted into a gospel bearing the name of Christ. We wish to make sure of our foundations; to know what is their corner-stone, and what is the relation of that to the whole structure of our faith. Christ is our Lord and Master: we take and bear his name; we rear temples for the proclamation of his gospel. All that gives distinctness to the gospel scheme of religion, in its theory and in its working power, on its speculative and on its practical side, is faith in Christ. Right views of him, then, of his office and agency, are essen- tial, not only to give us right views of the gospel, but also to our becoming Christians. The gospel is religion, with Christ added to it. Religion, with Christ added to it, becomes the Christian religion, or Christianity. Natural religion, whatever it may have been, or might have been, or ought to have been, yields, as we believe, to give place to revelation, — to a disclosure of all needful 8 religious truth. Revelation confirms all the truth previously received; it certifies to what of truth had before been doubtful; it purifies what had be- fore been corrupt; it makes known what had before been concealed. And all these gifts and blessings of revealed religion are baptized with the name of Christ. His own office and agency in the whole work of revelation entitle Christ to give his name to the religion which now claims dominion over the world. Christ, in his mission and his commission ; in his personal agency and in his official agency; in his authority, received from God, the Father; in his doctrine, which was not his, but God’s ; in his life, his works, his mediation, and his intercession, — Christ has embraced and perfected every thing that enters into the substance and the power of true reli- gion. Vital, then, is it, to every just conception of this gospel religion, that we should know just where Christ comes into religion, and how he comes into it, to change religion into the gospel, into Christianity. To these two questions, I will attempt to give direct a.I.) SWGI’S. I. Where does Christ come into religion to change it into Christianity" — at what point in it, at what place in it, in what stage of its progressive develop- ment, in what region of its infinite spaces of truth Christ comes into the world's history midway in its course; and so he comes into religion midway in the substance of its instructions. In history, as we read 9 its records, there is about the same space of time recognized before the Christian era as has transpired since. And the substantial truths and lessons of reli- gion bring in Christ about midway in the course of their instructions. He is the corner-stone of the pro- phetic and apostolic church. But there is always something below the corner-stone, — the sub-founda- tion, hidden but essential; laid solidly, even though of unsightly and ordinary materials, with reference to what is to be reared upon it. Prophets preceded, Christ, to announce him, and to prepare his way. Apostles followed him, to proclaim his full gospel to the world. He comes in between them, - the corner- stone, the first fair, finished, visible part between the hidden foundations and the perfected work of the great temple of faith and piety. There are some primary religious ideas and truths on which the revelation by Christ proceeds. No accepted philosophy of religion at this day fails to recognize what is called “an elder revelation,” or “an original revelation.” But no philosophy can dis- tinguish its substance, source, or method, as attaching to direct communications from God, or to the indi- rect action of the spiritual powers of human nature. We cannot know whether men, before the birth of the Messiah, had been forgetting or adding to the original religion with which humanity started on its career of trial and progress. This we know, - that all the faiths and superstitions of the world em- 2 10 braced conceptions and views answering to all those elements and workings of the human heart which either apprehend or respond to the great truths of religion. Christ is not the author of religion to the world. He himself, when teaching the world in bodily pre- sence, built his own truth upon the truth previously known and received. Christianity itself would be an incomplete system, if it had not adopted the sub- stantial truth which had been preparing humanity to receive it. “Ye believe in God,” said Christ: “believe also in me.” Men had faith in God before Christ came. The Supreme had never been without witness to men : they had prayed to him, sacrificed to him, and tried to know him ; they had learned as much as they could learn of him, till he himself should condescend to a manifestation to them. Christ accepted this previously existing faith of men as the basis of all that he taught them. To some minds, peculiar and sceptical, it has seemed as an obstacle to faith in revelation, that God should have postponed it for so many ages, denying it still to a large part of the globe. Revelation itself fur- nishes the best explanation of this fact, and turns it from an objection into a testimony. If the first words of Christ on the earth had been to announce that there is a God; that men are his children; that they had never known or dreamed of these truths; that there never had been any religion before him on the earth; 11 that every tear of the pleading eye, every sigh of the contrite heart, every prayer and struggle and aspira- tion of penitence and faith, had been but a poor deception, not recognized by God; had Christ said this, and claimed to stand over the graves of millions of the dead, as the first teacher of divine truth to men, proclaiming that all the dead were lost, and that none but those taught by him could live to God; had Christ thus spoken, – well might we have asked, Why did not God speak this before ? But Christ did not so speak. There was religion before Christ; and Christ built upon it, accepted it as the basis of his gospel. It seemed that God had left men to guess and grope by themselves; to speculate and to dream ; to yield themselves to doubt and superstition; to invent a religion for themselves. Do we err in explaining this fact by saying, that God designed that men should try how much they could do for them- selves; should find out the limits of their thought and power; should learn by their failures and errors; should cloud themselves and confound themselves, – so that when truth divine, pure, calm, and holy, like the morning light, should break from him, their poor aching hearts and bewildered minds might hail it as indeed his gift : And men did something for themselves. They faced every problem of life, expe- rience, and thought which we now meet with our maturest wisdom. They wrote lessons for us which we love to ponder. We are glad to have their plum- 12 mets with which to sound some of the ocean-depths of truth. They forestalled, at least, all our questions; they penetrated to some of the mysteries of the unseen, and left them mysteries, as they found them, and as we find them. Our own vain inquiries on many subjects into which the men of a heathen faith had searched might have been saved to us, had we been content to accept their futile efforts as testimony that those subjects are locked and barred to the curiosity of man. We may hear the ring of the echoes of their fruitless blows upon the unpierced and impenetrable wall that parts the world of mystery from our know- ledge, and reserves it for our faith. There was a religion, a universal religion, in the world, before Christ; and he accepted it as the basis of his own religion. Read every lesson of his recorded for us, and you will find that he took up man's reli- gious training as if midway in its course, – not beginning it, not laying its lower foundations anew, nor even disturbing them. He found Jews and Gen- tiles believing in God; he found in them all the primary religious convictions and sentiments. He did not use a primer in teaching them. Full, august, exhaustive lessons of divine truth were uttered to them by him, as if their elementary knowledge had made them capable of understanding them. Every age of the world before Christ was prophetic of him, as every age since has been a proclamation of him. We ask where Christ comes into religion to 13 change it into Christianity, - to turn natural religion into gospel religion. And we answer, Just here, — in confirming and purifying and elevating and sancti- fying every hope and aspiration, every virtue and duty, of man. It is one of the most generous and beautiful tokens of that catholic spirit which is the glory of the gospel, that it does thus ratify and indorse all the true faith — yes, and all the bewil- dered and groping faith — that went before it in the world. The nameless Syro-Phoenician woman had cherished this substantial faith of the heart to such a sufficient end, as to secure for herself, from the Saviour, an encomium which lifted her over all the unbelievers — yes, and over all the believers — of the race of Israel. The centurion Cornelius, by his own self- taught method of prayers and alms, won for himself the honor of standing by the gospel door which he had opened for all Gentiles into the kingdom of Christ. The curious, searching criticism of some of the most scholarly and independent divines of the Church of England, pursuing their deeper studies upon the ancient religions of the world, amid the shades of the old universities, has recently brought into agita- tion this question, Whether the great apostle, St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Romans, is to be under- stood as anathematizing all heathen religion, denoun- cing it as nothing but devil-service and superstition, the condemnation of its votaries, sealing the doom of all who were without Christ Does he declare 14 that all which the heathen knew or thought of God, or offered in homage or service to him, was, to the divine object of their clouded faith, not a tribute, but an offence, — not mercifully winked at because of ignorance, but visited with divine scorn because of its inadequacy " It may be a question for search- ing criticism, for deep or lofty argument. Not a question could be asked about the teachings of St. Paul, on the decision of which his own high place of reverence with us would more vitally depend, than on this, Whether he despised and anathematized all heathenism . Persuaded as I am that he did not, but that he is misjudged by those who so interpret him, I may venture to say, that, if the charge against him were true, it would prove, that, in one most serious and vital matter, he failed to catch the mind of his divine Master. For Christ, who revealed to men the IFather, did not leave us to doubt that every sincere effort of his children to know and serve him was accepted of God, and had his blessing. Here, then, we find the answer to our first question, Where does Christ come into religion to turn it into Christianity ? He comes in to complete and perfect the work which the Father of spirits had already begun, in making men feel the need of faith and piety. I know of no single token of Christ's divine commis- sion, which, as I dwell upon it, affects me with a more profound sense of its reality than this, – that, as with the whole authority of God, he approached our 15 race with the benignity of a gracious condescension, as if to meet them midway, and to acknowledge the sincerity of their seekings, and to show them a method better than their own. This view of the relation into which Christ put himself with the previously existing religion of the world need not lead us to forget or to palliate the grossness of the old superstitions. It has never been the habit of Christians to look with too much leniency upon the idolatries, the corruptions, and the debasing vices, of the ancient faiths. Rather have we visited upon them an unsparing severity; forgetting that all such delusions proved the sincerity with which they were cherished by the severity of their cost for heart and soul. It is an impressive and solemn truth for our ever-renewed meditation, that Christ, standing alone on this earth, in the calm tones of his own assured faith, and in words whose simpli- city matches the grandeur of their sentiment, declared that he would “draw all men’’ unto him. It certainly should win to him our affectionate confidence, to be able to assert, as from his lips, that he regarded all human efforts for belief and piety as preparations for his welcome when he came to the earth. He found men's eyes strained in their gaze towards the spot where he appeared. When he spoke to their hearts, he used language, and he recognized struggles and affections, which proved that hearts were wait- ing and watching for him. He was the Desire of all nations, – the Expectation of the Gentiles, as well as 16 the Consolation of Israel. How familiar are we with the fact, that all the proud and boastful theorizers, whether in schemes of philosophy, policy, or practical science, have offered their new conceits to the world with the pretence of originality, and with vaunts over every thing that has gone before as now falsified and set aside by them Contrast with such as these the divine grace of him who came not to destroy, but to fulfil. The pre-existence of Christ before he came to the earth is significant of the pre-existence of some portion of his truth and work on the earth. He came to perfect, not to begin it. II. We have now reached our second question, How does Christ come into religion to change it into Christianity What has he said or done, what agency is he exerting now, for and by which he may claim to connect his name with the faith of the civil- ized world, to be the corner-stone of God’s church, the medium of all spiritual renewal and power, the revealer and sanction of heavenly truth? It is a large and a crowded question. It takes in all the contro- versies of Christians, and something far more and better than their controversies, as it comprehends the whole life and law of their faith, and all their views and methods of truth in opinion and duty. The records of history, midway in their course, part in two, to close an old era, and to open a new era, – to create for us a new heaven and a new earth. Amid the scenes of human life appears a Being, undistin- 17 guished in personal aspect or the honors to which man bows, yet in whom there is nothing but the form to designate humanity. He is born, he dies, he revives, he vanishes, not as men come into the world, nor as men leave it. His word and work, his mind and spirit, his manifestation and his testimony, all designate a Being in whom there is more of the image of God set forth than had been seen in all the com- bined excellences of the wisest and purest and holiest of all ages. This Being gives his symbolic name, “the Anointed of the Holy One,” to the only reli- gion which henceforth shall stand to claim the whole world's faith. Through him religion becomes Chris- tianity. How ! This is our question. He makes himself the corner-stone, the first visible support, of a temple whose foundations are already laid; and he proceeds to rear the structure, fitly framed together until it grows a holy temple to God. Christ turns religion into Christianity by connecting his own name, offices, authority, and sanction with the new lessons by which he confirmed its old truths, and quickened them with a vital power for the souls and the lives of men. Two prominent suggestions present themselves, as embracing the main points included in our question. First, How does Christ regard or treat the materials and elements of religion existing in the world, when the fulness of time brought him into it? Second, What new materials does he add, as of himself, to the religion of the world? 18 First, as has been suggested already, Christ builds his religion upon the religion which existed before him, - upon the religion of the Jew, and also of the Gentile; for that religion was but a. prophecy of him. He and his apostles have given an example to all missionaries of the gospel to heathen lands, which they would have done better if they had followed, in accepting what they found of testimony or effort or faith or groping in religion, as the basis on which to build the temples of the gospel. Christ did not begin the religious training of humanity all anew ; he did not overturn or scorn the faith of a single man or woman, or repulse or chill the piety of the most doting or superstitious of our race. He accepts all the testimonies which human beings had thus given to their own spiritual instincts. He approves as sin- cere every attempt, however weak or inadequate, which men had made to approach toward God, to learn the way to him, to discover his will, and to do it. There is no treatise on natural religion which is so exhaustive of all its shining truths and testimo- nies as are the parables of Christ. He makes us feel that nature testifies to God; that similitudes to truths divine may be traced in the laws which work in the harmonies of matter; that the kingdom of heaven may be likened to the methods of the same sovereignty intrusted to men who represent it on the earth. Christ assures us that God's will is indicated by his provi- dence; and that the single condition of a sincere 19 desire to know the will of God, for the sake of doing it, will reveal all true doctrine, all divine knowledge, to the soul. "Here is a marked characteristic of every thing recorded for us of the teachings of Christ: he never defined, he never explained the meaning of, a single word or term used by him to express great religious truths or duties. He uses all these terms of faith and piety as if men already understood their meaning, and would understand all he said in them ; and yet he used them in a way which made men feel that they had not previously known their full meaning. This enlargement, this deepening, this exalting and filling- out, of all the terms used for expressing religious truths and duties, is another remarkable characteristic of the Saviour's teachings. How much all good and right and holy words mean, as he uses them | We understand these words, apart from what he teaches us in them and by them ; that is, we connect ideas, convictions, and feelings with their common or lower religious signification. We understand them well enough to be engaged by them through the heart, the conscience, or the spirit, as the vocabulary of a natu- ral religion. But, from the Saviour's holy lips, these common terms of faith and piety take a new, a pro- founder, an infinite meaning. I know of no process by which, in a Sunday school or in a family, children might be more pleasantly and effectively trained in great gospel-lessons than by this, – taking some of 20 the most simple yet significant words of religion, first in their lower meanings, as children use them about the things of this world, and then filling them up from the lessons which Christ attached to them and spoke by them. Take the words God, life, sin, death, heaven, truth, faith, love, hope, peace, prayer, and other words which we use in our best speech on the highest themes, and give them all the meaning which man's expanding thought can find in them. Then take the same words as Christ used them in his gospel teach- ings. Fill them with the power and unction, the glow and the reality, of his divine utterance. The effect will be, that all such words will be taken from the interpretation of the mind, and committed next to the heart, and at last to the spirit, to fill out their utmost meaning. Christ would thus have one signal warrant for giving his own name to the religion of the world, in that, with all the authority of his divine commission, he ratified and assured all the previous efforts and fruits of faith and piety. But this is not all. Christ re- vealed new truth, and accomplished a service for man's instruction and redemption, which justifies his claim as the Author and Finisher of our faith. Stamped indelibly and impressively upon the pages of this world’s history is the fact, that religion has received from Christ an impulse and power which has made all its old truths new to man, and has quickened them into life and vigor. The gospel is a living religion, 21 — one which has life in itself, and imparts and cre- ates life. This living power, whether or not we can explain it, is the new thing in the gospel. In vain shall we seek to find it in dogmas. In vain shall we undertake to set forth a system of doctrines, and say, There, there is the substance and essence of the gos- pel. The spiritual power of the gospel over the heart and the life of man, compared with any direct influence from a system wrought up from its doctrines or precepts, is like the power of light, compared with the influence and uses of the constellations of stars. These constellations require aid from man to group them and to name them ; and something of ingenuity must be exercised to draw their outlines on the dome of heaven. But light, pure unfathomed light, comes all the way down from above to be our present bless- ing; and it is through this light that even the con- stellations shine. So is it with the irradiating spirit of the blessed gospel, compared with the grouping or array of its doctrines in the systems of men. Gospel truth is light which maketh all things manifest. And this new and living power of the gospel lies not in deep speculations, nor in the mysteries of abstruse metaphysics, nor in schemes for reconciling God's attributes, nor in vicarious or substituted methods of redemption; but in simple, Sun-illumined truths, to which the penetrated heart answers. We shall not find that the key which unlocks gospel truth is the supposed fact, that the sin of man had brought God 22 into a dilemma, when he would exercise his mercy towards those who had broken his law; nor yet the other supposed fact, that the mediation of Christ helps God out of that dilemma. These are man's devices to perplex the pure, plain gospel of the Saviour. When I call to mind the themes of truth which alone fill the teachings of Christ; when I con- sider how large and profound and awful those themes are, embracing all that covers the experience and the destiny of a race, — I am amazed to mark with what simplicity they are presented to us in the gospel. While men were waiting on the lips of the great Teacher, as if for something that should startle or surprise them, they found that he had spoken his word, and passed on ; leaving them to find, in its sim- plicity, directness, and self-interpreting wisdom, more abounding and original power than has ever been found in the deepest and most intricate problems of the world's highest philosophy. sº And what to us is the substance of that new truth by which Christ has given his name to our religion ? It is found in that one great doctrine of his gospel,— Reconciliation. The highest and most comprehen- sive of all the titles of Christ is the Mediator. That title defines the most of his offices, interprets the objects of his mission, and expresses the method in which he fulfils it. He came to reconcile man to God, and earth to heaven. All the new truth dis- closed by his gospel is comprehended under his office 23 of a Mediator, and his object of insuring an atone- pment or a reconciliation. We accord with the whole Christian church, in all ages, in making that great word, that high and sacred office of the Saviour, to express the new thing in the gospel. In defining the method of that reconciliation, we may differ fun- damentally, or it may be more in terms than in reality, from other Christians; and we leave to the slow but sure decision of truth the issue between us. But we insist, with all the earnestness of sincere conviction, that the new blessing in the gospel to us is its dis- closure of the possibility and the method of our per- fect reconciliation to God; a way for every prodigal, if repentant, to return to the Father's house, welcome and forgiven; a way for every human heart, under its private burdens, to find peace and joy in believing in God. To this great original doctrine of Christ, — original in its design and in all its means, – the heart of man, in all the climes of the earth, has already responded; and those who have not known of it on the earth may find in it the first, if not the most sublime, of the revelations which heaven shall disclose to their spirits. A way to God; a way whose dark- ness should be brightened by light shining over it; a way through which we may carry the burdens we cannot lay aside; a way in which sinners may walk, guided by One who is so holy that he may keep them company unharmed, and so benignant that their hearts will not mock them while with him, - this 24 Way, this Light, this Guide, is furnished to the human race by Christ, the Reconciler. He took not that office upon himself; for he received it from God. Therefore to God in Christ we render the homage of reconciled hearts. But Christ fulfilled the office with a meekness and a love which have identified his name with its method, and have gathered around him, and centred in him, the reverent affec- tions, the glowing, yearning emotions, of his disciples. Therefore is he loved as he asked to be loved; while God, as he enjoined, is adored. Were it essential to the general topic of my dis- course, I might proceed to make this reconciling office of Christ the key to the interpretation of his whole gospel. I believe it is the key to his whole gospel. God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself. This, to every Christian heart in every Christian age, is the power and value of the gospel. As the medium for communicating that divine method of redemption to the world; as the new doctrine, which completes all that was true, and corrects all that was false, in the old religion, — Christ has won the right of giving his name to the faith which claims dominion over the earth. He thus becomes the Messiah of the everlasting gospel. His is the only name under heaven given among men whereby we can be saved. The same precious doctrine, original with Christ, and made dependent upon his agency for its practical 25 efficacy, as it is the basis of his right to give his name to the religion of the world, is also the ground of his claim to the personal affection of each disciple. The gospel lives and throbs with the sympathy of the Saviour; and so we sometimes forget his official agency from God, through force of the tenderness of that relation into which he put himself with man. We are arrested in our impulse to worship him by his own appeal to us, that we come nearer to him than to one whom we may worship. We should be prompted to pray to him, had he not said that he would pray for us. He would have hidden from us the Father, and have substituted himself as the highest object of our trust, if he had not taken with us the form and bur- den of humanity, and been glorified through humilia- tion. The epithet “Christian” was first attached to the disciples as a reproach ; but no disciple ever refused to bear it. The affection that had been quickened in the believing heart had already established that per- sonal relation with Christ which had written his name on the breast of each disciple; so that, from the first, the epithet could not sound strangely to the ear. If the new era which had opened upon the world was to bear his name, and the faith which was to traverse its islands and continents was to assume the title of “Christianity,” disciples in every age would answer to it, because it was to them a term of living affection and personal relationship. * Yet disciples, who have claimed, and gloried in, 4 26 that title for themselves, have sometimes denied it to their brethren ; not because Christian love was lack- ing in their hearts, nor because Christian motive was absent from their lives, but because their minds wrought out different conceptions and definitions for a creed. Hence, though Christ is not divided, his disciples are divided. But they are his disciples still; and if their divisions, which alienate them from each other, may yet leave them united to him, the object of their common trust and love can alone harmonize their differences. Purified affection for him can alone reconcile his disciples. Of those who now fill these seats, and who have listened so courteously to my words, it is to be inferred that only a very few are in sympathy — that is, in entire sympathy — with this occasion. You must pardon the acknowledgment, when I say, that it is sometimes with a smile of amazed incredulity, rather than with vexation or temper, that the class of Chris- tians for whom this temple is designed hear their peculiar views represented by others. Henceforward, this house of Christian worship is to offer a place of prayer and religious instruction to those whom it may aid in making known to them the truth of God, as revealed by Jesus Christ. It rises amid these fair and fertile scenes, at the confluence of these noble rivers, as they wind between these rolling hills and valleys. There may be those, who have worshipped elsewhere, who will prefer the mode in which divine . 27 truth is dispensed here. There may be those — I am told there are many such here, as in our great Eastern cities — who claim membership with no existing religious society, and who may find in this church helps to Christian piety. May this church be a peaceful, if not a cherished, object among you all ! and never may contention and passion lead any of you to regret that it has been reared But I must address myself now to those who wel- come it in hope and joy. What, then, to you, my friends, – to you who are to worship in this temple, – what is the significance of this dedication-service? A personal reference, if restricted within the terms of delicacy and propriety, will not be denied me, as a means of fixing your thoughts. A beautiful and well-furnished Christian church stands completed here, as the crown of a long-cherished purpose in the heart of one man, – your fellow-citizen. He whose home in infancy and youth was beyond the mountain-chains east of us, amid the more rugged scenes of New England, coming to this pleasant and fertile valley nearly half a cen- tury ago, brought with him a form of Christian faith, which, if it may not boast of a popular prevalence, has many tokens in proof of its power over earnest and intelligent and liberal men. Even then it was the purpose of his heart, that near to his own home, if God should lengthen his days, there should rise a place of public worship whose services should be con- 28 genial with his own assured views. With no exclu- sive, no narrow absorption in these views, he has held them as becomes a man conscientious, and fully per- suaded in his own mind. Worshipping for long years with those, some of whose doctrinal views were to his convictions very erroneous and inadequate as an inter- pretation of the gospel, while his faith to them was alarming heresy, he has lived upon his own generous hope. Whether you and he have lived together in peace, and, in other respects, in kind, neighborly, and Christian sympathy, is known to you better than to me. I trust there is no one here, or around him, who will begrudge him the satisfactions of this hour and scene, when, amid the glories of this fair season, beneath these skies of early summer, brightening the green carpet of the teeming earth, he lights the altar of his vows, and invokes the blessing of God to descend and rest upon it. To the God of his youth and age he consecrates the offering, in gratitude for the prosperity which Heaven has granted him, in hope that it will be to him a heart-solace, as the shadows of life's descending way are reminding him of the evening that approaches. You have listened to the deed of gift by which he surrenders what was till to-day a piece of private pro- perty to holy uses. You heard the sole condition attached to the perpetuity of the trust, — “That God should be worshipped here in Unity, and not in Trinity.” It may seem a strange and presumptuous 29 thing to make the uses of an earthly structure of brick and stone dependent upon the recognition of the simplicity, rather than the complexity, of a view of the Divine Nature. But the condition is only a sym- bol, expressive of and recognizing other conditions, which, long before that instrument was drawn, other instruments, not one whit more authoritative than that, had attached to religious structures and pious gifts, and, what is more, to terms of Christian com- munion. Our friend has but followed an example which usage has familiarized, even if the fullest appro- bation of our hearts would lead us to prefer that Christians might henceforward forego it. The marble tablet on the tower proclaims the same peculiarity of the faith to which this church is to be devoted. Yet not even those of us who have come from a far dis- tance to greet it and to rejoice over it would regret the day, should it come before another year begins, in which that condition might be antiquated and forgot- ten by the disuse of the metaphysical term to which it is opposed. f Thank God, that what is peculiar in our faith may tend to the enlargement of our charity; that, if we break down the barriers raised by men, it is to extend the blessings of the covenant of God! Yet we are by no means indifferent to what we hold to be the higher warrant of our peculiar views from Scripture, or to the fuller satisfaction which they afford for reason, thought, and inquiry. I will offer you no creed. 30 We have never felt the need of what some of you regard as essential in the shape of a creed, because we can get along for ourselves without one, and do not ex- pect to win converts through such an instrumentality. Some may ask, how, being so small a minority in the church of Christ, with so slender a popular sym- pathy engaged on our side, and repudiated as here- tics by those who profess to speak, perhaps without warrant, for the great mass of believers, – how we can possibly have courage and faith to hold our posi- tion. We answer, that our views themselves, and the way in which we cherish them, and their historical testimonies, and the sort of persons who have received them, and the fruits of them, are to us abundant and cheering sources of confidence. Of course, we believe that these views, and no others, were taught by Christ, and by his apostles; that upon them the foundations of the Christian church were laid; and that by them the gospel won its first splendid and impressive triumphs for two centuries. Then we begin to trace, in ecclesi- astical history, the incomings, through philosophy and speculation, of the elements of corruption. Abana and Pharpar, old heathen streams, were again brought into offensive comparison with the Jordan. The naked simplicity of Christian truth, its freedom from all teasing problems, led men to complicate it with metaphysics. They preferred a winding, labyrinthian way, to a straight, direct, and open access to God. Christianity became an intricate system. Then it 31 was overlaid with ritual and hierarchical inventions; then it was wrought in with scholastic dialectics. For ages these complicating processes were in action; for centuries they have been yielding to the protests which have followed the exposure of them. Necessa- rily slow has been the work of restoration. Every step of the backward search for the primitive gospel has reproduced and authenticated the views which we cherish. I say not that we have the whole of truth. God forbid the bigoted assumption of such a boast ! I say not that we have the glow and fervor and zeal which ought to characterize a fellowship that claims to have learned the mind of Christ. We feel our deficiencies. We have need of something. When I ask, What? I am inclined more and more to answer, that we need a more devotional, tender, and trustful sense of dependence on Christ, — to feel that the roots of our spiritual growth are planted in him, and that we draw all the sustaining vigor of faith and piety from his mediatorial office between us and God. We have been reviewing the grounds on which he has claimed to turn religion into Christianity. And of this we may be sure, that, the more we feel that our whole being is penetrated by the power of the divine truth and the divine love of Christ, the more will all that we hold as religion, all that we believe and cherish and revere and hope, receive its sweetest and strongest assurance to our hearts, through the sense of a personal relation between us and Christ. 32 The significance of this dedication-service to you, my friends, then is, that it gives to you a temple where you may enjoy the worship of God, through Christ, in a way which shall engage all your religious sympathies. It seems to me that there is committed to what is generally understood as the Unitarian view of Christianity, the serious responsibility of standing and mediating between a discredited theory of the gospel, and that blank and dreary unbelief which has spread its gloom over so many unsettled minds. I say, a discredited view of the gospel; and I mean by that the view which is generally known as Orthodoxy. I call it discredited, not in any harsh, wounding, or opprobrious sense, but in a sense which one may vindicate without rousing any acrimony of feeling; for I, for one, would not have this occasion, so pro- pitious and hopeful to one class of Christians, to be connected with any thing imbittering to any disciple of Christ of any name. When, therefore, I say that Orthodoxy is discredited, and attempt to maintain the assertion, I hope to speak without offence, though it may be with earnestness. I pronounce Orthodoxy, as a technical system, to be discredited, when it is tried by any legitimate test, — that of Scripture authority, which fails to give it a clear and indubita- ble warrant; that of biblical criticism, which steadily and triumphantly demonstrates the errors and incon- sistencies of Orthodoxy; that of a simple and childlike trial of the spirit of the gospel as glad tidings from a 33 God of love to sinful and dying men, the terms of which are not filled out by that gloomy and partial system. And, again, Orthodoxy stands discredited by the failing loyalty of many of the foremost among its supposed disciples, who have undermined its foun- dations, and made its elaborate structure to topple. And yet, once more, Orthodoxy is discredited by its lack of practical power to hold its own ground, and to advance its work as the wisdom and power of God. I grant the utmost that can be claimed for its authority, vigor, and success. I am no careless, no jealous observer of its policy, its zeal, or its fruits. The devout and amiable and pious souls whom it engages in its sacred vows and labors have the un- grudged, the approving homage of my heart. But still I hold that the peculiar and characteristic sub- stance of Orthodoxy has been discredited in the sight of the world. No Christian man is satisfied with what has been accomplished by the gospel. And among the questions and explanations which will arise must be this: Has the gospel itself— the whole, the pure, the simple gospel — been ever fairly tried, put to the test, offered to the world in all the vigor of its truth, love, energy, zeal, devotion, and confidence? It is the power of God. Has the world so felt, and answered to it ! Every form of oppression — that of mind, that of soul, that of body — has found en- couragement under the popular corruptions through which this gospel has been preached. There is no 5 34 message of this gospel which excites such dread in Christendom, even at this day, as the full proclama- tion of its own great doctrine of freedom, in mind, soul, and body. Love is another of its messages, and peace is yet another, and integrity is yet another. Are these, its messages, put foremost 7 Do all the towering and complicated organizations of the church take these gospel truths under their earnest and powerful patronage 7 No: the word of God has been bound. The truth as it is in Jesus has been corrupted. The power of the gospel has been sadly impaired; and we all look in each other's faces, and wonder why it is that we have so precious and beautiful and true a religion as we read it in a book, and so cold and dead a religion, so palsied and so powerless a religion, presenting itself before us in the world. Is it the gospel of Christ still' or is it an inadequate and corrupt interpretation of it by man 7 That gospel is the wisdom of God and the power of God. Let no one be held as an enemy by its disci- ples who acknowledges its shortcomings, and insists, in the strongest terms which a kind spirit will allow, that the blame of these shortcomings is with man, and with man alone. And here let all sectarian strifes, all party criti- cisms and recriminations, yield to the confession from every heart, that we have held this treasure not only in earthen vessels, but also, and far worse, with a faithless stewardship. When, in the rescued hours 35 of calm and devout meditation, we read the life and the lessons of Christ, we all of us know what is meant by the familiar assertion, that there is a sweet and gracious power, a fragrance and essence of piety, in those holy sentences, which neither com- ment nor exposition, neither hymn nor prayer, nor essay nor sermon, has yet drawn forth, as the throbs of the heart secretly dictate it. That hidden, that holy, that untried power which still lives in the gospel, is the hope of ages yet to come. All our poor strifes and variances about the substance of the gospel may stand relieved of all that we regret in them, if we can feel that what we call our various expositions of it carry us, with each other's help, more deeply down towards its springs. To that high service may this temple offer some humble help ! May faith minister at its altar, and Christian truth be taught from its pulpit ! May its organ swell the notes of true devotion l and, at its sacramental table, may the love of Christ constrain all who there remember him ' A P P E N D I X. THE following description of the Unitarian Church in Marietta, Ohio, is copied from the columns of a newspaper published in that city, under date of May 16, 1857 : — “This church, erected by the liberality of a single individual, - NAHUM WARD, Esq., - is now very nearly completed; and the dedication will take place on the 4th proximo. It is by far the handsomest public building of which Marietta can boast. The style of architecture is strictly Gothic, and in perfect keeping within and without. It is eighty feet long by fifty wide, and thirty-three feet to the eaves. One corner is surmounted by a finely proportioned tower, eighty-five feet high. Heavy buttresses adorn and support the walls on all sides, having stone offsets and pinnacles. The window caps and sills, and the cornice, are of cast-iron. In the front end is a large window of richly stained glass, made by H. Burgund, of Cincinnati: the other windows are of plain but double-thickness Wheeling glass, of large size. A plain, neat, wrought-iron fence, supported on a stone foundation, encloses the building on two sides. The main entrance is on Third Street: there is also an entrance from Putnam Street, through the tower. The graceful proportions of this church, and the taste and beauty of its adornings, make it a positive delight to the eye, which it never wearies. “The audience-room is twenty-eight feet high, with panel ceil- ing, painted blue, and heavy pendants grained in imitation of oak. There is a small gallery in the front end, between the tower and false tower, twelve feet deep by twenty long. In the opposite end are three arches, within the central and larger one of which stands 38 the pulpit or desk. In the one on the right hand stands a very fine organ, made by George Jardine and Son, of New York. The arch on the left side is filled with a screen, corresponding in style with the organ, and containing the Decalogue, and selections from Scripture, in the mediaeval style of illuminated lettering. The screen is done in the very highest style of this beautiful art, and displays rare talent both in the design and the execution. It must be seen to be at all appreciated. This was also made under the superintendence of Messrs. Jardine and Son. Behind the screen, and entirely concealed from view, is a stairway, leading from the desk to the pastor's study in the basement. The wall in the rear of the desk is relieved by a large painting, representing our Saviour on Mount Olivet foretelling the destruction of Jeru- salem. (Mark xiii.) “The aisles, pulpit, and slips are all handsomely carpeted; and the latter are uniformly cushioned. There are eighty-four slips, which will seat about six hundred persons. The choir will occupy 'seats immediately in front of the organ. “There is a basement under the whole building, divided into four rooms, – one large one for lecture-room and sabbath school, one for Bible class, one for pastor's study, and the other for the furnace, &c. The building is heated by hot air from a furnace of William Resor's patent, of Cincinnati. It appears to be admirably arranged, the supply of cold air being derived fresh and pure from the outside of the building. The bell is from the celebrated foundery of Meneeley and Sons, West Troy, N.Y.; weighs eleven hundred pounds; and, of course, has a rich, fine tone. “The building was commenced in the summer of 1855. The workmanship throughout will compare favorably with that on the finest of city churches; and it reflects the highest credit on the mechanics of our city. “In closing this notice, we should commit an injustice did we fail to award due credit to WILLIAM S. WARD, son of NAHUM WARD, under whose personal superintendence the building was erected. The fine taste, nice discrimination, and good judgment, of the Messrs. WARD, are everywhere seen, – in the plan of the building, in the internal arrangements, in the ornamenting and the adorning, and in the surroundings.” 39 At the commencement of the Exercises of the Dedica- tion of the Church on June 4, 1857, the Hon. NAHUM WARD appeared in front of the pulpit, and, addressing the Rev. S. K. LOTHROP, D.D., President of the American Unitarian Association, put into his hands the Instrument conveying the property to the administration of Trustees, and requested that it might be read. After a few appro- priate remarks in reply, Dr. LOTHROP presented the Deed to the Rev. H. A. MILES, D.D., Secretary of the Association, who proceeded to read it as follows : — “KNow ALL MEN, That I, NAHUM WARD, of Marietta, Washing- ton County, Ohio, in consideration of my faith in the Unity of God, as revealed in the gospel of his Son Jesus Christ, and of one dollar, to me paid by NAHUM WARD, WILLIAM. S. WARD, and THOMAs C. H. SMITH, Trustees of the “First Unitarian Society in Ma- rietta,” the receipt whereof is hereby acknowledged, do give, grant, and convey unto the said Trustees, and their successors in office, in trust for said Society, sixty-five (65) feet from the north-westerly end of city lot No. six hundred eighty-six (686), in square No. fifty (50), in the city of Marietta, Washington County, Ohio, -being sixty-five (65) feet on Third Street, and the full width of the lot on Putnam Street, — together with the church situate thereon, and the organ, bell, and church-furniture therein, with all the privileges and appurtenances thereto belonging : — “To have and to hold the same to the said Trustees, and their successors in office, in trust as aforesaid, so long as said Society shall exist, and worship God in Unity, and not in Trinity, and as set forth in the articles of association adopted by said Society, Feb. 3, A.D. 1855; but, if otherwise, the estate, real and personal, herein conveyed to said Trustees, in trust for said Society, shall revert, and be vested in my heirs and their heirs for ever, and this convey- ance be void and of no effect. “And I, HARRIET D. WARD, wife of said NAHUM WARD, for the consideration before named, do demise, release, and quit-claim unto the said Trustees and their successors in office, in trust as aforesaid, all my right and title of dower in the above-described premises. 40 “In testimony whereof, the said NAHUM WARD and HARRIET D. WARD have hereunto set their hands and seals, this fourth day of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven. “NAHUM WARD. [L.s.] HARRIET D. WARD. [L.s.] “Signed, sealed, and delivered in presence of “LUTHER TEMPLE, STEPHEN NEWTON. “THE STATE OF OHIO, WASHINGTON COUNTY, ss. – On this fourth day of June, A.D. 1857, personally appeared before the undersigned the above-named NAHUM WARD and HARRIET D. WARD, grantors in the above conveyance, and acknowledged the signing and sealing of the same to be their voluntary act and deed. And the said HARRIET D. being at the same time examined by me separate and apart from her said husband, and the contents of said instrument made known to her by me, she then declared that she did voluntarily sign, seal, and acknowledge the same ; and that she was still satisfied there with. “In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and seal of office, the day and year last above named. “STEPHEN NEWTON, [NOTARIAL SEAL.] “Notary Public, W. Co.” The Articles of Association referred to in the foregoing instrument will be found in connection with the following appeal, and the proceedings under it : — For the “Intelligencer.” To the Friends of Unitarian Christianity in Marietta and Vicinity. The day has arrived when I think an attempt should be made to form and organize a Unitarian, liberal, rational, religious society in this place, for the worship of God in Unity, and not in Trinity, in accordance with the plain, unmystified letter of the Bible. I shall ſ 41 be most happy to meet such Christian friends at the court-room of the Court House, on Saturday next, Feb. 3, at seven o’clock, P.M., that we may exchange Christian views of our duty to God and man, and then and there agree, if we can, upon our future course. (Signed) NAHUM WARD. JAN. 30, 1855. In accordance with the above notice, published in the Marietta. “Intelligencer,” a few friends assembled at the ap- pointed hour, and were addressed by Mr. WARD, in regard to the object of the meeting; after which he submitted the following, as the basis of organization for a Society: — “We the undersigned, citizéns of Marietta and vicinity, in the county of Washington and State of Ohio, disbelieving in the Triune nature of God, – not on account of any mystery connected with the doctrine, but because it is entirely destitute of proof from nature, reason, experience, or Scripture, — and in all those commonly de- fended views of the principles and results of the divine government which appear to us to involve a vindictive character; in the cur- rent dogma of the total depravity and helplessness of human nature; in the Deity of the ‘holy child Jesus; in the arbitrary election of some to eternal bliss, and condemnation of others to eter- nal torture; and in the resurrection of the fleshly body at any future day of judgment: but, on the other hand, - “Believing in the Unity, and in the paternal character and mer- ciful government, of God; in man's natural capacity of virtue, and liability to sin; in the supernatural authority of Jesus Christ, as a teacher sent from God; in his divine mission as a Redeemer; in his moral perfection as an Example ; in the remedial as well as retributive office and intention of the divine punishments; in the soul’s immediate ascension, on release from the body, to its account and reward; and that salvation rests, not on Superficial observance of rites, or on intellectual assent to creeds, or on any arbitrary decree, but, under the grace of God, on the rightness of the ruling affection, on humble faithfulness of life, and integral goodness of character; — 42 “Overlooking all minor differences, sinking all alienating con- troversies, in the generous and conciliatory spirit that becomes us best, that we may go forth and live the Christian life, – not as a form, but a principle, – with a warmer philanthropy, a holier con- secration, a deeper piety, a more united front, than we have yet shown; in the fear and affection of God, in the faith and love of Christ, — *. “Do form and organize ourselves, and such persons as may hereafter unite with us, into a church and society, to be known and called the ‘First Unitarian Society in Marietta; " and rejoice and be- lieve in God, as our Father, who is ‘in Christ, reconciling the world to himself;” in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, as our Redeemer, and who is to us ‘the way, the truth, and the life; in the Holy Spirit, proceeding from the Father, as our Comforter and Guide; and in the Bible, as our only creed and authority in belief.” The foregoing basis of organization being then signed by three persons, NAHUM WARD, Esq., was elected Chairman ; and JOHN C. McCoy, jun., Secretary. The following By-laws were then adopted for the govern- ment of the affairs of the Society : — “1. The affairs of the “First Unitarian Society in Marietta’ shall be managed by a Board of three Trustees, to be elected by the subscribers to said Society; and a Treasurer, to be elected as hereinafter provided. “2. The duty of the Trustees shall be to take charge of any property placed in their hands for the benefit of said Society, and employ a teacher of divine truth from time to time, as the Society may request and approve. Said Trustees shall keep a record of all their proceedings in a book, to be kept by them for the purpose. “3. The Trustees shall elect one of their number as Treasurer of said Society, who shall have charge of all the funds, and pay all joint-orders of the Trustees, out of any funds in his hands belonging to the Society, not otherwise appropriated. “4. The Treasurer shall, on the first Monday in March annually, render to the Trustees a statement, in writing, of the Society’s funds 43 in his hands, and of his receipts and disbursements during the per- vious year, with the vouchers therefor. “5. The Trustees shall, on the second Monday in March annually, render to the Society a true and faithful account, in writing, of all property and funds belonging to the Society, - said reports to be recorded in the records of the Society; and the records shall always be open to inspection by any member of the Society. “6. The Trustees and Treasurer shall be accountable to the Society for the faithful performance of the trusts, so as aforesaid reposed in them ; and any vacancy occurring in the Trustees shall be filled by the other Trustees, from subscribers to this Society. “7. Such further By-laws, not conflicting with the Articles of Association and the foregoing By-laws, may be made from time to time, as subscribers to this Society may deem expedient.” Whereupon, in accordance with the first By-law, NAHUM WARD, WILLIAM. S. WARD, and JoHN C. McCoy, jun., were elected Trustees; and the meeting adjourned sine die. NAHUM WARD, Chairman. J. C. McCOY, JUN., Secretary. June 1, 1856, WILLIAM. S. WARD was elected Treasurer. April 6, 1857, THOMAS C. H. SMITH was elected a Trustee, to fill the vacancy occasioned by the death of JoBN C. McCoy, jun. who died in Tampa, Florida, Feb. 28, 1857. The first stone of the Unitarian Church, erected at the expense of NAHUM WARD, Esq., was laid July 2, 1855. DEDICATED June 4, 1857. (Ørürt of (Éttrtists, I. P. R. E S E N T ATION OF D E E D. *=º II. SENTENCE. “But in the last days it shall come to pass.” III. IN WOCATION. BY DR. BURNAP, OF BALTIMORE. IV. READING FROM SCRIPTURE. BY DR. BURNAP, OF BALTIMORE. V. HY M. N. “Oh 1 bow thine ear, Eternal Ome.” VI. SERMON. BY REV. GEORGE E. ELLIS, CHARLESTOWN, MASS. VII. PRAYER OF DEDICATION. BY REv. D.R. LOTHROP, BOSTON. VIII. H. Y. M. N. “O Thow whose own vast temple stands ! ” IX. CLOSING PRAYER. BY R. E. W. D. R. MILES, O F B O STO N. x. BENEßICTION. &ºm===mºms XI. ANTHEM. “How beautiful upon the mountains !” XII. ADMINISTRATION OF THE LORD'S SUPPER. The Atlantic Telegraph: D IS CO U R S E D E L I V E R E D IN T H E F I R S T C H U R C H, August 8, 1858. - BY EZ RA S. GANNETT. *mºmº-º-º-º-º: }}ltblisjet by Request. - BOSTON: CROSBY, NICHOLS, AND COMPANY, i 117, WASHINGTON STREET. 1858. Qſìje 3tlantic (Iſtlegraph: D IS C. O U R S E D E LIVE RED IN T H E F I R S T C H U R C H, AUGUST 8, 1858. B Y E Z R. A. S. G A N N E T T. *s-º-º-º-º-º-º-º- 33ttblisbet by 33 equest, BOST ON : CROSBY, NICHOLS, AND COMPANY., 117, WASHINGTON STREET. 1858. The intelligence that the ATLANTIC TELEGRAPH CABLE had been successfully laid was received in Boston, on Thursday, Aug. 5, 1858. The following Discourse was delivered, on the next succeeding Sabbath, to the members of the Federal-street Church and the First Church, assembled in the First Church, Chauncy Street, — the two Societies having united, for public worship, during the temporary closing of the Federal-street Church. The Discourse is printed at the request of both Societies. B O STO N : PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SON, 22, School, STREET. THE ATLANTIC TELEGRAPH. JoB xxxviii. 35: CANST THOU SEND LIGHTNINGs, THAT THEY MAY GO AND sAY UNTO THEE, HERE we ARE 2 THE surprise, hesitation, doubt, the belief, delight, enthu- siasm, with which the intelligence that has been a principal subject of conversation the last two days, was received in our city, are a sufficient evidence of the interest taken in an enterprise, the practicability of which could be proved only by its success. That it has been attended with full success, is by no means clear; but so much has been accomplished, that ultimate failure may be pronounced impossible. Diffi- culties may remain to be overcome, before the submarine bond of union between two hemispheres can be used for the purposes of business and friendship, and unforeseen dis- aster may afterwards cause a suspension of the intercourse that shall have been established; but skill and patience must prevail at last. We are justified in considering the question virtually settled, whether the greatest discovery of this age can be put to the test of practical advantage on the grandest scale. 4 And a grand result it is, to be realized or anticipated, that the thought of man can travel through three thousand miles of space, with the rapidity of the lightning, and human hearts can use the bed of the ocean for the swift exchange of their sympathies. It cannot be a trivial event, at the annunciation of which worldly men broke forth into clamor- ous joy, and devout men bent their heads in grateful thanks- giving. It is not an improper subject to engage our minds on this day and in this place, since we regard it as the assu- rance of a series of benefits, whose extent and magnitude are beyond our power of computation. A new channel of bless- ing has been opened for the world. Is not this a suitable occasion for recognizing the providence and the goodness of God? Through a most unfortunate association of religion with the dark, rather than the bright aspects of life, any event which causes mourning is accepted as a fit theme for the pulpit, while the joyous side of experience is kept for the street and the domestic circle. What must be the con- sequence of invoking religion to add a deeper solemnity to whatever is sad, while our glad emotions are treated as unworthy to be brought into the house of worship, but to implant false views of the providence of God, and to restrict the domain of faith ? Why should death be more sacred than life : Why should the accident, as we term it, — the result probably of human negligence, — by which a thrill of horror is sent through the land, be made the occasion of ad- dress, appeal or warning in numberless discourses, but the achievement by which the community is thrown into a trans- port of delight, — the fruit of a wise use of the Divine laws, — be held as too secular for the purposes of Christian instruction ? Away with this ungenial superstition | God 5 made us to be glad, and we do not profane his temple when we bring our gladness within its walls. “Oh, that men would praise the Lord for his goodness and for his wonder- ful works to the children of men. Let them exalt him also in the congregation of the people, and praise him in the assembly of the elders.” The completion of the work in regard to which there has been so much room for incredulity, is suited to awaken our religious feelings, not only through its connection with the Providence that includes all efforts and all results, but in view of the illustration it affords of the mysterious yet bene- ficent method which that Providence observes in its care of the world. Wonderful as are the agencies of which the Atlantic Telegraph may be taken as the consummation, they are only the product of human skill availing itself of means which the Almighty had prepared for its use from the begin- ning of the creation. The science which has laid hold on one of the most subtile elements in nature, and bound it in perpetual service; the art which has constructed the bonds of its captivity, the materials which have been woven to be at once its chain and its pathway; the depths of the sea, which for the first time in the history of our race have been made subservient to the uses of humanity; the electric fluid with which continents will hold communication through future ages; and the mind of man, which has called science and art to the task of combining the palpable, the invisible, and the intangible, into a means of helping the world to reach its goal, - all these, and that final destiny to which the world is brought so much nearer by this means, existed from the first in the prolific thought of God. Delighted and astonished as we are, we see nothing here which the 6 Eternal Mind did not foresee and arrange when He laid the foundations of the earth. The labor and ingenuity of man have accomplished no more than was intended. And it has been accomplished at the intended moment. Of all and each of the great agencies for human good, who can doubt, that they come “in the fulness of time ’’’ By all his inventions man adds only new forms to the universe. Sub- stance and ability are from the Uncreated One. The fabrics which man fashions into the garments of his thought, are furnished by Him who made all things. Nor do any of his inventions anticipate the Divine wisdom. From the simple raft to the steam-ship with its complete equipment, from the alphabet to the printing-press, from the lowest point of savage ignorance to the highest reach of scientific inquiry, every stage and step of improvement has but helped to ful- fil and unfold the design of the world’s Author. Beautiful and instructive is this evolution of the eternal scheme, through the energies which now want, and now opportunity, excites to action. The connection of the Old World with the New in the middle of the nineteenth century is as strictly providential, as was the discovery of America at the close of the fifteenth, or the arrival of a body of Christian emigrants on these shores near the beginning of the seventeenth. Marvellous and gracious is the providence beneath which the generations work out their unforced, yet predetermined history. The properties of matter and the laws of the physical universe were the same before Morse, Franklin, or Newton studied them, before chemistry had a pupil, or astro- nomy a name, that they are now. Nothing is new with God; nothing original with man. When the intelligence came for which we had been waiting with more of despair than of 7 hope, our faith in God received confirmation, and piety felt itself strengthened for its conquest over wickedness. To God be the glory ! And yet man is exalted by the success which has crowned his undertaking. How forcibly are we reminded of the command given to him who was created “in the image of God,” that he should “subdue * all sublunary things to his own will. What an example of man’s power over nature does this achievement present Space and force offer no hindrance to the execution of his wish. Neither the breadth nor the depth of the ocean is an insuperable barrier to the realization of his idea. The imprac- ticable becomes unknown to effort, the impossible disappears from the horizon of hope. It was but as yesterday, when the question of four thousand years ago might have been repeated in scornful rebuke of man’s presumption, — “Canst thou send lightnings, that they may go and say unto thee, Here we are l’” That question can now be answered with an affirmation so literal that the accuracy of its terms almost startles us. Yes; the invisible, imponderable substance, force, whatever it be — we do not even certainly know what it is which we are dealing with, – the swift-winged messen- ger of destruction, the vital energy of the material creation, is brought under our control, to do our errands, like any menial, nay, like a very slave. Who shall now describe the circle within which human ability must confine itself? In neither height nor depth, in neither the seen nor the unseen, in neither the forms nor the elements which compose the universe, neither in that which terrifies the barbarian nor in that which perplexes the philosopher, do we recognize a limit to our subjugation of nature. What an amount of proof has the last quarter of a century furnished, that man 8 was made to rule the earth Not by force, nor by cunning; but by honestly and patiently gained acquaintance with the constitution of the world in which he lives. Science is the arm which he stretches out, and the hand with which he seizes on the mysteries that lie around him. The conqueror now is not he who leads armies to the battle-field, but he who by calculation and experiment widens the domain of know- ledge. The student and the engineer, in our age, win a success that shames the victories of Napoleon. What can stand before the determination of modern science : What can baffle its keen-eyed and persistent scrutiny Nor is it unworthy of notice, that the spoils which science now brings home from the fields on which it clothes itself with glory are laid at the feet of utility. The day of speculative inquiry is past. The acquisitions of the scholars who penetrate the recesses of nature, where they find richer treasures than the cities of India or the streams of California yield to their invaders, are freely offered to the world’s use. Mind asserts its superiority over matter, not in a spirit of self-admiration, but for the sake of enriching life. Our scholars are the true philanthropists of the age. We have an example of the jus- tice of this remark, in the enterprise which has determined the present direction of our thoughts. Its success is due to a union of the most acute scientific investigation, with careful and ingenious mechanical labor; both drawn to the work, not by an empty ambition nor by the hope of pecuniary reward, but by a desire to serve the practical interests of the two countries immediately concerned — the people, let us observe, and not simply nor chiefly the governments of those countries, – and through them of mankind. It is a noble tribute to the utilitarian spirit of the age, the spirit which 9 requires knowledge to justify itself by promoting the general good. . It is not without its significance, that the scene of the two grandest exhibitions of the benefit which may result from a combination of scientific principle with mechanic art is the ocean, that part of the earth, which, less than the solid land, less even than the atmosphere, might seem to be within the domain of man. The most perfect display of his inventive and practical genius is a ship, bearing in its form the massive strength with the graceful proportions which attest the right of naval architecture to be considered one of the fine arts, while in the forest of beauty over which the eye wanders, from the solid trunk of the mast to the feathery lightness of the topmast rigging, it rivals the sculptured elegance of the Co- rinthian temple or the Gothic cathedral. Behold this marvel of man’s production, whose weight, whose dimensions, whose capacity seem to entitle it to be called the monster of the deep, which yet sits with such a queenlike dignity upon the waves that we imagine them to be proud of their burthen; the home of a thousand men, who find comfort and luxury in its internal arrangements; the witness of a city’s wealth, the champion of a nation's honor, a proof of the world’s advancement; see this almost living creation of man’s brain and hand, careering over the Atlantic with an air of con- scious sovereignty. It is a spectacle that may well fill the heart of man with admiration of the place which he holds among the works of God; the ocean his highway, and the winds his ministers. But now from the ocean’s surface, sprinkled all over with the evidences of its submission to man’s purposes, look down through miles of liquid distance to its bed, and there see the last result of human toil, stretch- 2 10 ing its immense length across that bed, which never before since the earth was made had yielded a single foot to man’s use, but now is doomed to own his dominion through the centuries of the world’s future history, as the loves and fears of human hearts shall rush over its subject spaces. Tell me, my friends, where you will find more signal proof of man’s greatness, than in these two examples of the ocean's subserviency to his convenience. Still it would be a small recompense of the time and labor and anxiety that have been expended in perfecting this last expression of man’s inventive thought, if it only supplied fuel to his self-love, or even gave him a higher estimation of his own capacities. The temper of the times, I have said, is essentially practical, as the history of this enterprise may show. Though necessarily conducted by scientific men, it originated in a conviction of the commercial and political advantages it would yield, and was sustained through its expensive period of preparation by those in private life and in public office, who were looking at its effects on social and national interests. The enthusiasm with which the news of its completion was received, arose from a deeper source than the joy we always feel when anxiety is displaced by an assu- rance of success. The mind at once caught a glimpse of its distant as well as its immediate consequences, – its connec- tion with social progress, the world’s civilization, and the unity of mankind. And now, when we lay our sacrifice of praise on the altar of God, we think of the benefits which will flow from this triumph over difficulty and disappoint- ment. To enumerate those benefits would be an office which prophecy alone could undertake. The good contained in the future is wisely concealed from us, as well as the evil. No 11 one can tell what changes in the relations of the two portions of the civilized world to one another, and through them in the relations of all the countries of the earth, may follow upon the establishment of instantaneous communication be- tween the two continents. We may draw a lesson from the fact, that remarkable inventions or discoveries have generally produced effects very different from those which were antici- pated, when they first came into use ; what then seemed to be merely incidental or insignificant becoming the most valuable, while the results which were fondly contemplated have sunk into subordinate importance. It is not, therefore, an indication of wisdom, to speculate with much confidence, on the fruits of any enterprise at its commencement. The innocent author of the slave-trade had as little foresight of the evils which he was introducing, as the constructer of the first steam-vessel of the benefits which he was conferring on the world. Some conception, however, may be formed of the bearings of telegraphic intercourse between the Eastern and Western Continents on the interests of humanity. Its final influence on mercantile affairs as no one can predict, so its immediate effect only they who are familiar with the de- tails of trade can describe. It is plain that the transmission of intelligence with a rapidity that must put an end to crafty calculation on the one hand, and to anxious suspense on the other, will tend to give a more healthy tone to business. When every day shall renew the solution of the paradox, that the merchant in Boston or New York may learn as he enters his counting-room in the morning, what were the transactions of the Exchange in London or Paris at noon, a check will be placed on that wild spirit of speculation, by which the comfort and the morals of life have been so much 12 impaired in this country. On a higher plane of advantage we may mark the relief in numberless cases, the satisfaction every moment arising from the knowledge friends may obtain of one another's condition almost without delay, although separated by thousands of miles. Imagine your child or your parent in Europe, and, instead of a letter’s tedious travel across the Atlantic, a message flying through the elec- tric wires ; will not space and time be virtually abolished ? What a change, when the tenant of a house in England or Germany shall be my next-door neighbor, and soon Con- stantinople and Calcutta shall be but a street’s length from my own dwelling ! On political affairs the influence of this means of international conversation cannot but be important. How many misunderstandings may be prevented from growing into serious disputes, how many jealousies be dispelled, by a few taps of a little machine ; how much expense be saved by the use of an invisible, yet faithful messenger, in place of a special diplomatic agent who might only succeed in “ darkening counsel by words.” It is one of the happiest auspices of the future, which it belongs to our age, and may we not say to our country, to have introduced, that the inter- course of governments has been taken out of the mystery of equivocation in which the practice of ages had wrapt it, and been in great measure reduced to plain and frank speech. The telegraph will compel statesmen to study yet greater simplicity of expression. The connection of Great Britain with our own shores is not a fact that can stand alone. By this channel we shall hold communication with Continental Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia. The line of electric transmission will soon girdle the globe. Civilization must receive an impulse 13 greater than it has felt at any time within the last half- century, memorable as this period has been for the appear- ance of agencies suited to awaken intellectual activity. How can we bring before our minds, with sufficient distinctness, the consequence of a universal interchange of thought by the speediest method : The world, it has been said, will be made a great whispering-gallery ; I would rather say, a great assembly, where every one will see and hear every one else. The press has for the last fifty years been the chief agent in educating society. It must now share that privilege with another instrument. The telegraph will anticipate the journal. Facts and opinions, the materials with which suc- - cessive generations construct the road along which society advances with unequal, but never retrograde steps, will now be furnished to every one on the moment. What an excite- ment will be given to the brain and heart of the world ! Too much, you may say. Perhaps so. Excess, however, will not be fatal. Society will accommodate itself to the new conditions of its existence ; and then improvement will go on steadily, as well as rapidly. The most remarkable effect, if I may judge from my own narrow thought, will be the approach to a practical unity of the human race ; of which we have never yet had a foresha- dowing, except in the gospel of Christ. Actually, the race has been divided into as distinct portions as if they lived on separate planets. Jealous of one another, or mutually unknown, they have exchanged no sympathies, united in no common labors, recognized no obligations of kindred blood. What has China been to the rest of mankind for hundreds of years 7 Even on the maps of the geographer, what has the interior of Africa been, though now known to contain 14 populous cities, but an arid desert 7 Can such ignorance and isolation continue after the lightnings shall have been taken into the service of man, to go hither and thither at his command, saying, Here we are : The death blow has been struck to barbarism. An exclusive policy must yield to the universal solvent. The telegraph is cosmopolitan. Not more British than American, it can neither be monopolized by government, nor stopped in its work of civilization by neglect. It is an institution for the people. Its office is, to diffuse intelligence ; its effect, to allay differences. Men who talk together daily cannot hate or disown one another. Learning and freedom must be promoted by this disperser of darkness, this intruder into the haunts of senile conserva- tism. By many persons it is thought that an increase of religious faith and life must follow. But this effect seems to me more doubtful, because I do not perceive any direct bearing of an open intercourse among men on spiritual character, and because facts show that neither learning nor freedom is the sure precursor of virtue. We may indulge the hope, that men will not abuse an increase of light and opportunity, but their past history should teach us that such abuse is not impossible, nor improbable. God unquestiona- bly meant, that all our powers and all the circumstances of our being should bear the seal of consecration: but men do not believe with a firmer faith because they have more light, nor do they render a more strict obedience because it is made to depend on their own will. One of our most com- mon mistakes consists in imputing the end as a certain conse- quence of an enjoyment of the means; whereas knowledge is often a cause of increased vice and misery. The greater 15 the ability, the greater may be the wickedness. The intro- duction of a new means of improvement and happiness should render us more watchful over ourselves, rather than less faithful. The most intelligent community is not always the most moral. The common school is not an inevitable blessing to all whom it gathers under its instruction. It may be an effect of augmented facilities of communication, . that men will become less patient, less contented, less mind- ful of the Power that upholds their lives. It is not good to live too much abroad, too much in society. Retirement and repose are needful for the maturity of religious character, as both the little flowers and the great trees need night as well as day for their growth. There is danger, therefore, that the circumstances which might assist, will impede our excel- lence. Religion must have its root in the soul; it cannot flourish as a parasite on some other stock. Religion is spi- ritual experience, not mental development. A Christian is not one who cultivates his powers to the utmost, but one who subjects his whole nature to the guidance of Divine truth. Two different, but not very dissimilar forms of error capti- vate many persons in our day. One represents honesty of purpose and activity of life as the fundamental laws of our being, and repudiates faith as a weakness or a misfortune. A body who have taken to themselves the name of Secular- ists, that there may be no disguise over their purposes, have for some time been busy in propagating their opinions in England, through the efforts of a man of undeniable since- rity and ability who stands at their head. The want of a similar organization or name does not prevent the existence of the same class of minds in this country. The other error induces a reliance on education, taste and physical 16 comfort for the production of a spiritual character ; as if the buttresses and ornaments of a building could take the place of substantial walls. There are reformers among us, worthy to bear the title, who, adopting this error, fall into the delu- sion of confounding philanthropy with piety. Now it is clear, that men may be highly educated, and yet lack both conscientiousness and devotion; not thoroughly educated, of sº course, for the noblest part of their nature is neglected; but educated according to that false use of the term — so com- mon, alas ! here and everywhere — which confines it to mental accomplishment. It is equally clear, that a commu- nity may possess every means of outward prosperity, and yet be corrupt at heart. Tet us, then, not be caught by the fallacy which substitutes material and social blessings for personal righteousness, issuing from the fountain which Christ opens within the believer, and which “ springeth up into everlasting life.” After such cautions I need not be timid in the expression of a belief, that the ultimate, if not the immediate effect of that discovery, of which we are now gathering the first ripe fruit, will be a diffusion of Christian principles and senti- ments through the earth. It is not self-conceit which moves us to notice the fact, that the two countries which are not only united by a chord along which every pulsation in the heart of one may be borne to the other, but which joined their efforts in laying that chord where neither the hand of violence, nor, as we may hope, the chafing of time can reach it, that these two countries, I say, stand in the front rank of Christian nations, – the representatives and guardians of the most vital forms of religion on earth. Is there not a mean- ing and a prophecy in this fact? May we not believe that 17 the Providence which uses human freedom for the fulfilment of its own designs, and which announces the redemption of man from all evil as its final design, has committed to these two nations the sacred trust of bringing mankind into har- mony of faith and life? - The signs of the times may appear to some eyes gloomy. But to the believer in God's eternal purpose of regenera- tion for the race which was “made subject to vanity by reason of Him who subjected the same in hope,” the hour is auspicious, for it betokens union, progress and success. I do not ask you to indulge any unreasonable expectations. I do not say that the next intelligence from the island, which has sent its first message as a vibration of joy through our land, may not overwhelm us with disappointment; but not such as shall last. No. Enough has been done to be taken as a pledge that the work will neither be relinquished nor defeated. I dare not hope that the amicable relations which now exist between our Republic and the British Empire will never be disturbed by a feeling of jealousy or animosity. The time when wars shall cease, has not come. I am not blind to the symptoms of uneasiness and misunderstanding between the governments of Europe. But why need we look only on omens of disaster ? Why construe outward courtesies as a mask to hide secret hatred? Why shall we distrust, not only the generous sentiments, but the sound policy by which rulers profess to be governed ? Why not have a little more faith in man, and very much more faith in God? - - My friends, let us hail the event, which we have thought it no profanation of the sanctuary to make the subject of our discourse, as the harbinger of a closer sympathy and a more 3 18 effective co-operation by which not only England and the United States, but the nations of Christendom, and soon all the people of the earth, shall be bound together in the inter- change, not of friendly messages alone, but of kind offices and fraternal regards. In one of our cities, we are told, the indubitable confirmation of this event will be announced by the sweet music of bells ringing out their anthem of praise. Let us forerun that chime of metallic voices, while with our tongues and hearts we celebrate the triumphs of science, the goodness of God, and the hopes of humanity. It is no more than sober anticipation, which sees in the future history of our race achievements of mind over matter beyond any that have yet been chronicled, blessings scattered in wider profu- sion than has ever yet gladdened the eyes of the philanthro- pist, and a social progress in comparison with which the movements of the present age shall seem slow. It is not a dream of the fancy, but a lesson of our faith, which we interpret into a promise of universal civilization and univer- sal righteousness. The era of peace and goodwill, is it a vision never to be realized : The kingdom of Heaven em- bracing and sanctifying the various communities of mankind, is it a mere figure of speech 2 I trust in God it is not. The world will be redeemed from the bondage of corruption. The gospel of the Father’s love will run through the earth, and win all souls to a grateful obedience. Hope, prophecy, faith, they are not blind teachers of the blind. It was in an hour of holy exultation that Jesus exclaimed, “I beheld * The overthrow which to his vision, familiar with the measures of eternity, appeared Satan as lightning fall from heaven.” as swift and as resplendent as the lightning’s course, centu- ries of patience and struggle will yet be required to effect. 19 But it is as sure as the Eternal Word. May not we take the lightning as a type of its certainty, when we see that, which has been the world’s admiration and dread, converted into the messenger of its pleasure and the minister of its profit 2 PREACHED AT PORTLAND, MAINE, º at the Funeral of PASTOR OF THE FIRST CHURCH IN PortIAND. By ANDREW P. PEABODY, PASTor of THE souTH CHURCH IN PORTSMoUTH, NEW HAMPSHIRE. published by sequest. - *- BosTON: CROSBY, NICHOLS, AND COMPANY, - . . . . . 117, Washington starr. . . 1859. S E R M ON PREACHED AT PORTLAND, MAINE, ğt the Juneral of R. E.W. I.C H.A.B O D NIC HOLS, D.D. PASTOR of THE FIRST CHURCH IN Port LAND. BY ANDREW P. PEABODY, PASToR of THE SouTH CHURCH IN PortsMoUTH, NEW HAMPSHIRE. -* §ublished by §equest. -** BOST ON : CROSBY, NICHOLS, AND COMPANY, 117, WASHINGTON STREET. 1859. B O S T O N : PRINTED BY JoHN wilson AND son, 22, SoHool, STREET. S E R M O N. 2 TIM. i. 10: “OUR SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST, who HATH ABOLISHED DEATH.” STRONG language this, yet not mere rhetoric. In the circumstances under which it was written, it can have been only the literal transcript of St. Paul's faith and feeling. He was in imminent peril of what others called death. He was in chains at Rome, and his life hung on the caprice of the terrible Nero. Yet every thing personal in this Epistle is in a jubilant, triumphant tone, as if in the near prospect of some signal success, preferment, or happiness. Death is destruction ; not, indeed, the annihilation of material, - for that never takes place, — but such a change in the mode of being as to destroy the essen- tial principle of the previous mode. A change which leaves that principle unchanged is not death. Still less can that be death through which the essential principle of the previous being is endowed with a more vigorous and ample life. Man dies, if what con- stituted his life is broken up, destroyed, rendered for 4 ever impossible. He does not die, though every par- ticle in his body be reduced to dust and vapor, if in what pre-eminently constituted his life he lives still, and with enlarged scope and capacity. The sensual- ist can die, and will die. As breaking the shell kills the tortoise, so does the dissolution of the body kill the life that has been identified with it in all its interests, hopes, and joys. The worldling of higher tastes and aspirations can die, and will die; for his chosen life has its roots, its supplies, its revenues, in the world to which he is allied by the body alone, and it cannot survive the dissolution of the body. But now there joins the long procession of the dying, one who has walked with God, and followed Christ, and communed with heaven; whose life has been that of faith and devotion, sentiment and principle ; and that soul is in the procession in form, not in fact. It is not death; for what takes place touches not the seat or sources of the life. It is not death; for there can be no essen- tial change in the aim, the work, the joy, of the earthly existence. It is not death, but a new out- blooming of life, – a consummation, an enlargement, an exaltation. Faith cannot die, for its Redeemer ever lives; nor devotion, for its God ever reigns; nor holiness, for its congenial sphere is where Jesus leads his flock ; nor principle, for its foundation is the throne of the Omnipotent, its years the eternal ages of his being. It is then not figuratively but literally true, that, for the soul nurtured, redeemed, guided, 5 sanctified by Christ, he has abolished death. He has rendered it powerless and effete. Its name designates translation, not destruction ; gain, not loss; the growth, not the maiming, of the true life. Never have I been more impressed with this sublime verity, than when the tidings reached me, that he, whose loved and venerated form is now made ready for the grave, had passed on to a higher sphere of being. Seldom have I known one whose path hence it seemed so easy for the eye of faith to trace; who had so little of life to leave, so full a freight of heaven- born and heaven-tending life to bear with him to the house not made with hands. Profound indeed may well be our grief that we look for the last time on that benign brow, on those features glowing with spiritual beauty; that we can no more hear him dis- course of the deep things of God with lips that seemed touched with altar-coals from the upper sanctuary, till we rejoin him in the world of open vision; that a presence which has been to us a perpetual benediction is withdrawn from us. To many of us, the world seems much poorer for his departure. But of him I can think only with a calm and solemn joy: for, while he was with us, we felt that his conversation was in heaven; and, because we loved him, we may well be thankful that he was spared a longer conflict with growing infirmity, and that a life so rich and precious had closed its record without the slow and weary appendix of protracted decay and decrepitude. In the attempt to portray his character, I must – follow the leading of my own sentiments of admira- tion, reverence, and love ; and, while fulsome and heartless eulogy would only desecrate a season like this, I cannot but feel that such words as my heart prompts will have their full response from all in this bereaved church, congregation, and community. Our departed friend and father was rarely endowed by nature. His mind was unsurpassed in vigor, pene- tration, and working power. His childhood and youth were grave, studious, and reflective. In a college- class numbering an unusual array of eminent names, he was second to none in grasp of intellect, and in the successful pursuit of the higher branches of a liberal education. He distinguished himself as a mathema- tician: as a tutor in that department, he spent several years in the university; and he retained ever after- ward a strong interest in the subjects and processes of mathematical investigation. But the realm of metaphysical and ethical truth possessed a superior attraction for him; and, in this elevated region of thought, he moved through life with a keen vision and a firm tread, most familiar with the profoundest themes, most at home where ordinary minds are strangers and aliens. While this was his favorite field of study and reflection, it is hard to say in what department of liberal culture he was not among the foremost. A diligent student for his lifetime, with a mind always open and hospitable, with a vividness of apprehension which years had not impaired, with a love of learning as enthusiastic in age as in youth, and with a memory of marvellous capacity, he per- mitted no branch of knowledge to elude his research. You could hardly name a subject in which he seemed not an adept, a new discovery or speculation with whose processes and details he was not conversant, or a phasis of scientific thought which had not passed under his cognizance. But we most love to dwell upon the unreserved, lifelong religious consecration of his noble intellect, and his large and varied attainments. The religious element in his character seemed to absorb and assimi- late all else into its own substance. He was devout with all his mind, no less than with all his heart. No man ever shrank more than he did from the ostenta- tion of piety; yet no one could have heard him con- verse on any topic of science, art, or literature, without perceiving that its Godward aspects and relations were uppermost in his mind; that, whatever might be the theme of his inquiry, he was tracking the foot- prints or searching into the thoughts of the Most" High; that his meditations on a mathematical law, or a fine picture, or a new fact in natural history, or a dark problem in intellectual philosophy, were but a varied form of adoration, praise, or prayer. Never have I known one who seemed so constantly filled, energized, and elevated by vast and glowing views of the majesty, power, wisdom, and love of the Creator. 8 In listening to his eloquent discourse on some topic of what is called secular learning, it has often seemed to me as if I were hearing some grand cathedral an- them, every note laden with the incense of worship. With such a mind and such resources thus sancti- fied, he could not but have been an efficient and impressive preacher. In weight and depth of thought, in the range of subjects and illustrations, in the mastery of fitting words, in the command of rich and vivid imagery, in profound seriousness and earnest- ness, in the power of arousing the vigorous action of the strongest minds, of instructing the wisest, and of furthering simultaneously the intellectual and the spiritual culture of the ingenuous and truth-loving, he can have had few equals, no superiors. His ser- mons were, indeed, too full of condensed thought and of closely riveted chains of argument for the careless hearer. He demanded, and he richly rewarded, unin- termitted and rapt attention. His style has often reminded me of St. Paul's, in its union of cogent logic and fervent devotion, in its power of vitalizing argu- ment by appeal to the heart and conscience, in its aiming with the same stroke at the intellect and the affections, and in those wonderful digressions in which the main subject is not departed from, but is opened out in new and unexpected bearings and relations, and from which the return is made with more than redoubled force of conviction to the leading head of discourse. All who knew him must have remarked in his preaching, and equally in his conversation, the union —in our times too seldom witnessed—of bold thought and lowly reverence; of free speculation and childlike docility; of the independence which could call no man master, and implicit trust in the infallibility of the Teacher from heaven; of the commanding intellect which made all within its influence his pupils, and the simple, open-hearted receptivity with which he loved to sit at the feet of Jesus. In his mind, and his treatment of truth in every department, all science and learning, like the wise men from the East, brought gifts and paid tribute to the child of Bethlehem ; while revelation shed light from the throne of God on all else that could be known or reasoned upon, enunciated the comprehensive laws and underlying principles of science, struck the key-note of hopeful speculation, opened the path of successful research, and was the source and sum of all wisdom. It was thus that he saw and preached Christ in all, and all in Christ. The traits which I have named as belonging to his. sermons were no less manifest in his social intercourse, in which he preached at least as eloquently and powerfully as from the pulpit. His sacred commis- sion from his divine Master was never forgotten, or, I would rather say, never thought of, so naturally and with so modest grace sat the priestly robes upon him; but they were never laid aside. No man could 2 10 have been less willing to assume aught on the score of his profession ; but the characteristics of the Christian minister were ingrained, and constituted his personality: he could not but preach Christ. In the ordinary flow of his conversation, how often have we seen his countenance illumined with a light not of earth, eye and brow radiant with the glory of the great thoughts to which he gave utterance, while to us who listened it was as if an angel spake Of his devotional services in public and private, we who have heard them can never lose the memory. The topics of these prayers had a wider scope than I have ever known beside, and in themselves might often have seemed more appropriate to a sermon than to a direct address to the Deity. But it was always evident, that, in his own heart, they were subjects of fervent supplication, thanksgiving, and adoration. There was no material, however wide of the ordinary themes of social prayer, which did not in his mind spontaneously assume the sanctity of an altar-gift. Of those public interests which are to so great a degree under the charge of the New-England clergy, he has been the faithful and emergetic advocate and guar- dian. To the cause of good learning — alike in this city, in his official connection with Bowdoin College, and as a member and office-bearer of various literary and scientific associations—he has rendered invaluable service. In your organizations for the relief of want, and for the moral and religious benefit of the unprivi- 11 leged, he has bestowed his wise and efficient co-opera- tion. In the various enterprises of moral reform, while his calm discretion precluded ultraism, and suffered no precipitate, movement on which he might be compelled to retrace his steps, he has been equally averse from that blind conservatism which clings to inveterate evils, and admits the plea of precedent against the law of God and the immortal interests of man. As a true Christian shepherd, he has not been willing to leave his flock behind him, but has sought to lead them ever on to higher theories and a more consistent practice of the right and good in all those departments of public and social morality on which new light has been shed in our own day from the divine will and word. Of his tenderness, assiduity, and persevering kind- ness, as a pastor, how rich and fragrant must be the memory, and in how many hearts | With an instinctive delicacy which could never be obtrusive; with an unfeigned respect for every one's personal convictions; with a frank and unstudied compliance with the apostolic precept, “Honor all men,” — he eminently realized St. Peter's ideal of the true Chris- tian ministry, “Neither as being lords over God's heritage, but being ensamples to the flock.” The blessedness of such an example, of a life so saintly, so pure, so true; the power of such a spirit over the suc- cessive generations trained under its influence; the unrecognized conduits through which it has wound its 12 gentle way into other minds and hearts, moulding opi- nion, giving tone to sentiment, and shaping character, – it is beyond our power to estimate, yet impossible to over-estimate. His direct influence can be traced, remembered, and rehearsed; but such force of charac- ter, combined with a certain constitutional diffidence and reserve, must have exerted an indirect power immeasurably exceeding all that can be identified, and put on record. From a spirit like his, there goes forth a virtue of which multitudes partake who know not whence it comes. His private life blended all that was venerable with all that was beautiful and lovely. There was in him a rare combination of dignity and modesty, - a dig- nity not assumed, but the inevitable expression of what was worthy to be revered; a modesty betoken- ing one who walked humbly with his God. Meek and gentle, frank and generous, single-hearted and sincere, thoughtful for the rights, tastes, and comfort of all around him, he elevated manners to the rank which they once held as synonymous with morals, and breathed the spirit of his divine Master no less in the courtesies of his daily intercourse and the hospitalities of his home, than in the charge and service of his public ministry. What he was in the nearer relations of life, the hearts widowed and orphaned by his removal can alone tell. We intrude not on the sacredness of their grief. May the peace of God, the hope full of immor- 13 tality, and the assurance that death will unite those whom death has separated, be theirs in proportion to the sorrow and desolateness of their bereavement Our friend's last days were in beautiful harmony with his life. Except at rare and brief intervals, his mind retained to the close its unabated vigor, and its undiminished clearness of vision. It was but a few days before his departure that he spoke of the con- sciousness of a spiritual nature entire in all its powers, affections, and memories, while its frail tenement was so wasted and shattered, as a fresh and glorious con- firmation to him of the soul's independence on things seen, and its essential immortality. On Christmas morning, though unable to rise from his bed, he led, for the last time, the worship of his family; and those present can never forget the blended lowliness and grandeur, the deep self-abasement and glowing grati- tude, with which he poured forth thanks and praises for the divine love made incarnate in Bethlehem, and for the hope, so soon to be realized for him, of going to the Saviour who had first come down to us. The last weeks of his life were a period of unintermitted and severe suffering, but of entire resignation and sweet peace. Christ and redeeming mercy were his perpetual themes. Pictures of the Saviour that he had long loved to look upon were constantly at his side; and the dear name was ever on his lips. With that humility which had always been his, but which seemed to deepen as he drew nearer the throne of the 14 Eternal, he disclaimed the kind expressions with which friends alluded to his influence and services in the cause of his divine Master, and would say, “Oh I have done nothing but through Christ; it is all his love; my dependence is on him alone.” Thus sustained, hand in hand with Him who hath abolished death, he trod with unfaltering step the valley of the shadow ; murmured, with the last movement of his lips, “It is all well;” and fell asleep in Jesus. I feel, my friends, how inadequate has been my portraiture of your pastor. Were I not a mourner with you, I might have entered into a nicer analysis of his character, or have drawn a more elaborate sketch of his life. Of my own feelings, as mine, I ought not to speak; but I say what not a few of my brethren in the ministry are prepared to attest with me, and what we have often said to one another, when I tell you that to no other mind and character in our profession have we been indebted for so pre- cious thoughts, so holy impulses, so pure aspirations, so genial an influence, so lofty an example of Chris- tian excellence. Our communings with him have instructed, strengthened, and gladdened us. They have been seasons of hallowed privilege, which we can hardly hope to have repeated on this side the grave. Our father-prophet, our Elijah, is taken up from among us; and where shall we look for the resting of his mantle 7 My friends of this Christian flock, you have indeed 15 been blessed beyond measure in the precious ascen- sion-gift of the Redeemer, spared to you so long, resumed so late. While you must cherish his me- mory, oh! cherish still more his dearest wish for your Christian discipleship, your growth in grace, your kindred of spirit with the Saviour. Let the voice which can no longer plead with you still echo in your hearts. Let the finished testimony of his life speak to you of the beauty of holiness. Let his example, embalmed for you by the death-angel, have its endur- ing shrine in your souls. Let the remembrance of those things in which he followed Christ bring and keep you ever nearer the Redeemer. Thus may he, being dead, yet speak. Though he has gone to his reward, may he still pursue among you the work he loved And, if there are those whom his living words failed to reach, may even they be won by the reverent sorrow with which they bend over his grave, and by the unfading record on the heart-tablet of his Christian walk and conversation | And now draws near the solemn moment when what was mortal must be laid away, - earth to earth, and dust to dust. With our grief, let grateful hosannas rise to Him who hath abolished death, in whom the whole family of the faithful in heaven and earth is made one, – these outer courts and yonder upper rooms one universal house of God, in which are avenues and meeting-points whereby our love reaches those who have passed on from our sight, and 16 their benediction is poured into our hearts. Be this our comfort, till we commune again with our dear friend, our cherished pastor, our venerated father, where the farewell is never uttered Till then, a brief farewell, O man greatly beloved l Be it ours so to live and so to die, that we may meet thee in the resurrection of the just, and be found with thee, without fault, before the throne of God A P P E N D L X. I. PROCEEDINGS OF THE FIRST PARISH IN PORTLAND. AT a meeting of the First Parish, holden on Tuesday after- noon, Jan. 3, the following preamble and resolutions, presented by Hon. WILLIAM WILLIS, were unanimously adopted:— Whereas it has pleased Divine Providence to remove by death our late beloved pastor, Ichabod Nichols, who for nearly fifty years has been a burning and a shining light in this parish and this com- munity, it becomes our duty, while we submit with resignation to the will of God, to express our gratitude that we have so long enjoyed the benefit of his wise counsel, the elevating influence of his instruction, and the clear and beautiful radiance of his Christian life ; — That, coming to us in the prime of manhood, ready furnished for the great work which he had undertaken, he continued among us nearly half a century, adding constantly to his attainments in learn- ing, and his high spiritual endowments, until he stood at the head of his profession in the State; all the while meekly and faithfully bearing the burden of the parochial office in its varied forms, and combining the qualities of a useful and devoted pastor, a kind and sincere friend, a good citizen, and a true Christian gentleman. We rejoice that he has lived so long and so well, and that he has been spared to put the crowning finish on his Christian ministry by a Christian work, a rich legacy to his people, which will perpetuate his usefulness, and construct a permanent monument to his me- mory. * 3 18 We rejoice that he was permitted by a kind Providence to retain his intellectual energy to the last days of his earthly being, and to look calmly and serenely upon the momentous and final event of every man's life, – the leaving of it, — which he had cheerfully con- templated, and which he had awaited in a profound and unwavering assurance of the mercy and loving-kindness of the good Father, in whom he never ceased to trust, as revealed by his Son from heaven. We rejoice that our fathers who have gone before, ourselves, and our children, have enjoyed his able and faithful ministry; and that he did not go down to the grave until he was full of years, – full of the respect of the surviving generation; until he had finished his course, and, having kept the faith, was prepared to receive the crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give to him, and to all those who love his appearing. In view of our many obligations to our deceased and cherished pastor, and the love we bear to his character and memory, we, the members of his parish, do hereby — 1. Resolve, That this parish tender to the family of our late beloved pastor their sincere sympathy in this hour of severe be- reavement and affliction, and their sense of the loss which they and the community have sustained in his death. 2. That an application be made to the family for permission to remove his remains to Portland for interment. That, if such request be granted, public funeral ceremonies be performed at the meeting-house of the First Parish; and that a procession be formed of its members, the friends of the deceased, and citizens generally, to accompany the body to the place of burial. 3. That a committee of twenty members of the parish be chosen at this time to make arrangements for the funeral, and to appoint a committee of three of their number to proceed to Cambridge, and to accompany the remains to Portland. 4. That our respected pastor be requested to pronounce a funeral discourse on the occasion, or to adopt such measures in regard to that and other services as shall best honor the memory of his vene- rable predecessor in the sacred office. 5. That the meeting-house be suitably draped in mourning, that the bell be tolled on the day of the funeral, and that the clergy of the city be invited to attend the services. 19 6. That the expenses of the funeral, and all other expenses which may be incurred under these resolutions, be defrayed by the parish; and the Treasurer is hereby authorized to pay the same, after having been audited and approved by the Parish Committee. 7. That the committee of twenty consist of the following per- sons; viz., Joshua Richardson, Elias Thomas, Charles S. Davies, Thomas Chadwick, John Purinton, St. John Smith, Nathaniel Deering, John Williams, Seward Merrill, Nathan Cummings, A. W. H. Clapp, John T. Gilman, Henry Merrill, Albert Winslow, Samuel J. Anderson, N. F. Deering, A. M. Baker, John Dow, Charles Jones, William Boyd, William Willis; and that a com- mittee of ladies be appointed to superintend the draping of the meeting-house. 8. Resolved, That these resolutions, with the preamble, signed by the Chairman and Secretary, be communicated to the family of the deceased. H. STEBBINs, Chairman. JoBIN PURINTON, Secretary. Voted, That the foregoing preamble and resolutions be printed in the daily papers of the city. II. OBSEQUIES OF REV. D.R. NICHOLS. [From the Portland Advertiser.] The church of the First Parish was crowded yesterday fore- noon, notwithstanding the rain and consequent badness of the walking, on the occasion of the performance of funeral rites over the remains of the loved and venerable pastor and revered citizen. A common bond of sympathy, irrespective of sectarian biases, seemed to have called the vast assemblage together, in which we noticed the ministers of the different denominations in our city. The church was appropriately draped in mourning, the effect of which added great so- 20 lemnity to the scene. In front of the pulpit, the coffin was placed in view of all, covered with garlands of evergreen and flowers. One hour before the services commenced, and during the passage of the procession to the grave, all the bells in the city were tolled. The services in the church commenced with a dirge-like voluntary on the organ, by Kotzschmar; which was followed by a chant entitled “Burial of the Dead,” by Felton, a sin- gularly effective composition as rendered by the First-Parish choir. We give the stanzas which were adapted to it. The same words were sung at the funeral of the lamented Payson, arranged by Nolcini to a funeral anthem. Far from affliction, toil, and care, The happy soul is fled: The breathless clay shall slumber here Among the silent dead. The gospel was his joy and song, E’en to his latest breath : The truth he had proclaimed so long Was his support in death. The churches' loss we all deplore, And shed the falling tear; Since we shall see his face no more, Till Jesus shall appear. Now he resides where Jesus is, Above this dusky sphere: His soul was ripened for that bliss, While yet he sojourned here. But we are hastening to the tomb : Oh I may we ready stand; Then, dearest Lord, receive us home, To dwell at thy right hand. 21 Rev. Mr. FROTHINGHAM then read appropriate selections from the Psalms and other portions of the sacred writings; which were followed by a very fervent prayer by Rev. Mr. STEBBINS, the surviving pastor. After an interlude on the organ, that beautiful hymn of Mrs. Barbauld's was sung, commencing, — “How blest the righteous when he dies When sinks a weary soul to rest, How mildly beam the closing eyes! How gently heaves the expiring breath!” The discourse of Dr. PEABODY followed. Rev. Mr. STEBBINS offered the closing prayer; when the choir and congregation united in singing, to the tune of that grand old choral “Dundee,” Doddridge's well-known hymn, commencing, — wº “Ye golden lamps of heaven! farewell, With all your feeble light! Farewell, thou ever-changing moon, Pale empress of the night!” A benediction by the pastor closed the services; and the remains of the good, the faithful, the beloved pastor, followed by a long cortégé of mourners, were borne to their place of sepulture in the Western Cemetery. III. OBITUARY NOTICE, BY HON. WILLIAM WILLIS. [From the Portland Advertiser.] The venerable senior pastor of the First Parish in this city is no more. He departed this life at Cambridge, on Sun- day, Jan. 2, in the seventy-fifth year of his age. He was ordained as the colleague of the Rev. Dr. Deane, June 7, 1809, - the third pastor of that ancient parish, organized in 1727, the first in the State east of Kennebunk. The Rev. 22 Thomas Smith, the first pastor, was ordained, and the church formed, in March, 1727. He continued in the pastoral office to the close of his long life in 1795, – a period of sixty-eight years, two months and a third. Dr. Deane was settled as his colleague in 1764; and this was the only religious society in Portland until 1788, when the Second Parish was established. Dr. Deane’s pastorate continued fifty years, and was closed only by his death in 1814. With him Mr. Nichols was associated in 1809; and his connection with the society, now terminated by his death, has extended to more than forty-nine years. He was sole pastor from the decease of Dr. Deane, diligently and faithfully doing his Master’s work, to January, 1855, when the present pastor, the Rev. Horatio Stebbins, was settled as his colleague. Dr. Nichols was then desirous of withdrawing entirely from his official station, on account of the infirm state of his health: he wished entire repose from the cares of office. But the parish was unwilling to dissolve a connection which had existed so long and harmoniously; and he consented to retain his official relation, relieved from all duty and respon- sibility connected with it. On his retirement, a few mem- bers of his society tendered to him an annuity of $550 a year for the remainder of his life ; but this tribute to his services and worth, so justly deserved and so freely offered, he declined, from that innate sense of delicacy which governed all his conduct. This brief review of the history of the First Parish exhi- bits the striking facts, –that it has enjoyed an uninterrupted ministration of the parochial office for more than a hundred and thirty-one years, – not an hour without a pastor; that its three deceased ministers entered young upon their mi- nistry, and died in office; and that each has labored with a colleague. Such a history, in connection with the pro- tracted pastorates, – averaging fifty-six years, – cannot, we think, be paralleled in the annals of the church. 23 Dr. Nichols was born in Portsmouth, N.H., July 5, 1784. When he was but five or six years old, his parents removed to Salem, Mass.; where they both died at an advanced age. He received his preliminary education at Harvard College; from which he graduated with the highest honors at the age of eighteen, in the celebrated class of 1802. The class numbered sixty members; many of whom, in after-life, were distinguished men, – as President Allen, of Bowdoin Col- lege, James T. Austin, Dr. Codman, Samuel Hoar, Levi Frisbie, Levi Lincoln, Leverett Saltonstall. Immediately on leaving college, he commenced the study of his profession with his pastor, – Dr. Barnard, of Salem; but, in 1805, his services were sought at Harvard as a tutor in mathematics. Here his opportunities for a higher culti- vation were greatly enlarged ; and his strong and acute intellectual powers could not have failed to be richly im- proved in the society of the elder Ware, John Quincy Adams, Frisbie, Farrar, and Judge Ware, who were all associated with him in the instruction of the college. He continued in this office about four years, and until he ac- cepted the invitation of the First Parish in 1809. The parish had for two or three years been seeking a col- league for Dr. Deane; who, now seventy-five years old, felt unequal to the pastoral duties, and desired an assistant. Mr. Ely, Mr. McKean, Mr. Cary, S. C. Thacher, and Mr. Codman, all afterwards distinguished, had preached as can- didates, but without securing the concurrent approbation of the church and parish; which bodies acted separately, ac- cording to congregational usage, in selecting a minister. In January, Mr. Nichols preached his first sermon here, and continued to preach for four Sundays. On the 27th of Fe- bruary, the parish concurred unanimously with the church in giving him a call, and voting a salary of twelve hundred dollars; which was much larger than any minister then re- ceived in the town or the state, and which was not changed 24 during his whole ministry. The venerable Deacon Freeman, then the leading man in the parish and the town, speaking of the occasion, exultingly says, “The meeting of the parish was full and respectable ; and it is a pleasing circumstance, that there was not a hand raised nor a word spoken against the subject of either vote.” The invitation was accepted March 20 ; and the ordination took place June 7, 1809. Dr. Barnard, of Salem, preached the sermon; Dr. Lathrop, Dr. Kirkland, and Mr. Buckminster, of Boston, and Dr. Abbot, of Beverly, performing other parts in the service. By this auspicious event, new vitality was given to the parish, which had been declining in the latter years of Dr. Deane’s ministry; and had especially been shaken by the popularity of the fervent and eloquent Payson, who had recently been settled, a colleague with Mr. Kellogg, over the Second Parish. These two were then the only congre- gational churches in town. Dr. Deane died at the age of eighty-one, in October, 1814; and Mr. Nichols became the sole pastor, and continued most assiduously, faithfully, and acceptably to perform the functions of the sacred office, until the settlement of Mr. Stebbins in 1855. He not only dis- charged with fidelity the duties of his peculiar station, — in which, with advancing years, he grew more earnest and spiritual, both in his discourses and devotional exercises, – but he took an active part in the philanthropic and reforma- tory movements of the day. He was one of the earliest and most devoted friends of the Temperance cause, of the Bible Society, the Sunday School, and of various benevo- lent institutions. During his ministry, he was permitted to see the aged relics of the former days, and to bestow the last offices of con- solation upon the lingering parishioners of Mr. Smith, the first pastor. Those who listened to the preaching of the vene- rable Smith have all gone to their repose, save our respected friend Elias Thomas and his aged sister, whose presence is 25 now, as it has been for seventy-five years, still witnessed constantly in our church; and Daniel Fox, whose painful infirmities have long kept him from the house of worship. These venerable survivors of a long-past generation — na- tives of the town — are links which bind in historical inte- rest the early and latter days of this ancient society. There were at one and the same time, members of his parish and attendants upon his preaching, Chief-Justice Mellen, Chief-Justice Whitman, Judges Preble, Ware, Emery, Fitch, and Potter, Mr. Longfellow, Dr. Weed, and others of similar education and position, who could and did duly estimate the fine qualities of their pastor as a preacher and a man. His preaching was of a character to interest men of logical power and discrimination, rather than the careless or listless hearer. Dr. Nichols did not permit his mind to grow rusty amidst the various and every-day duties of parochial life, but de- voted all his leisure hours to study. He kept up not only with the theological progress of the age, but also with the wonderful advance in scientific attainment, which, in the last half-century, has almost created a new world. Nothing in the way of discovery escaped his vigilant observation, from the theories broached by visionary enthusiasts to the pro- found problems of La Place, Cuvier, Bowditch, and Pierce. In his latter days, after leaving his parochial duties, he had the highest gratification in a free intercourse with Agassiz upon his wonderful developments in the animal kingdom. From this new source of knowledge his mind received a fresh impulse; and he was able to add to his forthcoming great work on the connection of the old and new dispensa- tions fresh proofs and illustrations of the being and attri- butes of God. Dr. Nichols was equally familiar with the writings of German and of English scholars. He penetrated with a clear discrimination and an unswerving rectitude of judg- 4 26 ment into the prevailing fallacies of the philosophies of the day, and was able rightly to divide the word of truth. It is impossible that a mind naturally keen and comprehensive, and so thoroughly furnished by education and reflection, should not be full and instructive on all the topics which come under discussion among scholars and in the social circle. This copiousness of general knowledge gave him a power and richness in conversation, which few have sur- passed. No one could be in his society for even a brief time without being deeply impressed with the largeness and variety of his knowledge, and his ease and felicity in the communication of it. Yet, with these rare powers, he was perfectly simple, unaffected, and unpretending. No man was farther from conceit, or less fond of display. He loved to talk, not for the sake of talking, but to communicate instruction, — to impart from his accumulated stores to the pleasure and benefit of others. These qualities caused his society to be widely sought and valued as that of a ripe scholar, an able and sound theologian, and a most instruc- tive and interesting companion. Dr. Nichols was twice married, - first to Dorothy, daugh- ter of Governor Gilman, of New Hampshire; to whom he was united May 15, 1810. This admirable and beloved woman died in 1831, leaving two sons,— one a physician in Standish, the other a clergyman in Saco; both honorably sustaining the duties of their honorable professions. His second wife — the afflicted widow — is a daughter of the late Stephen Higginson, long a distinguished merchant and philanthropist in Boston, and of time-honored ancestry in New England. Dr. Nichols was early elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; as was also his predecessor, Dr. Deane; a distinction to which but few scholars in Maine have attained. In 1821, he received from Bowdoin College the honorary degree of D.D., and the same from Harvard 27 University in 1831. We may apply to Dr. Nichols with great appropriateness a truth happily expressed by Lord Coke, who said, “When a great learned man dieth, much learning dieth with him.” Though he has left a valuable legacy in his last great work, which he fondly called the rounding-off of his life, and which is the complement of his learning and best thought, yet there was that in his mind and heart, as in every wise man, which cannot be stamped on the printed page: it dies with the possessor. The beau- tiful expression, the mild and gentle demeanor, the sensitive appreciation and genial communication of the good and the true, the noble example of a virtuous and devoted life, – these all pass on, and leave but their subtile fragrance in the memory of surviving friends. May we who still linger here, and have known and loved our departed friend ; may his bereaved wife and his two devoted sons, who have watched with tender solicitude over his bed of languishing, — may we all bear to our own tombs a grateful and abiding sense of his wise, paternal, and friendly counsels, and the never-fading memory of his saintly life - THEODORE PARKER, A THE REFORM PULP IT, AND THE INFLUENCES THAT OPPOs E IT. A S E R M ON - Parached at The Melodeos, Nov. 7, 1852. B Y J O H N T S A R G E N T. abublished by 3Request, “Be bold for Truth, – though all the world despise; Be strong for Right, — though all the world oppose; Be free in Love, — though all men are thy foes; And God, in love, will bless the sacrifice.” - B O STON: BENJAMIN H. GREENE, 124, WASHINGTON STREET. - CHARLESTOWN: Mº KIM & CUTTER, - 62, MAIN STREET. 1852. THEODORE PARKER, T H E RE FOR M P ULP IT, AND THE IN FLUEN C E S THAT OPPOSE IT. A S E R M O N PREACHED AT THE MELODEON, Nov. 7, 1852. B Y J O H N T S A. R. G E N T. 3}ubligijet by 3&equest, “Be bold for Truth, – though all the world despise; Be strong for Right, — though all the world oppose; Be free in Love, - though all men are thy foes; And God, in love, will bless the sacrifice.” B O ST ON : BENJAMIN H. GREENE, 124, WASHINGTON STREET. - CHARLESTOWN: Mº KIM & CUTTER, 62, MAIN STREET. 1852. B O S T O N : PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SON, No. 22, School, Street. S E R M O N. Genesis xix. 9. — “AND THEY SAID, STAND BACK ** THE proscriptive action of the ruling powers, both in Church and State, towards the interests of reform, is a subject gath- ering interest every day by the pressing necessity of reform in all our social, ecclesiastical, and political relations. Be- fore entering on this, however, I would say a few words on the majesty and the need of that power against which this proscriptive action is mainly directed: I mean the Christian pulpit, the pulpit of the Christian reformer. You heard eloquent words last Sunday, noble words, about a great man, a great patriot (equivocally great), who has recently passed away, as on the breath of the nation's sighs, from the places that once knew him on the earth. Words of truth, soberness, and pathos, indeed they were. With a power of analysis such as few other preachers could command, with an intrepidity of candor as commendable as it is uncommon, and with a skilfulness of dissection such as evinced the steadiness of the surgical nerve that was brought to bear on the subject, the constituents of a true greatness and the elements of a right patriotism were set before you in a manner and form not soon to be forgotten. With the force of those words still pressing on our me- mories, and in contrast with the ephemeral greatness of the 4 fickle politician, I might speak to you to-day of the faithful preacher, — of the need of such a one in these times; and, to my apprehension, the great preacher, the Christian moralist, the acute moral philosopher, and, above all, the man of consistent virtues, who so moulds the public senti- ment, who so analyzes, adjudges, and dissects the politically great man, is just so much greater than he, as he wields a wider religious influence and a more diffusive moral power in the community. He discrowns and eclipses the merely politically great man by the greater breadth of his religious principles, the wider range of his moral sense, the greater integrity and consistency of his conscience, the completer discipline, compactness, and precision of his reformatory power. It is not that his influence is wholly destructive, iconoclastic, or epidemic, as he gathers an eager crowd, and carries captive the sympathies and affections of the listen- ing multitude; though, it must be confessed, he bombards rather fiercely many a consecrated citadel of faith, storms many an old castle of conventionalities, and sends the great battering-ram of his energies with a fatal efficiency against the walls of organized wrongs. It is not that he is thus the popular religious and theological gladiator of the time, that he so rallies around him such an olympic audience. It is, that he so justly weighs all the great questions of mo- rals and duty in the high hung balance of eternal verity. It is that he appeals so to the inward consciousness of men, is so loyal to Christian principles, so lifts aloft and before the earnest vision of his audience the everlasting standard of right, and interprets so effectively the great laws of the spirit of life. It is that he applies religion to all the outward facts and inward experience of life. He thus towers above his peers like some Mount Atlas or Chamoulari above yonder Blue Hills, and all the more because he bears in his bosom greater wealth of granite integrity than they. His great, strong, hearty words, when he speaks of injustice, make us 5 cling to his own secure spirit as to some “city of refuge.” They bring a sudden quickness to our pulse, a strange throb to our hearts, and the unwilling tears to our eyes. We wonder why every other teacher does not so magnetize and move us. Our hands close somehow nervously, and are clenched at our sides as if we were feeling for the great sword of Nemesis to revenge the terrible wrongs he so elo- quently describes. Sensations unwonted go stirring through the audience like the rush of autumnal winds through the forest-leaves; and then, again, it is so deathly still that only the tick of yonder clock and the beating of our hearts can be heard. His very look holds us by a mystic spell, as if the spirits of all the pure worlds above us were looking intercessions out of the magic chambers of his own philan- thropy. He takes the light of the rising sum of reform first on his own clear forehead, like some great mountain of the Himmalays or the Appenines, and then sends the melting stream of his influence adown, far and wide, on the expec- tant plains of society. His electric and magnetic influences crackle and coruscate and shoot up around us in the very midnight of our social and political troubles like an Aurora Borealis; waving and glancing and lifting up encourage- ments like the purple plumes of advancing legions, or an “army with banners” coming out of the North. And truly, if we do so idolize the great departed statesmen of our time, and think them so worthy of our best honors and obsequi- ous eulogies; hanging out our State banners in their behalf athwart the streets, and the flags of our shipping at half- mast; calling on our people to go mourning all through the land with muffled drums in long processions; inviting the eloquent and the learned to do them homage by funereal tributes, and magnifying their very weaknesses into vir- tues, – what shall we say of him, the fearless moral sur- geon of the time, who lays bare the inward spiritual ana- tomy of such great men, exhibits for a warning to all after 6 generations their moral maladies, and shows up every nerve and fibre of their inmost being? - Seeing, as he does, the danger of this popular disease, the unqualified homage which is paid to the worldly great, the disposition to overlook their moral defects for the sake of their political availability, how obviously is it a part of the mission of a true preacher to break the spell of that fatal enchantment; to disabuse the public mind of that mom- strous error as to the venial nature of certain crimes, if they are only committed by great men beneath the robes of offi- cial station; to show up the fallacy of their mistakes, as of all other wrongs of society; to tell the “plain truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,” even of the greatest men, especially when the claim is attempted for their deification ? Seeing also, as he does, how infatuated we have become as to the claims of military chieftains in our government; en- throning them, one after another, in the chief places of power, and turning their very swords into sceptres, – what wonder that he should start into his position of protest, and draw his sword — the “sword of the spirit”— ACRoss those bloody blades of the worldly warriors, and, looking them in the face, cry out in the name of God and humanity, — “Hold now ! – Have done 1–In God’s own might We gird us for the coming fight ! And, strong in Him whose cause is ours, In conflict with unholy powers We grasp the weapons he has given, – The LIGHT and TRUTH and LovE OF HEAVEN 1 ° I know the charge of “coarse denunciation” is often brought against your minister. We often hear it said his speech and manner are too severe, his rebukes too unqualified, his criticisms on public and private character too intense and searching. Within the last few days, no doubt, you have heard, as I have, his admirable discourse on Mr. Webster called atrocious; and, if eloquent uncompromising truthful- ness is atrocious, so it is. But really in these times, and in 7 such a crisis of the public sympathy as we are now pass- ing through, when the voices of our pulpits for the last fortnight have been turning one way, monotonously as the prevailing breeze turns the weather-vanes on the top of the spires; when the columns of the public press are overloaded and fatigued with indiscriminate panegyric, it is something like a refreshment to find one pulpit and a preacher honest, bold, truthful enough to be perfectly just on such a theme; so loyal to God that he can suffer no living or dead man to dethrone or eclipse him, and so strong that he can hold up the most colossal image or the heaviest brain which men have ever worshipped, and show that it is but flesh, or a frangible image with its flaws and dark stains, here and there running clear through the marble. And look you now. Let us be consistent. Is it indeed a public benefaction or a deed of mercy which builds up, yonder on our rocky shores of the Old Colony, the friendly lighthouse, – a beacon signal and a warning to the ap- proaching mariner in the midnight of his risks,—when the precipitous rocks and breakers are all about him 2 and is it any less a charity which quarries out of the very best of INew Hampshire granite, or the broken fragments of this great man's fame, such a monument of admonition as may forewarn other adventurers on the great sea of politi- cal ambition, and lifts there those “revolving lights” by which the heedless may have caution lest they drift also on the sandbanks of a compromise or the bleak wilds of a disappointment, to become only so many melancholy wrecks on the melancholy shores of hnman history? Is not he the best friend of his fellows who lives ever in their sight the divine life of holiness; who is ever earnest for their wel- fare; who is willing to breast in their behalf the sweeping tempest of all worldly trials, — some St. Bernard of the Alpine snow-drifts, to whom the driving sleet and blinding snows of the political mountain-pass are as nothing, when 8 he knows that some poor, fainting brothers are under the avalanche, – some heroic champion of justice, willing to stand and fight single-handed, if he must, the great battle for freedom, - some meek sufferer for the right, standing Christ-like amid the buffetings and abuse of the Scribes and Pharisees, while the reproachful terms infidel, heretic, disorganizer, blasphemer, are driven, like storm-gusts, into his face 7 All this he can bear for the sake of his cherished principles, “love to God, and love to man.” Such, indeed, is the mission and position of the great pulpit reformer of these days; and what shall we say, then, of such powers and appliances in society as would oppose such an influence, as are ever tending to foreclose and coun- teract it, — the cold, calculating, case-hardened conservatism which would excommunicate all progress and all freedom of speech, the powers of wealth and the powers of the world, the stringent policy and the intolerant selfishness, which are ever saying to all such lovers of truth and lib- erty, “Stand back!” Away with your interference! Hold your peace! This is a subject not without its immediate practical in- terest to us, involving, as it now does, not only the question of individual rights to the Christian ministry, but all the great practical issues of good to humanity at large. Indeed, the proscriptive action of the ruling powers in society, the Church and State, has become so notorious, so crafty, and so tyrannical,—the exclusive policy of those principalities is now so rife on certain great questions of moral and reli- gious concern, – it has so emasculated our pulpits, so stricken down the arms that ought to be uplifted, so blind- folded or extinguished the eyes of those who ought to be seers in these times, that I, for one, must enter again and "again my solemn protest against it. Seeing as I do, believ- ing as I do, that no other power bears as heavily as this against the influence which the pulpit of these days ought 9 to be exerting; seeing how it aims to silence, countermand, and pervert the voice of the ministry which is cowering be- neath it, I denounce it as the very Antichrist against which all the advocates of truth have now chiefly to contend. I denounce the wretchedness of the motives which underlie this proscriptive action, the mammonizing influence of our commercial interests, the self-seeking of our political parti- sans, the stolidity of our sectarian prejudice. And these were ever the antagonisms against which the influences of good, in God’s providence, have had to wage their spiritual conflict. See how it was with Christianity at the very first, and how it had to struggle with all the worldly and sen- sual forces of the time when the meek herald of its majestic truths came to “seek and to save " ' There were set over against him all the pride of station, all the powers of wealth, all the craft and sophistry of the world's philosophy; and all these were saying to him, “STAND BACK!” Who are you, and whence 2 was the exclamation of the haughty aristocrat of Judea to the humble Nazarene, when he came out of Galilee with his messages of mercy. “What have we to do with thee ?” and what have you to do with us?— coming here from your country village disturbing our city, meddling with our institutions, abusing our traditions, set- ting at nought our sacred laws, denouncing our Rabbis and first men “Stand back,” with your new views of doctrine and duty, your infidel philosophy, your revolutionizing the- ory of a “higher law.” What do you know of any higher law, or what are we to know of any higher law, than that of the Sanhedrim or the Areopagus'ſ What is it to us, – all this doctrine of yours about love to God, and love to man? “Have we not Abraham to our father?” What presump- tion and folly it is for you, a humble man, attended only by a few fanatical and obscure Galileans, as infidel and hereti- cal as yourself, to seek to change our social morality and public policy; telling us of the downfall of our church and 2 10 state, forsooth, or that such a fair and beautiful temple as this of ours shall soon have “not one stone left upon another”? Away with you! “Stand back!” “Thou blas- phemest.” Thus there were set over against him all the ruling powers of the time. There was the Pharisee, with his frigid formalism and his consummate subtlety (the con- servative and high churchman of the day); there was the Sadducee, so respectably clad all the time in his “purple and fine linen” (the “merchant-prince ’’ of the metropolis, not over nice in the depth of his religious principles, but a great stickler for order and the Union); and there were the Essenes, a set of ascetic “outsiders,” who did not seem to care much about any thing or anybody. All these were op- posed to the Nazarene reformer; and no doubt one or more of these respectable gentlemen in Jerusalem went down “on change” the next morning after the great “sermon on the mount,” gnashing their teeth, and said the doctrines and sen- timents of that sermon were outrageous, incendiary, treason- able, revolutionizing. No doubt they said such a preacher must be silenced! He must be put down! It will never do to have it thus ! He must be anathematized ; he must be outcast; he must be crucified;— and so he was. But, before that crisis came, only see how he projected the gene- rous and noble forces of his own great spirit, like arrows of eternal light, into that community and through all the after- ages. And, as with him, so with his disciples after him. They were persecuted, imprisoned, stoned, interfered with, and in every way reviled. “STAND BACK!” said the cau- tious, time-serving, and trembling Felix to the intrepid Paul, when he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and a judg- ment. “You are mad.” “You are beside yourself.” “You are very indiscreet.” “Oh, no!” said Paul, “I am not mad, but speaking only the words of truth and soberness.” So, through all the subsequent history of the early church, whose details would carry us far beyond the limits of a single dis- 11 course, we have similar illustrations of the exclusiveness and tyranny of the reigning powers in any given period. “STAND BACK!” said the Catholic hierarchy and the Roman Dominican Tetzel to Martin Luther, when he advanced on the tyrannies of the mother-church, and put forth his intrepid power to rebuke the sale of indulgences and other Popish iniquities. And what said he to the timid counsel of friends, who advised him not to cope with the ruling powers ? “Though there were as many devils in my way to Worms as there are tiles upon the roofs of its houses, I would go there.” And again, what said he when he heard that this same fanatical Tetzel was raving about him, and denoun- cing him through all the provinces of Germany? “God willing,” said Luther, “I will yet make a hole in his drum.” And, by the blessing of God, so he did, - as the triumph, or at least the progress, of the Protestant Reformation abun- dantly testifies. I will not weary you with any accounts of what must be so familiar to you all in the history of those struggling elements in the church: how at one time Protestantism, at another Catholicism, came to the ground as they wres- tled and rolled over and bit one another in their efforts for the mastery; and how the spirit of the world has ruled them both, and ran away with their hats, coats, and crosiers, while they were wrestling. I will pass over all this, and come directly down to our own time, and even to so limited a period of our own time as may be embraced within the memory of the youngest of these my hearers; and so may have an especial interest for this occasion. I will refer you, for instance, to what is familiarly known as the “Hollis- STREET ContRoversy.” Previous to that (perhaps I ought rather to say in connection with that, — say some twelve years ago), the same intemperate power of wealth and con- servatism, to which I have alluded, said to the faithful and fearless pastor of that church, who then stood in its pulpit 12 with the white flames of his grey hairs like a very “crown of righteousness” on his brow, “STAND BACK,” and a truce to your interference with our trade To such a man, with the honors of half a century on his forehead, and of half that time no less on his ministry, -to such a man, well described by a kindred spirit as “Girded for a constant strife with wrong, Like Nehemiah fighting while he wrought The broken walls of Zion, while his song Hath a rude martial tone, a blow in every thought,” — to such a man the influences of the world and the powers of evil, by their persecutions and protests and ecclesiastical councils, have dared to say, “STAND BACK!” But what could they do against the might of God's truth and the onward omnipotence of his principles, which never yet went backward for mortal man 7 Look you how that which was sown, if not in weakness, at least amid trials and discour- agements, has gathered strength in the compacter sympa- thies of the people and the now organized force of the Commonwealth’s enactment. Shall we say the pastor of that church had any less than a triumph when he thence departed, shaking off the very dust of his feet? Again, what said the “Fraternity of Churches,” so called, in this city, to your minister some eight years ago, when, by invitation of one of their ministers at large, he entered one of their chapels for the poor on a sabbath 7 “STAND BACK!” What have you to do with this preaching of the gospel to the poor, − with your infidelity and radicalism? You put in jeopardy the interests of our denomination' You injure our credit! We shall lose caste in the sectarian world. - So, also, to their official servitor they said in substance, “Stand back,” and lay aside your office, unless you will say as we say to that heretical preacher, Stand aside; for we are 13 stronger and sounder in the faith, if not holier, than thou! The result of that remonstrance and of that action is well enough known to you. How it thundered and lightened during that storm of the elements among the timid Unita- rians! See how the ark of the Lord in more liberal princi- ples has risen upon the topmost wave, while the frail barks of sectarian bigotry, which opened their batteries against it, have gone or are going down! And now the further conse- quences of that controversy are here in all the noble words that have been uttered from this pulpit ever since; in the rallying of so many kindred spirits and sympathizing souls around this heresiarch of yours, as he has stood here, sabbath after sabbath, through good report and evil re- port, diffusing a moral influence which none of his adver- saries have been able to gainsay or resist; illustrating so many subjects of practical interest by the wealth of his in- tellect; fulminating a reformatory power, such as no other preacher among us possesses, or pretends to ; revolutioniz- ing the popular conscience, far and wide, throughout the domains of the Church and State; striking down the stand- ards of all tyrannical usurpations, and shaking to their foun- dations all the pillars of a corrupt sectarianism' And, in the firm grasp of such a man, what are all those pillars of a time-serving church 2 They are as frail as so many reeds shaken by the wind. They are as unsubstantial as the frescoed pillars, painted on these walls behind me. I remember, that, when this controversy between right and wrong began in this city, eight years ago, in the fall of 1844, one of the conservatives of the ministry said to me, “Well, you are taking strange ground in regard to this matter, — the freedom of the pulpit! But never mind; mark you my words. This heretic preacher of yours, at the Melodeon, will have but a short time of it in the city.” “Ah!” said I, “ and how long, pray, will you give him to live?” “Well, about four months will settle the 14 matter,” he continued. “The public curiosity will then be fully satisfied, and his audience wholly dispersed”! As I had no very positive evidence that the person then addressing me was a miraculously inspired prophet, you may well suppose I was rather slow to credit his prediction. So I said, “Now let me vaticinate a little. I shall prophesy that in four years, yes, in twice that number, if he lives, that preacher will be found consolidating an influence and an audience such as no other preacher in this city, perhaps not all the preachers put together, can command.” That time has now passed; and I leave it to you, friends, to say which of us prophesied right. I am satisfied to rest the issue of my prediction on the fact, that within a fortnight you will transfer your place of worship, not only to a larger “tabernacle of witness,” but still nearer to the throbbing heart of this city, which so needs the reforming influences for which I plead. - Talk of crushing or suppressing such a man! Talk of confining or excluding him by any gates or bars of ecclesi- astical jurisdiction | Why, he takes all your gates off the hinges! He marches right up and over your barricades, and carries off your prison-doors as Samson bore away the gates of Gaza on his mighty shoulders! His very ink- stand—by the emergies which come out of it once a week, like the one which stern old Luther is said to have flung at the head of the devil — is full proof against all infernal agencies. He excommunicates the whole host of bigots and worldlings that mumble their poor words of complaint against him, and so carries us captive by the might of his majestic moral power, that, with every new sound of his apocalyptic trumpet, with every new revelation of truth and duty, we feel, every soul of us, as if we could shout aloud our thanksgiving ! “Such earnest natures are the fiery pith, The compact nucleus, round which systems grow: Mass after mass becomes inspired therewith, And whirls impregnate with the central glow.” 15 As we come to realize more and more the weight and worth of the impressions he is so diffusing through the community, we adopt, without qualification, that glowing apostrophe of Tennyson's : — “My hope and heart are with thee! Thou wilt be A latter Luther and a soldier-priest, To Scare church harpies from the master’s feast ! Our dusted velvets have much need of thee: Thou art no sabbath drawler of old saws, Distilled from some worm-cankered homily; But, spurred at heart with fiercest energy To embattle and to wall about thy cause With iron-worded proof, hating to hark The humming of the drowsy pulpit drone Half God’s good sabbath, while the worn-out clerk Browbeats his desk below. Thou, from a throme Mounted in heaven, wilt shoot into the dark Arrows of lightnings I will stand and mark : * I am well aware that all this eulogy of an individual might seem out of place, and quite superfluous to this audience, were it not fully understood, that in this case I subordinate all merely personal considerations to the great paramount claims of the principles I would thereby illus- trate. I have aimed to set forth my views of the principles, obligations, and mission of the right Christian pulpit in these days. If, in so doing, I have seemed to dwell too long on personalities, remember I could not well do other- wise in a description of the faithful and free pulpit. It is because, in my opinion, your minister impersonates, as few others do, the great radical principles of human life and of the absolute religion, that I so speak of him. It is because he represents the great stirring needs of the day as regards pulpit ministrations and moral reform, and because I verily believe no preacher of the present day (in this city at least) has done, or is doing, more to elevate and reinforce popular sentiment and heal the moral maladies of the mass. In view of this positiveness of his moral power, I, for one, have been willing to subordinate the minor questions of 16 his theology. Indeed, no sufficient argument has yet made it clear that his theology is wholly false. It has ever been with me the principle rather than the man; better should I say, the man of principle. I have so regarded the man only as the exponent of the principle, and I know of no one who better represents it: I mean the principle of MANLY RESISTANCE To PopULAR wroNG ! That is it! And, furthermore, this much will I say, though they were the last words I had to utter, that, in nothing has the judgment of many well-meaning Christians been so much at fault as in their estimate of this preacher, his spirit and purposes. Let others call him as they will and do, - disorganizer, infidel, deist (it was always so with those who go in advance of their age), — it is enough for me that he is a whole-hearted reformer There are few enough of such, unhappily, even among the ministry. I say also, that Unitarianism never did a worse thing for itself than when it passed the sentence of proscription on such a man. From the moment it so fell back from the one great principle of the broadest toleration, it received a stroke of paralysis in this city. Its numerical forces here, and its nominal rela- tions everywhere, have continued visibly to decline for the last few years. It has but the mere name to live. Its ten- dency is downward as a sect; and, like the Whig party, to which it really seems to have some asthetic affinity, it will be difficult by and by to find out where it is. It has striven to struggle up against this oozing away tendency, by build- ing, at great cost, one or two magnificent and stately churches, which are, after all, insolvent or in the market, or by coalition of one or two feeble churches; but it vainly resists the law of retributive decline, which it has incurred by recreancy to the one fundamental principle of its life, – courageous tolcration It really seemed, at one time, as if this denomination were on the ascending scale among the sects, – a very Protestant among Protestants; but, as soon 17 as any strong crisis came, putting their boasted principles to the test, ah me! they were just as weak as all the rest. Falling backward “in terrorem” against the legitimate deductions of their principles, they put on the shackles to their own wrists, and passed their own verdict of decline. As to what remains of them, if they continue to build the walls of restriction around freedom of inquiry, as the last king of France did around the city of Paris; if they go on as he did to face down the “reform banquets,” then must they also suffer as he did, and be discrowned and banished, while the throne of their distinctions is burnt away from under them | Yes! and you may write this, if you will, among the prophecies of your Bible, no less likely to be ful- filled than many which are there. This inconsistency of the so-called liberals in the church reminds us of what a politi- cal orator once said, quaintly enough, about our party pro- mises. He compared them to “western roads which open stately enough, with planted trees on either side, to tempt the traveller, but soon become narrow and narrower, and end in a squirrel track, and run up a tree.” What a disap- pointment do we realize, for instance, when we look, but with few exceptions, to the action or results of any great religious organizations of the time ! How little do they pro- mise — how much less do they perform — in regard to the great moral interests and reform-questions of the time! Look, for instance, at the late “Convention of Unitarians” at Baltimore. There was not a word in their discussion from which we could infer that the members of that con- vention had any interest or concern whatever in those great vital principles that are now shaking the globe. They seem to have been actuated throughout by the most equivo- cal. spirit of compromise, evasion, and sectarian timidity. “Stand back l’ seems to have been their edict towards every approximation of those subjects. Look at the three main propositions which formed the basis of their delibera- 3 18 . tion. The first of them seems almost like a covert satire on the conservative position of the denomination. And this is it: “The harmony of Unitarian Christianity with the |Universal Church greater than its contrasts.” There is truth in this, greater than was intended; but how much better were it, could they have said rather, — the contrast of Unitarians, in their position as reformers, greater than their agreement with other sects | The second proposition was equally unsatisfactory and equivocal : “The power of our primitive faith; this faith more important than the nega- tions which separate us from others.” And the third is like unto it, or little better: “The higher spiritual life, the more earnest missionary spirit and effort (and they might have added, the more courageous reformatory action), which should be the legitimate fruit of this faith.” So much for the three propositions of the last Unitarian Convention, the theses of a liberal theology. They would hardly have done for Luther to have pinned up on the outer panel of the old cathedral door at Wittemberg; and they certainly would not have alarmed the catholic tyrannies of those days. And was it for this poor talk that the Unitarians of New England, like so many prodigal sons, took what little por- tion of good has fallen to them, and made their journey into a far country, feeding on husks, and nibbling the old questions of obsolete theologies 2 Alas for the disloyalty of those who were born to the hope of better things! I come, then, in closing, to the question which underlies and terminates all others in this discourse, – Shall the pulpit be free? Shall the mission of a liberal Christianity, and of the absolute religion, ever be realized? I confess there are some signs which lead me to hope for a better state of things both in Church and State. We have one preacher, at all events, – nay, shall we not say this preacher is one of a thousand 7 — determined to be heard in behalf of justice, fixed in a resolute purpose to say the right word 19 for humanity, “whether men will hear, or whether they will forbear.” Reformers, too, of either sex, we have ; a goodly host, working “in season, out of season,” patiently, quietly, but none the less efficiently, by printing and by prayer, by speeches and by self-denial, by secret charities and by open appeal for the correction and guidance of the public con- science, and for the “re-enactment of the laws of God” in opposition to all unrighteous statutes of men. And, God be thanked, they are not laboring in vain. “The outworn right, the old abuse, The pious fraud transparent grown, The good held captive in the use Of wrong alone, – These wait their doom from that great law Which makes the past time serve to-day; And fresher life the World shall draw From their decay.” It is very evident, from all we see going on around us, that the political parties are in a transition-state. The Whigs have gone, or are going, the way of all pro-slavery flesh; as their great leader, in his dying hours, predicted they would. The Democrats, if they survive the spasm of intoxication consequent on their present success as a party, are none the less doomed, because they have within their body politic the same infernal, cancerous principle of disso- lution, — their connection with slavery, and their compro- mise with the abominable nuisance! They are just as surely predestined to dissolution, as a party, in their present form, or, at any rate, to absorption, in the oncoming anti-slavery sentiment of the next decade of years (which is the same thing), as GoD is mightier than the DEVIL, HEAVEN higher than HELL, and the “Rock of AGES ’’ stronger than the BALTIMORE PLATFoRM' Thus we shall come to see that such poor obscurities as they were once deemed, - WM. LLoyd GARRISON and his coadjutors (of whom Harrison 20 Gray Otis said they were “only a few very insignificant persons of all colors somewhere up in a printing-office gar- ret with one little negro-boy”), — we shall come to see that such men and such women as have thus labored for humanity through all difficulties and discouragements, hold- ing up the great banner of almighty justice amid many a flag of stripes, have not labored in vain; leavening, as they have, so largely the popular sympathies, proving such a mo- ral perplexity to all political parties, and blocking the wheels of their Juggernaut car. Still there is work to be done; quite enough of it for all true-hearted reformers. This in- cubus of selfish conservatism still overlays and oppresses the church. How else shall we account for that stupid sort of indifference in regard to the great questions of reform, - that uncomfortable neuralgia that seems now to afflict most religious societies 2 Comes it not from the oppression and paralyzing influence of sectarian association, party preju- dice, self-interest, and worldly expediency! A poor business it is, truly, so to waste the spiritual forces which ought to be given to God and humanity. The ministry, with but few exceptions, are absolutely dying of timidity; cring- ing and bowing down before little miserable cliques and associations, which threaten them with everlasting excom- munication and loss of their livings, unless they hold their tongues on certain subjects interdicted by those associations, or unless they vote the same ticket with their parishioners. The combined espionage of Church and State will watch them at the polls and at all the ward-rooms to-morrow, as it watches them in the pulpit, and will penetrate all the enve- lopes of their suffrage with all the severity of an inquisition | Oh shame! shame! What a miserable slavery it is . The Christian pulpit, so called! What a poor, mean thing it is in the main ' It is not unlike that curious toy, the “automaton chess-player,” that was exhibited here some years ago. It can cry “check” to no sin, unless the spring 21 of its machinery be touched by some “ Monsieur Maelzel ” of a parish committee man, and then only in a kind of thick, smothered voice. The gown of the clergyman, like the robes of that ingenious Turk, covers any amount of complicated wires, cranks, pulleys, springs, and motives, or perchance a living influence curled up somehow in the box. And as, in that game of chess, the real issue is worked out by some other than the wooden man that sits at the desk; so the pulpit has too often behind it some other influence than the person of its visible occupant. “There are those,” said a late preacher, in his charge to a company of young men about to leave the theological school for the office of preachers, “there are those who would interdict the action of the pulpit on all subjects which have a political and speculative, as well as moral bearing, however obvious and however momentous their moral bearing may be. But, I say, the freedom of the pulpit is a sacred trust committed to your care; and it were better for you that a mill-stone were hanged about your neck, and that you were drowned in the depths of the sea, than that you should betray it through selfish prudence or fear. The pulpit is, or should be, the moral sense of society, the public conscience, the highest tribunal of the time. When it ceases to be that, let it cease altogether.” And so say I: let the pulpit perish, unless it can be faithful to the moral needs of the time; and let the ministry meet their consequent martyrdom like men, rather than flinch, falter, or compromise in the least, or for an instant, the clearest convictions of their duty in this mat- ter; for it is clearly their duty to proclaim and pray for “peace on earth, good-will to men.” It is their duty to proclaim and illustrate those principles which may tend to the salvation, rather than the destruction, of men. It is their duty to bear their testimony in behalf of Liberty, Holiness, Love. So, if the pulpit can stand only as the timid apolo- gist for human or inhuman wrong, I say again, Let it fall: the sooner, the better! 22 “But then,” it is said, “these are secular subjects, party questions, agitating topics, – having nothing to do with the cause of Christ or our spiritual welfare.” Out upon such evasions ! And who says that? It were well for such a man that the pulpit is not panelled all round with glass mir- rors to exhibit the face of shame he must wear when he so says; ay, to exhibit the image of one who is denying his master; for, surely, Christ felt it to be his duty to preach deliverance to the captives, and the ransom of those who are bruised and oppressed. And, in doing this, he felt, and shall not we also feel, that the “spirit of the Lord” was upon him 3 What! the ministry have nothing to do in the way of pleading or remonstrance against a monstrous moral ini- quity, because, forsooth, it has become popular or national- ized! Must the professing followers of him who came to “heal the broken-hearted” fling aside, and trample under foot, his very dearest principles at the bidding of the world's partisans? Has it come to this, that, because a nation, or the demagogue of a nation, chooses to put the cap and feathers of their sanction on a great wrong, the ministry of Christ must therefore “stand back,” and see it worrying and mangling the souls and bodies of men with its bloody fangs? Must they retreat and stammer, and never say one word? By the worth of all immortal spirits, and by the might of the omnipotent justice, no, no! Away with such cruel interdictions! There are now banded, one against another, in these times and in this country, two great antagonistic elements, freedom and slavery, conservatism and reform; — on the one hand, the commercial and pro-slavery interests of the North and South; and, on the other, the anti-slavery princi- ples of all the world. And these two can never be recon- ciled, never! They are wholly opposite, the one to the other, as light to darkness. They can give no quarter 23 when they come to the last charge of their bayonets. One or the other must inevitably come to the ground in the struggle which is now going on between them; nor is it difficult to say which, since God is on the side of human rights, while the cause of oppression has nought but the selfishness of man to support it. The mission and duty, them, of reformers is plain: to be faithful, energetic, patient, persevering; undismayed by any sophistry of the selfish, the intolerance of the church, or the array of political powers. “Fear nothing, and hope all things; as the Right Alone may do securely : every hour The thrones of ignorance and ancient night Lose somewhat of their long-usurped power ; And Freedom’s lightest word can make them shiver With a base dread that clings to them for ever.” In our supplications to the great Searcher of all hearts, we are accustomed to pray — either with or without some significance to our words — for the coming of the king- dom, the kingdom of our God. From how many tem- ples, from how many altars of worship, is that prayer going up to-day ! If we mean any thing by that petition, we must mean, surely, that the spirit and life of that re- former, Christ, may reign upon the earth. We must mean that the spirit and power of God, through the influence and diffusion of all that is pure, wise, lovely, just, and of good report, may have free course, be glorified, and ascendant among the spirits and passions of men. We must mean by that aspiration, that the time may come as foretold in that other rhythmic prophecy, — “When man his brother shall no longer slay; When chains no more shall bind the bleeding slave ; When legal murder, cursed and passed away, No more shall hallow the untimely grave ; When Love, and not Revenge, shall deal with crime ; When Spirit shall be Lord, in place of Sense ; 24 When man shall not be bound to earth, and live Making his God of shillings and of pence ; When Love and Peace and Equity shall reign, And none shall starve, while some are richly fed; When one man shall not hoard his wealth of grain, And see his neighbor die for want of bread; When earth for every man hath hearth and home, – Then, – not till then, – God, will thy kingdom come.” Qi lje 21 tº Gunt it ember ºb. -**- A S E R M O N PREACHED AT JAMAICA PLAIN, * F E B R U A R Y 21, 1847, By Jos EPH HENRY ALLiº. O N R. E SIGN IN G H IS PAS TO R. A. L OFFIC E T H E R. E. PUBLISHED BY REQUEST. B O S T O N : PRINTED BY ANDREws & PRENTISS, No. 11 Devonshire Street. 1847. ū je ſitcount it embered. --------, S E. R. M. () N PREACHED AT JAMAICA PLAIN, F E B R U A R Y 21, 1847, BY JOSE PH H E N R Y AL LEN, (; O N R. E SIGN IN G H IS PAST O R. A. L OFFIC E T H E R. E. PUBLISHED BY REQUEST. B O STO N: PRINTED BY ANDREWS & PRENTISS, No. 11 Devonshire Street. 1847. S E R M 0 N . L U K E x v i. 2. GIVE AN ACCOUNT OF THIY STEWARDSHIP; FOR THOU MAYEST BE NO I.ONGER STEWARD. I suppose it is generally understood, that my official con- nexion with this church has ceased, in accordance with the vote given last Sunday. I am here now to say a few words before a final separation. As your minister I can no longer speak; — only as a friend, long and deeply interested in your welfare, who wishes now to say a single parting word. You have chosen to give me that title, – urged me to tarry a while in virtue of it, or at least to bear it with me where the Providence of God shall hereafter call me. And for this once I will use the privilege of it, and speak freely, as only in the presence of brethren and friends. I bring neither flattery nor reproach ; neither supplication for your good will, nor complaint at anything that has been done or withheld towards me. What I have in my mind to say, with your consent I will say it, as briefly and quietly as I may. It was just three years and a half ago this day, that you offered to me your invitation to be your pastor. The lament- ed death of my predecessor, together with a series of circum- stances over which you had no control, had created a want in this religious Society, not soon or easily supplied. After nearly a year and a half of interval, the existing differences of opinion were waived by common consent, as I understand it, for the sake of union and harmony; and to this excellent and Christian motive I ascribed the unanimity of feeling, with which, as I was then informed, the invitation was ex- w tended to me. Deeply conscious of my deficiencies, and filled with distrust, both from the greatness of the responsi- bility and the suddenness with which it was put upon me, I yet accepted the offer; trusting that the harmony and mutual conciliation then manifested, were a pledge of the patient kindness and willing sympathy with which my imperfect endeavors would be received. It must need be a solemn and affecting review that I am now led to make, of the three years’ experience I have passed through. There is always a soberness about the last of any course; and when the season has been one of much friendly intercourse and many serious thoughts, identified with the religious history of a community of living hearts, accompanied at every step by solemn prayer and an interchange of the deepest of the soul’s experience — then it cannot but be in some respects a matter of almost painful sadness to take a final leave of it. But cheerfully and confidently we must be ready to meet any change. Providence summons from one sphere to another. The voice of God calls, and it is our part to be prepared. Without apologies, or complaint, or sentimental grief, I feel myself entitled now to state one or two principles that have been prominent in my mind, and somewhat shaped my course; together with such thoughts as may naturally come, and fit themselves to the occasion. In the first place, what sort of ministry is it, that is needed in such a spot as this? The one idea, of the character of the office to be filled, must be the governing and essential one. If any mistake is made in this, it will show itself in the disadvantage and failure of all that is undertaken. If the idea seized and clearly apprehended, is a true one, it will gradually work upon all, and bring it towards a right issue. This then, in brief, has been my idea of such a ministry; that with its eyes open to all the light that comes from the kingdom of God, and its heart open to every want and inter- est of the world of man, it should be strictly a local ministry, — identified with every interest, plan of improvement, joy, sorrow, scenery even, and incident of the place where it is established. My ambition has been, not to be a popular and striking preacher, not to be a finished and learned scholar, not to be the associate of a few, the gifted and cultivated and prosperous ; but, in simple sincerity I say it now, as far as I knew how, to be a useful minister, citizen, man, here at Jamaica Plain. This has been my ambition and desire, because it seemed the business of the profession I had chosen. Personal reputation, whether as preacher, scholar, or member of society, I have held to be subordinate and of very small account, in comparison with that object. And it has seemed to me that no duties were too humble, no detail too insignificant, which would help at all towards carrying out that idea. I have always thought, that whether my stay should be six months or sixty years, my plan should be for permanent usefulness in this place. With any other view than this, a large part of what I have occupied myself about, might seem trifling and distracted. It did not seem so to me, as long as it was what ought to be done, and as long as it seemed to help in the least to carry out the ultimate and perfect plan. Some things were certainly undertaken with a lack of judgment, and led only to vexation and ill success. But, as I chose to measure them by my own plan, they did not seem wrong to me; and I always knew that a few years would bring them all to bear, easily and obviously, upon the work of my profession. For three years they may possibly be deemed failures; but not for ten or twenty years. I regret the incompleteness, not the undertaking of them. To do a single thing rightly by the place, I thought I must regard it as my home; my lasting and permanent home, if so it might be granted ; my own home, at least as long as it should be granted. And so there is not a feature in the beautiful landscape, or a child’s face, or a family in the parish, or a proposition for anything of benefit to our village, that I have not looked on with interest and affection; feeling that in the Providence of God it was somehow connected with my duty and hopes and prospects here. With strong and earnest love I looked forward, (while the hope was allowed me,) to the prospect of being more entirely at home in this neighhorhood, and more closely identified with the social and spiritual life of a place that had welcomed and encour- aged the efforts of my early youth. Much of it was only a pleasant dream — and it has passed over now — but it had grown deeply into my affections and thoughts. It made part and parcel of the life’s work I had sketched out for myself here. Where there was mistake, I regret it. Where there was fault, as in my own conscience I know there must have been, I am deeply sorry for it. But such as I have stated, was the main idea with which I came among you, and which I have sought to carry out. One word more, and I have done speaking of anything especial in my idea and plan of ministerial labor. I have been mortified and disappointed — not for myself—at find- ing some things misunderstood and complained of, which seem to me so clearly right, that I am only sorry there was not more of such reason of complaint. I mean in regard to the republican and unaristocratic character of some of my conduct here. Jesus of Nazareth, as we may infer from Scripture, and as the Church has always believed, worked with his own hands at a carpenter’s bench till he was about thirty years of age ; and throughout his ministry was re- proached for his free and indiscreet bearing, (as was thought) towards all classes of men. I have been grieved and ashamed sometimes, that any persons should rebuke an imitation of him in this respect, in any one who professes to be his dis- ciple. But to pass over this topic, I would go on to say, that it has seemed to me a main and very important part of the Christian office, to melt away by mutual intercourse and brotherly kindness, the harsh divisions that too often separate us into sets and classes in our social life. I remember to have often heard it affectionately related of my predecessor, that among his last words to this people was the earnest exhortation to brotherly union and kindliness of intercourse. It has seemed a charge solemnly put into my hands from him, to make the ministry a constant and active means of bringing this about—his last desire and request. The methods I have taken may have been indifferently planned, and only partial in their effects. But it has been a very great satis- faction to learn that a warmer and more general interest than I supposed, has been felt in them ; and that something, however little, has been actually done. If a beginning, no matter how humble, has been made, the work of promoting harmony, union and Christian charity, may safely be left with you. In regard to the great and special work of the ministry here or elsewhere — the inculcation of Christian truth and righteousness—it becomes me to speak with diffidence and reserve. There are deep religious wants everywhere — wants which only the strongest, purest, wisest, best of men can adequately meet; and they, relying solely on conscience and the help of God. I feel deeply — no one more than I — how very imperfectly I have met and satisfied these wants. The world demands a high and hard task of its spiritual teachers. I am glad it does. When the mark is set high, it is a good sign. Something is already gained when the want is felt. How vast and glorious would be the gain if the want were fully satisfied. Elsewhere I have spoken more fully than I can at present, of the principles that belong to this portion of the work. But there is one point that seems to deserve especial mention now. I mean the application of Christian principles to the position and duties and immense responsibilities of the privileged, prosperous, and influential. To set forth this, I have con- sidered a main and very essential part of the preacher’s office here. It has been our congratulation, perhaps our pride, that there is as much prosperity and wealth among us, along with as little want and suffering, as can be found anywhere, in a community of the same number of persons. Sharing in the commercial prosperity of the capital, we are free from its poverty and disquiet ; in a great measure free also from its excitements and vice. Blessed with a situation singularly beautiful and salubrious, we are exempt from a great share of the sickness and mortality that prevail in other places. Our affections are not so painfully disappointed, our households not so broken and desolated, our hearts not so weighed and afflicted as many others, by the visitation of disease and death. Along with all this privilege, comes a great responsibility. Moral wrong and dangers there will be, equal to the exemp- tions and advantages of such a place. If our position is favorable to general friendly and pleasant intercourse, to quietness and contentment and mutual good will, it exposes us also to a certain class of faults. What those are, it has been my duty and my earnest endeavor to understand; for this reason, if for no other, that I am as much exposed to them as any one. I have tried in this matter to be both strictly faithful and scrupulously just. I have endeavored to test each single principle in my own experience and conduct first ; and not to deal in personalities, or make any charges upon the individual, while I sought in all possible ways to bring every man’s conscience into play. I have considered that in matters of conscience each must find his guide and accuser for himself; and this rule I have steadily kept in view, when urging as strongly as I knew how, the peril and responsibility just spoken of. 2 I () Probably our greatest danger is of selfish apathy and out- side morality, without profound and earnest sentiment. This, I suppose, is the chief moral danger of all human society; especially of our highly civilized and artificial way of life. It is a danger which I am sure we must all feel for ourselves; which we must all have noticed in the prevailing faults of our community. And there is one evil, closely connected with it, so great that it seems to swallow up almost every other sin. I mean the indifference and neglect of the prosperous and influential towards matters of the most vital interest to the morals and happiness of man. The sin of moral indif- ference, in whatever shape, it is a most imperative duty of the religious teacher to rebuke — if possible, to cure. With what success I cannot tell, but you will bear me witness that I have not neglected to give my testimony against this great and fearful wrong. Again, the very broadest application of Christian principles of right, is at once the lawful claim and the duty of him who speaks in the name of conscience and God. And con- sequently, while his main business is undoubtedly with the solitary heart and the private character, at the same time there are matters of public morals, to which he must give some attention. At any rate he must be free to speak, “as God by his secretary Conscience shall enjoin.” If there is not personal confidence towards him, sufficient to bear him out in uttering his honest thought on any topic of moral or religious interest, this office is not for him to fill. I have felt free to speak, so long as I have stood here, whatever I felt it right and necessary to speak, in reference to those subjects— as war, intemperance, a vicious public sentiment, and the 11 false value set on wealth — which strike me as the most prominent evils of the day. Of course I should feel and vindicate this freedom wherever I might be, and should use it whenever I felt imperatively called on so to do. Pardon me, if I have not been clear enough, or strong enough, or earnest enough, as to these great and vital points. One more fault I must speak of ; the rather, because it takes hold so insidiously, and affects us before we are aware. I mean the fault of depending too much on what God intends as the tools and instruments of our usefulness, and too little on his providence, and on our own soul. We think too much of house and land, too much of prosperity and gain, too much of bodily health and ease, too much of the world's opinion and our reputation among other men, too much of the mere outside, and too little of the inner spiritual force of character and life. Even in our plans of doing good we partake of the same material tendency. We flatter ourselves that we shall be more useful and influential, better able to fulfil the trust God has reposed in us, if we get a larger share of the worldly goods which we mean shall be our instruments. God forgive us for this willing self-deceit of ours. We all share in it more or less. The notion is deceitful and wrong. Our real success, our real usefulness, or valuable influence in the world, depends far more on the spirit of the mind within than on the array of outward help. We direct our economy the wrong way. We cramp the mind and expand the pos- sessions ; whereas we should contract our wants if we must, think less of our possessions at any rate, but make the soul large and generous. For what we have is of infinitely less account than what we are. I have known the tendency was wrong, and have spoken of it frequently. But with sorrow I acknowledge, that with- out this present experience, I should never have felt its false- ness, as I feel it now. The plans of action, the schemes of one kind and another of success, the outward things so pleasant to my thought, so long identified with my hopes and love and worldly prospects, have passed away, like the thin film of mist that hid the morning sky. I can be glad that they are gone, if in spirit I can feel a grain more free. If any degree of moral and intellectual force, any gleam of deeper spiritual eyesight, has been granted me, though at the sacri- fice of what I had ever so strongly set my heart upon, I should feel that I had only reason to rejoice at the exchange. So pleasant a worldly lot as that which I now leave, I do not look for again. But however pleasant and desirable, it should not weigh one hour against the smallest degree of genuine spiritual good that might be gained. Would we could all conquer, once and forever, that wiliest sophistry that comes to corrupt our souls. And now for a few last words I turn, my friends, to you. When this hour is once passed, I shall go away, and can never again stand towards you in that relation which has been heretofore so pleasant and dear to me. I go, because my own judgment and yours have decided that it is best I should go. But if there has been a word of truth, a single thought sincerely spoken in all this time, I cannot possibly be indifferent hereafter to the religious welfare of this society. 13 For the personal testimonials of kindness shown towards me, I feel, especially at this time, most warmly and sincerely grateful. Within one short month, I have relinquished all the methods, hopes and plans of these three last years. The change wrought in this brief time is so entire, that I surrender them all without a single regret, unless it be at parting with those who have had so large a share of my esteem and love. I should deem it profane and ungrateful towards God, to be troubled for my own sake at a change like this. And for the sake of this society, I sincerely hope the change may be for their advantage. It will be so, if all can feel the need of mutual forbearance and harmony of action. Any change of outward condition or circumstance, has its value in leading our thoughts within, and teaching us to find the spiritual wisdom which is God’s most precious gift. As to a change of this sort, (we may as well acknowledge it, ) it cannot come to pass without some alienation of feeling and some difference of opinion. You have felt something of this already. At the present moment your minds are in a some- what harassed and divided state. Now you can suffer this state of mind, whatever degree of it exists, to brood and rankle, and kindle animosities that will trouble your peace for years. Or again, you may show the better wisdom, of soothing away all spirit of contention, and addressing your- selves in right earnest to the work of your Christian culture. What is past is past, and can never be recalled. Everything that has come to pass, has served to put you in a position where you can improve every advantage and make good every loss. Personal experience of spiritual things is cer- 14 tainly the greatest possible gain, purchased at whatever loss of other things. You can deal wisely or foolishly by this circumstance, which has interrupted the smooth flow of our religious history. It certainly need not be a disadvantage, in what- ever view we consider it. I am not disposed to think so sadly as many do, of the breaches of pastoral connexion, so frequent in our day. Very often it is necessary for a man, for the sake of his own growth and intellectual truthfulness, to leave a spot where he is compelled to labor at a disad- vantage. And for a society it may also be a benefit, if it breaks the monotony of long routine, and turns their thought upon their spiritual history and wants. The frequent changes therefore, so much complained of, may be a sign of greater religious activity in the body of our congregations. Let us hope it may prove so here. At any rate, you have now before you the clear choice of what you will do. You may forget personal preferences and personal feeling. You may put out of sight the differences of opinion. You may address yourselves, with one mind and heart, to the task of building up Christ’s kingdom here. You may do for yourselves what I have not been so well able to accomplish for you. All this lies before you, as the cheering and encouraging possibility now offered. A little mutual concess- ion, and a gentle, forgiving temper, will work wonders in effecting any Christian work. Only, whatever harmony there is, let it come not from policy but principle ; not from a mere calculation of the advantage of uniting, but from that spirit of brotherly love and deep religious conviction, which will sanctify whatever you undertake, and make all discord | 5 among you forever impossible. God give you grace, that in simple sincerity you may henceforth preserve the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. Brethren and friends of this Christian Society. I have done, what by the judgment of a sufficient number of you, coinciding with my own, it seemed best that I should do. I have withdrawn from the care and responsibilities of the office I have held among you. I respectfully decline the proposal you have made, that I should remain another half year, -partly in justice to myself, that I may not labor where there is not all that mutual confidence so necessary to any satisfactory result ; partly in justice to you, that I may not stand any longer in the way of that better ministration which you hope to find. As friend, and not as pastor, I shall henceforth know you, - by that title which you have pre- ferred that I should bear. And be assured of this, that on whomsoever your choice shall rest, I do not anticipate any possible jealousy or distrust, that can arise between him and me. For him and you I shall feel both willing interest and a strong desire of success. And along with this, permit me to indulge the hope, that any true word I may have spoken, and any plan of religious action here begun, may be if it were only a single ear of wheat, or a grain of scattered seed, in the harvest which you shall reap together, unto everlasting life. PETER AT ANTIOCH: THE WATICAN WS, BISMARCK AND GLADSTONE. A S E F M O N PREACHED BY J AM ES FREE MAN CLAR KE, To the Church of the Disciples, Boston, Dec. 20th, 1874. --~~~~~sº-º-º--------— B O STO N : OFFICE OF THE SATURDAY EVENING GAZETTE, No. 2 BROMFIELD, Corn ER WASHINGTON ST. 1875. PETER AT ANTIOCH: OR, . THE WATICAN WS. BISMAROK AND GLADSTONE. A S E R M O N PREACHED BY JAMES FREEMAN CLAR KE, To the Church of the Disciples, Boston, Dec. 20th, 1874. •º- º -º- B O S T O N : OFFICE OF THE SATURDAY EVENING GAZETTE, No. 2 BROMFIELD, CoENER WASHINGTON ST. 18 T 5. BoSTON, January 1, 1875. I authorize my sermon on “Gladstone and the Vatican º' to be printed in pamphlet form for the benefit of Mr. Tew, JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE. S E R M O N. GALATIANS 2: 11—“But when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to his face, because he was to be blamed.” As long as Peter remained at Jerusalem, attending to the concerns of his own diocese, Paul did not interfere with him, or find fault with him. But when he came to Antioch and undertook to treat the Gentiles, whom Paul had converted to Christianity, as inferior to himself, and not to be regarded as brethren, Paul withstood him to his face, because he was to be blamed. Peter was a good man, but he had his faults ; he was by no means infallible or impeccable. At one time he was under a divine influence, and then Jesus blessed him for his faith. But, shortly after, he came under a worldly influence, and savored not the things of God, but those of men ; and then Jesus said to him, “Get thee behind me, Satan ; thou art an offence unto me.’’ When he was with the soldiers and the maid-servants, he denied, with oaths, that he knew Jesus; but when Jesus looked at him, then he wept bitterly, and repented of his falsehood and cowardice. When the Roman Centurion sent for him, he went and baptized him, and declared that God had shewed him not to call any man common or unclean; yet afterwards, when he went to Antioch, he had not the courage of his opinion, and treated the Gentile Christians as if they were common or unclean. It is plain that Peter was not impeccable or in- fallible. The Pope of Rome considers himself the successor of Peter; but he is not greater nor better than Peter. As Bishop of Rome, he has a right to govern his diocese according to his own judgment; but when he comes to Germany or England, or America, and undertakes to interfere with the laws or social insti- tutions of these countries, we must withstand him to his face, because he is to be blamed. -o-º: This is what the Prince Bismarck and Mr. Gladstone have both intended to do, and the question which I wish to discuss this morning is, whether they are right, or whether the Vatican is right, in this matter. But first let me say that, though I am opposed to the claims of the Papacy, I am not opposed to the Roman Catholic religion. I am not one of those 4 Protestants who dislike the Catholics. On the contrary, I respect all their good works, all their great men, all that is excellent in their past, all that is hopeful in their future. If I had the power of destroying the whole Roman Catholic Church throughout the world. and of substituting Protestant churches in its place, I would not do it. If Protestants and Catholics could both grow up into something better, I should like that very much; but I should not wish to see any church violently abolished, and another violently put in its place. In fact, I think the chief danger to the Roman Catholic Church, to-day, comes from the excessive and extravagant claims of the ultramontane party in its own bosom. The danger is that, by claiming too much power for the Pope, they will make their church odious to the communities where it exists, disgust many of its own members, and create rebellions and schisms in its own body. If I hated the Roman Catholic Church, and wished to destroy it, I should rejoice in the decree of infallibility. But I do not hate it, and should be sorry to see it come to grief, and so I am sorry for the decree of infallibility. In all my criticisms on the course of the Jesuits, and on the claims of infalli- bility, I wish to be regarded as the friend, and not the enemy, of the Roman Catholic religion. For in every church, denomination or sect, there are two elements—the ele- ment of religion, and that of organization. They stand related as soul to body. Body and soul are both necessary to life, growth and activity. As long as the soul governs and the body obeys, they co-operate in the best way, and the whole man is morally, mentally and physically well. So, in any church, when the soul, which is religion, is supreme, and the body, which is organiza- tion, is the servant, then the church is in a healthy state. When, on the other hand, the body governs the soul, when man is led by his appetites and ruled by his senses, then both soul and body are corrupted by this false relation. So, in the church, when the spirit of religion is sacrificed to the letter; when, rites, forms, ceremonies, creeds, are made the end and the object, then the church is corrupted through and through, and hastens to its ruin. Such was the condition of the Jewish church in the time of Isaiah, when the Lord spoke by the prophet, and said, “To what purpose the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? It is iniquity, even your solemn assembly. Wash you, make you clean, cease to do evil, learn to do well, relieve the oppressed, plead for the widow ’’ The Jewish organization, its solemn sacraments and grand forms, had got the better of Jewish religion. The body had mastel ed the servant. So it was, also, in the time of Jesus. They made long prayers, they were very strict about the Sabbath, they fasted often, and gave tithes to the temple. But the Lord called them hypocrites, who made clean the outside of the dish, when it was foul within. The Roman Church has a grand organization. It is like a magnificent army, with its cavalry, infantry, artillery; its generals, colonels, captains; its quarter- master’s department, its commissary department, hospitals, ambulances, tele- graph corps. The Church of Rome is organized with Priests, Bishops, Archbish- ops, Cardinals and Pope; with its great monastic orders; its seven sacraments; its masses and varied ritual, This is its body. But it also has it religion; and the spirit of the Roman Catholic religion is that of self-denial, self-sacrifice, 5 devotion, and regular prayer. It has a loving and tender spirit—a spirit to be cherished and respected. But the danger of the Church is that this beautiful religious spirit may be sacrificed to the power and growth of the organization. All the evils of the Roman Catholic Church have come from this source. It has made conformity to its ceremonies, submission to its authority, the essential thing. Hence its persecutions, its Inquisition, its resisting truth, its arrogant claims, its desire for wealth, its lust of power, its insatiate ambition. All this happens when the organization of the church is set above the religion of the church. In 1870, the great Council of the Roman Church was held which declared the infallibility of the Pope. While the Council was yet in session, I published a book, in which I made the following statements : “It is a mistake, generally made by Protestants, to regard the declaration of papāl infallibility by the Vatican Council as a mere theoretical assertion of impossible claims. Almost all Protestant writers are amused by it, and con- sider it as simply ridiculous. But we must not suppose that so sagacious a body as the Roman Curia has no important practical object in view in thus com- pelling the bishops to admit the infallibility of the Pope. It means a great deal, practically. It is simply changing a constitutional monarchy into an absolute despotism. The company of Jesus has always been such a despotism. Every member of it has been a soldier, bound to obey every order of his superiors without question. The present plan is virtually to transform the whole Catho- lic Church into such a company of Jesus. The motto of the whole Catholic Church will then be ‘Perinde ac cadaver.” Every bishop will be bound to con- trol his diocese according to directions from Rome. A papal brief will then be like the order of the general of an army, to be obeyed absolutely, without hesi- tation, by every good Catholic. * Not theirs to make reply, Not theirs to reason why ; Theirs but to do or die.” “The plan is, by this magnificent centralization, to give to the whole Catho- lic Church the aggressive power which has made the Company of Jesus such splendid soldiers in the service of the Pope. As a nation, in its hour of peril, from internal rebellion or external foes, chooses a dictator and puts the whole power in his hands, so the Catholic Church, perceiving how it is endangered by the advance of science and the spirit of the age, proposes to make the Pope an absolute dictator.” It now seems that the two leading Protestant statesmen in Europe, Glad- stone and Bismarck, have come to the same conclusion. They both believe that, by the definition of papal infallibility, the Church of Rome is likely to in- \terfere with the allegiance of subjects, and to endanger the safety of every government in the world where Catholics are found. Prince Bismarck has not fully stated his views ; but Mr. Gladstone has. He has declared that, since the Vatican Council has decreed the infallibility of the Pope, “No one can be- come a convert to Romanism without renouncing his mental and moral free- dom, and placing his civil loyalty and duty at the mercy of another.” “Rome,” 6 he says, “has reburnished and paraded anew every rusty tool she was fondly thought to have disused.” For the present Pope, in his Encyclical and Sylla- bus, has denounced and anathematized those who maintain the liberty of the press, the liberty of conscience and worship, and the liberty of speech ; has denounced those Catholics who think the Pope may be disobeyed unless his commands refer to faith and morals; has denounced those who think the Popes have ever exceeded their power ; those who think they ought not to use force in punishing heretics; those who allow merely secular schools ; those who admit marriage to be binding, unless by a priest of Rome, etc. Mr. Gladstone, therefore, calls on his Roman Catholic fellow-subjects to say whether, in case of a conflict between the Pope and the English govern- ment, on any point of civil law, they mean to obey the laws of England, or to obey the Pope. To this, numerous replies have been made by Roman Catholics. But that of Archbishop Manning was the most prompt, and is the most decided. The Archbishop makes two points. (1.) The decree of Papal infallibility has made no change in the position of English subjects. They are no more bound to obey the Pope than they were before. (2.) A Roman Catholic, just like a Protestant, must obey the laws, unless where his duty to a higher law, the law of God, forbids it. But Catholics and Protestants, therefore, are bound to obey God rather than man. The first answer of Archbishop Manning is not very reassuring, when we know that the Archbishop believes and asserts that the Pope has the right of temporal and spiritual authority over all the nations of the earth. Only last month, at a large meeting of Roman Catholic noblemen, clergy, and laymen, he made a speech on the future policy of the Roman Catholic church, in which he declared that the Pope had a right to temporal as well as civil authority, and that in the last resort the only safety was in acknowledging civil allegiance to him. There must, he said, be no half-hearted assertion of these claims. Cath- olics must not fear to declare to England and to the world the Sovereign Pon- tiff’s claim to infallibility, his right to temporal power, and the duty of the nations of the world to return to their allegiance to him. If these are the Papal claims now, it makes very little difference what they were before. It is, however, a fact stated by Mr. Gladstone, that when it was proposed to admit Catholics into Parliament, they were asked if the infallibility of the Pope was an article of faith, and Bishop Doyle and other Roman Catholic prelates dis- tinctly declared that it was not an article of faith, and that neither the Pope nor any other ecelesiastical personage had any right to interfere in the obe- dience of the subjects to their civil rulers. Now, since the decree of infalli- bility, the state of things is very different ; for the Pope has, by that decree, supreme authority over every English and American Catholic in all matters of faith and morals—and morals include all of a man’s life—for everything we do is either right or wrong. But what shall we say as to the other reply of Dr. Manning? It is cer- tainly true that we all ought to obey God rather than man. In old slavery times, after the Fugitive Slave Bill was passed by Congress, all honest men, opposed to slavery, declared that they would not obey it, because it violated the higher law of their conscience. They said they must obey God rather 7 than man, and the nation justified them. So, when Quakers refuse to take the oath in courts, which the law requires, because they interpret literally Christ's command, “Swear not at all,” we justify them because we say “they must obey their conscience.” Why not, then, justify the Roman Catholics in England or America, if they obey the Pope, who is their outward conscience, and whose voice is to them the voice of God? It is no sufficient answer to reply, “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God’s.” This does very well in the majority of cases, no doubt. On this basis rests the separation of Church and State; let Caesar, or the government, be supreme in all outward public and political concerns; let God rule in all that relates to religion and morals. Let not Caesar undertake to establish a creed, or a State religion; let not religion interfere in matters of politics. But sometimes these two domains overlap each other; sometimes the same action belongs to the order of politics and to the order of religious duty, as in the two cases already cited. The Fugitive Slave Law was a law of the land, and to be obeyed as such. But many believed that to obey it was to enslave a human brother, who had a right to his liberty, and therefore it must be disobeyed. What did those of us who thought thus do? We assisted in concealing fugitives; we utterly re- fused to obey the law; we denied that it was truly a law; we went to Black- stone and other writers to show that nothing which violates human rights can be legally justified. Now, why have not the Catholics the same right to obey the Pope rather than human law, which we believed that we had to obey con- Science rather than human law 2 Let me put a case, which is not unlikely to occur? Suppose that the law establishes compulsory education throughout the Union. Every child must be taught to read and write. Public schools are established, and made free, that all children may go to them, and parents are obliged to send their children to them, under penalty if they refuse or neglect to do so. This law is based on the fact that a republican government cannot be carried on wherever a large part of the people are ignorant of the language in which the laws are written. Universal education is based on the duty of self-preservation. No republic can live where the people are ignorant. It is not only our right, but our duty, to insist that all the children of the country should be taught to read and Write. But now the Pope, in his Encyclical letter, denounces all secular education as impious. The 45th, 47th, and 48th Articles of the Syllabus of Pius IX., dated Dec. 8th, 1864, denounce all schools under secular instruction. A Ro- man Catholic convention in St. Louis unanimously passed a resolution de- nouncing the public schools of the United States, as being irreligious. Ac- cording to their view, it is irreligious to teach children to read and write and cipher, unless you teach them the Roman Catholic religion at the same time. The Catholics, therefore, under the inspiration of the Pope, are beginning to demand sectarian schools, which is the same thing as demanding that the children shall not be taught at all. For the only system which has ever suc- ceeded in educating the whole people is our own. In no Roman Catholic country, by schools taught by priests, have the people learned to read and write. Roman Catholic priests have had the whole control of education in 8 Spain, Austria, Italy, for many centuries, and the result has invariably been that, at least, thirty-three one-hundredths of the population of those countries have been unable to read and write. In the Northern United States, under a system of secular schools, and excluding foreigners just over, not under three persons in one hundred were illiterate in 1870. In Spain, at the same time, out of 16,000,000, it was found that 11,000,000 could neither read nor write. The reply to the question of the Catholics whether they are not to obey God rather than man in this: that to obey a Pope, a priest, or a minister, in- stead of listening to the voice of heaven in your own soul, is to obey man rather than God. He who gives up his private judgment to the absolute au- thority of human legislators or human priests, obeys man. The higher law, which is supreme, is not what a church says, for a church is composed of fal- lible men; not what a priest says, for he is only a man; not what the letter of the Bible says, for the letter is human; and Paul tells us that the letter even of the New Testament kills, while the spirit makes alive. The higher law is not what acts of Congress declare, nor what is written in a statute book, nor what human creeds or ecclesiastical councils may determine, The Church, the State, the Bible, the teacher, the priest, the clergyman, the statute-book, are all guides and helps to enlighten the conscience, and teach it what is its duty; but, in the last resort, the private conscience must be obeyed, or God is diso- beyed. The Church and the State have two different spheres. The State is to pro tect property and person, and to promote industry, education, and social prog- ress. The Church is to teach the love of God and man, develop the sense of duty, cultivate all inward Christian graces, prosecute purity of heart and life. It is the duty of the State to give secular education to the peqple. It is the duty of the Church to give religious education to the people. For this purpose, the Church has its Sunday-schools, and one day in seven set apart from labor for religious instruction. The State has no right to interfere with the Church, and undertake to teach secular knowledge in the Sunday-schools. The Church has no right to interfere with the State, and undertake to teach its religion in the day schools. In this way we render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God’s. But when the two domains overlap each other, and there is a conflict of juris- diction between Church and State, which is to decide? Neither is to decide. lf the State decides, it sets itself above the Church; if the Church decides, it sets itself above the State. Private conscience is to decide in such cases. Every separate soul is to decide for itself, independent of every other. This is the only rule which is safe. To let the Church decide on the extent of its domain, would be to establish a hierarchy, and put the whole world into the hands of priests. To let the State decide, would be to put the human conscience and the moral sense of mankind into the keeping of politicians and men of the world. But no danger attaches to the supremacy of private judgment. The individual conscience can only control its own actions. It cannot conspire against the State, or against the Church. It is the salt, to season and preserve both from decay and corruption. But see the enormous danger which comes from putting the control of human consciences into the hands of a Pope living in a foreign land, surrounded by a 9 court of his own, unacquainted with the institutions of other countries; a good man, perhaps, but ignorant of history, except what is taught in the colleges of priests; ignorant of life, but that which is seen through the grated windows of a monastery. Such a man is the present Pope; a good man, a benevolent man; but, as his Syllabus shows, living in the nineteenth century as if it were the tenth. His desire and purpose is to turn back the grand course of history, which is the movement of a divine Providence, and to make Science, literature, art, knowledge, go back to their childhood. The decree of infallibility has been established, in order to give to this man the supreme control of the con- sciences of the members of his church all over the world. If he chooses, when he thinks the time has come, he can issue his decree commanding every Cath- olic in the United States to take his children out of the public schools, the practical result of which would be that they would grow up in ignorance. This, the policy of the nation will never allow. It is treason against the national life; it would be a new rebellion, worse than the last, to allow the children of the land to grow up here, as they have been allowed to grow up in the Roman Catholic countries of Europe; taught to recite their catechism, but not taught to read and write. But it may be said in reply : “We are Catholics; we are not Protestants. We have no right to exercise private judgment in matters where the Pope speaks. We believe that God speaks by his mouth, and, in obeying him, we do obey God.” In that case, we answer, you must take the consequences. The great ma- jority of the Roman Catholics have come from other countries to the United States, to live here for their own convenience, because they find it a good country to live in. Now they must not come here to destroy the very institu- tions which have made it a good country for them to live in. We welcome them cordially to all its blessings; to free institutions, to freedom of religion, to opportunity for becoming rich, to an equal chance with the native citizens to all the privileges of the land. Only, we say, do not seek to destroy those institutions which are the strength and life of the State. If you cannot con- scientiously live under them, go where you can. All we ask is to be allowed to tax ourselves to teach your children to read and write. All we ask is that we may be allowed not to interfere with their religion, and not to return to that worn-out system of clerical instruction that has been the ruin of every country of Europe. When Profestants, in the exercise of private judgment, refuse to obey the laws, they take the consequences. When the Quakers refused to take the oath of allegiance to King James, they went to prison ; when they refuse to support war, they bear the penalty. Anti-slavery men would not return fugitives ; they protected them in their houses ; but they were ready to endure the pen- alty for so doing. I have a friend, now living in South Carolina, John Hunn, who was formerly a citizen of Delaware. He sheltered escaped slaves in his house, was prosecuted for it, and convicted; and paid a fine of several thousand dollars which took a large part of his property. But when the United States judge, in pronouncing sentence, told him that he hoped this would be a warn- ing to him, John Hunn replied: “If you, sir, or any other white man, or any black man, shall come to my house, and ask for food and shelter, I will give it, 10 and I will take the consequences, whatever they are.” So he did ; and, after paying this heavy penalty, he sheltered some two hundred fugitive slaves, until the war and emancipation made it no longer necessary. No priest told him to do it ; no foreign bishop ordered it; no church made such a rule ; but the voice of God in his soul told him to do it, and he willingly endured the loss, despising the shame. If the Roman Catholics of this country or England seriously believe that they are obeying God in doing whatever the Bishop of Rome commands, then they ought to do it and take the consequences. The consequences will be very injurious to the country, but still more injurious, I think, to the Catholic Church itself. The great danger of the Roman Catholic Church is not from Protestantism, but from the Ultramontane or Jesuit party, which has obtained control of it, and is now directing its policy. When I say the Jesuit party, I do not mean to condemn all Jesuits. But the leading men of that order are unfortunately committed to this plan of pushing the claims of the Church to a dangerous ex- treme. Alarmed by the progress of modern thought, they think to resist it by making the organization of the Church more compact, by giving all power into the hands of a single person. They are doing exactly what the slave- holders in this country did before the war. They also were afraid of the progress of opinion, and tried to resist it by increasing their power and advancing their claims. In this purpose they annexed Texas, lepealed the Missouri compro- mise, passed the Fugutive Slave Law, obtained the Dred Scott Decision. In vain; by these assaults on freedom they created a more violent opposition to their system, which at last overthrew it. So the Jesuit party at Rome have ob- tained the Papal Encyclical against freedom of thought and life and all modern progress; they have obtained the decree of infallibility; they wish to make the pope absolute monarch of the Church. But what has been the result? The revolt of Italy and Austria from their church; the loss of the pope's temporal power; the expulsion of his Bourbon allies from their thrones; the defeat of his ally Napoleon III.; the emancipation of Italy. In Austria, the result has been the final abolition of the concordat with Rome, and a system of secular instruc- tion. Mexico, so long under the control of the Roman Church, has proclaimed the independence of Church and State, made marriage a civil contract, forbid- den the religious orders acquiring real estate, and prohibited monasteries and nunneries as immoral institutions. In fact, there is no Roman Catholic nation in the world where the Roman Catholic Church enjoys such privileges and makes such progress as it does in the Protestant countries of Germany, Eng- land and the United States. The free institutions, which the Jesuits have in- duced the pope to anthematize, are the greatest helps to his own Ghurch. Ro- man Catholic States expel the Jesuits; we let them come and do as they will. Roman Catholic countries suppress the monasteries and confiscate their proper- ty; here they hold their wealth by a title which no one disputes. Roman Catholic countries suppress their schools and colleges; in the United States, they may have as many as they like. All we ask is that they shall not attempt to overthrow the institutions which protect them. We ask them not to meddle with that system of education which has created a nation able to tolerate even intolerance, and to give equal rights to those who, in other countries, deny all rights to those who differ from them. 11 I, for one, hope that the Roman Catholics of this country will be sensible enough to enjoy their privileges and remain true and loyal citizens. I wish it for their own sake and the sake of their church, as well as for our own. I hope that no conflict will ever arise in this country between hostile sects; but all, equally protected by the law, will continue their peaceful task of teaching piety and morality to their people... But there are some institutions which we must maintain at all hazards ; and among them especially, are the free schools, the common schools, the unsectarian Schools; for on the continuance of these the safety of this nation depends. [The sermons of Rev. JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE are printed regularly in the Boston SATURDAY EVENING GAZETTE, from the author’s manuscript..] - 2- s - - - A - - - - ,' S E R M O N | PREACHED ON THE TwPNTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY HIS ORDINATION As PASTOR OF THE SECOND CHURCH IN S- - - BOSTON, MASS, SUNDAY, DEC. 5, 1858. BY CHANDLER ROBBINS, D.D. cºtti, an appenbir. . PRINTED IN COMPLIANCE witH A votR OF THE PARISH. - BOSTON: -. CROSBY, NICHOLS, AND COMPANY, 117, washington STREET. j 1858 - S E R M ON PREACHED ON THE TWENTY-FIFTH AN NIVERSAIRY OF HIS ORDINATION AS PASTOR OF THE SECOND CHURCH IN BOSTON, MASS, SUNDAY, DEC. 5, 1858. BY CHANDLER ROBBINS, D.D. Cºſtſ, an äppenbir. PRINTED IN COMPLIANCE WITH A VOTE OF THE PARISH. BOST ON : CROSBY, NICHOLS, AND COMPANY., 117, WASHINGTON STREET. 1858. B O S T O N : PRINTED BY JOHN wilson AND son, 22, School, STREET. S E R M O N. Acts xxvi. 22: “HAvLNG THEREFoRE obTAINED IIELP of GoD, I CoNTINUE To THis DAY.” ONE emotion is paramount in my heart, which ought to have, which must have, utterance before any other, —before any thought which the occasion suggests has clothed itself in language: it is that of gratitude to Him by whose most gracious help I have continued to this day. I stand here amazed at his goodness. The consciousness that it has been unmerited heightens my adoration. “What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits towards me?” Should I not be unfeeling and perfidious, if I did not offer to him this sacrifice of thanksgiving, if I did not “pay my vows unto him, now, in the courts of the Lord's house, in the presence of all his people” It is difficult for me to realize that a quarter of a century has elapsed since my ordination as Pastor of 4 the Second Church, so fresh in my memory are all the circumstances and feelings of that occasion. I see the old church in Hanover Street just as it appeared on the 4th of December, 1833, − a square- built, high-roofed, timeworn edifice, with no archi- tectural beauty to please the eye; and yet impressive, and even stately, for its air of antiquity, its massive- ness and puritanic plainness, – more impressive and interesting, at that hour, to me, than the most mag- nificent temple of the earth. I hear the measured stroke of its sharp-toned but not unmusical bell, sounding above the noise of the streets, as it tolls the approaching hour for the solemn rite. I look down upon the goodly congregation of future friends, gathered within its peaceful gates, – instinctively trusted, though all unknown, – spreading before my untried path like a glowing cloud. I see the vene- rable fathers sitting in the pulpit by my side. I give ear to the words of truth and wisdom which flow in mellow and fervent tones from the faithful Preacher's golden mouth. I listen to a Prayer that opens heaven, while the hand of the aged man of God, who is uttering it, is laid in benediction upon my head. I hearken to the faithful and tender Charge of one whose years and virtues alike give impressiveness to his admonitions. I clasp the hand of my elder brother, as he offers me, with generous words, the welcome pledge of a pure and cordial Fellowship. 5 The softer music of the hymns melts my heart to tenderness, while the louder strains of the anthem lift it up with courage and hope.* I see, I hear, I feel it all, as if that day were 3. yesterday. - - Yet, ah ! what changes have passed upon the hallowed spot, and the reverent company, associated with those early vows! The time-honored walls which encircled and overshadowed those sacred cere- monies have long since disappeared from the face of the earth. Another temple — which it seems like a dream that we built and occupied and left — is al- ready beginning to grow old upon their site. Of that large congregation, the youngest children have be- come men and women ; those who were in their prime have grown old; the elders, with one or two exceptions, have passed away; while the greater number, of whatever age, have fallen asleep. That “golden mouth” has long been silent. That righteous man, whose prayers were availing, and whose touch was a consecration, has been at rest these many years. Upon the grave of that friend who gave me, trem- bling, the beautiful token of the church's fellow- ship, and the dear promise of his personal sympathy, six times has autumn spread its fallen leaves, since, standing over it, I testified, with a sad heart, how * See Appendix, 6 perfectly our professional intercourse of nineteen years had corresponded with that token, how faith- fully he had redeemed that pledge.” - Of all the principal actors in that interesting scene, only one remains on earth, – one who is associated, not only with that day, but with persons and events of a former century; and who binds me by a single living link to his venerated predecessor in the First Church in Plymouth, – the pious ancestor whose name I bear. Thank God that he who charged me to “be faithful unto death,” and exhorted me also to 2 “be of good courage,” still lingers amongst us, to re- new the same sacred counsel, and repeat the same high encouragement, with silent eloquence, by that unfailing serenity of faith, and that unabated fervor of piety, which illustrate his own protracted ministry.* When, on looking back, my mind fastens, thus, upon that day of consecration, the intervening time dwindles to a point; but, when I attempt to retrace the interval step by step, it stretches out to an extent which seems almost immeasurable. It is not my intention to offer you a history of the affairs of this church during the quarter of a century of my connection with it. That duty has been already partially performed; an account of all but the last seven years having been included in * See Appendix. 7 the volume prepared in commemoration of the two hundred and first anniversary of the Second Church, which was celebrated, with becoming solemnities, in 1851. Such an undertaking, therefore, is rendered unnecessary now, even if it might otherwise have been appropriate; but the demands of this occasion are, I think, strictly interpreted, of a more limited and personal nature. It has no general importance or interest: it merely marks a term of my professional service; it is an epoch simply with reference to my own ministerial life. I propose, therefore, after a brief review of the most important events which have affected the wel- fare of the church, to gather up some of the general impressions of my ministerial experience; trusting that, although such a course will involve the violation of an established rule of this pulpit, — to exclude every thing of a personal nature, — it may be allowed for once, if I carefully respect the limits of your for- bearance and the delicate bounds of modesty. - It has pleased God that the ancient church to which we are attached should accomplish, in our day, an eventful career; pass through various changes and trials; experience remarkable alternations of pros- perity and adversity, repose and migration. Had we chosen for ourselves our own lot, it would have been a quiet and regular course, – one that would have attracted no observation ; that would have been 8 marked by internal and concordant growth, rather than by external changes, – a condition to which might have been applied the beautiful and expressive words of an apostle: “The fruits of righteousness are sown in peace of them that make peace.” But it was not left to our choice what course this church should pursue, or what events affecting its interests should mark the period of my ministry. As we could not have foreseen what has actually transpired, so neither could we have guided our own way through the vicissitudes which have attended it. A wiser Power determined our times, and directed our goings. And what though He has led us as we would not have gone? We see, now, that it was the right way; for, though it carried us through cloud and trial, it was a path of discipline, of instruction, of correction, and has brought us at length to a beautiful “city of habitation.” The first ten years of my ministry were — so far as my pastoral relations were concerned — years of uninterrupted peace and unclouded prosperity. Al- though I entered upon my work with no experience and many imperfections, suffering also in spirit and body under a depressing malady, which prevented me from doing justice to my intentions, I was met by such kindness, forbearance, and consideration, as no young minister ever stood more in need of, and no people ever rendered in more liberal measure. How could I have done otherwise than at once give my heart in return' wishing to make up, as far as possible, by the full measure of love, what was in- adequate in my official ministrations. Thus we grew together, pastor and people, into an eminently har- monious, if not an unusually vigorous, church. We grew, I say; for too well do I remember and regret that we did not, on either part, put forth our strength as we ought. We grew: we did not ear- nestly and laboriously build. Mutual affection made our relation pleasant to ourselves and attractive to others; and, by reason of it, we held together, and increased. But we did not work, as we ought to have done, for God, for Christ, for our own salvation, for the conversion of others. Profoundly conscious am I of this, and often, very often, take to myself shame at the remembrance. But still we grew by the spontaneous vitality of brotherly kindness. Such is the eternal law. Wherever “brethren dwell together in unity, there the Lord commandeth the blessing,” — the blessing, the blessing of all blessings, – “even life,” — life that partakes of the nature of immor- tality. & So we continued, till the unfortunate question of removing from the old spot — which had been occa- sionally rising before, but as often, for the sake of peace, been suffered to subside — was at length taken up, and agitated in earnest, 2 10 I will not rehearse the painful history of that con- troversy. It is sufficient to say, that nothing but the mere impetus of our former prosperous motion could have carried the society over the perilous chasm that yawned before it, while the old church was in process of demolition, and the new of erection. When the latter house was finished, it was indeed more spacious and elegant than the former; but it was not, like that, a monument of union. Nevertheless, the greater part of us, faithful to old associations, came back; and strangers came with us. We tried to rejoice when we entered into its gates; we tried to regard it with hope, and to transfer to it the attachment which we had cherished for its vene- rable predecessor : but it was all in vain. Doubts lurked in the mind, and despondency lay in ambush in the heart. The former love had gone ; and how could we eaſpect the former blessing to come back 2 We were still numerous enough and strong enough to have retained the edifice, had we stood, as we once stood, shoulder to shoulder. If the pillars had only clustered as they were wont to do, they might have borne the weight easily: but the cement was gone; the perfect bond was broken. They fell apart, and were borne down. We went out, not knowing whither we went ; having no provision made for our journey; having no roof for our shelter; taking with us, as a church, 11 neither scrip nor purse ; only taking our faith in God, our confidence in one another, our old church records, and the ancient silver vessels, associated with the Redeemer's promises, dearer than all. It was indeed a gloomy exodus. In all our sky, there was not a single ray of promise. But now, as we look back, and call to mind, not only the good things, then unexpected, which we have enjoyed, but the dangers, then unknown, which we have escaped, that sad exile is seen to have been timely and providential. No one, who has not been an attentive observer of the changes which have been going on in the part of the city which we left, can fully appreciate the external obstacles with which we should have been called to contend, even for our existence as a society, had we remained. Nature herself has cir- cumscribed - this peninsula by a watery girdle, that forms an insurmountable barrier to the spread of its population towards the north and east. The narrow rim of warehouses which, when I was settled, only skirted the brink of the harbor, has gradually widened, till it has displaced dwelling after dwelling, from which devout companies went up on the sab- bath to the house of God. Whole streets, once lined with homes, are now entirely given up to pur- poses, of trade. Stores and shops occupy many a spot consecrated, within my remembrance, by scenes 12 of domestic joy or grief. Those very parlors and chambers in which I have listened to the sage con- verse of age, and the lively prattle of childhood; in which I have seen the smile of patience in suffering, and of love in death, – now echo with the stir of business, and are laden with the merchants' wares. Other circumstances also are to our point. An extraordinary number of places of worship, in pro- portion to that of the inhabitants, are crowded to- gether, at the northern part of the city, in a little space. A large proportion of the population are Roman Catholics. Not a few are mariners, who pass the greater part of their lives at sea. From the remainder of the inhabitants, deduct those who belong to no religious society and seldom attend worship, and then apportion the residue among ten or eleven Protestant churches, and you wills have data for an estimate of the probability of our having been able to keep together, to the present time, a flourishing congregation. But when, in addition to these facts, we take into account the frequent removals of our citizens into the country; the constant tendency of American families to migrate from the northern to the southern wards; and “the undeniable preference of the great majority in the vicinity of our former church for modes of faith and worship different from our own,” —it seems, to say the least, very doubtful whether, 13 had we retained the old location, we should have continued in being to this day; or, if we had not actually died, whether we might not have had only “a name to live.” But it is in vain to speculate as to what might have been : it is wise devoutly to remember, and studiously to reflect upon, those events which, in God’s providence, have actually transpired. At the point of time at which the published his- tory of the Second Church, already alluded to, ter- minates, we had just obtained possession of the retired and pleasant chapel in Freeman Place. I cannot forget how fervently we gave thanks to God, how cordially we exchanged felicitations with one another. It seemed, indeed, that “the Lord had done great things for us. whereof we were glad.” We supposed that our wanderings were over; that, at length, we had found a resting-place. Gladly we encouraged our affections to twine around that altar of prayer, and sought to establish with the place those sweet and holy associations which the devout soul always delights to cherish with its sabbath- home. But even that was not to be our rest. Providence had in store for us still better things, – far better than our most sanguine hopes. One more removal awaited our ark, before its wanderings should come to an end, - before it should be set up on a firm 14 foundation, within the strong pillars, and under the beautiful arches, where it was his gracious purpose that it should abide. A neighboring congregation, which also had been winnowed by misfortune and tried as by fire, though the burden of their struggle was the reverse of ours, — their duty being to hold their edifice for the sake of their beautiful Christian fellowship, and ours to sacrifice our house to save our ancient church, – made us friendly overtures of union ; generously consenting to yield the corporate name of the younger church to that of the elder; content if but the principle which was the germ of their organiza- tion, — a principle old as Christianity itself; the great principle that Jesus Christ is the true and only foundation of the church, and that faith in him as the Saviour is the vital element of Christian life and communion, — content if only this principle, which had been dearer to us also than life itself, should suffer no detriment through their concession, but rather, as they trusted, be honored and advanced. These overtures were at once met in the spirit in which they were offered. But still a great and diffi- cult work lay between the plan and execution, — a work which never could have been accomplished so speedily, so harmoniously, and so perfectly, had it not received the entire sanction of the great Head of the church, and the strong co-operation of Pro- 15 vidence. So many things must work together; so many obstacles be cleared away; so many individuals be consulted, and give consent; so many different interests must be satisfied; so many nice questions of law and equity must be settled; so many prompt pecuniary sacrifices were requisite; so much gratui- tous labor must be performed; so much good judg- ment must be exercised ; and, above all, so much Christian love was demanded, -- that every one, who knew and reflects upon the process by which the union of these churches was consummated, is sur- prised at the result, and prompted both by faith and reason to give God the glory. Yet, even after the consummation, it was impos- sible to look forward without some degree of solici- tude. Whatever confidence the parties to the agree- ment had in each other's characters and motives, and however strong a disposition existed, on both sides, to amity and concord, it could not but occur to all who took a clear and sober view of the arrange- ment, that its practical working was attended with some uncertainty, - that difficulties might arise, which no human foresight could predict, and no ordinary prudence provide against. It was, after all, an experiment, — which other churches were watch- ing with no little interest, — the issue of which we trusted and prayed might be successful, and to the favorable process of which we determined to devote 16 our best endeavors. But we knew and felt that it was but an experiment; and, as such, we had not the presumption to be over-confident of the result. But, thank God, it is an experiment no longer. Time has dispelled our fears, and more than realized our anticipations. Divine Providence has set an approving seal upon our union. We have long ago become, in deed and in truth, one people. The lines of demarcation have been overgrown and covered up by healthy shoots of brotherly kindness, and the interlacing tendrils of Christian sympathy. Ye are no more twain, but one body in Christ. What God hath joined together cannot be put asunder. A dispassionate review of the history of this church, since the auspicious union in April, 1854, brings to light such gratifying results as ought to awaken in our hearts a lively gratitude. We have enjoyed, certainly, a high degree of outward pro- sperity. Nothing has occurred to disturb our peace. Our congregation has gradually and steadily increased. And it is a source of satisfaction, that those who have come to worship with us have been drawn by no allurements aside from the regular ministrations of the gospel, and the natural attractiveness of har- mony. We have resorted to mone of the modern artifices to build up a society; we have presented no lures to the curious and the roving; we have fur- nished no artistic music; we have spread no adver- 17 tisements of novel and striking topics in the place of the grave proprieties of the pulpit. Whatever accession we have gained has been of a different material from that which is caught by such ques- tionable expedients. We have pursued the old plain and sober way; we have adhered to the simple and consecrated order of the Lord's house; we have sought in religion itself the attractions which religion needs; we have wished to satisfy worshippers by the simple grandeur of decent worship, and relied upon the appointed ordinances and hallowed themes of the gospel for the power of awakening an interest in the truth, and of building up a living church. But why do I remind you of our prosperity and strength Not, brethren, to commend you; not to stir up a feeling of parish pride; not even for the higher purpose of exciting your gratitude to God for the favor with which he has crowned us. If we have done well, we dare not begin to praise ourselves; since we might have done, and ought to have done, so much better. I should fear that congratulation on our success might be an indirect indulgence of self-love; and that ardent expressions of gratitude, in a matter so implicated with our own reputation, might borrow warmth from vain-glory. A purer purpose than any of these prompts me here and now to hold the mirror up to your pro- sperity. It is, that, while in God's presence you 3 18 reflect upon your advantages and blessings, you may have a deeper impression of your accountability and obligations; it is, that while I remind you of your collective ability, which you are glad to acknowledge, your consciences may admonish you of your corporate trust and duty, which you would be guilty not to realize and discharge; it is, that, recognizing your- selves as one of those churches to which God has given much, you may feel that the solemn condition attached to such preferment applies to you in all its force. But I must not forget that the plan of this dis- course contemplates, as the occasion itself seems to demand, a brief review of the impressions of my ministerial experience. So long a professional service cannot fail to teach some valuable lessons, to bring into notice some important principles, to furnish material for some wise judgments, even in the case of one whose power of observation is feeble, and whose capacity to generalize is small. The last quarter of a century has been a time of severe trial to the pulpit. Questions have powerfully agitated society, which, at the date of my settlement, had not been stirred. Great reformatory movements, then not so much as anticipated, have started up simultaneously, and advanced with gigantic strides. Associations have multiplied with astonishing ra- pidity, dividing amongst them almost every object which interests humanity; some of them for pur- 19 poses formerly regarded as belonging expressly to the province of the church; and thereby, although not directly opposing the church, to a certain extent drawing attention and interest away from it, and practically casting reproach upon it for having left its work for others to do. Moral questions have been taken up by political parties, mixed confusedly with their measures, and so implicated with their ambitious strifes, that some of them can hardly be discussed, or even alluded to, without exciting re- sentment and provoking prejudice on the one side or the other. These are trials, all of which have come into full action within the comparatively short term of my ministry. They have materially affected the influence of the pulpit, and, in some cases, its modes of ad- ministration. They are affecting them still. The question is still unsettled as to what is the propriety and duty of the Christian minister, in his official capacity, in relation to the questions and movements referred to. It was a long time before I could decide as to what was the part of wisdom and duty for myself. Mean- while, I was governed by feeling rather than judg- ment; and when it prompted, and as it prompted, introduced into the pulpit the discussion of topics aside from the especial themes of the gospel. My congregation, on such occasions, – to the honor of 20 their liberality be it spoken, – never attempted to circumscribe my freedom or trammel my conscience. I have never been troubled with any fear of perse- cution for the honest and becoming utterance of any sentiments worthy of a Christian minister and sober- minded man. If I had not felt a proper degree of liberty, I should probably have struggled for it. If I had felt that any rights were imperilled, I should doubtless have taken pains to assert and test them. But I am happy to be able to say, that I have always found as much respect and consideration for the rights and feelings of the pulpit as I have been dis- posed to give to the rights and feelings of the pews. More I could not ask. We should claim but what we allow, and allow as much as we claim. At length, after much experience and observation, my judgment was made up, my course was taken. I had seen no good, but often ill, effects result from using the pulpit for political discussions and social dis- quisitions. I had no reason to expect that any good I might be able to accomplish by the treatment of secular themes would counterbalance the harm I should risk doing. I was doubtful of my ability to discuss them - with sufficient knowledge, discretion, impartiality, and force, to lead to any important result. I was afraid of bringing into the sanctuary another fire than that caught from the altar of God, – of speak- ing in another spirit than that imbibed at the feet of 21 Jesus. I determined to know in the pulpit no king- dom but that spiritual kingdom, which “cometh without observation,” — no party, however high and pure its avowed platform, but the company of Christ's confessed and loyal disciples, – no philanthropy but that Christian charity which “suffereth long, and is Kind; which envieth not, vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, is not easily pro- voked, thinketh no evil; beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things, and never faileth,” — no instrumentality of reform, but the re- generating word of God, no sure hope for humanity, but in the power and preaching of the cross of Christ. But one consideration weighed upon me more powerfully than any other. It was the connection of the pulpit with the sabbath day, - a day which I believe it to be absolutely necessary to the true wel- fare of our busy, restless, striving, struggling people, to consecrate to its legitimate uses; to set apart for spiritual rest, refreshment, and consolation; so that the whole community, as far as possible, may be brought under its peculiar influence of peace, con- ciliation, and religious, joy. I regard the sabbath — and every year's experience deepens the feeling — as a day sacred to tranquillity of soul, to peaceful thoughts, and harmonious emotions; to thankfulness and hope and love and joy; to the forgiveness, of 22 injuries, the forgetting of distinctions, the cessation of all hostilities, the interruption of all debates; to filial approaches to our heavenly Father, and fraternal advances towards our fellow-men. A blessed time of truce, — by the general consent of the Christian church in all ages, – a blessed time of truce ; the common privilege, the common inheritance, the sacred right, of all; the full enjoy- ment of which by his brother-man, of whatever name or rank or party, or shade of opinion, no individual has a right to violate ; and he who stands in a Christian pulpit should be the last to wish or venture to violate. A blessed season of armistice; when the white flag should wave from the tower of every church, from the windows of every home, and in the hands of men as they meet and pass in the streets, though, yesterday, they may have battled as opposing partisans in the forum, or, to-morrow, they may be arrayed against each other at the polls. A blessed day of jubilee; when all shall not only be allowed to lay down their implements of toil; to emerge from the confinement of the shop ; to rest from menial offices; to put off the garb of labor and the badges of service, and put on the holiday attire ; to wend their way at will towards the open gate of some amiable tabernacle of the Lord of hosts, or walk forth in the fields or the public squares, with easy pace and quiet mind, to inhale the incense of morn 23 or even, and join in the silent worship of nature in its more spacious and beautiful temple; — when not only such rest and such liberty as this, shall be the privilege of all, but rest and freedom also to the mind and heart — from all the excitements of the week; from all agitating discussions and imbittering con- troversies; from the repetition of every day's political debate; from the infliction of listening in the church to feeble echoes of the harangues at the hustings; from every watchword of party, which, acting like a war-cry upon slumbering animosity and prejudice, will rob the heart of its peace, and despoil the soul of its most needful and sweet enjoyment. I have regarded and treated the sabbath as such a day of truce, of armistice, of jubilee. I have looked upon my congregation as a company not only of men and young men, but also of women and maidens and little children; of all ages and conditions, of all varieties of political opinion, in all the different stages of moral and spiritual development; not only citizens of an earthly commonwealth, but candidates also for a heavenly; who have come up to the temple to praise, to pray, to enjoy an hour of devotion, to be impressed with a sense of the presence of God, to imbibe the spirit of Jesus, to be enlightened by the pure, peaceable, merciful, and beneficent “wisdom which is from above.” I have doubted, therefore, my right to turn the whole tide of thought in all these 24 minds into the channel of a discussion for which many of them are entirely unprepared, which would be most uncongenial to the state of feeling of others, which would be unsuited to the religious wants of not a few, and from which some have come to the place of worship to be for a season diverted. I have doubted my right to revive disputes and distinctions, from the influence of which it is the duty, and ought to be also the desire, of those who are ordinarily most affected by them, to be delivered in the sanc- tuary. I have doubted my right to spoil any man's enjoyment of that house of prayer, which he himself has helped to build and to sustain for his own and his children's devotional duties, by forcing him to listen to a one-sided debate against his political creed, and making him feel as if he had been dragged against his will into the caucus-hall of an opposing party. I am convinced, that if I were in the hearer's place, and the preacher, on the sabbath day, should impose upon me and my children a political lecture in the place of a Christian sermon, I should feel grieved and offended. There is a time and place for every thing; and, in its time and place, every thing is useful and good. There are times and places enough for the discussion of political questions and social experiments. We have a right to claim one time and one place for purely devotional acts, religious exhortations, and 25 the exposition of the doctrines of the gospel in the spirit of Jesus. If there were not occasions enough, teachers enough, and publications enough, and also many ways open to the minister outside of his pul- pit, for instructing the people concerning the affairs of state, the movements of associations, and the points at issue in elections, there might, perhaps, be a demand upon the preacher to bring such matters before them on the only occasion which they can have for public worship. But, at the present hour, the greatest want of our community is religious in- struction. The most urgent need of our people is to be awakened to a sense of their eternal interests and relations; to be impressed with a profound vene- ration for God; to be brought into subjection and loyalty to the Lord Jesus Christ, and to be baptized into his spirit. A striking feature of the period under review is the insecure and fluctuating condition into which the pastoral relation has fallen. It sounds almost like irony to apply the old term “settled” to the mini- stry, so short is the average term of office, and so unstable its tenure. Instead of the ancient feeling of confidence between the parties about to enter into the pastoral connection, there is, at the present day, too often, on the contrary, a degree of distrust, which not only attests a painful history and experience, but is both an omen and a cause of unfavorable issues. 4 26 Theoretically opposed to itinerancy, many Congrega- tional churches have practically stumbled into it; in- curring all its evils, — worse evils, also, than attach to it when reduced to a system, - and reaping none of its benefits. It fills me with astonishment to reckon up the changes which have taken place, in twenty-five years, in the parishes within the range of my observation, and to remember how few of the vacancies which have occurred in New England pulpits have been caused by death. It is a question of no little inte- rest, how this fact is to be accounted for. It results, no doubt, in part, from those peculiar trials of the ministry to which reference has been already made; but not from these alone. Other causes have been at work, less creditable to the moral and religious character of the people. A spirit of restlessness has taken possession of this community. Clergy and laity have been alike infected with it. We have been growing discontented, impatient, ambitious, intellectually vain. Those same feelings of rivalry and competition, which have manifested themselves in other directions, have intruded also into parishes. IEvery congregation — the poorest as well as the richest — is in search of a preacher to be proud of, and whose fame shall reflect glory upon themselves. This demand over-stimulates those who desire, and think themselves able, to meet it; while it disheartens 27 the humble-minded, offends and grieves the godly, and makes shipwreck of many. The constant cry is, “Give us a powerful preacher.” It is a reasonable call. It is, indeed, the great de- mand of the age. But stay ! What is the popular idea of powerful preaching, and of the secret of the pulpit's power? Would Christ's powerful preacher, would such a powerful preacher as Paul, suit the popular craving ' Would plain, earnest, affectionate, wise gospel-preaching meet the wide demand Or do the people desire what is called “talented preach- ing”? or philosophical, learned, ingenious, enter- taining, fantastic preaching? If the former were the standard, we should doubt- less find a general endeavor in the ministry to come up to it; the style of the pulpit would shape itself accordingly; the popular talk would take a consistent tone; and the general taste would give indubitable signs of conformity to it. But these things are not what we see. It is not the very “gospel of the blessed God and our Saviour Jesus Christ” which the people crave to hear. It is not the very gospel which all preachers are most studious to preach. The people look aside from the gospel for the power they seek in the pulpit ; and the pulpit too often looks aside from the gospel for the secret of the power it wishes to exert, and of the effect it aims to produce. Ceasing to defer entirely 28 to the gospel, the influence of preaching becomes a mere matter of accident, dependent on the natural gifts or the acquirements of him who engages in it. The secret of the power is transferred from the Holy Ghost to human genius; from Christ's doctrines to man's devices; from the wisdom of God to human wit; from faith to intellect; from the authority of the divine word to the authority of the preacher's person. If churches are attempting to stand on the personal attractions of their ministers, is it a matter of won- der that they should totter and fall ! If preachers attempt to rest upon the admiration of their people for learning and rhetoric, or their interest in novel and piquant discussions, is it strange that they should feel their foundation unsteady, and sometimes find it sliding from beneath their feet? Let congregation and minister rest only upon the true and only Foundation, and they will be conscious of a deep and sweet security. Let both together seek to build up a true church of Christ; and, though their formal connection may not be long continued, it will be endearing, edifying, and satisfactory while it lasts, and never will be sundered rudely. It is a saying which will never lose its pertinency, and the sense of which is far wider and deeper than appears, “They that preach the gospel shall live by the gospel.” Yes, they that preach it, and all they 29 that labor for it and love it, shall live by the gospel. It will sustain them; it will give them steadiness; it will comfort them; it will give strength to their influence. It is safe and sufficient to rely upon for a happy and successful ministry, without shining abilities or rich stores of learning. Preacher and people shall live by it. It will cause them to grow, and grow together. It will establish between them a deep and pure sympathy. Binding both to Christ, it will bring them into dearest communion with each other. All that is most richly worthy of the name of life it will give them in their mutual relation. Better than gold, better than fame, better than learn- ing, it will give the minister for his people, and from his people, – best and sweetest of all things, – even love, -that love which covers all defects, and supplies all necessities; which casts out all fear, and warms into life all those gentler and finer sentiments which make human intercourse sacred and beautiful, and are both the preparation for, and the promise of, an eternal friendship. The proper limits of this discourse will allow me to refer to but one other topic connected with my ministerial experience. Important changes have been going on, since the date of my settlement, in the relation and attitude of the Protestant sects towards one another, and of 30 individuals to the denominations with which they are connected. Never, I believe, were the dividing lines between the sects drawn more strictly than at that period. Although the open warfare which had been carried on previously amongst the more zealous leaders of the different parties had generally ceased; though the sharp volleys of controversy were silent along the lines, – yet the effects were everywhere apparent, and most deeply felt. A settled coldness had taken the place of hot collision. An almost complete non-intercourse existed. Though there was less disposition to take the field, yet the prospect of reconciliation was as dark as ever, since every man kept close to his own camp. It was next to impossible for a young man to be settled over any of our churches at that day, without taking a more or less positive sectarian stand, even though his natural instincts and his Christian sense prompted him to a different course. There was, virtually, no middle ground recognized or allowed in the community. This sectarian attitude, uncon- genial as it was, your minister was forced to assume with the rest. But, in common with many others in the different denominations, his heart chafed against the necessity. We sought some high and common ground on which we might stand, as Chris- tians, in communion and co-operation with all who believe and love the Lord Jesus Christ; who worship 31 the Father in spirit and in truth; and who labor to promote “peace on earth, and good-will among men.” This desire has been gradually and constantly extend- ing. The most marked, and, as it seems to me, the most encouraging, distinction of the last quarter of a century, in a religious point of view, is the more and more general and earnest movement towards concord and fellowship amongst the positive believers in the divine nature of Jesus. What controversy there is now, is not so much between the different members of the body of Christ, as between those who “hold to the Head,” and those who openly or insidiously oppose and deny him. But while heartily joining this movement, and doing all in my power to promote it, I have not been indifferent to the objections which are urged by some, whose opinions are worthy of respect, against the attempt to occupy such a broad ground. “It is necessary,” they say, “in order to any practical re- sults, that a man should identify himself with some denomination. If he does not work with some sect, he virtually cannot work at all. Moreover, he owes it to the truths which he believes, to strive for the advancement of those truths; and, if he does this, he must, so far, assume a sectarian attitude.” The force of these objections I admit to the full extent of their wisdom and validity; but, after all, they are not conclusive. I am, indeed, obligated to 32 sustain and advance what I believe to be the truth. But suppose I believe this truth, and hold it to be the most precious of all truths, – that Christ desires and commands unity, brotherly love, and peace amongst his disciples; that the very first thing to be aimed at in order to the rapid spread of essential Christianity in the world is to promote concord, harmony, fellowship, in the church itself; that the spirit and the course of action expressed in the Bea- titudes ought to be the governing law of Christians in sentiment and practice: am I not obligated to live by, and to endeavor to advance, this truth first of all? Suppose I heartily believe that the most important thing to be done for our religion is to promote peace in the great Christian family itself: am I not true to my creed, in making this my first and last endeavor Or am I doing nothing, while cultivating the spirit of this creed in my own heart, and laboring to produce it amongst my brethren? Suppose that the great moral forced upon me by the study of the history and literature of the church (the former too often a dreary record of theological hatred and fierce contentions; the latter disfigured by an undue proportion of polemical writings, offensively unfair and uncandid in their tone) is an impressive warning against the perils of controversy, and an “imperative enforcement of forbearance, toleration, 2 and charity; ” suppose I am compelled to believe 33 that there is a persistent disposition to limit Chris- tianity to the rigid acceptance of dogmatical pro- positions, – a constant tendency to alienation and persecution for opinion's sake ; suppose that reading, observation, and experience have convinced me of the stifling influence of religious disputes upon all human affections, and their unhappy consequences upon the Master's cause, by dividing the strength of the church, and determining the zeal of Christians from practical enterprises of pressing importance to speculative questions of uncertain value ; suppose that I have become persuaded that there is no danger to which the Christian mind and heart are exposed so great as that which lies in the direction of sectarian- ism, no work so necessary as that of bringing Chris- tians to a friendly conference, no duty so urgent as that of promoting “the unity of the spirit in the bond 2 of peace: ” is not “necessity laid upon me” to act in obedience to these convictions ! But still, as I have said, the objections urged against an unsectarian position are not without validity. In order to engage in Christian enterprises, – nay, in order to belong to any Christian organization, or . even to worship regularly in any church, – we must attach ourselves more or less closely to some one of the denominations. Well then, let us do so; but, in doing so, let us understand the reason, and guard against the dangers. The reason is, because it is 5 34 necessary in order that we may take hold somewhere of the manifold machinery that is in operation to Christianize the world. It is not to restrict our sympathies, but to concentrate our energies. It is not from exclusiveness of dogmatic zeal, but from intensity of practical interest. We do not labor for a denomination; but, with a denomination, we labor for the church universal. We do not love the party with which, on the whole, it is most convenient for us to work, for itself, but as one of the instruments of accomplishing a result equally dear to every other party. We work with it, not in its partisan strifes, but in its holy warfare. It is with our Christian as it is with our human position. We are citizens of Boston, and love Bos- ton best, and devote to its welfare our best powers; but this does not divide us from New England, nor from our whole country, nor from all mankind. The different interests of other cities and other States do not excite our hostility or envy. Political differences do not alienate us from our countrymen, or cause us to deny that they love their country. Diverse forms of government, varieties of race, of custom, of com- plexion, do not separate from our sympathy any who wear the image of humanity. We are Bostonians; we are New Englanders; we are Americans: but, more than all, we are men. In the same manner, though we love our own church best, and dedicate 35 to it such as we have, this attachment does not divide our hearts from other churches, or cause us to deny to any other the Christian name. Forms of faith, forms of discipline, forms of ritual, do not ex- clude any disciple of Jesus from our affections; for, more than all, we are Christians. Such is the ground I have long occupied; such is the ground which, I believe, the greater part of this congregation occupy with me. My position here, and not elsewhere, is because here I am allowed perfect liberty of conscience; here I can stand un- pledged to any system of doctrines framed by man; here I can stand without hostility to any body of Christians, but in opposition to bigotry, exclusiveness, . and arrogance in every body; because here I am not held to have relinquished, even by implication, the right of believing and preaching whatever doctrine the Holy Spirit may teach me out of the Scriptures, —the privilege of altering any old opinion or adopting any new, if increasing prayer, study, and experience should expand and clear my spiritual vision, or God should cause new light to break forth from his word. I am pledged to Christ; I am pledged to his holy church ; I am pledged to defend the gospel; I am pledged to believe all that the Scriptures teach; I am pledged to preach all, and to preach only, that which their clear authority reveals and commands. 36 It is a source of unfeigned satisfaction to me, in the review of the past, — no circumstance connected with my ministerial experience is equally gratifying, — that, whatever faults have contaminated the poor services which have been rendered in the great Master's name in this pulpit, my conscience acquits me of any offence against the law of brotherly kindness. I thank God I can call you to bear record, that no rude breath of controversy, no tone of hostility, no disrespectful allusion, to any body of men who “bow the knee at the name of Jesus,” has ever dis- turbed the peaceful air of our Father's house, or stirred a sentiment uncongenial with that spirit of * concord which should reign amongst the many mem- bers of Christ's one body. But I must hasten to conclude these already pro- tracted remarks. In retracing the pastoral path which I have trod- den these twenty-five years, I seem to myself like one walking, in contemplative and pensive mood, through a long gallery, lighted up gradually as I advance ; hung, on either side, with pictures of sacred scenes of joy and sorrow, and the portraits of departed friends ; reviving impressions, which, though they had lain retired in the memory, can never be effaced; and bringing back the images of dear companions, which, though for a long time not brought out into the light, have not one of them 37 been removed from its own peculiar shrine in the temple of the affections. Dear domestic circles — most of them long since narrowed, and some now quite broken up — appear again complete and happy, as when, of old, it made me glad and grateful to look in upon their peace and joy. Aged and vene- rable faces look calmly and tenderly down upon me. Strong men who stood as pillars of the church and the State, who cheered me by their manly characters, and sustained me by their vigorous help, rise erect before me in those very posts of duty which once they filled so nobly, but which shall know them no more for ever. Matrons with all their sedate beauty restored, and maidens with their livelier charms un- faded, greet me with their wonted smile. Little children, long ago lifted up to the Saviour's bosom, reach out invitingly their graceful arms. Joyful and tearful companies gather before me, just as they were grouped at bridal, at baptism, and at funeral. Scenes more than I can describe, individuals more than I can number, — each for some peculiar virtue worthy of respect, or for some kindness to myself deservedly dear, – have a niche sacredly set apart for them for ever in that long, illuminated vista of a pastor's memory. And every one of these many images is intimately associated with religious thoughts, with Christian sentiments and offices, with hallowed me- 38 mories of God's good providence, and precious hopes of Christ's redeeming love. With all these recollections no painful regret mingles, except from the consciousness of my own imperfect service. In the circumstances of the past, there is nothing I would alter. I feel that “the lines have fallen to me in pleasant places.” With my “goodly heritage” I am more than content. In the friends of the past and the present, I have nothing to forgive, every thing to love. They have been kinder to me than I have deserved, more forbearing than I had a right to hope. Whatever God has seen in my ministry that has been displeasing to his holy eye, humbly and trust- fully, through the dear Advocate, I implore him to forgive. Whatever has offended man, may human charity cover with its white mantle, and bury in the beauty of its smile ! A P P E N D I X. THE present pastor of the Second Church was chosen by the proprietors, Oct. 20, 1833. It is an evidence of the laudable zeal at that time manifested by our religious socie- ties in parish affairs, that nearly one hundred ballots were cast on the occasion., On the succeeding sabbath, the mem- bers of the church, according to a custom which is now very seldom observed among Congregationalists of the “Liberal School,” took separate action upon the election, as may be seen by the following extract from their Records: — “At a meeting of the brethren, after the communion service, the following vote passed unanimously, namely: Voted, that this church most cordially concur with the proprietors in their recent unani- mous call to Mr. Chandler Robbins to be the minister of the Second Church and Society, and that we shall most cheerfully receive him as our pastor. “Attest: PETER MACKINTOSH, Jun., Deacon, &c.” The Ordination took place Dec. 4, 1833. The following was the order of services on that occasion, viz.: Introductory Prayer, and Selections from Scripture, by Rev. John Pier- pont; Sermon, by Professor Henry Ware, jun. ; Ordaining Prayer, by Rev. Hezekiah Packard, D.D.; Charge, by Rev. James Kendall, D.D.; Fellowship of the Churches, by Rev. Francis Parkman; Concluding Prayer, by Rev. George Putnam. 40 Rev. JoHN PIERCE, D.D., of Brookline, was Moderator of the Council. The members of the Society, with their invited guests, dined together after the services at Concert Hall. The dinner was noticed by Dr. Pierce as the first Ordina- tion dinner which had occurred in Boston at which no wine was furnished. HENRY WARE, the preacher, has been so often commemo- rated, and is so generally respected, that it would be out of place to indulge here in a tribute to his virtues. Rev. HEZEKIAH PACKARD was elected to offer the Prayer of Ordination on account of his having been, for a short time, my instructor, during his ministry at Wiscasset, Maine. He was, at that period, Vice-President of Bowdoin College. His character commanded respect. He was truly a “man of God.” His preaching was plain, sound, and evangelical; his prayers, peculiarly fervent and impressive. Rev. JAMES KENDALL succeeded my grandfather, Rev. Chandler Robbins, D.D., in the pastoral charge of the First Church in Plymouth, Mass. He was ordained in the year 1800; and now, at the age of more than ninety years, retains his moral and mental faculties in unabated vigor. Rev. FRANCIS PARKMAN, in offering me the Right Hand of Fellowship, closed his brief address with the following beautiful words: — “Might I be permitted to mingle for a moment any personal con- siderations with the services of this occasion, I should say that they associate themselves with my own grateful, though solemn recollec- tions. With this week, which commences your ministry, are com- pleted just twenty years of mine, since I first became the pastor of an associated church (the New North), and received from the lips of your predecessor, the apostolic Lathrop, the Charge which has been addressed to you. That venerable man, whose light shone pure and bright in this golden candlestick for nearly half a century, in a tribute to my lamented predecessor, the learned and candid Eliot, uttered this concerning him : “At his departure, I lost a brother, with whom, in an intimacy of more than thirty-three years, 41 I never exchanged a feeling or a look but of perfect friendship.’” “Let me adduce,” Dr. Parkman continued, “this testimony of my spiritual guide and father, himself a close follower of the disciple whom Jesus loved, as an example of the cordial fellowship which has always blessed the ministers of these churches, and which we now proffer to you. When I consider the interval that separates the beginnings of our ministry, I may not, indeed, hope for myself that our earthly friendship shall be as long. God grant that it may be as pure and faithful l’” That prayer has been answered. I can bear, with equal sincerity, the same grateful testimony to him which my vene- rable predecessor bore to John Eliot. I hail the opportunity which this anniversary and the printing of this sermon offer for performing an act of justice to the memory of Dr. Parkman, whose character has failed to receive the commemoration to which it is entitled. More- over, in paying here a proper tribute to his name, I am not merely relieving a long regret of friendship, and discharging a personal obligation. I cannot forget that three pastors of the Second Church before myself shared, in succession, his confidence, and proved the fidelity of his attachment. I can- not forget that he loved and venerated Dr. Lathrop as if he had been his own father; that he took delight in comfort- ing his old age ; that, with sedulous gratitude, he sought to repay him, in his last sickness, by affectionate attentions and fervent prayers, for the sacred counsels he had received from him in youth ; that he commemorated him, at his funeral, in a just and touching eulogy; and that, long after his de- cease, even up to the day of his own death, he kept alive the memory of his virtues, and watered, with frequent return, the flowers he had planted upon his grave. I cannot forget that he stood at Mr. Ware's right hand, as he did at mine, to strengthen him in the feebleness of his early ministry; that, so long as that ministry lasted, they were bound together in the fastest attachment; that Mr. 6 42 Ware has himself recorded an abiding memorial of their intimacy, in the dedication which he made to him of one of his books; that, when increasing infirmities had too early removed that useful minister from the wide field of his gen- erous activity, Dr. Parkman’s friendship helped to lighten the burden of his exile; and when at length, to the sorrow of all, “the golden bowl was broken,” that friendship also discharged the same last duty for him which it had already performed for his predecessor, by pronouncing in the chapel of the University, and perpetuating on the printed page, an appropriate tribute to his exalted character and useful life. Neither can I forget the old ecclesiastical bonds and plea- sant neighborly associations which, in spite of an ancient and almost-forgotten feud, subsisted during his ministry between the church over which he presided and my own, – that sis- terly relation which both Dr. Parkman and myself most highly valued, most heartily enjoyed, and did all in our power to promote. Nor, finally, can I forget the monthly union of our two churches in evening worship and ante-communion medita- tions; at which we officiated together for fifteen years, – one preaching the sermon, and the other offering the prayer, — when we always met in the pulpit with that perfect fra- ternal unity which, we humbly trusted, was an acceptable offering to God, though the words we spake may have been feeble, and the good we accomplished small. But I must not indulge myself in these pleasant recollec- tions. Though they present his character in an attractive light, they show it but in a single point of view and in too restricted relations. His age and position, as well as his accomplishments, brought him into connection with a long line of eminent men, extending through three generations; and also, either as partaker or observer, with many import- ant affairs, both ecclesiastical and eleemosynary. He had 43 enjoyed the acquaintance of all in our own city, distinguished in church and state, whose lives, having adorned the last century, were drawing to a close when the present opened. He loved to talk of those men of old, and we loved as well to listen to him ; for his strong memory had preserved their distinct likenesses, and his graphic words could paint them to the very life. He studied theology at the feet of Channing. Buckminster was his intimate friend. All the beloved and illustrious preachers who have occupied our pulpits for fifty years have been his associates. And where is the living amongst all his brethren who has not enjoyed his hospitality, or who does not treasure in grateful remembrance some proof of his brotherly kindness 2 Dr. Parkman honored and loved his profession. Though his social disposition, extensive acquaintance, and fondness for general reading, together with the associations insepa- rable perhaps from inherited wealth, were constantly tempt- ing him aside from its sober duties and severer studies — (but not so successfully tempting him as some who did not know him well may have imagined), — yet, in spite of all these obstacles to ministerial devotedness, he was in very deed, as I have had ample opportunity to know, surpassed by few in fidelity and diligence in the discharge of his pas- toral obligations. My own parochial walks were side by side with his, and constantly intersecting them, for many years. Hardly a week passed without a confidential interview be- tween us. His habits of study and visiting I knew as well as my own. With the character of his preaching, and his modes of preparation for it, no one could have been more familiar. His purposes, his resolves, his struggles of princi- ple, his real and deepest feelings with regard to his flock and his calling, were freely revealed to me. And — I say it with the utmost confidence — few, very few, have I known in the clerical profession whose hearts have been more 44 devoted to its sacred offices, or who have striven more ear- nestly to discharge them well. Those who only occasionally met him in general Society, where sometimes, in the excitement of conversation, which he loved, or in the play of humor, in which he excelled, he was betrayed — for he had not the tact of the hypo- crite — into remarks of a livelier or lighter character than are thought suitable to the gravity of his calling, may have hastily concluded that he was deficient in seriousness and reverence. And others, because of his close ties to the wealthier class, may have falsely argued that he must have been deficient in that humbleness of mind, and sympathy with the poor and lowly, which are essential to a good Chris- tian ministry. That such judgments, however, are erroneous and prejudiced, my intimate knowledge of his professional character enables me unequivocally to declare. But some there may be who may infer, from the slow de- cline of the parish under his charge, that there must have been some defect in his ministrations. On this point I know that his feelings were very tender; as might be expected, indeed, of any man of the least sensibility or self-respect. It was a matter that caused him, at times, considerable suffer- ing. The fact of the diminution of the Society was univer- sally understood ; and that it might seem to implicate his character as a minister, was a circumstance which he was too clear-sighted not to perceive. Upon this subject, more than any other that could affect his reputation, I am per- suaded he would desire to have all possible light thrown, and the judgment of men set right. I know not what might have been the case, had Dr. Parkman been what is called a “ popular” preacher. But I am very certain that none but one of the most highly gifted and brilliant could have sus- tained in the New North Church, up to the period of his death, any thing like such a congregation as attended it when his ministry began. His sermons were instructive and prac- 45 tical, - well written, serious, and sensible. His devotional services were of unusual fervency and richness. His pastoral duties were punctually discharged. His manners were easy and urbane. His consolations to the afflicted were assiduous and tender. His attentions to the poor and unfortunate were worthy of praise. His pecuniary benefactions were not stinted. And, in addition to all these, his drafts upon the treasury of the church were smaller than would have sufficed for the support of the generality of men. In most positions, in most parishes, such a ministry would have been as pro- sperous and useful, and well attended to the last, as is ordi- marily the case with that of good and faithful men. The truth is, that causes were operating to diminish the number of his hearers, and weaken the strength of his Society, which were entirely independent of his character, and beyond his control. They were wholly incident to the locality of the New North Church. They were precisely those already noticed at some length in the foregoing dis- course (pp. 11, 12), and need not be repeated here. It is undeniably true that Dr. Parkman’s strong and un- disguised conservative tastes and opinions may have operated to diminish the attractiveness of his preaching to a certain class of the community. But the same reasons would also have attached to him others, and have secured their respect. But, though suspicious of innovations, he was not bigoted. Though opposed to what he considered a specious and con- ceited philanthropy, his feelings and his practice were hu- mane. Though sometimes sharp in censuring radicalism, there was no bitterness in his heart. A tone of good-humor and frankness mingled with his severest criticisms, and a covert sparkle of kindness relieved the sternness of his frown. If less disposed than many to take an interest in new ma- chinery of benevolence and reform, he was more active than most in assisting the operations of the old. Of nearly all the 46 most important charitable associations of the city, he was not only a leading member, but an efficient officer. The Bible Society, the Peace Society, the Congregational Chari- table, the Humane, and the Evangelical Missionary, the Society for propagating the Gospel, and that for the Promo- tion of Theological Education, especially felt his interest, and were as much indebted to him as to almost any other man. He was a friend and patron of good learning also. To the college at Cambridge he was devotedly attached. He had served it long as an overseer, and will be remem- bered among its munificent benefactors. In fine, no member of the clerical profession in the city has died, during the period of my ministry, whose vacant places of trust and friendship have been more numerous, or more difficult to fill. His brethren still miss his friendly aid in their days of sickness, and necessary absence from their pulpits, which he ever stood ready to supply. We miss his presence, so long enjoyed, in our professional ga- therings. We miss his wisdom and moderation, so greatly needed, in deliberations and counsels. We miss his ani- mated conversation in social hours. We miss his experience and energy and official exactness in the conduct of the many societies with which he was identified. But we did not lament when he went to rest. He was beginning to faint and be weary, and death came to him in a good time. His step was beginning to tremble, and his soul to be more and more frequently oppressed with heavi- ness; and it was a merciful release for him to lay down the staff of his pilgrimage, and drop the burden of mortality at the door of the sepulchre. 47 The admissions to the church, since December, 1833, have averaged about fourteen per annum; being, in all, not far from three hundred and fifty. The number has varied very much at different periods, ranging from upwards of fifty to One Or tWO. I regret that, a part of my records being inaccessible at the moment when this Appendix is going to press, I am not able to give other statistics with accuracy. g” - - • . - • - - º . . . . *... . - *- * - - * : : * * -. - . { tº - *, - - ; , : * ! : w . * ... r - - f : , i. + - . . . - . - - x * - & * * * * - : - .* * : *' tº . - . r- - , * - - - *** - * * - * * * - - > • * * - - * 6. - - - - - - * p - - - *.* - - - - *- - - & - - -. . - .*.*. #" - * : +. * º -- - r - - - .. & 3 - - A' - _ - , - > - - - + . . - : - *. * . . - * - . - - :- . " . - : t g : - – f * - . . . . _ . ) - - ... . . . .. + - ; * : - - t " * . • , T. . . -- : - i f ' ' , . . . - . - + - " ; - - - * & . . g - - * . - -- - . - . -- - 4. - # - - - - . | • . * * - i - - : * . . - + ... ." - # - - * . . - - t - r * • , , , , ; : ...? - . - * . . § - ſ i. - • , + \ r . . . . . e - * . , ' ' ºn - : * º . } - - - - - \, t : - x : : - • . . - - * - - * 3. ". . ; • * - . - - -- - - - f - - - - * • : - - - - -* - - w - , , - : - } ... ; # J - . - : . ‘. . * r. 4 - . - : i * . ; ! * i < - - * - a • - ,, . 4 --> r ... -- . - - - f . - - •. S. J : - * - - i - + * . º - - % a'. - - - : - --- - - - wº * - - 't - - - - . -- - ? • r r : * - : .. 3 * - * . . . . - r - -. * º | { - - - * -- - - - & - - • - : . …” : + - - -- - : i * . . - tº - - - tº ... - • , - * tº. - - -- - - .." - - - I * , A-. •” - . - • . - - r s : * - * | - * * - + i f - - - S \ .** - - r - - - . r - * . . y . . : - * * ~ : . . . • - - - * • ' A - - *. * tº * - - - ſ - .- * * ſº * t - • - - * - . - $ º | - } - -: - f . * * . - { - - - * , , - { : : 3. * ; : - * * * - - *, i & , , -- - + * : * *, *... . % , - - § - zº ; * - - • & - . * - + T i - - - * - * # , * . | --- .* : -. & - - , * • ' f ... • - - * i y - § - * --> - f - - <, - - f - - • * * * r - ... ºr * . r - • . f - * - - * - - - * - - i - - - -> *. -*. * - $3 t - - : > * >s: ' - - * t - #1," - - - - “. . • .. • - * - * - - . . " - -. - - - 4. - C * . - - * r tº 4. - - .* - - - - - - - - - { .” - . . . . - * . . . º - - * . - -- “ , , = . - - - - - g r r - ' . + - - - - - - g - - - - i k - - - º * - - : --- t x - : . - ; } , - - + • - - - * * : * * * - * - : i - ...sº - - - -> & • * * - - - * * - - ~. I - 3. : y .* , ' . - r - tº . * - z" - * - - - - i - . . . $ - . . . * 3. + ... " + - * - * - - - * - - . - i * - * - - - º - - - t - & ºr - . . . . . - i - - ; r * . . t r * . * . - - - f : - ºr . * * 4. " * , - i W. - -- - - **. q • - - : - - - , r - - + - - ~ : , > * * - - - - i .* - , - * ... - . , e - . . - - : t - - - - - * * - - . - - - - * . f :- - + . . l - DISCOURSE, PR E A C H E D A T T H E D E D H C A TI O N OF THE SECOND CONGREGATIONAL UNITARIAN CHURCH, | iſºtim 330rk, DECEMBER 7, 1826. By 'WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING. SEGOIND EDITION". |NEW YORK : PUBLISHED FOR THE SECOND CONGREGATIONAL UNITARIAN CHURCH. 1827. Southern District of JWew York, 8s. BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the 23d day of December, A.D. 1826, and in the fifty-first year of the Independence of the United States of America, Henry Deve- reux Sewall, of the said district, has deposited in this office the title of a book, the right whereof he claims as proprietor, in the words following, to wit:— “A Discourse, preached at the Dedication of the Second Congregational Unitarian Church, New York, December 7, 1826. By William Ellery Channing.” In conformity to the Act of the Congress of the United States, entitled, “An Act for the encouragement of learning, by securing the copies of maps, charts, and books to the authors and proprietors of such copies, during the times therein mentioned,” and also to an Act, entitled, “An Act supplementary to an Act, entitled, “An Act for the encouragement of learning, by Securing the copies of maps, charts, and books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies during the times therein mentioned;’ and extending the benefits thereof to the arts of designing, engraving, and etching historical and other prints.” JAMES DILL, Clerk of the Southern District of JNew York. In delivering this Discourse, the author was obliged to omit large portions; and these are now published, at once to give some new views of the subject, and to unfold more fully those which were then exhibited. DISC O U R S E. MARK xii. 29, 30. g And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; the Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. This is the first commandment. WE have assembled to dedicate this building to the worship of the only living and true God, and to the teaching of the religion of his son, Jesus Christ. By this act we do not expect to confer on this spot of ground and these walls any peculiar sanctity or any mysterious properties. We do not suppose that, in consequence of rites now performed, the worship offered here will be more acceptable, than prayer uttered in the closet, or breathed from the soul in the midst of business ; or that the instructions de- livered from this pulpit will be more effectual, than if they were uttered in a private dwelling or the open air. By dedication we understand only a sol- emn expression of the purpose for which this build- ing is reared, joined with prayer to Him, who alone can crown our enterprise with success, that our design may be accepted and fulfilled. For this re- ligious act we find, indeed, no precept in the New 6 Testament, and on this account some have scrupled as to its propriety. But we are not among those who consider the written word as a statute book, by the letter of which every step in life must be governed. We believe, on the other hand, that one of the great excellencies of Christianity is, that it does not deal in minute regulation, but that, having given broad views of duty, and enjoined a pure and disinterested spirit, it leaves us to apply these rules and express this spirit, according to the promptings of the divine monitor within us, and according to the claims and exigencies of the ever varying con- ditions in which we are placed. We believe, too, that revelation is not intended to supersede God’s other modes of instruction; that it is not intended to drown, but to make more audible, the voice of nature. Now nature dictates the propriety of such an act as we are this day assembled to perform. Nature has always taught men, on the completion of an important structure, designed for public and lasting good, to solemnize its first appropriation to the purpose for which it was reared, by some special service. To us there is a sacredness in this moral instinct, in this law written on the heart; and in listening reverently to God's dictates, how- ever conveyed, we doubt not that we shall enjoy his acceptance and blessing. I have said, we dedicate this building to the teaching of the gospel of Christ. But in the pre- sent state of the Christian church, these words are .7 not as definite as they one day will be. This gospel is variously interpreted. It is preached in various forms. Christendom is parcelled out into various sects. When, therefore, we see a new house of worship reared, the question immediately rises, To what mode of teaching Christianity is it to be devoted P I need not tell you, my hearers, that this house has been built by that class of Christians, who are called Unitarians, and that the gospel will here be taught, as interpreted by that body of be- lievers. This you all know ; but perhaps all present have not attached a very precise meaning to the word, by which our particular views of Christianity are designated. Unitarianism has been made a term of so much reproach, and has been uttered in so many tones of alarm, horror, indignation, and scorn, that to many it gives only a vague impression of something monstrous, impious, unutterably perilous. To such, I would say, that this doctrine, which is considered by some, as the last and most perfect invention of Satan, the consummation of his blas- phemies, the most cunning weapon ever forged in the fires of hell, amounts to this—That there is One God, even the Father; and that Jesus Christ is not this One God, but his son and messenger, who derived all his powers and glories from the Uni- versal Parent, and who came into the world not to claim supreme homage for himself, but to carry up the soul to his Father, as the Only Divine Person, the only Ultimate Object of religious worship. To us, this doctrine seems not to have steamed up 3 from hell, but to have descended from the throne of God, and to invite and attract us thither. To us it seems to come from the Scriptures, with a voice loud as the sound of many waters, and as articulate and clear as if Jesus, in a bodily form, were pro- nouncing it distinctly in our ears. To this doctrine, and to Christianity interpreted in consistency with it, we dedicate this building. That we desire to propagate this doctrine, we do not conceal. It is a treasure, which we wish not to confine to ourselves, which we dare not lock up in our own breasts. We regard it as given to us for others, as well as for ourselves. We should rejoice to spread it through this great city, to carry it into every dwelling, and to send it far and wide to the remotest settlements of our country. Am I asked, why we wish this diffusion ? We dare not say, that we are in no degree influenced by secta- rian feeling; for we see it raging around us, and we should be more than men, were we wholly to escape an epidemic passion. We do hope, however, that our main purpose and aim is not sectarian, but to promote a purer and nobler piety than now prevails. We are not induced to spread our opinions by the mere conviction that they are true ; for there are many truths, historical, metaphysical, scientific, lit- erary, which we have no anxiety to propagate. We regard them as the highest, most important, most efficient truths, and therefore demanding a firm tes- timony, and earnest efforts to make them known. 9 In thus speaking, we do not mean, that we regard our peculiar views as essential to salvation. Far from us be this spirit of exclusion, the very spirit of antichrist, the worst of all the delusions of popery and of protestantism. We hold nothing to be essen- tial, but the simple and supreme dedication of the mind, heart, and life to God and to his will. This inward and practical devotedness to the Supreme Being, we are assured, is attained and accepted under all the forms of Christianity. We believe, however, that it is favored by that truth which we maintain, as by no other system of faith. We re- gard Unitarianism as peculiarly the friend of inward, living, practical religion. For this we value it. For this we would spread it ; and we desire none to embrace it, but such as shall seek and derive from it this celestial influence. s This character and property of Unitarian Chris- tianity, its fitness to promote true, deep, and living piety, being our chief ground of attachment to it, and our chief motive for dedicating this house to its in- culcation, I have thought proper to make this the topic of my present discourse. I do not propose to prove the truth of Unitarianism by scriptural author- ities, for this argument would exceed the limits of a sermon, but to show its superior tendency to form an elevated religious character. If, however, this position can be sustained, I shall have contributed no weak argument in support of the truth of our views; for the chief purpose of Christianity undoubtedly 2 1() is, to promote piety, to bring us to God, to fill our souls with that Great Being, to make us alive to Him; and a religious system can carry no more authentic mark of a divine original, than its obvious, direct, and peculiar adaptation to quicken and raise the mind to its Creator.—In speaking thus of Uni- tarian Christianity as promoting piety, I ought to observe, that I use this word in its proper and high- est sense. I mean not every thing which bears the name of piety, for under this title superstition, famaticism, and formality are walking abroad and claiming respect. I mean not an anxious frame of mind, not abject and slavish fear, not a dread of hell, not a repetition of forms, not church-going, not loud profession, not severe censures of others’ irreligion; but filial love and reverence towards God, habitual gratitude, cheerful trust, ready obe- dience, and, though last not least, an imitation of the ever active and unbounded benevolence of the Creator. The object of this discourse requires me to speak with great freedom of different systems of re- ligion. But let me not be misunderstood. Let not the uncharitableness, which I condemn, be . lightly laid to my charge. Let it be remembered, that I speak only of systems, not of those who em- brace them. In setting forth with all simplicity what seem to me the good or bad tendencies of doc- trines, I have not a thought of giving standards or measures by which to estimate the virtue or vice of | 1 their professors. Nothing would be more unjust, than to decide on men's characters from their pecu- liarities of faith; and the reason is plain. Such peculiarities are not the only causes which impress and determine the mind. Our nature is exposed to innumerable other influences. If indeed a man were to know nothing but his creed, were to meet with no human beings but those who adopt it, were to see no example and to hear no conversation, but such as were formed by it; if his creed were to meet him every where, and to exclude every other object of thought; then his character might be expected to answer to it with great precision. But our Creator has not shut us up in so narrow a school. The mind is exposed to an infinite variety of influences, and these are multiplying with the progress of so- ciety. Education, friendship, neighbourhood, public opinion, the state of society, “the genius of the place ’’ where we live, books, events, the pleasures and business of life, the outward creation, our phy- sical temperament, and innumerable other causes, are perpetually pouring in upon the soul thoughts, views, and emotions; and these influences are so complicated, so peculiarly combined in the case of every individual, and so modified by the original susceptibilities and constitution of every mind, that on no subject is there greater uncertainty than on the formation of character. To determine the pre- cise operation of a religious opinion amidst this host of influences surpasses human power. A great truth 12 may be completely neutralized by the countless im- pressions and excitements, which the mind receives from other sources ; and so a great error may be disarmed of much of its power, by the superior energy of other and better views, of early habits, and of virtuous examples. Nothing is more common than to see a doctrine believed without swaying the will. Its efficacy depends, not on the assent of the intellect, but on the place which it occupies in the thoughts, on the distinctness and vividness with which it is conceived, on its association with our common ideas, on its frequency of recurrence, and on its command of the attention, without which it has no life. Accordingly permicious opinions are not seldom held by men of the most illustrious vir- tue. I mean not then, in commending or condemn- ing systems, to pass sentence on their professors. I know the power of the mind to select from a multifarious system, for its habitual use, those fea- tures or principles which are generous, pure, and ennobling, and by these to sustain its spiritual life amidst the nominal profession of many errors. I know that a creed is one thing, as written in a book, and another, as it exists in the minds of its advo- cates. In the book, all the doctrines appear in equally strong and legible lines. In the mind, many are faintly traced and seldom recurred to, whilst others are inscribed as with sunbeams, and are the chosen, constant lights of the soul. Hence, in good men of opposing denominations, a real agreement 13 may subsist as to their vital principles of faith; and amidst the division of tongues, there may be unity of soul, and the same internal worship of God. By these remarks I do not mean, that error is not evil, or that it bears no pernicious fruit. Its ten- dencies are always bad. But I mean, that these tendencies exert themselves amidst so many coun- teracting influences; and that injurious opinions so often lie dead, through the want of mixture with the common thoughts, through the mind’s not absorbing them, and changing them into its own substance; that the highest respect may, and ought to be cher- ished for men, in whose creed we find much to dis- approve. In this discourse I shall speak freely, and some may say severely, of Trinitarianism ; but I love and honor not a few of its advocates; and in opposing what I deem their crror, I would on no account detract from their worth. After these re- marks, I hope that the language of earnest discus- sion and strong conviction will not be construed into the want of that charity, which I acknowledge as the first grace of our religion. I now proceed to illustrate and prove the supe- riority of Unitarian Christianity, as a means of pro- moting a deep and noble piety. ^ I. Unitarianism is a system most favorable to piety, because it presents to the mind one, and only one, Infinite Person, to whom supreme homage is to be paid. It does not weaken the energy of religious sentiment by dividing it among various ob- 14 jects. It collects and concentrates the soul on One Father of unbounded, undivided, unrivalled glory. To Him it teaches the mind to rise through all be- ings. Around Him it gathers all the splendors of the universe. To him it teaches us to ascribe whatever good we receive or behold, the beauty and magnifi- cence of nature, the liberal gifts of providence, the capacities of the soul, the bonds of society, and es- pecially the riches of grace and redemption, the mission, and powers, and beneficent influences of Jesus Christ. All happiness it traces up to the Father, as the sole source; and the mind, which these views have penetrated, through this intimate asso- ciation of every thing exciting and exalting in the universe with One Infinite Parent, can and does of fer itself up to him with the intensest and profound- est love, of which human nature is susceptible. The Trinitarian indeed professes to believe in one God. But three persons, having distinctive qualities and relations, of whom one is sent and another the send- er, one is given and another the giver, of whom one intercedes and another hears the intercession, of whom one takes flesh, and another never becomes incarnate, three persons, thus discriminated, are as truly three objects to the mind, as if they were ac- knowledged to be separate divinities; and from the principles of our nature, they cannot act on the mind as deeply and powerfully as One Infinite Per- son, to whose sole goodness all happiness is ascribed. To multiply infinite objects for the heart, is to dis- 15 tract it. To scatter the attention among three equal persons, is to impair the power of each. The more strict and absolute the unity of God, the more easily and intimately all the impressions and emotions of piety flow together, and are condensed into one glowing thought, one thrilling love. No language can express the absorbing energy of the thought of one Infinite Father. When vitally im- planted in the soul, it grows and gains strength for ever. It enriches itself by every new view of God's word and works; gathers tribute from all regions and all ages; and attracts into itself all the rays of beauty, glory, and joy, in the material and spiritual creation. My hearers, as you would feel the full influence of God upon your souls, guard sacredly, keep un- obscured and unsullied, that fundamental and glo- rious truth, that there is One, and only one, Al- mighty Agent in the universe, One Infinite Father. Let this truth dwell in me in its uncorrupted sim- plicity, and I have the spring and nutriment of an ever growing piety. I have an object for my mind towards which all things bear me. I know whither to go in all trial, whom to bless in all joy, whom to adore in all I behold. But let three persons claim from me supreme homage, and claim it on different grounds, one for sending and another for coming to my relief, and I am divided, distracted, perplexed. My frail intellect is overborne. Instead of One Father, on whose arm I can rest, my mind is torn from object to object, and has reason to tremble lest 16 among so many claimants of Supreme love, it should withhold from one or another his due. II. Unitarianism is the system most favorable to piety, because it holds forth and preserves inviolate the spirituality of God. “God is a spirit, and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.” It is of great importance to the progress and elevation of the religious principle, that we should refine more and more our conceptions of God; that we should separate from him all material properties, and whatever is limited or imperfect in our own nature; that we should regard him as a pure intelligence, an unmixed and infinite Mind. When it pleased God to select the Jewish people and place them under miraculous interpositions, one of the first precepts given them was, that they should not represent God under any bodily form, any graven image, or the likeness of any creature. Next came Christianity, which had this as one of its great objects, to render religion still more spiritual, by abolishing the ceremonial and outward worship of former times, and by discarding those grosser modes of describing God, through which the ancient prophets had sought to impress an un- refined people. Now Unitarianism concurs with this sublime moral purpose of God. It asserts his spirituality. It approaches him under no bodily form, but as a pure spirit, as the infinite and universal Mind. On the other hand, it is the direct influence of Trinita- 17 rianism, to materialize men’s conceptions of God; and, in truth, this system is a relapse into the error of the rudest and earliest ages, into the worship of a corporeal God. Its leading feature is, the doc- trine of a God clothed with a body, and acting and speaking through a material frame, of the Infinite Divinity dying on a cross ; a doctrine, which in earthliness reminds us of the mythology of the rudest pagans, and which a pious Jew, in the twi- light of the Mosaic religion, would have shrunk from with horror. It seems to me no small objec- tion to the Trinity, that it supposes God to take a body in the later and more improved ages of the world, when it is plain, that such a manifestation, if needed at all, was peculiarly required in the in- fancy of the race. The effect of such a system in debasing the idea of God, in associating with the Divinity human passions and infirmities, is too ob- vious to need much elucidation. On the supposition that the second person of the Trinity became in- carnate, God may be said to be a material being on the same general ground, on which this is affirmed of man ; for man is material only by the union of mind with the body; and the very meaning of incar- nation is, that God took a body, through which he acted and spoke, as the human soul operates through its corporeal organs. Every bodily affection may thus be ascribed to God. Accordingly the Trini- tarian, in his most solemn act of adoration, is heard to pray in these appalling words; “Good Lord, 3 - [8 deliver us; by the mystery of thy holy incarnation, by thy holy nativity and circumcision, by thy bap- tism, fasting, and temptation, by thine agony and bloody sweat, by thy cross and passion, good Lord, deliver us.” Now I ask you to judge, from the principles of human nature, whether to worshippers, who adore their God for his wounds and tears, his agony, and blood, and sweat, the ideas of corporeal existence and human suffering will not predominate over the conceptions of a purely spiritual essence ; whether the mind, in clinging to the man, will not lose the God; whether a surer method for depress- ing and adulterating the pure thought of the Divin- ity could have been devised. The Roman Catholics, true to human nature and their creed, have sought, by painting and statuary, to bring their imagined God before their eyes; and have thus obtained almost as vivid impressions of him, as if they had lived with him on the earth. The Protestant condemns them for using these similitudes and representations in their worship ; but if a Trinitarian, he does so to his own condem- nation. For if, as he believes, it was once a duty to bow in adoration before the living body of his incarnate God, what possible guilt can there be in worshipping before the pictured or sculptured me- morial of the same being. Christ’s body may as truly be represented by the artist, as any other human form ; and its image may be used as effect- ually and properly, as that of an ancient sage or iS) hero to recall him with vividness to the mind.— Is it said, that God has expressly forbidden the use of images in our worship P But why was that prohibition laid on the Jews For this express reason, that God had not presented himself to them in any form, which admitted of representation. Hear the language of Moses, “Take good heed, lest ye make you a graven image, for ye saw no manner of similitude on the day that the Lord spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire.”* If, since that period, God has taken a body, then the reason of the prohibition has ceased ; and if he took a body, among other purposes, that he might assist the weakness of the intellect, which needs a material form, then a statue which lends so great an aid to the conception of an absent friend, is not only justified, but seems to be re- quired. This materializing and embodying of the Supreme Being, which is the essence of Trinitarianism, can- not but be adverse to a growing and exalted piety. Human and divine properties, being confounded in one being, lose their distinctness. The splendors of the Godhead are dimmed. The worshippers of an incarnate Deity, through the frailty of their mature, are strongly tempted to fasten chiefly on his human attributes; and their devotion, instead of rising to the Infinite God, and taking the pecu- * Deut. iv. 15, 16. 20 liar character which Infinity inspires, becomes rather a human affection, borrowing much of its fervor from the ideas of suffering, blood, and death. It is indeed possible, that this God-man (to use the strange phraseology of Trinitarians) may excite the mind more easily, than a purely spiritual divinity; just as a tragedy, addressed to the eye and ear, will interest the multitude more than the contem- plation of the most exalted character. But the emotions, which are most easily roused, are not the profoundest or most enduring. This human love, inspired by a human God, though at first more fervid, cannot grow and spread through the soul, like the reverential attachment, which an infinite, spiritual Father awakens. Refined conceptions of God, though more slowly attained, have a more quickening and all-pervading energy, and admit of perpetual accessions of brightness, life, and strength. True, we shall be told, that Trinitarianism has converted only one of its three persons into a hu- man Deity, and that the other two remain purely spiritual beings. But who does not know, that man will attach himself most strongly to the God who has become a man P Is not this even a duty, if the Divinity has taken a body to place himself within the reach of human comprehension and sympathy P. That the Trinitarian’s views of the Divinity will be colored more by his visible, tan- gible, corporeal God, than by those persons of the 21 Trinity, who remain comparatively hidden in their invisible and spiritual essence, is so accordant with the principles of our nature, as to need no labored proof. My friends, hold fast the doctrine of a purely spiritual divinity. It is one of the great supports and instruments of a vital piety. It brings God near, as no other doctrine can. One of the lead- ing purposes of Christianity, is to give us an ever growing sense of God’s immediate presence, a consciousness of him in our souls. Now just as far as corporeal or limited attributes enter into our conception of him, we remove him from us. He becomes an outward, distant being, instead of being viewed and felt as dwelling in the soul itself. It is an unspeakable benefit of the doc- trine of a purely spiritual God, that he can be regarded as inhabiting, filling our spiritual nature; and through this union with our minds, he can and does become the object of an intimacy and friendship, such as no embodied being can call forth. III. Unitarianism is the system most favorable to piety, because it presents a distinct and intelligible object of worship, a being, whose nature, whilst in- expressibly sublime, is yet simple and suited to hu- man apprehension. An infinite Father is the most ex- alted of all conceptions, and yet the least perplexing. It involves no incongruous ideas. It is illustrated by analogies from our own nature. It coincides 22 with that fundamental law of the intellect, through which we demand a cause proportioned to effects. It is also as interesting as it is rational ; so that it is peculiarly congenial with the improved mind. The sublime simplicity of God, as he is taught in Uni- tarianism, by relieving the understanding from perplexity, and by placing him within the reach of thought and affection, gives him peculiar power over the soul. Trinitarianism, on the other hand, is a riddle. Men call it a mystery, but it is myste- rious, not like the great truths of religion, by its vastness and grandeur, but by the irreconcilable ideas which it involves. One God, consisting of three persons or agents, is so strange a being, so unlike our own minds, and all others with which we hold intercourse, is so misty, so incongruous, so contradictory, that he cannot be apprehended with that distinctness and that feeling of reality, which belong to the opposite system. Such a heteroge- neous being, who is at the same moment one and many; who includes in his own nature the relations of Father and Son, or, in other words, is Father and Son to himself; who, in one of his persons, is at the same moment the Supreme God and a mortal man, omniscient and ignorant, almighty and impo- tent; such a being is certainly the most puzzling and distracting object ever presented to human thought. Trinitarianism, instead of teaching an intelligible God, offers to the mind a monstrous com- pound of hostile attributes, bearing plain marks of 23 those ages of darkness, when Christianity shed but a faint ray, and the diseased fancy teemed with prodigies and unnatural creations. In contem- plating a being, who presents such different and inconsistent aspects, the mind finds nothing to rest upon ; and instead of receiving distinct and harmo- nious impressions, is disturbed by shifting, unsettled images. To commune with such a being must be as hard, as to converse with a man of three different countenances, speaking with three different tongues. The believer in this system must forget it, when he prays, or he could find no repose in devotion. Who can compare it in distinctness, reality, and power, with the simple doctrine of One Infinite Father P IV. Unitarianism promotes a fervent and en- lightened piety, by asserting the absolute and un- bounded perfection of God’s character. This is the highest service which can be rendered to mankind. Just and generous conceptions of the Divinity are the soul’s true wealth. To spread these, is to con- tribute more effectually, than by any other agency, to the progress and happiness of the intelligent creation. To obscure God’s glory is to do greater wrong, than to blot out the sun. The character and influence of a religion must answer to the views which it gives of the Divinity; and there is a plain. tendency in that system, which manifests the di- vine perfections most resplendently, to awaken the sublimest and most blessed piety. 24 Now Trinitarianism has a fatal tendency to de- grade the character of the Supreme Being. By multiplying divine persons, it takes from each the glory of independent, all-sufficient, absolute per- fection. This may be shown in various particulars. And in the first place, the very idea, that three persons in the divinity are in any degree important, implies and involves the imperfection of each ; for it is plain, that if one divine person possesses all possible power, wisdom, love, and happiness, noth- ing will be gained to himself or to the creation by joining with him two, or two hundred other persons. To say that he needs others for any purpose or in any degree, is to strip him of independent and all-sufficient majesty. If our Father in Heaven, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, is not of himself sufficient to all the wants of his creation ; if, by his union with other persons, he can accomplish any good to which he is not of himself equal; or if he thus acquires a claim to the least degree of trust or hope, to which he is not of him- self entitled by his own independent attributes; then it is plain, he is not a being of infinite and absolute perfection. Now Trinitarianism teaches, that the highest good accrues to the human race from the existence of three divine persons, sustaining differ- ent offices and relations to the world ; and it re- gards the Unitarian, as subverting the foundation of human hope, by asserting that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus is alone and singly God. Thus it derogates from his infinite glory. 25 In the next place, Trinitarianism degrades the character of the Supreme Being, by laying its dis- ciples under the necessity of making such a distri- bution of offices and relations among the three persons, as will serve to designate and distinguish them ; for in this way it interferes with the sublime conception of One Infinite Person, in whom all glories are concentred. If we are required to wor- ship three persons, we must view them in different lights, or they will be mere repetitions of each other, mere names and sounds, presenting no objects, con- veying no meaning to the mind. Some appropriate character, some peculiar acts, feelings, and relations must be ascribed to each. In other words, the glory of all must be shorn, that some special dis- tinguishing lustre may be thrown on each. Accord- ingly, creation is associated peculiarly with the conception of the Father; satisfaction for human guilt with that of the Son; whilst sanctification, the noblest work of all, is given to the Holy Spirit as his more particular work. By a still more fatal distribution, the work of justice, the office of vindi- cating the rights of the Divinity, falls peculiarly to the Father, whilst the loveliness of interposing mercy clothes peculiarly the person of the Son. By this unhappy influence of Trinitarianism, from which common minds at least cannot escape, the splendors of the Godhead, being scattered among three objects, instead of being united in One Infi- mite Father, are dimmed ; and he, whose mind is 4. 26 thoroughly and practically possessed by this sys- tem, can hardly conceive the effulgence of glory in which the One God offers himself to a pious be- liever in his strict unity. But the worst has not been told. I observe, then, in the third place, that if Three Divine Per- sons are believed in, such an administration or government of the world must be ascribed to them, as will furnish them with a sphere of operation. No man will admit three persons into his creed, without finding a use for them. Now it is an ob- vious remark, that a system of the universe, which involves and demands more than One Infinite Agent, must be wild, extravagant, and unworthy the perfect God; because there is no possible or conceivable good, to which such an agent is not adequate. Accordingly we find Trinitarianism con- necting itself with a scheme of administration, ex- ceedingly derogatory to the divine character. It teaches, that the Infinite Father saw fit to put into the hands of our first parents the character and condition of their whole progeny; and that, through one act of disobedience, the whole race bring with them into being a corrupt nature, or are born de- praved. It teaches, that the offences of a short life, though begun and spent under this disastrous influence, merit endless punishment, and that God’s law threatens this infinite penalty; and that man is thus burdened with a guilt, which no sufferings of the created universe can expiate, which nothing 27 but the sufferings of an Infinite Being can purge away. In this condition of human nature, Trinita- rianism finds a sphere of action for its different persons. I am aware that some Trinitarians, on hearing this statement of their system, may reproach me with ascribing to them the errors of Calvinism, a system which they abhor as much as ourselves. But none of the peculiarities of Calvinism enter into this exposition. I have given what I under- stand to be the leading features of Trinitarianism all the world over ; and the benevolent professors of that faith, who recoil from this statement, must blame not the preacher, but the creeds and establishments by which these doctrines are diffused. For ourselves, we look with horror and grief on the views of God’s government, which are naturally and intimately united with Trinitarianism. They take from us our Father in Heaven, and substitute a stern and unjust lord. Our filial love and reverence rise up against them. We say to the Trinitarian, touch any thing but the perfections of God. Cast no stain on that spotless purity and loveliness. We can endure any errors but those, which subvert or unsettle the conviction of God’s paternal goodness. Urge not upon us a system, which makes existence a curse, and wraps the universe in gloom. Leave us the cheerful light, the free and healthful atmosphere, of a liberal and rational faith; the ennobling and consoling influ- ences of the doctrine, which nature and revelation 28 in blessed concord teach us, of One Father of Un- bounded and Inexhaustible Love. V. Unitarianism is peculiarly favorable to piety, because it accords with nature, with the world around and the world within us ; and through this accordance it gives aid to nature, and receives aid from it, in impressing the mind with God. We live in the midst of a glorious universe, which was meant to be a witness and preacher of the Divinity; and a revelation from God may be expected to be in harmony with this system, and to carry on a common ministry with it in lifting the soul to God. Now Unitarianism is in accordance with nature. It teaches One Father, and so does creation, the more it is explored. Philosophy, in proportion as it extends its views of the universe, sees in it, more and more, a sublime and beautiful unity, and multi- plies proofs, that all things have sprung from one intelligence, one power, one love. The whole outward creation proclaims to the Unitarian the truth in which he delights. So does his own soul. But neither nature nor the soul bears one trace of Three Divine Persons. Nature is no Trinitarian. It gives not a hint, not a glimpse of a tri-personal author. Trinitarianism is a confined system, shut up in a few texts, a few written lines, where many of the wisest minds have failed to discover it. It is not inscribed on the heavens and the earth, not borne on every wind, not resounding and re-echo- ing through the universe. The sun and stars say 29 nothing of a God of three persons. They all speak of the One Father whom we adore. To our ears, one and the same voice comes from God’s word. and works, a full and swelling strain, growing clearer, louder, more thrilling as we listen, and with one blessed influence lifting up our souls to the Almighty Father. This accordance between nature and revelationin- creases the power of both over the mind. Concurring as they do in one impression, they make that impres- sion deeper. To men of reflection, the conviction of the reality of religion is exceedingly heightened, by a perception of harmony in the views of it which they derive from various sources, Revela- tion is never received with so intimate a persuasion of its truth, as when it is seen to conspire to the same ends and impressions, for which all other things are made. It is no small objection to Trinitarian- ism, that it is an insulated doctrine, that it reveals a God whom we meet nowhere in the universe. Three Divine Persons, I repeat it, are found only in a few texts, and those so dark, that the gifted minds of Milton, Newton, and Locke could not find them there. Nature gives them not a whisper of evidence. And can they be as real and power- ful to the mind, as that One Father, whom the general strain and common voice of Scripture, and the universal voice of nature call us to adore ? VI. Unitarianism favors piety by opening the mind to new and ever enlarging views of God. 30 Teaching, as it does, the same God with nature, it leads us to seek him in nature. It does not shut us up in the written word, precious as that mani- festation of the Divinity is. It considers revelation, not as independent on his other means of instruc- tion; not as a separate agent; but as a part of the great system of God for enlightening and elevating the human soul; as intimately joined with creation and providence, and intended to concur with them ; and as given to assist us in reading the volume of the universe. Thus Unitarianism, where its genu- ine influence is experienced, tends to enrich and fertilize the mind; opens it to new lights, wherever they spring up ; and by combining, makes more efficient, the means of religious knowledge. Trini- tarianism; on the other hand, is a system which tends to confine the mind; to shut it up in what is written ; to diminish its interest in the universe; and to disincline it to bright and enlarged views of God’s works. This effect will be explained, in the first place, if we consider, that the peculiarities of Trinitarianism differ so much from the teachings of the universe, that he, who attaches himself to the one, will be in danger of losing his interest in the other. The ideas of Three Divine Persons, of God clothing himself in flesh, of the Infinite Creator saving the guilty by transferring their punishment to an innocent being, these ideas cannot easily be made to coalesce in the mind with that, which nature gives, of One Almighty Father and Un- 31 bounded Spirit, whom no worlds can contain, and whose vicegerent in the human breast pronounces it a crime, to lay the penalties of vice on the pure and unoffending. But Trinitarianism has a still more positive in- fluence in shutting the mind against improving views from the universe. It tends to throw gloom over God’s works. Imagining that Christ is to be exalted, by giving him an exclusive agency in en- lightening and recovering mankind, it is tempted to disparage other lights and influences; and for the purpose of magnifying his salvation, it inclines to exaggerate the darkness and desperateness of man’s present condition. The mind, thus impressed, naturally leans to those views of nature and of society, which will strengthen the ideas of desola- tion and guilt. It is tempted to aggravate the miseries of life, and to see in them only the marks of divine displeasure and punishing justice ; and overlooks their obvious fitness and design to awaken our powers, exercise our virtues, and strengthen our social ties. In like manner it exaggerates the sins of men, that the need of an Infinite atone- ment may be maintained. Some of the most af- fecting tokens of God’s love within and around us are obscured by this gloomy theology. The glorious faculties of the soul, its high aspirations, its sensi- bility to the great and good in character, its sym- pathy with disinterested and suffering virtue, its benevolent and religious instincts, its thirst for a 32 ** happiness not found on earth, these are overlooked or thrown into the shade, that they may not disturb the persuasion of man's natural corruption. Inge- nuity is employed to disparage what is interesting in the human character. Whilst the bursts of pas- sion in the new-born child are gravely urged, as indications of a native rooted corruption ; its bursts of affection, its sweet Smile, its innocent and inex- pressible joy, its loveliness and beauty, are not listened to, though they plead more eloquently its alliance with higher natures. The sacred and ten- der affections of home ; the unwearied watchings and cheerful sacrifices of parents; the reverential, grateful assiduity of children, smoothing an aged father’s or mother’s descent to the grave ; woman’s love, stronger than death; the friendship of brothers and sisters; the anxious affection, which tends around the bed of sickness; the subdued voice, which breathes comfort into the mourner’s heart; all the endearing offices, which shed a serene light through our dwellings; these are explained away by the thorough advocates of this system, so as to in- clude no real virtue, so as to consist with a natural aversion to goodness. Even the higher efforts of disinterested benevolence, and the most unaffected expressions of piety, if not connected with what is called “the true faith,” are, by the most rigid dis- ciples of the doctrine which I oppose, resolved into the passion for distinction, or some other working of “unsanctified nature.” Thus Trinitarianism 33 and its kindred doctrines have a tendency to veil God’s goodness, to Sully his fairest works, to dim the lustre of those innocent and pure affections, which a divine breath kindles in the soul, to blight the beauty and freshness of creation, and in this way to consume the very nutriment of piety. We know, and rejoice to know, that in multitudes this tendency is counteracted by a cheerful temperament, a benevolent nature, and a strength of gratitude, which bursts the shackles of a melancholy system. But from the mature of the doctrine, the tendency exists and is strong; and an impartial observer will often discern it resulting in gloomy, depressing views of life and the universe. Trinitarianism, by thus tending to exclude bright and enlarging views of the creation, seems to me not only to chill the heart, but to injure the under- standing. It does not send the mind far and wide for new and elevating objects; and we have here one explanation of the barrenness and feebleness by which theological writings are so generally marked. It is not wonderful, that the prevalent theology should want vitality and enlargement of thought, for it does not accord with the perfections of God and the spirit of the universe. It has not its root in eternal truth ; but is a narrow, technical, artifi- cial system, the fabrication of unrefined ages, and consequently incapable of being blended with the new lights which are spreading over the most in- teresting subjects, and of being incorporated with 5 34 the results and anticipations of original and pro- gressive minds. It stands apart in the mind, in- stead of seizing upon new truths, and converting them into its own nutriment. With few exceptions, the Trinitarian theology of the present day is great- ly deficient in freshness of thought, and in power to awaken the interest and to meet the intellectual and spiritual wants of thinking men. I see indeed superior minds and great minds among the adhe- rents of the prevalent system ; but they seem to me to move in chains, and to fulfil poorly their high function of adding to the wealth of the human in- tellect. In theological discussion, they remind me more of Sampson grinding in the narrow mill of the Philistines, than of that undaunted champion achieving victories for God’s people, and enlarging the bounds of their inheritance. Now a system, which has a tendency to confine the mind, and to impair its sensibility to the manifestations of God in the universe, is so far unfriendly to piety, to a bright, joyous, hopeful, ever growing love of the Creator. It tends to generate and nourish a religion of a low, dull, melancholy tone, such, I apprehend, as now predominates in the Christian world. VII. Unitarianism promotes piety by the high place, which it assigns to piety in the character and work of Jesus Christ. What is it, which the Unitarian regards as the chief glory of the char- acter of Christ P I answer, his filial devotion, the entireness with which he surrendered himself to the 35 will and benevolent purposes of God. The piety of Jesus, which, on the supposition of his Supreme Divinity, is a subordinate and incongruous, is, to us, his prominent and crowning, attribute. We place his “oneness with God,” not in an unintelligible unity of essence, but in unity of mind and heart, in the strength of his love, through which he re- nounced every separate interest, and identified him- self with his Father’s designs. In other words, filial piety, the consecration of his whole being to the benevolent will of his Father, this is the mild glory in which he always offers himself to our minds; and, of consequence, all our sympathies with him, all our love and veneration towards him, are so many forms of delight in a pious character, and our whole knowledge of him incites us to a like sur- render of our whole nature and existence to God. In the next place, Unitarianism teaches, that the highest work or office of Christ is to call forth and strengthen piety in the human breast, and thus it sets before us this character as the chief acquisition and end of our being. To us, the great glory of . Christ’s mission consists in the power, with which he “reveals the Father,” and establishes the “kingdom or reign of God within” the soul. By the crown, which he wears, we understand the emi- mence which he enjoys in the most beneficent work in the universe, that of bringing back the lost mind to the knowledge, love, and likeness of its Creator. With these views of Christ's office, nothing can sº 36 seem to us so important as an enlightened and profound piety, and we are quickened to seek it, as the perfection and happiness, to which nature and redemption jointly summon us. Now we maintain, that Trinitarianism obscures and weakens these views of Christ’s character and work; and this it does, by insisting perpetually on others of an incongruous, discordant nature. It diminishes the power of his piety. Making him, as it does, the Supreme Being, and placing him as an equal on his Father’s throne, it turns the mind from him as the meekest worshipper of God; throws into the shade, as of very inferior worth, his self-denying obedience; and gives us other grounds for revering him, than his entire homage, his fervent love, his cheerful self-sacrifice to the Universal Parent. There is a plain incongruity in the belief of his Supreme Godhead with the ideas of filial piety and exemplary devotion. The mind, which has been taught to regard him as of equal majesty and au- thority with the Father, cannot easily feel the power of his character as the affectionate son, whose meat it was to do his Father’s will. The mind, accus- tomed to make him the Ultimate Object of worship, cannot easily recognise in him the pattern of that worship, the guide to the Most High. The char- acters are incongruous, and their union perplexing, so that neither exerts its full energy on the mind. Trinitarianism also exhibits the work, as well as character of Christ, in lights less favorable to piety. 37 It does not make the promotion of piety his chief end. It teaches, that the highest purpose of his mission was to reconcile God to man, not man to God. It teaches, that the most formidable obstacle to human happiness lies in the claims and threatenings of divine justice. Hence it leads men to prize Christ more, for satisfying this justice, and appeasing God’s anger, than for awakening in the human soul sentiments of love towards its Father in heaven. Accordingly, multitudes seem to prize pardon more than piety, and think it a greater boon to escape, through Christ's sufferings, the fire of hell, than to receive, through his influence, the spirit of heaven, the spirit of devotion. Is such a system propitious to a generous and ever growing piety f If I may be allowed a short digression, I would conclude this head with the general observation, that we deem our views of Jesus Christ more in- teresting than those of Trinitarianism. We feel that we should lose much, by exchanging the dis- tinct character and mild radiance, with which he offers himself to our minds, for the confused and irreconcilable glories with which that system la- bors to invest him. According to Unitarianism, he is a being who may be understood, for he is one mind, one conscious nature. According to the op- posite faith, he is an inconceivable compound of two most dissimilar minds, joining in one person a finite and infinite nature, a soul weak and ignorant, and a soul almighty and omniscient. And is such 38 a being a proper object for human thought and affection ?–I add, as another important considera- tion, that to us, Jesus, instead of being the second of three obscure, unintelligible persons, is first and preeminent in the sphere in which he acts, and is thus the object of a distinct attachment, which he shares with no equals or rivals. To us, he is first of the sons of God, the Son by peculiar nearness and likeness to the Father. He is first of all the ministers of God’s mercy and beneficence, and through him the largest stream of bounty flows to the creation. He is first in God’s favor and love, the most accepted of worshippers, the most preva- lent of intercessors. In this mighty universe, framed to be a mirror of its author, we turn to Jesus as the brightest image of God, and gratefully yield him a place in our souls, second only to the Infinite Father, to whom he himself directs our supreme affection. VIII. I now proceed to a great topic. Unita- rianism promotes piety, by meeting the wants of man as a sinner. The wants of the sinner may be expressed almost in one word. He wants assur- ances of mercy in his Creator. He wants pledges, that God is Love in its purest form, that is, that He has a goodness so disinterested, free, full, strong, and immutable, that the ingratitude and disobe- dience of his creatures cannot overcome it. This unconquerable love, which in Scripture is de- nominated grace, and which waits not for merit to 39 call it forth, but flows out to the most guilty, is the sinner’s only hope, and is fitted to call forth the most devoted gratitude. Now this grace or mercy of God, which seeks the lost, and receives and blesses the returning child, is proclaimed by that faith, which we advocate, with a clearness and energy, which cannot be surpassed. Unitarianism will not listen for a moment to the common errors, by which this bright attribute is obscured. It will not hear of a vindictive wrath in God, which must be quenched by blood; or of a justice, which binds his mercy with an iron chain, until its demands are satisfied to the full. It will not hear that God needs any foreign influence to awaken his mercy: but teaches, that the yearnings of the tenderest human parent towards a lost child are but a faint image of God’s deep and overflowing compassion towards erring man. This essential and unchange- able propensity of the divine mind to forgiveness, the Unitarian beholds shining forth through the whole word of God, and especially in the mission and revelation of Jesus Christ, who lived and died to make manifest the inexhaustible plenitude of divine grace; and, aided by revelation, he sees this attribute of God every where, both around him and within him. He sees it in the sun which shines, and the rain which descends, on the evil and un- thankful ; in the peace, which returns to the mind in proportion to its return to God and duty; in the sentiment of compassion, which springs up sponta- 40 neously in the human breast towards the fallen and lost; and in the moral instinct, which teaches us to cherish this compassion as a sacred principle, as an emanation of God’s infinite love. In truth, Unita- rianism asserts so strongly the mercy of God, that the reproach thrown upon it is, that it takes from the sinner the dread of punishment; a reproach wholly without foundation; for our system teaches, that God’s mercy is not an instinctive tenderness, which cannot inflict pain ; but an all-wise love, which desires the true and lasting good of its ob- ject, and consequently desires first for the sinner that restoration to purity, without which, shame, and suffering, and exile from God and Heaven are of necessity and unalterably his doom. Thus Uni- tarianism holds forth God’s grace and forgiving goodness most resplendently; and by this manifes- tation of him, it tends to awaken a tender and con- fiding piety; an ingenuous love, which mourns that it has offended; an ingenuous aversion to sin, not because sin brings punishment, but because it sepa- rates the mind from this merciful Father. Now we object to Trinitarianism, that it ob- scures, if it does not annul, the mercy of God. It does so in various ways. We have already seen, that it gives such views of God’s government, that we can hardly conceive of this attribute as entering into his character. Mercy to the sinner is the principle of love or benevolence in its highest form; and surely this cannot be expected from a being 41 who brings us into existence burdened with heredi- tary guilt, and who threatens with endless pun- ishment and wo the heirs of so frail and feeble a nature. With such a Creator, the idea of mercy can- not coalesce ; and I will say more, that under such a government man has no need of mercy; for he owes no allegiance to such a maker, and cannot of course contract the guilt of violating it ; and with- out guilt, he needs no grace or pardon. The se- verity of this system places him on the ground of an injured being. The wrong lies on the side of the Creator. In the next place, Trinitarianism obscures God’s mercy, by the manner in which it supposes pardon to be communicated. It teaches, that God remits the punishment of the offender, in consequence of receiving an equivalent from an innocent person ; that the sufferings of the sinner are removed by a full satisfaction made to divine justice in the suffer- ings of a substitute. And is this “the quality of mercy P” What means forgiveness, but the recep- tion of the returning child through the strength of parental love P This doctrine invests the Saviour with a claim of merit, with a right to the remission of the sins of his followers; and represents God’s reception of the penitent as a recompense due to the worth of his son. And is mercy, which means free and undeserved love, made more manifest, more resplendent, by the introduction of merit and right as the ground of our salvation ? Could a 6 4? surer expedient be invented for obscuring its free- mess, and for turning the sinner's gratitude from the sovereign who demands, to the sufferer who offers, ſull satisfaction for his guilt f I know it is said, that Trinitarianism magnifies God’s mercy, because it teaches, that he himself provided the substitute for the guilty. But I reply, that the work here ascribed to mercy is not the most appropriate, nor most fitted to manifest it and impress it on the heart. This may be made appa- rent by familiar illustrations. Suppose that a cred- itor, through compassion to certain debtors, should persuade a benevolent and opulent man to pay him in their stead. Would not the debtors see a great- er mercy, and feel a weightier obligation, if they were to receive a free, gratuitous release ? And will not their chief gratitude stray beyond the creditor to the benevolent substitute º Or suppose, that a parent, unwilling to inflict a penality on a disobedient but feeble child, should persuade a stronger child to bear it. Would not the offender see a more touching mercy in a free forgiveness, springing immediately from a parent’s heart, than in this circuitous remission ? And will he not be tempted to turn with his strongest love to the gen- erous sufferer? In this process of substitution, of which Trinitarianism boasts so loudly, the mercy of God becomes complicated with the rights and merits of the substitute, and is a more distant cause than these rights and merits in our salvation. These 43 are nearer, more visible, and more than divide the glory with grace and mercy in our rescue. They turn the mind from mercy as the only spring of its happiness, and only rock of its hope. Now this is to deprive piety of one of its chief means of growth and joy. Nothing should stand between the soul and God’s mercy. Nothing should share with mercy the work of our salvation. Christ’s inter- cession should ever be regarded as an application to love and mercy, not as a demand of justice, not as a claim of merit. I grieve to say, that Christ, as now viewed by multitudes, hides the lustre of that very attribute, which it is his great purpose to display. I fear, that to many, Jesus wears the glory of a more winning, tender mercy, than his Father ; and that he is regarded as the sinner’s chief resource. Is this the way to invigo- rate piety f Trinitarians imagine, that there is one view of their system, peculiarly fitted to give peace and hope to the sinner, and consequently to promote gratitude and love. It is this. They say, it pro- vides an Infinite substitute for the sinner, than which nothing can give greater relief to the bur- dened conscience. Jesus, being the second person of the Trinity, was able to make infinite satisfac- tion for sin ; and what, they ask, in Unitarianism, can compare with this F I have time only for two brief replies. And first, this doctrine of an Infinite satisfaction, or, as it is improperly called, of an In- 44 finite atonement, subverts, instead of building up, hope, because it argues infinite severity in the gov- ernment which requires it. Did I believe, what Trinitarianism teaches, that not the least trans- gression, not even the first sin of the dawning mind of the child, could be remitted without an infinite expiation, I should feel myself living under a legislation unspeakably dreadful, under laws writ- ten, like Draco's, in blood; and instead of thanking the sovereign for providing an infinite substitute, I should shudder at the attributes, which render this expedient necessary. It is commonly said, that an infinite atonement is needed to make due and deep impressions of the evil of sin. But he, who framed all souls and gave them their susceptibilities, ought not to be thought so wanting in goodness and wis- dom, as to have constituted a universe, which demands so dreadful and degrading a method of enforcing obedience, as the penal sufferings of a God. This doctrine of an Infinite substitute, suf- ſering the penalty of sin, to manifest God’s wrath against sin, and thus to support his government, is, I fear, so familiar to us all, that its monstrous character is overlooked. Let me then set it before you, in new terms, and by a new illustration; and if in so doing I may wound the feelings of some who hear me, I beg them to believe, that I do it with pain, and from no impulse but a desire to serve the cause of truth.-Suppose, then, that a teacher should come among you, and should tell you, that 45 the Creator, in order to pardon his own children, had erected a gallows in the centre of the universe, and had publicly executed upon it, in room of the offenders, an Infinite Being, the partaker of his own Supreme Divinity; suppose him to declare, that this execution was appointed, as a most conspicuous and terrible manifestation of God’s justice and wrath, and of the infinite wo denounced by his law ; and suppose him to add, that all beings in Heaven and earth are required to fix their eyes on this fearful sight, as the most powerful enforcement of obedience and virtue. Would you not tell him, that he calum- niated his Maker P Would you not say to him, that this central gallows threw gloom over the universe; that the spirit of a government, whose very acts of pardon were written in such blood, was terror, not paternal love; and that the obedience, which need- ed to be upheld by this horrid spectacle, was nothing worth P Would you not say to him, that even you, in this infancy and imperfection of your being, were capable of being wrought upon by nobler motives, and of hating sin through more generous views; and that much more the angels, those pure flames of love, need not the gallows and an exe- cuted God, to confirm their loyalty P You would all so feel at such teaching as I have supposed ; and yet how does this differ from the popular doc- trine of atonement? According to this doctrine, we have an Infinite Being sentenced to suffer as a sub- stitute the death of the cross, a punishment more 46 ignominious and agonizing than the gallows, a punishment reserved for slaves and the vilest male- factors; and he suffers this punishment, that he may show forth the terrors of God’s law, and strike a dread of sin through the universe.—I am indeed aware that multitudes, who profess this doctrine, are not accustomed to bring it to their minds distinctly in this light; that they do not or- dimarily regard the death of Christ, as a criminal execution, as an infinitely dreadful infliction of justice, as intended to show, that, without an infi- nite satisfaction, they must hope nothing from God. Their minds turn by a generous instinct from these appalling views, to the love, the disinterestedness, the moral grandeur and beauty of the sufferer; and through such thoughts they make the cross a source of peace, gratitude, love, and hope ; thus af- fording a delightful exemplification of the power of the human mind to attach itself to what is good and purifying in the most irrational system. But let mone on this account say, that we misrepresent the doctrine of atonement, the primary and essential idea of which is, the public execution of a God, for the purpose of satisfying justice and awakening a shuddering dread of sin. I have a second objection to this doctrine of In- finite atonement. When examined minutely, and freed from ambiguous language, it vanishes into air. It is wholly delusion. The Trinitarian tells me, that, according to his system, we have an 47 infinite substitute; that the Infinite God was pleased to bear our punishment, and consequently that pardon is made sure. But I ask him, Do I understand you ? Do you mean that the Great God, who never changes, whose happiness is the same yesterday, to day, and for ever, that this Eternal Being really bore the penalty of my sins, really suffered and died ? Every pious man, when pressed by this question, answers, No. What then does the doctrine of Infinite atonement mean? Why, this; that God took into union with himself our nature, that is, a human body and soul; and these bore the suffering for our sins ; and, through his union with these, God may be said to have borne it himself. Thus this vaunted system goes out—in words. The Infinite victim proves to be a frail man, and God’s share in the sacrifice is a mere fiction. I ask with solemnity, Can this doc- trime give one moment’s ease to the conscience of an unbiassed, thinking man f Does it not unsettle all hope, by making the whole religion suspicious and unsure ? I am compelled to say, that I see in it no impression of majesty, or wisdom, or love, nothing worthy of a God; and when I compare it with that nobler faith, which directs our eyes and hearts to God’s essential mercy, as our only hope, I am amazed that any should ascribe to it superior efficacy, as a religion for sinners, as a means of filling the soul with pious trust and love. I know, indeed, that some will say, that, in giving 48 up an Infinite atonement, I deprive myself of all hope of divine favor. To such, I would say, You do infinite wrong to God’s mercy. On that mercy I cast myself without a fear. I indeed desire Christ to intercede for me. I regard his relation to me as God’s kindest appointment. Through him, “grace and truth come * to me from Heaven, and I look forward to his friendship, as among the highest blessings of my whole future being. But I cannot, and dare not ask him, to offer an infinite satisfaction for my sins; to appease the wrath of God ; to reconcile the Universal Father to his own offspring ; to open to me those arms of Divine Mercy, which have encircled and borne me from the first moment of my being. The essential and unbounded mercy of my Creator is the foundation of my hope, and a broader and surer the universe cannot give me. IX. I now proceed to the last consideration, which the limits of this discourse will permit me to urge. It has been more than once suggested, but deserves to be distinctly stated. I observe, then, that Unitarianism promotes piety, because it is a rational religion. By this, I do not mean, that its truths can be fully comprehended ; for there is not an object in nature or religion, which has not innumerable connexions and relations be- yond our grasp of thought. I mean, that its doc- trines are consistent with one another, and with all established truth. Unitarianism is in harmony 49 with the great and clear principles of revelation; with the laws and power of human nature; with the dictates of the moral sense ; with the noblest instincts and highest aspirations of the soul; and with the lights, which the universe throws on the character of its author. We can hold this doctrine without self-contradiction, without rebelling against our rational and moral powers, without putting to silence the divine monitor in the breast. And this is an unspeakable benefit; for a religion, thus coincident with reason, conscience, and our whole spiritual being, has the foundations of universal empire in the breast; and the heart, finding no resistance in the intellect, yields itself wholly, cheerfully, without doubts or misgivings, to the love of its Creator. To Trinitarianism we object, what has always been objected to it, that it contradicts and degrades reason, and thus exposes the mind to the worst de- lusions. Some of its advocates, more courageous than prudent, have even recommended “the pros- tration of the understanding ” as preparatory to its reception. Its chief doctrine is an outrage on our rational nature. Its three persons, who constitute its God, must either be frittered away into three unmeaning distinctions, into sounds signifying nothing ; or they are three conscious agents, who cannot, by any human art or metaphysical device, be made to coalesce into one being; who cannot be really viewed as one mind, having one conscious- *** ſ 50 ness and one will. Now a religious system, the cardinal principle of which offends the understand- ing, very naturally conforms itself throughout to this prominent feature, and becomes prevalently irrational. He, who is compelled to defend his faith in any particular by the plea, that human reason is so depraved through the fall, as to be an inadequate judge of religion, and that God is honored by our reception of what shocks the in- tellect, seems to have no defence left against accumulated absurdities. According to these prin- ciples, the fanatic, who exclaimed, “I believe, be- cause it is impossible,” had a fair title to canoniz- ation. Reason is too Godlike a faculty, to be insulted with impunity. Accordingly Trinitarian- ism, as we have seen, links itself with several degrading errors; and its most natural alliance is with Calvinism, that cruel faith, which, stripping God of mercy and man of power, has made Chris- tianity an instrument of torture to the timid, and an object of doubt or scorn to hardier spirits. I repeat it, a doctrine, which violates reason like the Trinity, prepares its advocates, in proportion as it is incorporated into the mind, for worse and worse delusions. It breaks down the distinc- tions and barriers between truth and falsehood. It creates a diseased taste for prodigies, fictions, and exaggerations, for startling mysteries, and wild dreams of enthusiasm. It destroys the relish for the simple, chaste, serene beauties of truth. Es- 51 pecially when the prostration of understanding is taught as an act of piety, we cannot wonder, that the grossest superstitions should be devoured, and that the credulity of the multitude should keep pace with the forgeries of imposture and fanaticism. The history of the church is the best comment on the effects of divorcing reason from religion; and if the present age is disburdened of many of the superstitions, under which Christianity and human nature groaned for ages, it owes its relief in no small degree to the reinstating of reason in her long violated rights. The injury to religion, from irrational doctrines when thoroughly believed, is immense. The human soul has a unity. Its various faculties are adapted to one another. One life pervades it; and its beauty, strength, and growth, depend on nothing so much, as on the harmony and joint action of all its principles. To wound and degrade it in any of its powers, and especially in the noble and dis- tinguishing power of reason, is to inflict on it universal injury. No motion is more false, than that the heart is to thrive by dwarfing the intellect; that perplexing doctrines are the best food of piety; that religion flourishes most luxuriantly in mists and darkness. Reason was given for God as its great object; and for him it should be kept sacred, invigorated, clarified, protected from human usurp- ation, and inspired with a meek self-reverence. 52 The soul never acts so effectually or joyfully, as when all its powers and affections conspire, as when thought and feeling, reason and sensibility, are called forth together by one great and kindling object. It will never devote itself to God with its whole energy, whilst its guiding faculty sees in him a being to shock and confound it. We want a harmony in our inward nature. We want a piety, which will join light and fervor, and on which the intellectual power will look benignantly. We want religion to be so exhibited, that, in the clearest moments of the intellect, its signatures of truth will grow brighter; that instead of tottering, it will gather strength and stability from the pro- gress of the human mind. These wants we be- lieve to be met by Unitarian Christianity, and therefore we prize it as the best friend of piety. I have thus stated the chief grounds, on which I rest the claim of Unitarianism to the honor of promoting an enlightened, profound, and happy piety. Am I now asked, why we prize our system, and why we build churches for its inculcation ? If I may be allowed to express myself in the name of conscientious Unitarians, who apply their doctrine to their own hearts and lives, I would reply thus: We prize and would spread our views, because we believe that they reveal God to us in greater glory, 53 and bring us nearer to him, than any other. We are conscious of a deep want, which the creation cannot supply, the want of a Perfect Being, on whom the strength of our love may be centered, and of an Almighty Father, in whom our weaknesses, imperfections, and sorrows may find resource; and such a Being and Father, Unitarian Christianity sets before us. For this we prize it above all price. We can part with every other good. We can endure the darkening of life’s fairest prospects. But this bright, consoling doctrine of One God, even the Father, is dearer than life, and we cannot let it go.--Through this faith, every thing grows brighter to our view. Born of such a Parent, we esteem our existence an inestimable gift. We meet every where our Father, and his presence is as a sun shining on our path. We see him in his works, and hear his praise rising from every spot which we tread. We feel him near in our soli- tudes, and sometimes enjoy communion with him more tender than human friendship. We see him in our duties, and perform them more gladly, be- cause they are the best tribute we can offer our Heavenly Benefactor. Even the consciousness of sin, mournful as it is, does not subvert our peace ; for in the mercy of God, as made mani- fest in Jesus Christ, we see an inexhaustible fountain of strength, purity, and pardon for all who, in filial reliance, seek these heavenly gifts.- Through this faith, we are conscious of a new 54 benevolence springing up to our fellow creatures, purer and more enlarged than natural affection. Towards all mankind we see a rich and free love flowing from the common Parent, and touched by this love, we are the friends of all. We com- passionate the most guilty, and would win them back to God.—Through this faith, we receive the happiness of an ever enlarging hope. There is no good too vast for us to anticipate for the universe or for ourselves, from such a Father as we believe in. The horrible thought, of a large proportion of our fellow creatures being cast by an angry God into tortures unutterable by human tongue, and sentenced to spend etermity in shrieks of agony, which will never reach the ear or touch the heart of their Creator; this dreadful anticipation, which would shroud the universe in more than sepulchral gloom, and is enough to break every heart which is not stone, this forms ao part of our conception of the purposes and government of the God and Father of Jesus Christ. Whilst we believe, that every new view of the constitution and administration of the universe will reveal more strikingly the solemn and indissoluble connexion between sin and suffer- ing, we have equal confidence, that God's equity and kindness towards all his creatures will be more and more triumphantly and gloriously dis- played. We have an earnest of heaven in the assurance, that all things are tending to a consum- mation, which, however undefined and incompre- 55 hensible now, will fill the benevolent heart with unmingled joy.—Through this faith, we not only hope for the universe, but hope for ourselves. We are told, indeed, that our faith will not prove an anchor in the last hour. But we have known those, whose departure it has brightened; and our experience of its power, in trial and peril, has proved it to be equal to all the wants of human nature. We doubt not, that, to its sincere follow- ers, death will be a transition to the calm, pure, joyful mansions prepared by Christ for his disciples. There we expect to meet that great and good De- liverer. With the eye of faith, we already see him looking round him with celestial love on all of every name, who have imbibed his spirit. His spirit; his loyal and entire devotion to the will of his Heavenly Father; his universal unconquerable benevolence, through which he freely gave from his pierced side his blood, his life for the salvation of the world; this divine love, and not creeds, and names, and forms, will then be found to at- tract his supreme regard. This spirit we trust to see in multitudes of every sect and name ; and we trust, too, that they, who now reproach us, will at that day recognise, in the dreaded Uni- tarian, this only badge of Christ, and will bid him welcome to the joy of our common Lord.— I have thus stated the views, with which we have reared this building. We desire to glorify God, to promote a purer, nobler, happier piety, 56 Even if we err in doctrine, we think, that these motives should shield us from reproach; should disarm that intolerance, which would exclude us from the church on earth, and from our Father’s house in Heaven. We end, as we began, by offering up this build- ing to the Only Living and True God. We have erected it amidst our private habitations, as a re- membrancer of our Creator. We have reared it in this busy city, as a retreat for pious meditation and prayer. We dedicate it to the King and Father Eternal, the King of kings and Lord of lords. We dedicate it to his Unity, to his unrival- led and undivided Majesty. We dedicate it to the praise of his free, unbought, unmerited Grace. We dedicate it to Jesus Christ, to the memory of his love, to the celebration of his divine virtue, to the preaching of that truth, which he sealed with blood. We dedicate it to the Holy Spirit, to the sanctifying influence of God, to those celestial emanations of light and strength, which visit and refresh the devout mind. We dedicate it to pray- ers and praises, which we trust will be continued and perfected in Heaven. We dedicate it to social worship, to Christian intercourse, to the commun- ion of saints. We dedicate it to the cause of pure morals, of public order, of equity, uprightness, and general good will. We dedicate it to Christian admonition, to those warnings, remonstrances, and 57 earnest and tender persuasions, by which the sin- mer may be arrested, and brought back to God. We dedicate it to Christian consolation, to those truths which assuage sorrow, animate penitence, and lighten the load of human anxiety and fear. We dedicate it to the doctrine of Immortality, to sublime and joyful hopes which reach beyond the grave. In a word, we dedicate it to the great work of perfecting the human soul, and fitting it for nearer approach to its Author. Here may heart meet heart. Here may man meet God. From this place may the song of praise, the ascrip- tion of gratitude, the sigh of penitence, the prayer for grace, and the holy resolve, ascend, as fragrant incense, to Heaven; and through many generations may parents bequeath to their children this house, as a sacred spot, where God had “lifted upon them his countenance,” and given them pledges of his everlasting love. NOTES. Page 19.—The arrangement of the text from Deuteron- omy, quoted on this page, is a little changed, to put the reader immediately in possession of the meaning. Eighth Head.—Under this head, I have more than once used the word atonement in the sense in which Trinitarians generally use it; and without doing so, my object might not have been sufficiently clear to some of my readers. I ought to say, however, that I do not consider this sense as the true one, or as agreeing with the meaning which belongs to the term in the Scriptures; and I always lament the necessity of using a Scriptural word in a manner, which may countenance a misapprehension of its real import. This subject of atone- ment needs a much more extensive discussion, than the limits and design of this sermon would allow. I have a strong impression, that the prevalent views of it may easily be shown to be false, though the true views of it may not so easily be established. I believe, too, that time will prove, that thinking men of opposite sects differ less on this point than is imagined. It will be observed, that I have not under- taken to state the way or method by which Christ's sufferings contribute to human salvation. On this point there is a diversity of opinion. I have thought it sufficient to state the general principle in which Unitarian Christians agree. They all believe, that God’s love or mercy is “the beginning and the end" of human salvation, and that this gives to Christ's sufferings and intercession their efficacy. *::tº: *"+, "...T. --- " - A.,. * . . . ; A = :* * * . . . . . tº ... &"yº" ºšič * -- ~! . . .” ---- - “. •º: - ; ; *… 2 ... ºrº. *- ... ? *. - “. . . .”.” - : "º “, - # , *A "* . , - -, -8 * → * $ - 3. if -> - - s ) - ** , - - - - •, - * 3 x , * Tº . ." - * * * * * , r • . . . . t ' ' s +. - e + ! - -- - -- § * , * { -- - - ‘. . . . . ... • ( * > * “ ... ? * - & g ^- g º, * . . - t ºf & - - * *- * . t $, ..' . • ,” - * ~ * * 1 * , * * ~ * * • * * t ~ * 3. -. ... " " - - - , , * , g t - * - * * ; - - - - - - - - • ‘. - - f , , 4 º' n = -> - s - * * , - 3 + - . - - - - - • * - - - !' . . - $ - - - • ~ * * * º .* - - --- - ... • * " ... -- - - - -- - - - * * * . *, - * , ! - × { . . 3. - - - - - r - - # . . . * - ? . - • * - º * t w • * , - ,- - . - - * - -- * *. - - - - * - * • - y - * - - f - - -- * : - & - - # - - 3. - -- - ex r r ſ • . + * , + > - - - - +. * - - x * , , a * - * - *... • g - - - - - - • * * * * * - - --. - * * - t .* * . . • - v. : t - - - |* º - - *. - - -- - - * * * * “. . - - - g - - * -- - - r - f - * " . , * * * * - * - - } f - +. ‘. . *: g • * : * g - - * * - . *.*, - - * , - + - f : * - - .* -- - * -. - - *- - ! . - * * - #. - - • * ~4 - w - - - t t - & # * , * * - t & t - • t 4 - - -- • , ... " *: - f t • - & i. - ... • - . n . $ " . - . . . - - - - - - - w * a - * - * - - * 4 - : # r * - t - - º • * * -*. ' ' . - : T & 4 - ! • s - * -- - • , - - s . . . " - - l - - - - • , * , * * * * *. * . . . . . . . • , , ... • * *I - | . - • -> * . - - # * - ‘' . * ... " * * * , - . - - i * * * , , , * . * * - . . ~ * - s • - - - ; $ • * * - . : { & A ' * * * * . . - ~ 3 - * - - - - - - > , ‘. . . ...- : w - | * , , º r . • - -> i * - # • , - 2 * * * -- - *. * * - - t a } , , * a ſ , , . “ * ... " r * - - --- t -: - * : -- - t 4 -- • * * * - - • * , , ~ - - - # } - y - - • , … * - I - • * * -> - , 4 r - --- - - * - ... * - - - - - ! • - w , * - - - * - %. 4 - ? | * - * … .º. r s ; - - t * - * = . - * * - - # - - Y- - - $ - - - - | 3. - { ... • - - , I, w " * * . . . ** - - * ~ i 2 - ? - - *, * r * * ** , at . . . * * • . * * * - : . - + * . - -- - * -- * *. w - - § . . t * } -, * - - *. * * - - * * º . # - - * : * . . & & •. - * } ~~~ - * - * - - j - - - - - * , , -, * - * * * . - * * .* , - - | ?, -> - • l - - 3. - - --- •º *. • * + * - * * v. ** - • - - i J * ..." - - t - 3. * . - - r k - - - - * x- r & - - - * * - - - - j * , ; ; – - * 1. ... " - - - • *. - - - •. ; , , , * { * ...— - } - - - . . … - - - - ...” - •. r = - - w ; : ** ... " - - *x , * * * * * f. - z - * & ~. * - * * * * * - - * a * - $ w & - 4. - - - - - - - * , 1 . - - - * , 's - * 4 - -- - . . . - - - - - - - • . - : $ 8 ‘. . - - - - - * -*T *. : - * - … 4 - - - - - y’ a. . + -- ~. - - t - * * - r * - t - “. * * , a • ‘ * - - -- - -> ! - - s . . . - +. - - * - - * Y- ... - *. - t * - - g º - - S. | - r t - 3. * . . . - - d - * - - * } * -, y r - - - - - - ~ • * ~, - - * # - *, * * * -- . . * * - , , . . . " } • * f * * - - * - - , - * * * - $ # - * *— * - * < *; * - - , - * : f - ** → *. - 3. - - - ... - * * * * x - - # , -- - ** d • - r :- - - - - * - * a • - - ^ * . • * * # - *. - - • * - - - - - , “ . . . . . • - . g - 3. - º * -- *- - - - - { - * , ~ - * * ‘. - i + . . . * . . - -- - • , , . . . -- ; * . . . • * , * ‘. : - * : - d - - * . r - * , i. - - - • * { & - * s * * - º - - - - - t * . * - - * * * - * - t i * 3. - * i * - - - - * } - - - '. x 3. * w $ - * * - * - -> g - - .* - - ... ? * { .3 - • ... " k - , - - * . • * * . - . . * . . - - * - - - . . - , - r *. - - - - - , * * * • , * , - - - * * * * ... “ . . - . i ... " - - - - - • * * - r - , \ , '• * - % - - - - - * r t • * 1. * * $ - r * * * -- - - - - t, - - * & y * * -* • * * - * . - - - ... . - * * * , * * * i- , . - - * * - • * - s i - | - . . " - - --> *: * - --- ." * * *, - - * - •x * * * * * * - d - *... , ; y t - * > * - - ** : '. *. * * * * g ~ * & r - - * - * * - - + , ; - * - - - - * - * { * * - - . * .* f *. - * . -- - -- - & • - - - * | - y - ... ' - - **-* r t - ; - - f -- $º y - - - T - , * , - 4. - ' '. * * * * 1 w r • * , * . º - * * - & *. - • . . s". - ... • – - {{ f ' ' ', + - - - & * -- - * • s - • d -- - t * . x * - . * * * - - * : * . • * ; : - . tº -- - * x … , - - - * , - * ~. s - ** - - - * * * } t t ; : & - w *. - - * * - - tº * .. * * , - -* . *. * - +. * - - - - * . % ... • - --. $ * | - - - - ; - - - i - ‘. •w * - ... -- i. - g - - , - - - _* - y * g -- -> & 4 - * * * - * -- - - , , , * * * - - - j - ‘. . . . . - x * . . • * - , , - x - . - - 4. - * , § + • i • ; 4. * z - 4 - s - +. * } t * * ? • - ~. * : ,” ‘. .* a * * * * - y - Af ** : * * * : i , , , i. . . . . . . ^ a - - - - - 3 * * ~. i -- - y - * * x - * * * * * - ,” ". . . r - - - - * • { - --- A * * } * . - * - 3. - - ~ ; * . - - - * * * -: - - 4 * , " , . . . . - - < . ... • + i - + ‘. i - - : - - —n * * # , * } . * - ... . - 4 + J- * * - . -- - º - - t - - - - * -- - - '. -- * 4 - - * - - - - $ # * , -º - * - - - - - * } { - , - - - * & - - A 4 - , , , , - *- 3 * * * ~ * - * , (* * * - ºxº~ : … t º:; §º. t ºś …' ..." -- "4 Yi* * : * :*:::::::::: º * :::::: ;3 º - º * 3rººts.º.º. § * §§ * §§ §:§: £º **i. * § lº: A. :*::: º §§ #: $ºr; sº Wºº * r * : *:::::A § - ~ ºr. §§ 3 ºf ºššššº :T. - **. •, * * * 3. * * ** -- ºzº. * tºº.” $º: $: $º *** -*. tº: :*::::::: gl’’; ºš. ;3 §§§ º #ſº * - - • -º, F ºp”.”. º *A* §§§ t º: #.º.º. ºº:::::::::::::::$3. ." ty - s: Tsº : ...?' - Sº, "Fºx ºz º.º. ,-,- >, “ . . …, sº º: t; . * -," §§ Sº ** *- r" - - * :*.*, . -S- § º : º ... ºff- - ºr §: ; º §: ; ; , º. r-r zºº §: §§§ *.*.* *.*-,-, 3, ... rº; 2 - 1 Fººj ºº::2?-, *. - º: : § 3. &: g § 3. § . - > ; - war [...', 31% - *** - 4 - - ; : 3. . º: *:: '_*, * *_ --- * > - • * - • .*. ; : * * jº, • * *.** Q - ~ * *...* ... -- *, *. K-' - - :*-", *. *.*.*. -, * :* - … ** * ... "tº". . . ...; *... . * * .* - - .r T.:*, *...', '-'.5 v t - - . . . * ", , , • * '. : 'º';*: 3. : . "...] • * * * * : ºr r-ºr ... 's'. ' '... - , Fſ, "...” …,’’.” x: ** , , , ,- 3-" ..S.-- $1. §:º. *... - . . §§3. sºjº, , *…* $: %.; * § § ºrrº. - - sº _s=- In lali null qu º: r am lass at Vellatio sylva. A.D. 1838.4. # =#. : º ** - *-*. s” . . . g.º.º. . . # , ºr " " (" ! ::::::A;" -, *, '...º.º. * . * * ~ -- * # * ~3. **** * * * -32 i, º, '... --- - - - • ** s --~~~ * , * *...*.4 ... * - º r -ºš - - - #7. • * *...* :'. * •r 3 .*.* * & 3. I*... : ! -7.3 °.S.. ^***, *, *. -*. *...*.*::::- -- - - > r: “… ~ *-i. 4. * ~ * ** ; $ * º *. - ... * * • * * ;: "... ºff. ** *. “t f : º & Y-º- + 3. * - i : * º " *, *- * > * * * *. * *-*-** *, *. - * ... t * .* § § * *. ..': • ? * : º, , § : ! . º 3 3- *... .” ... " - ; - $. s º - - ºr * . . . 3. • ‘: * * x) ------- W - ***a*. .- 3. 28---> §3. 4, • *- º: A FAREWELL SERMON DELIVERED IN THE BY REV. SAMUEL W. DUFFIELD SUNDAY EVENING, NOV. 29, 1874. PUBLISHED EY FEQUEST. ANN ARBOR COURIER STEAM PRINTING HOUSE I 87.4 TO THE CHURCH AND CONGREGATION WHO HAVE JOINED WITH MIE IN LABOR AND IN PRAYER I DEDICATE THIS oUR UNITED STORY OF STRUGGLE AND SUCCESS ſº SAMUEL W. DUFFIELD. DEC. I, 1874. C/V/74,S ZDA. Z. “For my brethren and companions' sakes I will now say, Peace be within thee 7? City of God, grown old with silent faces Aying beneath ſhe shadoze, of the clay, Zhine are the flowers built up in barren pſaces, Thine the great bastions waiting for the day. JJim through the might stone after stone arises, Bold through the dazwn step forth the peaks of flame, Touched zwith the sp/endor of those glad suzzºrises Ay which the Ö/essing of the Spirit came. 7oiſers of fruſh are zwe, who aſ our /affor A eeſ the sharp sword stil/ girded aſ the Zhigh, Afeeding no summons of the pipe and faāor, Fighting and building fill the end be migh. º e Thus, them, we build through storm and Aleasant zeyeather, Zhus, Zhen, Zwe pray Öy morning and by night, Pſearf knit with heart, and hands aſ work fogether— Aeseſ by foes unti! Zhou gives? /ight. City of God / ſhy peace is our petition ; Cºſy of God / our Örethren dweſ/ 272 ſhee, And for their sakes, in frue and deep com/rition, We seek ſhy good, O dwelling of the free. S. W. D. From “WARP AND Woof " (1870). A FAREWELL SERMON. “These things have I told you, that swhen the time shall come ye may remember that I told you of them. And these things I said not unto you at the beginning, because I was with you.”—Jo HN xvi. 4. THE loveliest evening often succeeds the stormiest day. An obscured Sun, hidden through many hours by mists and vapors, has at length shown for a moment the brightness of its light. Far peaks glow in a level splendor which stays for no descent into the vale be- tween. The distant ocean shines in the new and unexpected glory. And you and I, pilgrims and strangers, rejoice in the coming and lament at the going of that sunny ray which “Smote the white sails of ships that wore Outward Or in, and gilded O'er The steeples with their veering vanes.” Thus it must have been in the earthly history of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Hidden by the veil—“that is to say, His flesh ’’—the true divinity of light was seldom seen. The rays which here and there appeared, were thought by most to be but reflections or scintillations from a pure character and a noble heart. That this carpenter's son could be God’s son, was hard to comprehend. And every error which has since prevailed respecting the person and work of Christ, finds its origin in this short-sighted judgment “after the outward appearance.” Seldom did He declare Himself in actual words. A Samaritan woman of no reputation, a Jewish ruler of the temple conversing with Him at dead of night, a poor impulsive dis- ciple—such as these heard Him announce His true Messiahship. To the wise and the learned and the rich—then as now—the face was a hidden face. But when the near approach of death renders it fittest for Him to speak, we have the sunburst and the splendor. Compressed within a few short pages of a single Gospel, we find those “thoughts which breathe and words which burn,” by which henceforth we may inter- 6 A FAA’ E WEZ.Z. SAEA2A/OAV. pret the universe of God. The far-off summits of the truth are touched from this horizon, and the great deep of human wisdom becomes as brilliant as the ocean of Apocalypse. And amid all this—just as He had revealed the immense possibil- ities of His character—He was to “go away.” He was to leave the conversion of mankind to a few poor fishermen, a couple of publicans, a woman saved from seven devils, and such other feeble and insignifi- cant folk as had followed Him out upon the road to Bethany, to watch Him vanish, like a vision, within the morning cloud. If there was grief because He left them, there was greater grief because of what was left behind. Yet He had told them, in essence if not in substance, that after the night would come the morning—that this sunset of His person would be succeeded by the dawn of His Spirit. He asked only of them truth and trust, until the trial should be ended and the cloven flame should play about their heads. He might have prophesied that “The new day comes, the light Dearer for night.” But it would seem that in this, as in almost every event of His life, He transcended or reversed our human judgment. He points them not to the time to come so much as to the securing of that time —not so much to glory beyond, as to that tribulation and that perse- cution which made the glory sure. The light upon the peak gave a lustre even to the low valley. Better than the wonderful story which the marvelous tinker fash- ioned in Bedford jail, is the record of this life and this departure— the Progress of the best of Pilgrims back unto His Father's house. And it is no forced or strained attempt for us to be so involved in His personality, through all His way in the world, that we too seem, as it were, to be treading in His steps and “filling up what is behind of the sufferings of Christ, for His body’s sake, which is the church.” To this that “ Follow me !” calls us as well as them ; and the occa- sions and circumstances—the trials and temptations and tears and pain—of our own existence, can be found interpreted in His. Even our partings come beneath the same surpassing pattern. For if we are truly making God’s will our rule, and if the word of His commandment is on “fleshly tables of the heart” which beats within our bosoms, we too may discover that “all things work for good,” and that the methods of the “Most High” are, like His A FAA’Aº WEZ.Z. SEA’MOZV. 7 guiding light, invariable and without shadow of turning. And even as we now perceive that a deeper blessing followed because of the Christ who was parted from them—so each “good gift '' and each ‘‘perfect gift” which we enjoy and which is taken from us, but brings a better in its place. Yet we all hold with tremulous fingers to the health or the hope or the home or the loved and dear ones, as God removes us from them and them from us. We should otherwise sin with lip and heart, and not knowing that which was for Our highest profit we should simply rest and be at ease. Yet He who makes man’s labor for his mouth to be the basis of all political economy, inspires in the soul that loves Him a like hunger, not to be appeased until the beatitude is complete, that “they who hunger and thirst after right- ousness * * shall be filled.” Not impiously, then, nor from any endeavor to compare Small things with great, do I point you in these, the closing Services of an eventful pastorate, to the language of Our Lord. If the true pastor be in the stead of the visible Christ, that he may illustrate by precept and example that attractive yet unparalleled life, it follows that he must “have the Spirit of Christ or he is none of His.” Born again into a regeneration which leaves no room for self-seeking and no mo- ment for repose, he can be at best but “a pilgrim and a stranger” tarrying over-night, a soldier “fighting the good fight of faith,” a herald at the entrance of the stadium, watchful “lest he himself should be a castaway.” The lessons of self-dependence we learn in almost every matter better than in religion. We strangely forget that in this, prečminently, our souls must seek the wisdom which is from above, and that we must, with all our love for the brethren, be indi- vidual inquirers after that will of God affecting us which is our highest rule of duty. Absence has its advantages. It appears to have done everything for Peter and John—it certainly produced Stephen, and as certainly accomplished the divine decree. And, in every sundering of human relations, it bids us remember that “the whole family in heaven and on earth '' are named by one name and are laboring in one love. I. Three years ago I came among you “ because thereto I was sent.” It was certainly no cheerful prospect. Here stood a great unfinished church, with the nail-heads in their naked ugliness and the walls of the audience-room Orange-tawny and indescribably depressing to the sight. A cold breeze plunged down upon the head of the 8 A FAA’Aº WA. Z.Z. SAE RA/OAV. preacher, and a mocking echo wandered and played in the angles of the bare and abandoned ceiling. Some of you sat upon your own purchased cushions, and many of you had nothing but the plain pine boards. As the church stood it was evidently the result of a good brave purpose, but debt had arisen and debt must be discharged. This irksome task fell upon my predecessor, and before it was fully rounded out, he, like others, had been overwhelmed by the weight he was to carry, and had no longer the heart to bear the load. Nor was it strange that he should feel as he did. The disadvantages were thus very great. A prejudice had some- how sprung up—a thing which I now comprehend more clearly than I comprehended it then—and the church was almost deserted by the students of the University. Its important situation as the only church of our denomination by the side of a large and unsectarian institution of learning, had not been grasped thoroughly by either Presbytery or Synod. Financially it represented no great amount of capital. Men- tally it had enormous demands. Spiritually it required patient and careful training, that the strong and contemplative piety of individual Christians might be all brought into one common purpose and turned toward active work. Socially it was charged with coldness, formality, and a predisposition to run into cliques and feuds. On the contrary, the troublesome debt had been really paid. The building, so far as it went—truncated tower, paintless stairways, un- adorned lecture-room, and fenceless grounds—was, notwithstanding, a most solid and admirable structure. There had been a revival, even in the inferregnum, and some forty young people, mostly baptized children of the church, had been received. The necessity itself had obliterated many old marks of division, and had developed a fervent spirit of prayer for God’s guidance. The Presbytery had offered special petitions to this same effect. And I, myself, hurried by the Spirit, like Philip, into the way toward Gaza “which is desert,” felt that He who had brought me hither could “make the wilderness to blossom as the rose.” II. The very first thing to be done was to secure the blessing of the great Head of the Church, by giving to Him and to the commun ion of His body and blood, the chief and foremost place. We first met at that dear Table, and there we have this day parted, and we have found no sweeter or more solemn pleasure than in commemorat- ing His dying love. It was here that we learned to know each other's A FAA’A. WA. Z.Z. SAA’ MO/W. 9 faith. It was here that we were renewed by bread from heaven, and found that the blood of Christ was life unto our souls. For I have endeavored to cause this ordinance to be, to all of us just what, in simplicity and earnestness, a plain honest student of God’s book per- ceives it to have been in the mind of Christ. Theology has never intruded here, to snatch from our lips the cup or to take from Our hands the bread. Art and poetry, and the noblest and highest matters, have here, in this atmosphere of heart-life and perfect consecration, found their dearest home. And how often you have come to me, and with wet eyes gazing into wet eyes and hand warmly clasping hand, you have spoken of this joyfulness and blessing, you ‘yourselves know full well. We have often been on the Hill called Clear, nay even we have walked and talked, beholding the golden streets of the New Jeru- salem from Beulah Land itself. Thus, with this consecration of our entire morning service, once in two months, to this happiest of all privileges, we began to find God’s blessing among us. We began to pause after prayer-meeting, and to shake hands, Gradually the quiet and unobtrusive praying ones made themselves known. And on the principle that “he that believeth shall not make haste,” I preferred rather to follow God’s guidance than to anticipate it—but I dreaded that I might lag behind the purpose of Providence by So little as a single hour. The need for change in the very atmosphere of the house and worship of God, cried out for attention and energy at the start. But to change an atmosphere requires a change in Surroundings. And “surroundings,” to begin with, meant new cushions and something more after the fashion of a pulpit than the existing structure on that wide waste of platform, over which those curious lanceolate pieces of wood gazed so benignantly into space. To those ladies who then and since have been identified with every good word and work, must be given the praise for our present most comfortable seats. The pulpit has its own peculiarities. It aims to offend neither the lover of the old-time desk, nor the advocate of the new-time lec- tern. And yet it is no compromise. And it bears in unmistakeable characters its true commission, which is to “Preach the Word.” Now and then I have thought that this pulpit, and this platform, are symbolic of those principles, upon which the preaching of these three years has been based. It has been both free and firm, and first of all, it has been fixed upon the Lord Jesus Christ. Behind this desk have IO A FAR E WEZ / SEAC MOAV. stood those brethren from abroad—whatsoever their creed––who have loved Him first and chief. Baptist and Congregationalist and Metho- dist and Presbyterian, high-church Lutheran and “broad-church '' Church of England—all, in these three years, have had their repre- sentatives, and all have felt at home. And we never listened to words of more singular purity, Originality, or devout Christliness, than those which fell from the lips of George MacDonald. Yet this portion of the work was only premonitory. For, pres- ently—with your good help and encouragement—we set about the re- construction of the audience-room and building. It did not “rise into towers,” mist-like, in the manner of fabled Ilium, but it rose into one tower which had never been before. It gathered its galleries about it, ribbed its ceiling with appropriate and architectural woods, and took on that new and bright appearance which every visitor so readily commends. Thanks to one generous heart, the “fair colors” of the walls and ceiling are also here, and will remain “in memorial of her ’’ for many years to come. Presently a band of young ladies made it 7 7 possible to “praise God with the organ,” and a mighty bell took its place in the finished tower, and on it was inscribed : “Ring out the darkness of the land, Ring in the Christ that is to be I’” After a summer of most unclerical attitudes upon scaffolds higher than Haman’s, the work for which we had so long waited was mainly complete ; and at a cost far less than one could have supposed possible we were in possession of a beautiful and home-like audience-room. Paint and varnish had done their duty, and the prayer with which we began our labor had been answered, for amid all the dangers incident to many portions of the task, no accident of Consequence had hap- pened. There were narrow escapes, but there was no real injury. We could look upon it with gladness and thankfulness of heart, and pronounce it “very good.” The poor man is not awed by its mag- nificence; the rich man cannot criticise its poverty; the man of taste cannot recoil from its incongruities; and last and best of all, the spir- itual worshiper finds within it the air of home, of heart-life and of heaven. It has done more for us than anything besides the pure gospel. Following this came the next Summer’s work upon lecture-room and grounds. The same atmosphere crept across them both, and if to no other care I could trust it, I think I might safely ask of our A FARE WEZZ SERMON. II thrifty ivies that they should keep my memory green. And thus, quietly and steadily, we took our station as a power for the truth in this city. It may even now surprise you to be told that this reconstruction was so utter and absolute that it involved new articles of association, a new method in finance, and a new organization in many ways. But So it was. III. In considering this steady line of progress, it is at once evident as being the result of deliberate and careful purpose ; but no purpose, however deliberate and careful, could have succeeded unless by the blessing of God and the aid of the church. The prayers of Presbytery and Synod have been, at one time and another, specially offered for us. It may, therefore, be wise and well to disclose before you, not those matters which you accepted and supported as they were each announced, but the connection of one with the other in the long chain of events. For the spiritual and mental history are equally the result of God’s guiding hand, and the relation of this church to great and grave questions of principle and policy should be by no means questionable. I. When the providence of God called me to meet the rum- seller at the coffin of his victim, it was high time to speak of Tem- perance, and I endeavored to conceal nothing of the counsel of God against this curse. Then and since, the trumpet has given no uncer- tain sound. When the demand of blatant sciolists came like the challenge of Goliath of Gath across the plain, we went against them with sword and spear, but we much preferred at length no armor of Saul—only the Smooth stone from ** Siloa,’s brook that flowed Fast by the oracle of God.” And we are pretty generally convinced that while science and skepti- cism must receive attention, and true science and honest doubt deserve even more than attention, the best assault upon their ranks is not made from their low level. To rise above, to better and purer air—to breathe a strength which is not in the place of battle—to know science and to aff/reciate doubt, but to soar, singing, beyond them all into the eye of the day—this is the more permanently powerful work. As some look upon this method, it becomes but the subterfuge of ignor- ance calling for “implicit faith '' as against reason. But as we appre- I 2 A FARE WEZZ SERMON. hend it, it proclaims faith to be the highest reason, intellect to be inferior to heart, confidence in God to be the surest road to knowl- edge, and Christ Jesus to be that wisdom before which this lower learning pales and fades, as the morning star before the Sun. It cannot be charged upon the teachings of this pulpit, in these three years, that they have repressed thought, repelled inquiry, or disdained a state of ‘‘honest doubt.” For we have believed that there are, in this com- munity, many such uncertain, dubious minds, ill at ease, and seeking after rest within the truth. And we have even preferred their partial faith, to the thoughtless acquiescence in an unknown and unintelligible Creed. To all such, simple or subtle, we have as a church—in our public services, in our social and cottage meetings, and in our search of “wit, eloquence and poesy' 7 in the Young People’s Association—held up only Him who “Was nailed For our advantage on the bitter cross.” We have found no convincing argument so good as Christ Himself. 2. Aside from these public questions which from the state of the public mind must be as publicly met and moved, there have been other relations of vital value to us as a Society. We are associated with other evangelical churches in common labor for the common weal. We have found that by respecting our own rights and the rights of others, and by sincere and unsectarian desire for the salvation of souls, we were walking most nearly in the way of Christ. “As much as in us lay ’’ we have “lived peaceably with all ” who were of “the household of faith.” May the day be far distant, when word or act of this church shall either surrender a single principle of importance to permanent Christian union. or consent to a false or factitious sem- blance, in the stead of that reality which now so generally exists 3. Nor have we been able to overlook another duty—that, namely, to our own young people and, by example, to the young peo- ple of other churches. It took a considerable time before the way was clear for the organization of our Young Peoples' Association. But now it is a factor of the utmost consequence in the future of the church. Socially, intellectually, and in the matter of Christian training and aggressive work, it satisfies a want long felt in this peculiar field between the Church and the University. Here, on some sort of common ground, it is possible for us to meet all worthy and earnest young A FARE WEZZ SAE RMOM. I 3 people, and to make a strong link between the “stranger within Our gates” and those who dwell at home. A literary element has been found of admirable service as a cohesive force, and the Sunday even- ing and Cottage prayer-meetings are religious centres. It is by the Cottage meetings more especially that the fire of real Christian sym- pathy and experience is borne from home to home, and from heart to heart. 4. To an exterior view there is one relation of this church which is anomalous, and which demands thorough consideration. It is its position beside the University of Michigan. Were this Institution denominational, any attempt on the part of those who were of a different faith and order, to affect or influence students in a religious point of view, would be a decided impertinence. Had it an organized Church within its walls, it would be unjust and unfair to compete with its religious design. Did it make Protestant Christianity a fundamental article in its method of education, it would deserve and extend a wide charity. But it happens to be a State In- stitution in which no religious tests inhere, whose students are under no personal religious supervision, whose morning-prayers are strictly voluntary, and whose occasional religious efforts depend for their suc- cess upon their nature, season and promoters. That a religious feeling prevails at all within its halls and class-rooms, can be directly ascribed to the personal high character of some of its instructors, and to the presence of a Students' Christian Association, which, through negation and chill and discouragement, has seen its work crowned, during the last winter, with an abundant revival of the power of the Holy Ghost. When I happened once to make a public statement of these patent facts, I found myself drawn back from the columns of a religious journal into the columns of the daily press. To your disgust, and my own, the issue of fact was forced upon me, and I have seen reason to hope that Christian people penetrated, even in that short contest, be- hind the fallacious comparisons of present with past. The exact state of religion in the University was reached in a single answer to a single question, asked by one of the famous committee who came to carry through that which they felt to be a solemn farce, and to inquire into “Sectarian instruction in religion and medicine.” The question was put : “Does the University teach religion P’’ and the answer was given, “AWegatively, yes.” Which, if it means anything, can be logi- cally construed as “Affirmative/y, No !” And it is to be noticed that neither creed nor sect was comprehended in the query. I4. A FAA’A, WAE ZZ SAERMOAV. Was it, therefore, a misconception of the duty of this Church that it owed its service to those thus cast upon it P Do we differ in our feelings from the other churches of the city, when we include this as one of the main things to be reached in our work? Or should I have paid no attention to this mass of Twelve Hundred young men and women, simply culling out the Presbyterians, and holding forth no hand of welcome, and saying no word of aid to any of the rest ? The attendance upon this congregation for the past two years, and the souls who have been saved, and the delight which has filled your own hearts prove the contrary. Intangibilities are dangerous foes. To fight them is to fight “as one that beateth the air.” But real and evident things are worthy of remark. Hence, called out by a desire for facts upon a given ques- tion, a word of mine spoken under the elms of Yale, and merely ex- pressing a doubt as to the physical fitness of ladies for masculine study, was caught up and went echoing backward and forward through the land. But it encouraged me when I found, in the space of a fortnight after, that Professor Seelye, of Amherst, and Dr. Bellows, of New York, and presently, Dr. Clark, of Boston, placed their fingers on the same weak spot, and for the sake of all concerned called attention to it as I had done. And I would be untrue to my own sense of honor, ungrateful to my remembrance of personal friendship, and dull and dead to any ap- preciation of deep Christianity, pure and noble lives, and high and successful endeavor, if I did not pay the tribute of sincere esteem to the womanly women of this University. That which I feared for them has been happily averted, and the future story of the Day of God will reveal that with Woman came into the University of Michi- gan heart, taste and a religious and social element of inexpressible importance. In the midst of these strivings for the light, there was an unac- countable lack of cordial assistance on the part of the University authorities. Many saw it, some felt it, and Some—though they were few in number—agonized over it. When, therefore, to the complete dismay of those who were nearest to the Christian heart of that insti- tution, we were publicly informed that there was “no sympathy with this anxious solicitude” as to some of the present tendencies of Higher Education, and that this “transition-period” of student-life was to be left to run its course of skepticism that it might end in faith, it cer- A FAA’A, WAE ZZ SAEAC MOZV. I5 tainly claimed and obtained a reply. All the warnings and predic- tions of the Evangelical Alliance as to these tendencies revived at once, because the evidence was on the ground, and the effects were present before our eyes. Thus, the case at length demanded, and your pastor used “great plainness of speech,” “without partiality and without hypocrisy.” Was it because of an unanswering God that from that very night, the Spirit of all Truth was striving among those students? Was it an unconscious comment on a certain proud carelessness for the Souls beneath their charge, that the great blast bowed certain members of the Faculty, as it swept down the skeptic, and gave breath of life to many a fainting Soul? Since then the old struggle renews itself in another form. Could there be between these churches and the authorities of that institution, the friendship and fellowship which now prevail between us and our student-friends, it would indeed be a happy thing. These faithful, earnest students, whose zeal gives to the University the best of its re- pute, would be educated, not merely technically, but in the love of a broad, sweet culture, wrought through the spirit of Him of Nazareth, who “spake as never man spake ’’ before or since. Yet it is a main part of the intense difficulty, and the source of the most wearing anxiety of the pastorate in this church of ours, that this is emphatically not so. And the latter will forever kill—in relig- ion and in learning—for the spirit alone giveth life. Unsectarian, as it professes to be, there is no outlook for a per- manent constituency to the University, except in some way through religious influence. And to place any denomination evidently in power, or to place any denomination evidently under the ban, is to cast off the sympathy and support of a certain constituency of evan- gelical christians. You may remember that Prof. De Volson Wood served us in the Session and in the Board of Trustees, most admirably well. His de- partment in the University gave it and him renown. But when he left —and his printed report makes plain why he did leave—we lost the only professor in the Literary Department who was identified with us. Our work has, hence, been very trying and perplexing. We ran the risk of appearing to intrude in every move we made ; but it seemed clear that we must do our full duty, and leave the rest to God. I do not disguise from you, that in all ordinary expectation of justice, the I6 A FAA’A, WAE Z.Z. SAE A2 MOZV. vacant place thus left in our working force should have been soon Sup- plied. I refrain from criticism, but I cannot sufficiently express my regret that many should have been driven to believe that disinclination and not inability, operated against us. A consciousness of this fact has largely produced my consent to labor where I shall have, I trust, the same success without encountering forever the effect of whispers, hints, detractions, and whatever else might seek to nullify your success as well as mine. That this is no fancy, I am very sure. I have too frequent confirmation of the belief that this church, as it stands to-day in all its methods, arrangements and prosperity, is to be left to fight its battle alone for the souls of these young men and women, for me to be in doubt. I have been compelled, now and then, to step in ad- vance of you and to take a position to which, very soon, I have Se- cured your full consent. Once more, and for the last time, and in the presence of the Searcher of all hearts, I take before you the posi- tion that if you believe with the heart, if you love with the heart, if you go forward on your chosen path and do your chosen work, all will be well. This path may cross other paths, but there will be no col- lision. And if you do not share in a positive misconception of plan and labor, you shall be set free, finally, from a necessity for change which comes to whatever will not base itself upon the heart instead of the head. That this change is iniminent in all ‘education and in all religion, I have no fraction of doubt. Wisdom, whether in Chris- tianity or in the integral calculus, is the product of a love for princi- ples which transcends both creed and rule, useful and even necessary as they both must ever be. On this high plane you are now proceed- ing. Go forward upon it without let or hindrance, undismayed IV. This constitutes the outlook of your future work. This in- stitution, wisely planned at the first by Christian men, shall endure un- doubtedly to commemorate their christian zeal. But it may be permit- ted to a descendant of one of those earliest regents, to announce that the University as a fact is greater than any man, yea, than any administra- tion or the policy of any administration. It can never remain the football of a faction, or the bema of a demagogue. Surely and stead- ily it will crystallize into a clear policy. The insects in the coral may perish, but the work shall live. Education is no deluded goddess— her name is rather to be called Wisdom. A ſº.4/º/2 WAE // SAEA’A/OAV. 17 “Her open eyes desire the truth, The wisdom of a thousand years Is in them; may perpetual youth Keep bright their light from tears 1 '' Religion and Learning should be hand in hand. It is for you—in your sphere, and within the true limits of your own demesne—to keep them truly joined. Hereafter there may be those who will cry, “Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out.” May I not, then, counsel you to “hold fast that which thou hast, that no man take thy crown.” Prayer you have proved to be a power, and therefore you must pray. Two revivals, and the addition of over a hundred persons in these three years, demonstate the fact. You have learned with gladness the “more excellent way ” of love and close association, therefore, let none divide you—let there be “no schism in the body.” “If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them.” The conscientiousness, developed by our present system of finance, must not be cast aside. But there will need to be a wiser and more generous liberality on the part of those whom God has blessed with means. The kingdom and house of God should be dear to every worshipper. But why should I proceed as though you required a charge to do your duty P Surely, the experience of a church which two years hence should celebrate its semi-centennial, must suffice to have established what is the true way of happiness, the truest mode of peace. The same Church-Session, who have kindly and firmly administered the dis- cipline and cared for the doctrine of this church, are at your service. The same Deacons watch over your poor. The same Trustees plan and provide. You have made it a matter of conscience to select them wisely, and I do not fear that they will fail you now. V. And now it is time for us to part. In harmony and good-will we have lived together, in harmony and good-will we separate. We have , rejoiced together with the living, and we have often wept together by the coffin of the dead. Face after face Qomes out upon the canvas of my thought—each face full of its story. You have made me your friend, your confidant, your counselor. You have come to me sorrowing for sin, and I have heard the first crying of your new-born souls. You have come to me with your burdened hearts, and we have placed the cares of life on “Him who careth for us.” You have sought me as your spiritual physician, and I have administered to you the “Balm that is in 18 A FAA'Aº WZZZZ, S/2 RA/OAV. Gilead.” I have gone after the straying, and helped the hurt, and been happy with the whole. Whatever may have been the faults of the preaching, the Lord has overruled its “foolishness '' to the salvation of souls. I have striven to give you always the best I had, and the lecture-room has been as blessèd as the room above. That desire for knowledge which is so marked a feature of this congregation, and of its Sunday-school and Bible-classes, has been met so far as in me lay. I trust that, hid away within your heart may be here and there a thought which shall recall me to you in the days to come. Let us be thankful, then, for these years which we have spent to- gether—these Passovers which have celebrated our deliverance “out of the land of Egypt, and out of the house of bondage.” We may not forget each other, for we are a part of each others' lives. Yet now “I hear a voice you cannot hear, Which says I must not stay : I See a hand you Cannot see, Which beckons me away.” In the advancing years, you too, may comprehend that shape of duty which I alone upon my Brocken height can now behold. I hardly hope that you can yet perceive it—nor that you can, see as I see, the clear road of your own future. But, when we are together beyond these mists, within the realm of light, we shall only wonder that we sighed about the nests that were apart, while forest and blue heaven were to be filled and thrilled with song. Like those last words of warning, of love and of regret, with which we watch our dear ones passing from our side, are these my words to you. It is I who am stationary upon that will of God, which bears me now away. To me, upon my sphere of duty, you are like a known and lovely orb, whose steady planetary movement I shall watch from the rim of my new earth. Better than any one else, Ishall interpret your precessions, your retrogressions, and the shifting of your place among the stars. For I know you, like myself, to be lighted by the same Sun' of Righteousness, and to hold an unvarying orbit about His throne of truth. I shall test you with the spectroscope; I shall follow you with the telescope. And I shall hear across dim wastes of air your songs of salvation, and the paeans of your joy. They tell us of a mariner who, contrary to the custom of his class, brought to every new land the best seeds and the choicest plants. A FAA’A. WELL SERMOZV. I9 He tended them, and saw to their success—he taught the native islanders to trust him, and to care for what he gave. And then he sailed away, to renew on other shores his benevolent design. And thus he scattered Edens across the summer sea, blessing and being blessed—a true evangelist in the common gifts of God. And if, to-night, like him, I leave behind me the seeds of truth, and the plants of goodly plans, I know that, like him, I shall be ever welcome back. Like him, I shall linger lovingly, now and then, be- side Some precious growth, and when I go on board my vessel I shall find her name to be the Good Hope, freighted with generous wishes and fervent prayers, and bound—beyond all transient harbors—for the Port of Everlasting Peace. THE IN CARNATION. A * S E R M O N oRDINATION or REv. CALVIN S. LOCKE - OVER THE UNITARIAN CHURCH AND society IN WEST DEDHAM. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1854. R. E. W. O I, IV E R S T E A R N S, MINISTER OF THE THIRD CHURCH IN HINGHAM. WITH THE CHARGE, RIGHT HAND OF FELLOWSHIP, AND ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE. BOST ON: CR O S BY, NIC HOLS, AND COMPANY, 111 washington STREET. 18 5 5. | THE IN C A R N A TI O N. S E R ME O N PREACHED AT THE ORDINATION OF REV. CALVIN S. LOCKE OWER THE UNITARIAN CHURCH AND SOCIETY IN WEST DEDHAM, WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1854. BY R E W. O I, IV E R S T E A R N S, IMINISTER OF THE THIRD CHURCH IN HINGHAM. WITH THE CHARGE, RIGHT HAND OF FELLOWSHIP, AND ADDRESS TO THE BEOPLE. B O S T O N : CR O S BY, NIC HOLS, AND COMPANY., 111 WASHINGTON STREET. 18 5 5. C A. M. B. R. I D G E : METCALF AND COMPANY, PRINTERS To THE UNIVERSITY. S E R M O N . FOR. UNTO YOU IS BORN THIS DAY, IN THE CITY of DAVID, A SAVIOUR, WHICH IS CHRIST THE LORD. —Luke ii. 11. THE beautiful prayers and collects of the ancient Church, in all this month of December, point to the Incarnation. They very appropriately, as it seems to me, turn the thoughts of believers to the moment which marks the be- ginning of the New Despensation, to the Saviour's birth, to the shepherds watching their flocks by night on the Judaean plains, to the angels choiring peace and good-will, and to the mother bending with new-born interest and inexpressible hope over the unconscious babe. He who took little children in his arms and blessed them, with words which are his eternal benediction to childhood, him- self lay a little child in the manger at Bethlehem. In that infant form was inclosed a spirit which should look through the windows of sense as with the eyes of God upon the life it came to exalt and the world it came to redeem, and be the medium of disclosing in its full brightness the Father's grace and truth. In that helpless babe lay wrap- ped the germ of a love which would infold the race of men in its embrace, and devote its unabused body to the bitter cross for their deliverance from sin. In the wailing child trembled a voice whose articulate speech, the word of God, would be echoed from the most distant ages of future history, and from men's immortal destiny. I shall attempt to speak of this Incarnation. And I ob- 4. serve, first, that the ministry of the Holy Spirit by this In- carnation commenced with Jesus’s birth. The mother and the child of Bethlehem have become the sacred images of maternity and infancy throughout Christendom. As men in rude times looked upon the picture with a simple faith, albeit mingled with something like adoration, they felt more the dignity of the maternal office, the worth of child- hood, and the sacredness of the mystery of a soul's birth in a form of flesh. Wherever the history of redemption is known, it has honored the maternal relation, that Mary bore and nourished the infant Jesus, the Emanuel. It has shed something of a holy radiance upon infancy, that the Christ rested his head as a helpless babe upon a mother's breast. It has made birth a more sacred event, that the Son of God was born of woman. The superstition of ignorant times gathering around his early history, and not yet dispelled, has gone so far as to call Mary the mother of God, to esteem her a divinity, and to address to her petitions for her intercession. “So mighty art thou, lady, and so great, That he, who grace desireth, and comes not To thee for aidance, fain would have desire, Fly without wings,” are words which Tante puts into the mouth of St. Ber- nard. In renouncing this, we do unwisely, if we throw away, too, all the power of the peculiar circumstances attending the advent of the Messiah to consecrate mater- nity and childhood in our associations. We need their influence to hallow the advent of souls. It seems to have been one of the functions of the Re- deemer to shed a new light, by his history from his birth to his ascension, upon the origin, uses, relations, and end of human life. All this was wrapped in darkness to most of the world, when his earthly course began. Men were sunk in brutality, notwithstanding all their artificial refine- ment, as they are now except as the Gospel has lifted them 5 out of it. They looked upon the child too often as but a toy, a sweet plaything; at best as but the heir of some earthly riches or honor ; nay, very often, as only fit to be the tool of a conqueror or the serf of a lord. The child was too much regarded as born only of human parents to an animal life. The soul was scarcely recognized as the breath of God. Rarely could the mother anticipate any- thing exalted for her offspring. Rarely could the child, as his consciousness unfolded, find a cheering or quicken- ing influence in the thoughts of his destiny. Human trial, which Christ turns into an angelic ministry, was a blinding mystery. Human life was degraded. Human relations were dishonored. So they are now where the supernatural light has not beamed. So they are now where Christ is despised and rejected. It was one of his functions, in de- livering us from sin and the power of the senses, to rid human life and its prominent stages and experiences from trivial and debasing associations. At Cana he owned the divine bond of the wedded pair, by his presence and his gift. Man’s probation he hallowed by meeting and con- quering temptation at the threshold of full manhood. To the mystery of human trial, his sorrows, revealing the divine heart, and his own perfection, gave the only solu- tion. He consecrated human tears at the grave of Laza- rus. He hallowed human agony in Gethsemane. On the cross he was crucified to the world, as we must be to pass the gate of the divine kingdom ; and taught us to con- quer fear and false shame; and showed us how the Father lavished the divine wealth of mercy, while we were yet sinners, to forestall the prodigal's return. So I think the miracle of his introduction into the world was designed in part to give to the sceptical or grovelling minds of men higher suggestions respecting all human origin. It was, perhaps, needed, to lift men's thoughts directly to the Crea- tor; to teach that, as his unsullied soul was the direct cre- ation of the Divine Spirit, and thus fitted to be the instru- ment of the Divine Word, to express God, so all souls 6 are divine offspring, breathings of the effluent spirit, even if corrupted by descending through ancestral chan- nels ; that all are impressed with the Divine image, however worn dim with the streams of human offence. The Beloved of the Father, born of woman, lying an infant in the manger at Bethlehem, suggests a divine origin for every soul, of whatever parentage. Through the influence of the Divine mind and heart addressing hu- man minds and hearts, by the life and word of that holy child Jesus, believers see the immortal destiny begun with the advent of every spirit in an earthly body; and kind men and women pick up neglected boys and girls in the filthy lanes of corrupt modern American cities as lost kindred of the infant Jesus, that need to be taken to the welcome and the holy nurture of a Christian home. The Redeemer's salvation was to belt the globe, – and that light in the East, followed by some true worshippers of God and martyrs of the Crucified, has crossed the sky to the Western dome ; and now, in a world which the wise men never dreamed of, the little pauper immigrant, or the ragged street runner, or the babe in a slave-cot, equally with the infant cradled in ease and lapped in luxury, is to many hearts a brother or sister of the Christ-child. The Incarnation has consecrated human birth. Every child springs from a divine lineage; it is not only a son or daughter of Adam, but of God. It has the impress of the Father, which, however overlaid it may seem, can be re- newed and made distinct. It has the essential human faculties, the one original constitution which makes a hu- man soul, by whatever peculiarities modified in the indi- vidual. This is a capacity to become the servant of the Most High. This makes it a subject for Christian nurture and for divine grace. This makes it capable of redemp- tion from the tendencies and forces hostile to its integrity. The Christian child is born within the bosom of Christian beliefs and sanctities. It comes to pass through some or all stages of this life as preparatory to another. It comes to 7 take life's events and relations as a ministry of God. It comes to meet tempters, to love, to rejoice, to weep, and if it grow up a disciple of the Crucified, to take up the cross, to conquer self, and to ascend at last into a higher being. It is born to be instructed in God’s providence, and to grow in the knowledge of human and divine things. It is born to teachers and guides refined by holiness, schooled in the faith to hallow as they tempt forth its soul, and to minister to it as unto an heir of salvation. It is born to all which is symbolized by baptism. It comes to be baptized into those influences of the effluent spirit, which, as water flows in all countries, flow in the vicinity of every soul. It comes to have its plastic nature bathed, penetrated through religious education with that remould- ing and corrective life from God, which dwelt in Jesus, which dwells in every society of redeemed souls; and thus to be led, reconciled and happy, to the bosom of its Fa- ther's love. This is the significance of human birth under the Christian dispensation, and Christ's birth may teach it still. The birth of a soul in the corporeal form and life, amidst means of grace and religious opportunities, is the prelude to the spirit's birth into an inward life of holiness. It is the vestibule to the religious life, which is hid with Christ in God. Yet it is only the portal; it is not the very birth in the spirit of holy principles and affections; that comes we know not how nor whence, except that it must come from the fountain of original energy. We are not to confound occasions with the Omnipresent Spirit which works by them. Using opportunities, we are yet not to ascribe to human agencies that which is wrought by the Divine power. Train the child in the nurture of the Lord, but remember that its spirit cannot be redeemed from the besetting presence of evil, and born to holiness, without the inspiration of the Almighty breathing through its nature; and pray for that to work through your agency. S Christ's supernatural advent instructs us to look above nature for the coming of spirit in nature, and to see God in the spiritual as well as in the natural birth. The holiest leadings and most blessed exercises of our souls, intelligible in experience, are mysterious in their causation, and we can rest only in the thought that all good desires do proceed from the Central and Underived Being; and the ripe saint who has done most with opportunities, and put to best uses nature and life, will bend with awe and humility before an inward Redeemer, and say with Paul, “By the grace of God I am what I am.” II. The course of our meditation has brought us to the great fact of redemption, the birth of Christ in conscious- ness and the soul. There follows necessarily the regen- eration of humanity, the coming of Christ's spirit in soci- ety, in human laws, ideas, usages, and institutions. But first in order is the birth of the Redeemer in the individual soul. “Unto you is born a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord.” This Saviour must be in us, generating a life op- posed to the life of self. He must be the inward Lord and Sovereign of our affections and desires. As at Bethlehem the Divine word came in a shape of flesh, and was man- ifest through infancy, childhood, and adult life, the Christ who lay there a weak babe achieving a ministry which has become the mightiest power to cleanse and deliver the human race from its corruptions; so must that Divine word come in us too, it may be at first in some faint de- sire after better things, in some resolution partially kept, that with Divine help we will deny self, but growing to the mastership over body and mind, until we live the lives we live in the flesh by faith in the Son of God, who loved us and gave himself for us. This is the great fact of re- demption. This meets the deep, central, indestructible want of the soul. As soon as it becomes in some degree conscious of its spiritual relations, the soul finds itself in spiritual helplessness. The deepest religious experience is 9 marked at some time by a profound sense of deficiency. The Divine will has not been done. The Divine law utters its condemnation of us. Abuse has crept into our being. A life of self lies hidden at its centre, as a power of sin holding us at its mercy, and balking our better as- pirations. Natural inclinations, grown tyrannous, may have intrenched themselves as hurtful passions and lusts in our souls. The evil spirit of the world may have passed into us. The evil spirit of those who lived before us may reappear in us. The moment the holiness of God and the Divine requirement shine in upon the soul in full radiance, sin, seen to be a fearful tendency, is felt to be our chief enemy, - our only danger and misery. How it came we may not know. But its power is felt. It seems to beset us behind and before. When this convic- tion of sinful tendency and spiritual weakness is wrought in the soul, to be delivered from it is the greatest joy. Human nature, arrived at this stage of the consciousness of its relation to the spiritual order of the universe, craves a more than human help. It wants more than human wis- dom, affection, or pity can do for it. It wants harmony with its own highest law written upon itself. It wants recon- ciliation with offended holiness. It wants atonement be- tween itself and the spótless rectitude. It wants express tokens of interest in its struggle and destiny from the spiritual realm. It wants a lifting up of its affections, a revival and elevation of its hope, a sanctification of its motives, all lending a new moral power to the will. It turns to conscience, and conscience cries, One thing thou lackest. It turns to the natural creation: that is beautiful; but its beauty does not meet this deepest need; its order chills the spirit longing for Divine pity. That order feeds and protects, but sometimes it famishes and destroys. It is inexorable law. Wisdom and mercy, we may come to trust as Christián believers, are its rule. But to us in its natural aspect it is inexorable law. It goes 2 10 on with its ceaseless and mighty retributions. Its wheels never turn out of the eternal ruts. It sheds bounty and scatters flowers; but it crushes us at last bodily in its fin- gers, as the moth perishes in the blaze of your evening light. In his longing for approach to the Infinite, man turns to nature's grandest displays of power. I wander by the beach, and listen to the ocean’s solemn and majestic hymn, which it poured into the Indian's ear, and which now periodically lulls the drudges of civilized cares into an obliv- ion of the artificial and conventional. The surges with their everlasting roar do not tell of pity. Its gurgling, swallow- ing waters tell of destruction as much as of life. They do not whisper of immortality, until Christ, dwelling in and filling the soul’s intuitions, lends a softer under-tone of hope to its everlasting rhythm. Before this emblem of power, man, bowed by the consciousness of weakness and sin, if he could turn nowhere else, might stand in prayer, in almost the cry of despair, “Speak, Almighty Power in some accents of compassion. Break through this dread order, and say if thou lovest my soul. Declare thyself mercy as well as law. Solve for me this mystery in which I am encompassed. Tell me of forgiveness and eternal life and help for my spiritual conflicts.” And that cry from the depths of the want like no other, and of an anguish like no other, that of a weak and wounded spirit, has been answered on the shores of the Galilaean lake, by the voice which broke upon its storm, the voice of the Father in him who walked upon its waves, “It is I, be not afraid.” I am with you always, the Pa- ternal Spirit, in and above the natural order, adjusting your discipline, cognizant of your trials, and instantly present to your prayer. The Almighty has broken through the natu- ral order to reveal the spiritual order. While we were yet sinners, that cry of the soul's great want had been already answered ; for Christ had been born and had fulfilled his ministry; his story had been written in light in the world's history; mercy had anticipated the crisis of the soul. It 11 was answered by the word incarnate in Jesus, at Beth- lehem and Bethany, and at Olivet and Calvary. It is answered now, by Christ born in the regenerated soul, dwelling in the heart by faith, its purifier, its forgiver, its Comforter, the life of its holiest affections, its assurer of immortality, the indwelling pledge and fulness of the Father's power and love. III. As the fact of redemption first in order is Christ spiritually united with the individual believer, so the fact consequent upon it is Christ dwelling in many united in him. The Word first has form in the single disciple, and then it takes form in worship, laws, and social life. All advance in the social spirit and condition of man is the embodiment of Christ in social institutions and dealings, the incarnation of the Divine Word in mankind. A perfect Christian society or state would be the realization on earth of one of the grandest thoughts of God. It would announce and show, as the soul of its operations, the law of regard- ing others’ rights and interests equally with one’s own; and as the genuine faith pervading it, that he is greatest who is of most service. Such a state would be a temple in which the citizen might gratefully worship, — a God’s house in which the child, as his powers unfolded, would see the Divine attributes, not through a medium obscur- ing the Father's glory, but in Christ, its brightness shin- ing through windows opening at all points to heaven. From the ascension till now, men have looked for a form of social life, which should be the Shekinah assuring them of marching under the leadership of Jehovah. And in a time of universal ferment and undefined expectation like ours, many share the impatience of the first disciples, and ask if the Lord will now descend, and the reign of truth and righteousness come with some decisive transforming stroke upon the kingdoms of the world. And the answer of Jesus has been ever, “Ask not of times, but watch for the duties which the Spirit shall disclose, and do them in their order, and power shall go with you.” There is the 12 sole power for the social regeneration of man, in the Lord Christ descending into upward-looking souls. I say not that one civil constitution is as good as another ; but evil will creep in under any constitution, if Christ be cast out from those who under it constitute a state. Representa- tive legislatures and elective magistrates will not enact and execute justice, if Christ be not in the heart of the people. Liberty, equality, and fraternity, the watchwords of the people, mean no good, out of Christ; for liberty is but animal passion at large, equality but the equal chance of brutes in confused scramble, and fraternity but the as- sociation of robber bands. Christ renewing men reforms society. The Church — the invisible Church — must keep or deliver the State. Not that any formal union of Church and State is expedient. But Church and State are always vitally united,— the heart and arm of one organizing life; and the limb will wither as soon as it ceases to throb with pulses thrown into its arteries from the centre of a vitality replenished from God. The call of the Gospel to each soul must ever be, Repent, live anew, live to-day, with a new devotion of all thy being to God, the same now as when the Baptizer sent it forth on the breeze of the Jordan; but there has been going on since a regeneration of man, to which every one spiritually born has contributed his strength. And yet to this regeneration the perfect spirit-birth of all who live in any community or time is not essential. Long before the evil which supports a wrong is eradicated from every individual of a society, that wrong will disappear, because a sufficient part will re- fuse longer to uphold it. How soon that sufficient number, spiritually severed from the wrong, will exist, we know not; it is one of the times known only to the Father, but which may always be hoped for. We know that when life in a sufficient number is withdrawn from an evil doc- trine, custom, or institution, it must die. Those who separate themselves from it, being on truth's side, have a weight disproportioned to their numbers. Each is a 13 power working with and worked by God. They mould opinion, feeling, taste, even where they do not change the heart. This is moral civilization. He who, begotten of God, was born a Saviour into our human life, is its effi- cient cause; the deliverer from evil, bruising in the most vital part the serpent coiling around the form of humanity. IV. The incarnation of a Divine Word to communi- cate large measures of the Holy Spirit to the human fam- ily, was a demonstration of supernatural grace. It stands in the centre of all the Divine Providence, and stands out from it, supernatural in its method, and special in its intent. It was costly to the Divine mind and heart. It involved necessarily a sacrifice of the Mediator; and this involved a sacrifice on the part of the Father, of whom he was the voice and image. In the fact of that sacrifice re- sides the chief power to convince the world of sin, and to prepare man’s heart for the renewing contact of the Divine Spirit. It was not substituted punishment. It was sacri- fice inevitably incident to a Divine mediatorship. It was essential to God’s expression of himself, to bringing on earth the Gospel of truth and forgiveness. The per- son who should institute this redemption by a life on earth must unite in himself, perfectly, the Divine and the human. The Father must dwell in him ; how, we know not ; but it is a rational conception that the Father should dwell in him, so that he and the Father should be one in the im- pression made on man; so that his word and act should be his own, and yet should exactly express God, and as fully as God can be expressed to finite apprehension. He must also be truly human, in human form and with sus- ceptibility to human feeling. The Divine fulness in him must make him, not more impassive, but more alive to the proper impressions of things. It must be an inlet of vast joy. It must be an inlet of vast suffering. This was the fact. The marvel of the evangels is the blending in him of the supernatural and the human with a perfection 14 of which the prototype must have been a real person ; and which puts the question of the mythical origin of what is peculiar to them almost out of the pale of argument; for the conception of it seems impossible to any mind but that which conceived it before the world was. A sinless man, who, let me ask, would suffer from proximity to human sin and collision with it, like him whose immacu- late nature reached into the depths of the indwelling Father ? In the form of God, he could not jealously as- sert his Divine dignity, nor selfishly claim any exemption from the stroke of evil; he must rather, as it were, empty himself of divinity, that the suffering of a genuinely human condition might come in upon him. He wielded a Divine power over nature and man ; yet at Cana he would perform his first miracle with no alacrity, but with reluctance, resisting a mother's importunity, unwilling to hasten the hour when that mother with pierced soul should stand in the shadow of the redeeming cross. And at Bethany he wrought his last and greatest miracle, forecast- ing the hour it expedited, - wrought it in no elation of mind, but in the spirit of sacrifice, and in such sadness of soul that a few words of appeal to his affections and his help caused him to groan and weep. The fulness of God in him made more vast and deep his longing for holy, human sympathy; yet he stood at that grave of Lazarus in lonely grandeur, too high for any but the Almighty to reach, and too deep for any but infinite love to fathom ; and in his conscious want of sympathy, there rushed in upon him a feeling of the trials and darkness of man such as never had come into any breast. He who should bring a re- deeming power down to mankind, – who should become man's hope, his object of contemplation, his standard of truth, his leader for all generations, the trust of his weak heart, and its uplifter to a forgiving God, - must be on the one side a representative of human life victorious and pure, and on the other the representative of God to men, 15 — Son of Man, and Son of God, a special and beautiful creation. Through his celestial spirit and his divine in- sight he must be capable of unfathomable suffering, and sink in Gethsemane under an agony which has amazed the world with its mystery. Should God decree that incarna- tion ? Should God expose an immaculate soul, his be- loved Son, to the stroke of evil? The tone of the introduction of the Gospels, the tone of amazing expectation, and of wonder at the Divine grace, as if the destiny of our race hung upon that moment, is a fit prelude to the sequel. “Unto you is born this day a Saviour.” It was a crisis in man's history. There was need of a being who, under the forms of a human presence and condition, should manifest God, - who should draw men's minds to himself with a new veneration, and give them higher thoughts of Divine pity and Divine purity. There was need of interposition, as we express it. Not that a point of time had arrived in history unforeseen by Divine prescience, an emergency to be suddenly provided for. Not that the order of the universe so far had failed, and something originally forgotten must be appended as Sup- plementary. The provision for the crisis was a part of the eternal order. It was the predestined complement of the creation up to that point. We may call the fulfilment of this provision an interposition, to give it a proper relief on the plane of Divine operations, to express the speciality of the Divine purpose in adapting it to its place in the Divine order. Why God chose to create a race with spiritual faculties, yet to grope so long in a dim apprehension of their objects, and at length to reveal those objects fully in one person, — why He so slowly pushes this lamp of truth into the dense pagan darkness, – is one of the secrets of his incommunicable being. But the actual method of the Divine procedure we see and know. It is unfolded in the history of the world, which may be looked at as the history of God's thought. That procedure and that thought 16 we think and speak of in human modes of conception and in forms of human language. God has addressed, in history, and especially in Christ, our human modes of thinking and feeling, to convey to us some portion of his thought and character which is otherwise incommuni- cable. And as we humanly apprehend the matter, there was need of interposition, of a way in which Divine love should make itself more felt in sinful human hearts, and of a life adequate to represent T)ivine truth to man. That love and that truth must be embodied in the purest person. And that person must fall a victim to human cruelty. For Divine truth could not be incarnated on the stage of human action without coming into conflict with sin. That conflict was indispensable, also, because the Divine mercy or spirit of sacrifice in God, to be imaged to all the genera- tions of men in that person’s love, could find such expres- sion as the case needed only by meeting contumely and death at the hands of the Spirit of Evil. Should such a person be sent 2 Thus we may humanly represent the matter as a question of the Divine mind to itself. And in the eternal thought there was no other way of communica- tion between the wandering child and the Father's feeling. This way God chose, because it alone satisfied his per- fection. Thus, we may say, Christ alone satisfied God's hatred of sin, and his holy nature; Christ alone expressed the yearning of the Divine heart. God spared not his beloved Son. This is a form of human speech and human conception. But it states a fact in providence and history, and a fact which is a standing revelation of something — the spirit of sacrifice — in the Divine character, incommu- nicable in all other modes. There was a crisis in the history of our race at Jesus's birth. Man had not the sufficient, all-reconciling truth, and he could not work his way to it alone. The “word made flesh” was the demonstration of that truth; Christ cruci- fied was the price of it. I see little danger of exaggerat- 17 ing the world's debt to the Gospel as a medium of re- ligious truth. We can scarcely imagine that debt. It is very difficult to conceive of ourselves as so destitute in this respect as were our ancestors in Britain and on the continent of Europe at the introduction of Christianity among them ; or, to take a different case, as destitute as were the contemporaries of Tacitus and Cicero, in the palmy period of Roman culture. It is easier to see how unworthy we are of this light of the world, than to show what would be our condition now without the Incarna- tion and its fruits. I see no probability that natural and moral science would have given us the essential truth. Even if natural science could have taught the people the unity of the creative power, it alone could not have taught a spiritual Providence, nor made the belief of immortality an elevated and efficient conviction. And moral science would not have kept pace with natural; for it had not the requisite facts. The natural world is a perfect embodi- ment of the laws of natural science, and stimulates and guides the faculties adapted to know them. But human life was not an embodiment of the Divine truth. No life, until Jesus lived and suffered, offered a perfect object to man's spiritual faculties. In ancient literature there is no recorded sentiment, no strain of conversation, which rises to the level of the Evangelist's doctrine of a spiritual Father, or Paul’s bold lyric announcement of the resurrection. Why was it ! Because Christ embodied these truths in himself, and brought them to man’s spiritual perception. If that accomplished Roman who in the midst of public affairs found time for philosophy had sat with the band around the paschal board, and had asked, “Show us the Father, — tell us whither thou goest,” Christ could have answered him only as he answered Philip and Thomas, “I am the way,”—“He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” And if Cicero had communed with Jesus personally in his ministry, had seen him suffer on the cross, and then had 3 1S pondered the words and deeds of that One, and by the touch of that spiritual power his intuitional faculties had been waked, a new object would have been presented to his thought and love; Christ would have stood forth to his anointed vision a representation of Infinite Holiness and Love; and that new object would have shed on every rela- tion and act, and on the issues of things, a light for which he longed. Conviction of sin would have crucified vanity. Love would have widened into more than Roman patriot- ism. Humanity would have superseded glory. Loose thoughts of providential powers would have concentrated into the burning thought of God as a benign and holy Father, and of himself as a child sustaining through love and duty a relation to that Father, of which only eternity could fulfil the obligations and hopes. Thus the mortal gulf would have been spanned by a spiritual arch, and the unseen Divine hand felt extended for him to grasp and hold by as he walked through the shadow of death. It was not Jesus's speech only which taught man Divine truth, not his outward miracles alone which proved it, not his resurrection alone, but all together, all that he was. The life and sacrifice which he wrought through a human body lifted the Divine character and human destiny into the world's view. They made this character, this destiny objec- tive, and thus informing and quickening to man. They still do this. And it is the office of the Church and the ministry to give prolonged effect to this mediation; to repeat in ritual and in speech this voice of Jesus out of the Divine heart, beseeching the sinner to be reconciled to God. Therefore neither mountain nor ocean, no aspect of nature, —no crys- tal palace or monumental pile, or victorious battle-field, or eloquence in high debate at the organizing of a nation’s life, – no work, act, or art of man, – is the token of any- thing so grand and affecting as that of which the lowliest Christian temple is the symbol. It stands in the busy street where men are hurrying to and fro on the errands of 19 human interest, amidst clustering homes where birth and death come, and sin and change are felt, to remind them of a God to be hoped in, and a mercy to be prayed and hoped for. There is no work which reaches to the height and depth of the preacher's, – that of him who is an am- bassador to men in Christ's stead. Such an ambassador we ordain to-day. He is to be the tongue of the Incarna- tion, the medium by whom the Comforter will come and bring earth's child and heaven's Father together. If he have felt the proper power of the Word made flesh, that power will go out on his word; for the Son of God will be with such preachers until time shall be no more. Let him never attempt to reduce the Gospel to a mere result of the operation of natural laws. Let him preach the super- natural grace. Let him preach Christ, with whom the Fa- ther was one. And let him preach, and let others reverently hear, of the Christ who was not ashamed to call men his brethren. Our subject suggests one or two thoughts of general ad- monition. Honor all men for Christ's sake. Honor man, in however darkened or fallen a condition, for the sake of him who being in the form of God came in the form and condition of man. Honor every being who wears that human form which Christ wore. Its glory may be eclipsed by the brutalizing effect of sin; its power of expression may be unillumined, lost under a rayless and torpid spirit; its shape may be bowed by hardship and oppression; but honor it as human ; honor it as capable of being trans- formed by an awakened and redeemed soul; honor it as of the same human type with the body which Jesus glorified with obedience and suffering, and through which he repre- sented the merciful Father to earth's child. It stamps its possessor as human, as born with the germs of spiritual capacity, as a subject for redeeming love. The Gospel is the pledge of man's emancipation from legalized despo- tism and abuse, by showing that all who wear the human 20 form are brethren of the Mediator, the man Christ Jesus. While some students of the Scriptures have sought to lend to the doctrine of property in man the sanction of the super- natural Word, some students of Nature pretend to show her stamp of chattelhood on the form of certain varieties or races of the human family. Let the question come. But remember, it is no question about varieties of race, neither is it a question about the strict unity of human parentage. It is a question about what is human. A brute we cannot punish for human, crimes. We cannot demand of him hu- man duties, nor pray for the forgiveness of sin for a chattel, existing for the will, profit, and servile pleasure of a human owner. In spite of cavils, there is a human form. And whoever wears it can be no subject of ownership; he is capable of redemption and sanctification; and correspond- ing to human duties he may demand unimpaired human relations. Meanwhile, in the discussion, let the Church be careful what doctrine she countenances. It is as great a heresy to deny Christ's humanity and its consequences, as to deny his Divinity and its consequences. The denial of the first makes the last a nullity. It is putting the Son of God on the slave-cross again. The mediatorship has two parts. The redemption, the disenthralment, the elevation of every variety and grade of human beings, is involved in the just honor of God’s dear Son. ~ Again, honor woman for Christ's sake, who was born of woman, that you may be led to honor her fitly for her own sake. Honor the maternal office. For the sake of Mary, the mother of the Redeemer, let the mother's appeal be eternally sacred to man. And ye, who are happy to- day in the joy of gratified affections, think of all the domestic happiness you owe to Mary's Son. Repay the obligation by seeking to honor, to elevate in real dignity, your own sex. Keep your ear ever open to the wife's and mother's wrongs. Besiege the sterner sex, beseech Heaven for the reform or destruction of all laws, customs, 21 doctrines, tyrannies, oppressions, under whatever name, in your own land or other lands, which dishonor sacred rela- tions, which despoil the mother of the best part of her trust and joy. It is a wife's and mother's and sister's voice which has sent its plea against the violation of the most sacred rights into so many kindreds and tongues of hu- manity. It was the remonstrance of woman's heart against cruelties heaped upon her sisters as well as upon man. Honor to genius doubly consecrated by the spirit of Mary’s Son and by the spirit of Mary's maternity. Yes, honor woman. But rebuke for those who dishonor her. For him who denies her the best culture of her powers, who contemns her peculiar offices, relations, and graces; for him who thinks woman made only for dalliance and a toy; for him who puts on airs, and hopes to atone for his want of manliness by ridiculing his sister's sisters; for the worldling whose heart, withered in the arid atmosphere of policy and calculation, feels nothing for her wrongs, – the Incarnation has no blessing. He is a shame to his race. He is a living, walking insult to him who was born of woman at Bethlehem. Honor the child for the Christ-child's sake. Honor it by Christian culture, by tempting forth its spirit to Christian deeds and aspiration. Honor childhood in rags and igno- rance, for the jewel which the rough casket incloses. Honor the neglected child, the child with perverse habits, the pro- fane little boy, the rude little girl; respect their better na- ture, and teach them to respect it in their words and actions. Finally, in these and all ways honor the Redeemer him- self. Honor him by professing him before men, and by standing fast through every conflict in defence of his truth and his divine principles. Honor him by laying down your unbelief and sin at the foot of his cross of love. It is not a human voice only that calls you to be reconciled to God; it is the Holy Spirit's voice, it is the call of the Father through the Incarnate Word. See that ye despise not him that speaketh. C. H. A. R. G. E. BY REV. DR. LAMSON, OF DEDHAM. IN performing the service assigned me on this afternoon of a short winter’s day, my brother, I feel that I must be brief. I shall not ask you to accompany me through the whole circle of your du- ties and responsibilities as preacher and pastor. I have a right to presume that they have been deeply meditated upon by you, and that, as you stand at this altar to-day, to take on you the work of the ministry here, the most earnest wish and prayer of your heart is that you may be found faithful. It is a solemn season with you, - a solemn event, — this beginning of the ministry. May the God of all wisdom and peace guide and keep you to the end. To the many grave precepts and counsels contained in St. Paul’s Epistles to Timothy and Titus, in their spirit still applicable, I need barely refer. You will, I trust, from time to time, make them the subject of thoughtful attention. The relations of the ministry have become somewhat changed of late years, and to discharge its duties acceptably, and meet the exigencies of the times, requires wisdom and a devoted heart. The latter will do much, though not everything. It is indispen- sable, however, to an effective ministry. I would say to you, then, in the first place, Give your whole soul to your work | Devote yourself to it heart and hand. Give to it your best thoughts, your diligence, your prayers. Let your ministry be an earnest one. This, its great end and the spirit of the age alike exact. A min- istry that is not earnest must be a feeble ministry. See, then, that you enter on your work with a full heart, in singleness of purpose, and a deep love of souls. Propose to yourself a high aim ; cherish 23 an exalted conception of the nature of the trust committed to you as a Christian minister, and resolve to discharge it in all honesty and truthfulness, with affectionateness and zeal, and in an untiring spirit. In your words and acts, in all you do, let there be life, spirit, energy, power. Be fervent. Feel the greatness of your work, the worth of souls, and the transcendent value of Christ’s Gospel of reconciliation, and be true to yourself, and the blessing of Heaven will be with you. The times demand much of the pulpit, and he that would have a successful ministry must not think lightly of a preparation for its duties. His sermons must give evidence of thought and care. He must put life and substance, muscle and sinew, into them. His great work, that which most tasks his faculties, surely, is in the pulpit. The “pulpit is his throne.” There he must make his power felt, or it will not long be felt anywhere. From that he must send the arrow home to the conscience of his hearers ; from that mould the convictions and sway the hearts of the people. Whatever be the merits of a minister in other respects, no congrega- tion, in these days certainly, will long remain satisfied, if the pul- pit fail of its duty. People will overlook or excuse anything, al- most, sooner than “stale, flat, and unprofitable * sermons, or mere frothy harangues. A man may be assiduous elsewhere, may be open, free, sympathizing, and conscientious, but if he give chaff for wheat in the pulpit, he will himself soon be driven away as chaff before the wind. I do not allude to the unfaithfulness or unskilfulness of the pul- pit as though it were a crying sin of our times. The only matter of surprise is, that, with all the demands which, in this age and country, are made on the minister from without, — the amount of which no one but himself knows, – he can from week to week take into the pulpit sermons containing so much evidence of power, so much freshness of thought, and so much variety. But remarks are sometimes heard, to which a young man should be cautious in listening, intimating that, if a preacher perform well certain other duties, the people will pardon some feebleness, or want of careful preparation, in his pulpit ministrations. It may be so for a time; but the experiment is always hazardous, and in the end usually fails. Look at the cases of a short or unsuccessful 24 ministry. You will find, after all, that the objections, not in all instances, but most frequently, urged or felt, are want of life, in- terest, power, wisdom, or soundness in the pulpit. It is defective, bad, or unedifying preaching. I would not be understood to say, that I think the views enter- tained of preaching, at least often practically acted upon, at the present day, in all respects sound and just. Too many come to church, not to worship, but to listen to splendid oratory; and they go away to criticize, admire, or condemn, much as they would from the lecture-room, the theatre, or any place of professed en- tertainment. This error we would see corrected. I would have it felt, that the church is a place of worship, — a place to be vis- ited in a religious spirit, and for a religious end, and not for the sake of an intellectual feast. The want of this spirit it is which often lays a heavy burden on the preacher, and causes him to en- ter his pulpit with a sinking heart. Strive, then, to make your peo- ple religious, in the strict sense of the term. Encourage in them right views of the office of the church and pulpit, and endeavor, by “sound speech that cannot be condemned,” to produce in them Christian seriousness. Accomplish this, and though your task of preparation for the pulpit will still be no light one, though it will require meditation, thought, study, as well as an earnest and right spirit, your deadliest foe will have been vanquished. The selection of topics to be treated in the discourses of Sunday may well be supposed to be attended with some embarrassment in these times. I would not have the pulpit polemic. Its main busi- ness is with personal religion, with sin and holiness. Yet there are questions from time to time coming up in the theological world, on which the preacher, if he is faithful, must have something to say. Some reference to them, direct or indirect, can hardly be avoided. We build on the “foundation of the Apostles and Proph- ets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone.” He will, therefore, occupy a prominent place in all Christian preach- ing, as the Christ both of history and of consciousness. You will preach Christ crucified and risen, the Sent of God, the Saviour of souls. The Christian rites, in their emblematic significance and hallowed uses, you will urge on the attention, and endeavor to put life into them. ~ 25 In reference to the reformatory movements and great agitating questions of the day, the pulpit most certainly has a duty to per- form, and a very solemn one too, and in some respects difficult. Whatever course it pursues, it cannot hope to escape censure. One and another has his pet idea, or pet reform or measure, and he is dissatisfied, and thinks the pulpit false to its trust, — perhaps pronounces it cowardly, if it do not from Sunday to Sunday, year in and year out, make that its great, absorbing theme. In regard to the introduction of topics of the kind referred to, I know of but one rule to be given, and that is, the occupant of the pulpit must act conscientiously, according to the best light he has or can obtain. He cannot be dictated to ; he cannot surrender his inde- pendence ; yet he may be expected to avoid rashness, one-sided- ness, and extravagance, remembering that the Gospel is not a spirit of “power” merely, but also of “wisdom and a sound mind,” and he is to discern things that differ. He will not assume a defiant tone ; nor say provoking things simply to show his daring. He will speak the truth in love, not in temper, passion, or wrath. There are proprieties of the pulpit, a calm dignity, a tenderness and delicacy, a respect for common rights and feelings, which he will not deem it a part of Christian fidelity to discard. After all, more depends on manner, language, and tone, than on matter and thought. It is not so much what is said that irritates, as how it is said. There are few, if any, topics on which the occupant of the pulpit may not freely speak, if he observe due modesty, and do not lose his temper; if he allow others their rights; if he do not dogmatize, adopt an arrogant, overbearing tone, nor resort to abusive epithets or bitter sarcasm, - always out of place in the pulpit. Few congregations will feel any desire to limit his free- dom, or control his independence, as long as he makes it evident that the meek, loving spirit of the Saviour rests upon him, and breathes in all his thoughts, words, and acts. His people will en- courage and wish him to use this freedom ; and will cease to re- spect him if he do not. I doubt whether there is any disposition in any large number to restrain the reasonable exercise of liberty in the pulpit. The pulpit is not impeccable; and if there is fault, it may be sometimes there, — not always in the pews. I say, then, in conclusion of this part of my charge, – in select- 4. 26 ing topics of discourse, and in treating them, use your own judg- ment; act independently, but always in a spirit of Christian kind- ness, and with due consideration of others’ rights and feelings, avoiding needless offence. Be honest, be candid, be upright; utter your own sentiments with frankness, not timidly, but in “meekness of wisdom"; and from what I know of this people, I can assure you of their love and respect, and a disposition to allow you all the freedom you can desire. The pulpit has great duties to perform, disconnected with the exciting topics of the day. Counsel, reproof, encouragement, con- solation, — the preaching of Christ, the unfolding of the great, spiritual truths of his Gospel, and their application to conscience, — the momentous retribution of sin and holiness, – repentance, for- giveness, death, judgment, — here are exhaustless themes, no one of which is to be neglected, but each one is to be treated with a frequency and earnestness proportioned to its importance. So Christian faithfulness demands. I have left myself time but barely to allude to pastoral duties. During the ministry of your predecessor they were discharged in this place with great fidelity, and you will be expected not to neg- lect them. Visit, encourage, and console. Let your counsels and prayers in the house of mourning, and by the bedside of the dying, be felt to be a blessing. Neglect no legitimate mode of influence. Give special attention to the young. You can benefit them as you cannot benefit others whose characters are fixed and stereotyped. Be in the midst of them, and, if you can, acquire their confidence, their love ; and lead them to Jesus, that through him they may be led up to the Father, and they shall be your joy and crown in the great day of account. Be not easily discouraged; but proceed on your way with a strong and resolute heart, and leave the result to Providence. And may the God of all power and might, all wisdom and love, go with you, my brother, enlighten you by his spirit, guide you in perplexity, sustain you in your trials, and crown your ministry with his blessing. RIGHT HAND OF FELLOWSHIP. My FRIEND AND BROTHER, - Institutions, as you are aware, sometimes outlast their day, and outlive their meaning. Many forms which at first had a right to be, because they had a soul in them, lose the soul, but do not go out of sight as forms till long after their spirit has fled. A form comes into use at first as the expression of a thought, — the embodiment of some idea. But the thought expands to some- thing better, or shrinks to something poorer; and still the form often lives on its formal life, in shape, and size, and external seeming, unchanged. No, it cannot be said to live on, — it is embalmed rather, and preserved as a dead form. And it is usual- ly difficult to get rid of a dead form, and bury it, when men have done with it. The tendency is to keep it after life has gone out of it, rather than to lay it by while life remains in it. To drop any form which we have been accustomed to, is to confess that its life has departed, and nobody, perhaps, likes to be the one to take the responsibility of making that confession. When the spirit declines and dies away from any form, it is a change which goes on so gradually and secretly, that it does not excite observation. But it is a change which all remark when the form itself is taken down from its usual place, and put away from sight. For the most part, men like to believe as long as they can, that the spirit is not gone from any time-honored and cherished form, or that, if gone, it will come back again; and so they keep the house, that the tenant may find it again when he wants it. They continue to repeat the good word which has long been in use, and which once had a meaning, that it may be ready for a meaning to inhabit again, should there fortunately come a meaning by and by to fit it, and claim it. 28 You do not see whereto all this tends, my friend ? Perhaps it tends no whither. Perhaps it makes no proper part of these ser- vices. The way it came in was this. When I found myself nominated to offer you the “Fellowship of the Churches'’ on the occasion of your ordination, I asked myself, as I think was not unnatural, whether I could offer you that; whether anybody could ; whether fellowship was a thing that one could give or promise to another. I could see well enough how the sign of fellowship might be introduced here. I could see how we — these ministers here, and delegates from the churches — could agree to act as if we had fellowship with you; that we might promise to conduct towards you, exteriorly, as fellow-Christians should conduct towards one another; that we might mutually pledge ourselves to the interchange of ministerial courtesies and Christian offices. But the essence of fellowship is not in an act, or in any series of acts. Outside behavior cannot include it. It will reside in no arrangement which we of this council, on the one part, and you, on the other, may consent to enter into. It was not singular, then, that one who was to meet you to-day with the as- surance of the “fellowship of the churches,” should ask himself what he would mean, when he should come to this office, — when he should rise to tell you that you had such fellowship, and should hold out the hand of welcome. He inquired of himself, What would the sign signify A welcome to what? And the inquiry compelled him to see that this rite, this giving the hand of fellow- ship, is one of those forms which has lost in great measure its original significance. You will mind that I do not say a rite which has lost significance, but one which has lost the peculiar signifi- cance which it had at first. The fellowship of the churches is, with us, pretty much a thing of the past. The independence of the churches has been carried to such an extreme, that it has come to be little short of the isola- tion of the churches. Nor is this surprising, when individualism has been carried so far within each fold, that fellowship sometimes exists only in name, even among those persons who constitute one church. The time was, and not far back, when the independency of the Congregational churches of New England did not prevent their being banded together in close relationship. If this fellow- 29 ship consisted something too much in external forms, it was real of its kind ; it did not profess to make little account of the external; it expressed what it was meant to ; as a form, it was kept up with a spirit and vigor which proved that, to those who employed it, it was not altogether formal. When no church settled or unsettled a minister without calling in advisers from the neighboring churches; when every dissension arising within a church led to the summoning of numerous counsellors from among the pastors and brethren of the churches round about to hear and advise the matter; when every drought and flood, every fire and epidemic, every ex- traordinary calamity and unaccountable phenomenon in nature, were made the occasion of local fasts, in the improvement of which several of the nearest pastors were expected to lend their assist- ance, by taking part in the appointed solemnities; when, often, a church without a pastor elected the pastor of some bordering church to be its presiding officer, and to aid in all its deliberations and acts, – then it meant something, when an accredited member of an ordaining council stood up before an anxious and inex- perienced young man, just assuming a pastoral charge, and pledged to him the support, confidence, and sympathy of his min- istering brethren around, and of the churches of his vicinity. Though Congregationalism vindicated the right of every church to choose and ordain its own teacher in its own way, it was prac- tically found by the candidate as necessary that he should be ac- cepted and approved by the Church general, as by that particular church to which he was specially to minister. Until he was passed upon and recognized by the great body of Christians as sound in doctrine and well furnished for his ministry, his own flock might hold it an unsettled question whether he were wolf to be dreaded, or shepherd to be followed. But though circumstances are somewhat changed with us, my brother, and our ecclesiastical forms and organizations seem to indicate less denominational coherence and less co-operation and interaction among our religious bodies and among individual Christians than once were known, it is far from certain that there is any less true fellowship. Never was this rite, representative of Christian fellowship, more appropriate than now. Fellowship is not in modes of intercourse. It is not something which we will to 30 have, and therefore have it. The will cannot enact it. One can- not promise another that he will have fellowship with him. It depends upon whether he can. The two cannot decide that it shall be between them, and thereupon a real fellowship springs up according to their plan. It depends upon whether the conditions, on which alone it can be, are found in them. I can give no pledge that, for the future, there shall be fellowship between you and these ministers and their churches. It may not be possible. But I can remind you, - (and that is what I am here for, – nothing else, – and indeed there is great encouragement and cheer for you in that,) — I can remind you that you do have fellowship, and necessarily must, with all between whom and you there is unity of purpose and motive, affection and meaning. So far as moral and spiritual affinities lay a foundation for it, or make it possible, it is, it must be. We cannot arrange a fellowship, but we can declare that it is already just so far as there is a common life and love and worship, and loyalty for it to grow out of; and except as there is such a basis for it, we must declare it to be wanting, not- withstanding any show of it there may be. You and I may grasp hands here, but there is not necessarily any fellowship in that. We may not have a single fellow-feeling to bridge the space be- tween our minds and souls, and, so long as we have not that, the clasped hands are nothing. Our souls will never flow together through our arms and joined hands. There must be concurrent affections, assimilated spiritual moods, coincident religious ex- periences, community of moral aim and purpose, to enable us to go over, the one to the other, to pass and repass the interval which separates our individualities. A gulf as wide, as impassable, as that which kept Lazarus and Dives asunder, may divide any two who stand hand in hand. To agree that once a twelvemonth we will exchange pulpit services, would not imply Christian fellow- ship between us. You may preach one Gospel, I another. That which I preach, you may be ashamed of Him whom you con- fess, I may deny. You may be of one spirit, I of another, and between the two may be no possible communion. On the other hand, no distance, no vote of exclusion, no want of acquaintance, no inequality of station or difference of tongue, can prevent or terminate fellowship among such as are filled with 31 fellow-feelings, prompted by fellow-motives, lifted up by fellow- aspirations, anchored upon fellow-hopes, and consecrated to fellow- labors. In true Christian fellowship there is a oneness of inner- most motive, a correspondence of lowermost convictions, a unanimity in the choice of ultimate ends of life, a blending of the central loves, a consentaneous flow and movement of that life which is liveliest within. There is a felt assurance of kinship in the hidden man of the heart. This is true fellowship ; and there can be few hours in your life, my dear sir, when the thought of this communion of all Saints could come to you more timely, more gratefully, more cheeringly, than in this hour. Your hand already touches your work. You begin to feel that there is to be no turn- ing back, at the same time that you feel as you never did before the greatness of the charge you are undertaking. It would not be strange if you had experienced some solicitude and misgiving as to your sufficiency for these things before you. To any feeling of self-distrust that may be in you, I may not address a word calcu- lated to make you think that the importance of the work of the ministry, or even the discouragements you will encounter in it, have been exaggerated. I think you will find the labors of your profession fully as great and as difficult, its trials as many and as hard, your discouragements as disheartening, as you now apprehend. The trying passages of your way probably will not be the very ones you now anticipate, but there will be others which you do not an- ticipate ; and I have nothing to say by way of reducing your estimate of the toils and trials that are before you. But what then P You have looked all this in the face; and knowing who is your Helper, you are resolved to proceed. And now, although it will never do to match the workman with his work by bringing the work down to him, we may do it, if we can, by raising him to the measure of its demands. There is no work for you here, — for me elsewhere, — for any man anywhere, — for which he is not, through the almightiness of the Almighty, sufficient. The Christian theory is, that there are no impossibilities of a moral nature to the true disciple of Christ. I would spend no time in convincing a minister that he has not mountains to remove. I think he has that to do. But I may remind him out of the Gospel, that mountains are removable, when Christian faith essays to pluck 32 them away. And what more encouraging word can be said to one standing, as you do, at the door of this ministry, than to bid him remember in what fellowship he will work and bear 2 Whatever he does, he is sure of the fellowship of all who do the like ; what. ever he is, he is sure of the fellowship of all who are like. And you, my brother, can go forth to no work of love, can lift no cross of self-denial, can pray no prayer of faith, can struggle no struggle with the flesh and the Devil, but you may have strength from the thought that you are in fellowship with all such as have wrought, and prayed, and denied themselves in like manner. You will re- member that all who are one-minded and one-hearted constitute an indissoluble communion, — a communion of Saints, if they are saintly-minded and saintly-hearted. You will feel an inspiration of hope and strength from the thought of the company to which you belong. Better than that. Be about your Father’s business, and evermore shall you be able, with an infinite joy, to use the Apostle's words, “TRULY our FELLowSHIP Is witH THE FATHER, AND witH HIs SoN JESUS CHRIST.” I offer you, then, – and I do it with all my heart, — this token of the communion and fellowship which make one all Christian disciples. ADDRESS TO THE SOCIETY. BY REV. F. D. HUNTINGTON. I suppose that the best possible “Address to the Society,” at an Ordination, would be the most earnest exhortation to repent- ance and newness of spiritual life; inasmuch as the best parish will always be a parish of the best people. There is one condi- tion of your future prosperity comprehensive enough to include all others, – faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. For if your devotion to him is real, and warm, and constant, it will expel all causes of disorder from your spiritual body; it will create internal health; it will make mutual dissensions among the members impossible; it will turn weakness itself into strength, dissatisfaction into con- tent, and, in the “foolishmess of men’’ and preaching, illustrate the “wisdom of God.” Perhaps there could be no surer test of a Society, than a capacity to exist, and hold its own, independently of sermons, – having, for its organizing and vitalizing force, a secret fellowship with the Head of the Church, and a love of God’s worship. But it is commonly expected of this part of the ordaining cere- monies, that, in its direct specifications of duty, it shall balance the Charge to the minister. And as that is meant to open upon him certain claims on the part of the people, which they would hardly feel at liberty to express to him in their own persons, so this brings to the notice of the people some obligations due from them, which he might not feel it quite delicate to challenge for himself. Un- der this construction, considerable plainness would seem to be a natural prerogative of both performances, and not needing apolo- gy. I accept this freedom the more cheerfully, because I have reason to know the parish I am addressing to be full of right pur- 5 34 poses and an honest zeal for joining their new minister in every pure and legitimate enterprise for the Gospel.” You have, once more, my friends, a messenger of the New Testament, elected by your affections and your judgment. The place providentially made vacant, Providence has permitted to be filled. I earnestly congratulate you both on the consolations and the promises that are gathered into this hour, and uttered in this service. I am sure of your hearty assent, when I say that I could offer you no more impressive exposition of your duties, than by calling up the image of that venerable and apostolic man, whose whole life and conversation among you, for so many years, were a tender and wise teaching of whatever pertains to the relations between a good shepherd and his flock. In the ardor of your affection for your newly acquired minister, you are doubtless anxious to give proofs of your attachment to him. Understand, once for all, that no visible token of it can be so satisfying to him as for you to be in the pews while he, or his substitute, is in the pulpit. It will be worth incalculably more to him, for the refreshing of his fatigues and the cheering of his spirit, than any smooth or ingenious compliments. He will spare your flatteries, if you will let him see that you are not to be frightened from his instructions by a cloud in the sky or a snow-drift in the . street. Strictly speaking, you are all making public proclamation here to-day that social worship deserves a regular attendance, every Sabbath, and both halves of it; and, by common honesty, if you have come together this afternoon, intending to let small oc- casions prevent your thus coming regularly hereafter, you are guilty of getting a minister on false pretences. But there is a hearing heart, as well as a hearing ear. If you go to church to act the critic on the sermon on Sunday, the sermon will hardly help you to act the Christian through the week. It is better to be believers than critics. On the other hand, while you offer to your minister a teachable spirit, that he may fairly achieve his own work upon you, be care- ful not to slide into the fatal misconception that he is to take your work out of your hands. We have dropped the theory of vicari- ous righteousness, and we cannot fall back upon any substitution of official piety. Luther describes a picture representing a ship 35 called the Christian Church, wherein the only passengers were the Pope and the clergy; the laymen were all in the water, depend- ent altogether on ropes thrown out to them by the holy fathers. Hierarchies are dead, past resuscitation. But the form of clerical usurpation which the Church has now to fear is that which comes of the voluntary abandonment of their spiritual functions by the laity, leaving the whole labor of maintaining piety in the com- munity to the minister, who is paid a salary for the job. Some parishioners seem to fancy that, if they show civilities to the cler- gyman, it will somehow so pass to their account, that Heaven will send comforts to them. The man you are ordaining has not ſcome here to stand as a daysman between you and God, but to tell you truths, and to live a life, that shall awaken your own en- ergies to action, to growth unlimited. You enter, with him, afresh upon a study of religion ; and, at the Judgment, his presence will prove not to have shifted burdens of responsibility from your shoulders to his, but to have intensified every solemn stress upon your frame unspeakably. It is largely the fashion to discuss preaching and preachers. Parlors, shops, markets, rail-cars, all have their comment on the sermon. When you talk of the discourse, talk of its matter, and not of its merits as a performance; of the spiritualities the pulpit inculcates, and not of the petty accidents that foster its secular ambition, and ornament or disfigure its incumbent. Need I remind you to respect your minister’s independence 2 I might rather join my wonder to yours, that self-respecting per- sons can ever consent to sit under a chained pulpit and a fettered preacher. It is often said there are parishes in New England that will not allow their ministers to speak what they believe, – thus keeping them literally their ministers and not Christ’s. You will not be willing to have it understood, I think, that in West Dedham is a preacher whose conscience is under mortgage, – and that you are his people. You would rather have your opinions frankly contradicted, and your feelings kindly wounded, and your politics considerately crossed, every week, than to take any part in erect- ing a new moral inquisition, or procuring a test-act for making cowards and slaves of the successors of the Apostles. Imagine Paul and Peter taking cautious and expedient counsel together 36 whether their sentiments on righteousness, temperance, and judg- ment to come, will suit their congregations ! Reject your minister the moment you find him accommodating his deliberate convic- tions to the popular demand, but not when he utters careful and good-tempered, but unwelcome words; for in the latter case he may hold mistakes in his judgment, but in the former he carries a lie in his heart. And do not expect him always to wait, before he smites a sin, till it is manifestly dying of itself. That would make the church a prison of thought, the meeting-house a spiritual lazar- house, and your minister himself a piece of movable church fur- niture, scarcely worth the storage. Ye are called unto liberty, be not entangled again with any yoke of bondage. In your houses, and in his, do not forget that Mr. Locke is a man, with a man’s heart in his bosom, and a student, with a stu- dent’s tastes, as well as a public speaker and pastor. There is such a thing as a cruel politeness, and an oppressive etiquette. If he should sometimes prefer to stay at home with his authors and his family, that he may the better strengthen and qualify himself for his office, have the magnanimity to let him be still. Without considerate allowances, there can be no right dealing between you and him; without thoughtful delicacy, no progress in friendship; and without lofty candor, no intercourse that is cordial, manly, or profitable. $. Let me mention two or three of the elements that do not seem to me desirable in a parish, either for the sake of its own internal interests, or for its minister’s encouragement and efficiency. Have among you as few as possible of those men who regard religion as something to be done for the family by the female part of it. I know of some husbands who are able to designate their ecclesiastical relations only by mentioning what church their wives belong to ; as if piety were worthy of no other than feminine con- fidence. It is greatly to our shame that the actual available force of the most vital, most essential, and most commanding institution in our Christendom, - that for which all others do really exist, from which all others take their security and dignity, and the nearest, in its shaping, to the heavenly pattern of society, -the Christian Church, – should show such a constant disproportion between its male and female elements. The Church of the living God wants 37 the strong shoulders, the masculine energy, and the honest enter- prise of men. Nor will the conjugal bond be found, at last, to in- clude any vicarious virtue by which a church-going wife's religion saves her absenting husband's soul. Have among you, again, as few as possible of those men or women whose only rule of church-going seems to be drawn from some rare and solemn occurrence at their houses; as that they shall appear at God's worship one Sunday after a pastoral call, and two or three after a bereavement and a funeral, and then fall back into a normal state of neglect. A congregation dependent on these fitful stimulants to attendance follows the grave-yard’s law of pop- ulation in more ways than the one I have mentioned. * Have among you, again, as few as possible of those turbulent spirits, – the thorns and bramble-bushes of the Christian vine- yard, – whose only function is to goad and vex the rest; who thrive on parish dissensions; men who snuff incipient provocations, as Job's war-horse snuffeth the battle, or Jeremiah’s wild asses the wind, afar off; men who find no more wholesome exercise of their influence than by breeding contentions between the pews, or pain- ful suspicions in the pulpit: men who are ready to go to any meeting of the parish rather than the one that is held on Sunday, and, when there, only agitate the materials of strife ; or women, who will be active in the charities of the congregation only out of a headstrong will, and would rather turn the social kindness of a whole sewing-circle into gall, than have good done to Christ's poor in any way but their own. And since, in a community and a day like ours, things are apt to be tested by a pecuniary valuation, and since the willingness to give money may be taken as a tolerably fair thermometer of ec- clesiastical zeal, so it will not be strange, if, in the livelier interest created by this new chapter in your affairs, you will find it impos- sible to deny yourselves the privilege of some fresh outlay on your church accommodations. So that we who love you and desire your good shall be neither surprised nor sorry to hear that pres- ently, having made liberal provision for your pastor, you have given a more convenient form to your meeting-house, and provided that indispensable auxiliary to a thorough and enterprising parish, a good vestry. By this means you will not only encourage your 38 minister, but you will put a new power of benefiting you into his hands, and make the wisest of all investments for yourselves and your children. Another class that you will be rich in proportion as you miss is composed of those whose increasing prosperity in business engen- ders an increasing indifference to all religious institutions and ser- vices; whose growing means are at once indicated and desecrated by growing worldliness, as if their honor could afford to forget the God that has prospered them, by less interested attention to the worship, by resigning their places as Sunday-school teachers, on some poor plea of having served long enough, or finding small fruits, and by a diminished heartiness, or else a lighter tone, in their intercourse with their spiritual guide. I have no doubt the minister we are ordaining over you will be just as faithful in all his official and personal attentions to these sad instances of spirit- ual declension, as to any other members of his flock; he will come and sorrow with them in their sorrows, he will pray for them with double earnestness in his study, he will count no sacrifices hard to serve and help them ; but it is for them to consider with how heavy a heart he will do it, how painfully their changed faces will affect him, and how wrongfully the pledges of this hour of mutual promises will be broken. A parish situated as this is has at least this advantage over our city congregations, that the minister is not disheartened by seeing his parishioners on Sunday driving into the country. Let us hope that, if your city friends should call at any of your houses in church time, they will be rebuked by finding none of the family at home. You desire parish success and increasing numbers. But acces- sions from either of the classes I have mentioned would be worse for you than empty seats. You desire parish success, I say, and increasing numbers. If you will give your minister freedom, give him time, give him your ears and hearts, and form yourselves about him into a consecrated phalanx, however small, of devout, working, harmonious parish- ioners, thoroughly baptized into his own spirit and the spirit of Jesus his master, you will find that his gifts will surely draw to his ministration enough of the only material of which strong societies are built. Be content to take the truth your minister brings to 39 you, to enjoy his labors and friendship, to tax yourselves liberally, and then bide God’s time. Abstain altogether from the poor prac- tice of counting your minister’s hearers when you ought to be di- gesting his doctrine. All these are but subordinate and minute particulars. Such du- ties of detail are sure to fall into place, whenever the soul is quick- ened by the devotions and the sympathies of a living faith. The grand business of a Christian parish is to ordain and edify within its body a true church life. By a zealous carefulness for things invisible and eternal which shall more than match your busy in- dustry and your active enterprise, – by brotherly and sisterly help- fulness between the members, – by the righteousness that tran- scends barren rules of decency, — by principles deeper than pro- fessions, – by a piety that is greater than morality, — by a faith that inspires works, – and by prayers that at once lift earth into the light of heaven and bring down the glory of heaven to earth, – you are to build yourselves up, a living temple in the Lord, on the foundation of prophets and apostles, “Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone.” You have appointed, and witnessed, and confirmed, the ordina- tion of your minister. This is the ordination vow which is laid upon you. O R D E R O F SIE R VI C E S. 1. Voluntary Anthem. 2. Prayer. By Rev. Mr. Sanger, of Dover. 3. Reading of Scripture. By Rev. J. M. Merrick, of Walpole. 4. Hymn. By Mrs. S. F. Clapp. GoD of all churches here below ! With needed blessing now draw near, And let thy holy spirit flow, Filling our souls with love and fear; — Love for the truth thy Son has taught, And fear to break thy just command ; Love, working righteous deed and thought, — Fear, keeping watch o'er heart and hand 1 O bless thy servant, who to-day Apostle's armor putteth on ; Gird him with strength and purity, With zeal and truth to preach thy Son | And make all hearts more fervent, Lord ' Renew our love for righteousness! Grant open ears to hear thy word, And answering lives of holiness From devious paths preserve our feet ! Lead us, in love, by “waters still " ' O give us “living bread " to eat, Through faithful doing of thy will ! 41 5. Sermon. By Rev. Mr. Stearns, of Hingham. 6. Hymn. By Mrs. M. L. B. GoD, who dost dwell alone, apart, In thine eternity sublime, Yet visitest the human heart, And dwellest with the sons of time;— Most Holy, do not thou refuse To meet below with us to-day : Blest is the man whom thou dost choose For ever in thy courts to stay. Come, and thy servant shall be blest, Who tremblingly himself doth gird, Putting thy shield upon his breast, Taking the strong sword of thy Word. Come, and anoint, and consecrate, Lay thine own hand upon his head; So shall he cheer the desolate, And for the hungry break thy bread. 7. Prayer of Ordination. By Rev. J. H. Morison, of Milton. 8. Charge. By Rev. Dr. Lamson, of Dedham. 9. Fellowship of the Churches. By Rev. Mr. Willson, of West Roxbury. 10. Address to the People. By Rev. Mr. Huntington, of Boston. 11. Hymn. 12. Benediction. sººn stººza y º . . . .';****::- - - - - - -- . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ºº:: - . . . . . . . . . . A D IS () () U R S E REV. WILLIAM H. FURNESS. T H E S O N OF M.A. N. CO MET H . DISCO URSE PREACHED BEFORE THE SOCIETY OF THE CAMBRIDGEPORT PARISH, S UN D A Y, M A Y 30, 1847. By WILLIAM H. FURNESS, PASTOR of THE UNITARIAN SOCIETY, PHILADELPHIA 33 u ü If s 5 e U by 33 equ est. gººmssºs * B O S TO N : J A M E S M U N R O E A N D C O M P A N Y. 1 8 4 7. B O S T O N : PRESS OF THURSTON, TORRY AND CO. 31 Devonshire Street. D IS C 0 U R S E. LUKE XII. 40. “BE YE THEREFORE READY ALso, FoR THE son of MAN comeTH AT AN Hou R WHEN YE THINK NoT.” I QUESTION whether these words are at all under- stood. I think that they are entirely misappre- hended. By “the coming of the Son of man,” here and in many other places referred to by Christ, the generality of the readers of the New Testament understand the coming of Jesus Christ to judge mankind, at the end of the world ; or, by “the coming of the Son of man,” is understood the hour of death, which, as it is considered the judgment hour of the individual, is considered also as the coming of Christ, by whom, in person, as the pop- ular belief runs, mankind are to be judged. Whether Christ, in person, shall judge men, may or may not be a question. My present object is to set forth, as clearly as may be, the meaning which 14. 6 these words had in the mind of Christ himself, and which, as I conceive, differs very materially from the common interpretation of this passage. Prop- erly understood, our text has nothing to do with that great pageant of a future judgment-day, which fills the imaginations of so many Christians ; it has nothing to do with death, but everything to do with life, with the present hour. Properly, interpreted, it expresses a truth, which admits of a direct, in- evitable, and most forcible application to every man, at any and at all moments of his life, a truth, which, once distinctly perceived, will not suffer the shadow of a contradiction. Let me beg your careful attention, therefore, while I attempt to place before you the true signifi- cation of these words. We must go back some eighteen hundred years, and seek to appreciate the circumstances, and enter into the spirit of the time when these words were spoken. All language is to be interpreted by reference to the occasion upon which it was uttered. We must acquaint ourselves with the character of the speaker, and the moral and intellectual condition of those to whom he speaks, and the circumstances by which the speaker and the persons spoken to were surrounded. With- out this knowledge, we cannot understand what is written ; we are sure to fall into error. Let us then, I say, go back, and endeavor to enter into the spirit of the time, and of the people, to whom Christ spake. 7 The Jews of that period, as you know, were in subjection to the power of Rome. Accounting themselves the favorites of Heaven, looking upon all other nations as an inferior race, as scarcely bet- ter than dogs in comparison with the descendants of Abraham, they were maddened at the idea of the political bondage to which they were reduced. They looked forward, with the most intense expec- tation, for the coming of a leader, who should break their chains, and deliver their sacred nation, and raise them to a condition of unexampled prosperity. They believed that a grand revolution was at hand. which was to place them at the head of the world. The leader who was to come was to be sent from Heaven, charged with extraordinary powers, and destined to subjugate the world, and to establish a glorious kingdom, “a kingdom of heaven,” a “kingdom of God,” upon the earth. These ex- pectations ran very high among the Jews at that period when Christ appeared. The whole nation was looking eagerly for a prophet and prince from God. While the public mind was thus excited, and all were impatiently waiting for the heavenly kingdom to come, there suddenly appeared in the country lying on the river Jordan, an individual clad in the wild garb of the ancient prophets, in a mantle of camels’ hair, fastened round the waist with a girdle of leather. And here let us pause for a moment, and consider what a startling impression the appear- 8 § ance of this man must have made, resembling as he did the old prophets of Israel in his dress, and in the ascetic mode of his life, and repeating their very words, crying aloud, “Amend your lives, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” The ancient prophets, – those austere and fearless men, filled to overflowing with the inspiration of poetry and of God, communing with the Invisible, delivering mes- sages from heaven to earth ! What nation can boast such mighty bards, such rapt prophets, as those of Israel P. “Mark,” says an eloquent writer, “mark one of these wondrous beings, in his most perfect character, tossed up and down like a leaf upon the strong and awful storm of his inspiration. The power which came upon him, cut by its fierce com- ing all the threads which bound him to his kind, tore him from the plough, or from the pastoral soli- tude, and hurried him to the desert, and thence to the foot of the throne, or to the wheel of the tri- umphal chariot. And how startling his coming, to crowned or conquering guilt | Wild from the wil derness, bearded like its lion-lord, the fury of God glaring in his eye, his mantle heaving to his heaving breast ; his words, stern, swelling, tinged on their terrible edges with poetry; his attitude, dignity; his gesture, power; how did he burst upon the as- tonished gaze, how abrupt and awful his entrance, how short and spirit-like his stay, how dreamily dreadful the impression made by his words, long 9 after they had ceased to tingle on the ears, and how mysterious the solitude into which he seemed to melt away ! Poet, nay, prophet were a feeble name for such a being. He was a trumpet, filled with the voice of God; a chariot of fire, carrying blazing tidings; a meteor, kindled at the eye and blown on the breath of the Eternal.” When John appeared, a voice crying in the wilderness, clad in the wild raiment, nourished by the scanty food of the desert, the people beheld in him one of the awful line of their prophets. This sudden and strange apparition, so calculated- to excite the Jewish imagination, instantly attracted universal attention, for he an- nounced the approach of the long looked for king- dom. The whole country poured itself out, all Jerusalem and Judea, to the river, upon the banks of which stood this man, who, in his dress and man- ner of life, seemed like one of the ancient seers risen from the dead. In the midst of the excitement caused by John, another individual appeared, making the same an- nouncement, going about, and everywhere pro- claiming the kingdom of heaven to be at hand, asserting that the expected Deliverer, the glorious Prince, the inspired Prophet, the “Son of man,” was on his way, and exhorting the people everywhere to be in readiness. He went throughout the land, this second herald of the approaching kingdom, saying, The kingdom of God is at hand, the “Son of man” is coming. The phrase, “Son of man,” was fa- 10 miliar to the Jews, as a designation or title of a prophet. The ancient prophet, Ezekiel, always styled himself the son of man. “ The word of the Lord came unto him, saying, “ son of man.’” This form of words became sacred, therefore, to the Jews, as a prophetic designation. The “Son of man?” spoken of in the New Testament, in the four Gospels, of course means that prophet in particular whom the Jews were then so eagerly looking for. When John declared that the kingdom of heaven was at hand, the Jews considered this declaration as precisely the same, as if John had said that the Messiah, the promised and expected prophet, the Son of man, was at hand. And when following John, another appeared, coming from the despised town of Nazareth, making the very same declara- tion, the people understood that the Son of man, the leader, prophet, king, whom they waited for, was announced as shortly to appear. As the Jews had flocked to John, so they gathered in immense crowds around Jesus of Nazareth, be- cause he “preached the gospel of the kingdom,” that is, he proclaimed the good news of the ap- proach of the divine kingdom. But he spake with such an air of authority, such gracious words fell from his lips, he performed such wonderful works of power and mercy, that it very soon began to be sur- mised that this Jesus was himself the Messiah, the expected one, the very Son of man, whose coming all men were looking for. They said among them- | 1 selves, whenever he did or said anything extraordi- . nary, “Is not this the Christ P” But he did not declare himself the Christ. He talked to the people about the coming kingdom, about the Son of man. And although they suspected that he was that per- son, yet they did not consider him as having come. Still, the advent of the Messiah, the coming of the Son of man, was an event in prospect, not yet re- alized, although close at hand. If, as they began to think, this Jesus of Nazareth was the anointed deliverer, the heaven-sent prophet, he was as yet in disguise. He had not assumed his high office. He had not yet “come.” They were all still anxiously expecting the coming of the Son of man, still look- ing forward to catch sight of him, to welcome him whenever he should make his appearance. No doubt the great body of the people flattered them- selves that they were all ready and prepared to re- ceive him. They flattered themselves that they should recognize the heaven-sent, the instant he should come in sight, that they should hail him with acclamations. But this extraordinary person from Nazareth, who talked with so much authority about the coming kingdom, and upon whom public atten- tion was so strongly fixed, warned them again and again to be upon their guard. He declared that the 'Son of man would come at an hour when they thought not, that he would come like a thief in the night. Let me repeat now in a few words what I have 12 said in explanation of our text. It is worth our while to understand it. The Jews were looking anxiously for a great good, which was to come to them in the shape of a glorious visible kingdom. They looked for a great prophet, who should libe- rate their nation, and bestow on them countless blessings. While they are in this state of expecta- tion, a very extraordinary person appears, speaking with unwonted authority and doing many wonderful things, and he tells the people that the divine king- dom is approaching, that the great prophet, the Son of man, is at hand. But he also admonishes them to be on their guard — to watch; for that the Son of man would make his appearance at an hour when they thought not. And now, my friends, does not our text appear in a very different light from that in which it is com- monly viewed P “Be ye also ready, for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.” These words, and similar words uttered by Jesus of Naza- reth on different occasions, are commonly under- stood, as I have said, to refer to his own second coming at the end of the world, to judge the world in person. Accordingly, from the beginning of the Christian era to this day, a great deal has been said about the second coming of Christ; and in the year 1000 of Christ there was a general looking for of the end of the world throughout Christendom. It was thought then that the second coming was to take place, and in our own day we have just had the 13 same delusion revived, with most disastrous effects, driving men and women to insanity and death. It is not to my present purpose to go into an examin- ation of all the passages in which Jesus speaks of the coming of the Son, nor could I make this matter clear within the limits of one or any allowable num- ber of discourses; but with my reading of the New Testament, and with such understanding as I have been able to obtain of the state of the Jewish mind in the time of Jesus of Nazareth, it is very plain to me that when he spake of the coming of the Son of man, he had reference to that great and undefined good which the Jews were impatiently looking for, which they expected to appear in the shape of a great visible empire, splendid and mighty, with a prophet and prince, inspired and anointed of God, at its head. Jesus of Nazareth declared that this great good was at hand, that it was coming. But to his illumi- nated vision, it was a far higher good than the Jew- ish imagination had yet dreamed of. lt might be represented under the image of a celestial kingdom, but the most magnificent outward empire was only a faint image of its greatness. It might be described as the coming of an extraordinary messenger, an illustrious prophet; but no visible person, though glowing with the halo of a preternatural glory, could adequately symbolize its import and its power. In one word, it was in his mind, the Truth, – the truth concerning God and Man — the knowledge of 2 14 the Invisible and the Everlasting — of the highest topics of human thought, and the dearest interests of the soul — of the Eternal will — of the sacred and unchangeable law ; in obedience to which is power and great glory and an ineffable peace, and by obeying which, earth becomes heaven, and man becomes like God. This, as I believe, was the great good which Jesus announced, when he said, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand.” This is what he pointed at, not any personal appearance, when he spake of the coming of the Son of man. And spake he anything, but clear, undeniable truth, when he warned his countrymen to watch, to keep eyes and ears open, wide open; for the good which they were so intensely expecting, which they fondly thought to recognize in the visible appearance of “a Son of man,” a heaven-sent Prophet, would come at an hour when they little thought? Behold! it had come already. It was in the very midst of them while he was speaking. It was beaming upon them with a heavenly light out of the very face of the man of Nazareth. It was sounding in their ears in his voice. It was standing before them in his person, face to face. Had they only had eyes to see, and ears to hear ! Then would they have discerned in the words of Jesus truth, truth greater and more enduring far than the might of empires. The magnificent vision of a kingdom of God, wherein reigns righteousness, would have opened upon their view They would have recognized in 15 the lowly person of the man of Nazareth, the true Son of man, invested with a glory outshining the regalia of kings. They would have heard a music in his voice, the music of mercy and of love, more ravishing than the melody of myriads of seraphic harps. They would have seen all their poor imag- inations of a Messiah’s kingdom infinitely outdone by the unutterable splendors of truth. But alas ! they were blinded by their senses, by those coarse passions, which thrust their own wretched pictures between them and the truth. Well may we take up the laments of Jesus himself: O Jerusalem Jeru- salem hadst thou only known, in that thy day, the things which belonged to thy peace, but alas, they were hidden from thine eyes! The truth came to thee, speaking in an angel’s voice, manifested in the spotless and beneficent life of Jesus. The Son of man passed through thy streets, sate at thy tables, healed thy sick, and would fain have gathered thy children as a bird gathereth her young under her wings, and thus protected them from impending calamity. But thou knewest not the gift of God! Thou wouldst not receive the truth. And, accord- ingly, like the good man of the house, who knew not at what hour the thief would come, thou didst awake at last to find thyself despoiled and a beggar! There is no bloodier page in history than that which records the downfall of the Jewish nation, the de- struction of Jerusalem, when mothers served up 16 their children for food, and the ruins of the city were buried under the heaps of the slain. How wonderfully did the Jews illustrate the words of Jesus at the very moment when he was speaking ! Had they thought — had they not been so blinded by their false expectations, they would have seen that the Son of Man was come to them, that the truth, which is the kingdom of heaven and the prophet of God to the soul, was communing with them, that they were in the midst of a momentous crisis, when, as they received or rejected the truth, they would prepare weal or woe for themselves and their children. But they did not think. They heard with their ears, but they did not understand. They did not discern the divine significance of the instructions, of the ap- pearance of Jesus ; and so they prepared for their nation a day of blood and horror, in which multi- tudes of the blameless and innocent were involved. I have set forth the meaning of our text in its application to those to whom it was originally addressed. But there is a most important truth for every one of us in this passage. And if we will open our hearts to it, it shall be to us “the coming of the Son of man.” It will introduce us now into the kingdom of God. It will shed light upon us like the bright approach of a prophet from heaven. “Be ye therefore ready also, for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.” At this 17 very moment while I speak and while you sit here, if we will only think of it—if we will only say with entire sincerity, “Speak, Lord, for thy servants hear,” we shall hear God speaking to us as distinctly as he spoke to the Jews of old through the lips of Jesus. Yes, to hearing ears, the voice of God, the voice of Eternal truth, is now speaking. It rings through the chambers of the open soul. It comes down to us from the broad and silent heavens which declare the transcendent majesty of the Om- nipotent, which tell us of a Power higher than we, and bid us worship and adore. It comes forth out of the bosom of the earth on which we dwell, and by whose bounty we are fed, and by whose beauty we are delighted, and calls us to be humble and thankful. It teaches and encourages and warns us from all the varied aspects of life. We may hear its admonitions in the gladness and in the Sorrows of human hearts, in the virtues and in the crimes of men, in the honor and in the shame, in the triumphs and in the defeat, in the weal and in the woe, in the lives and in the deaths of our fellows. In and through all things truth is pleading with us, revealing to us the sacred law of God,' by which alone we live. Watch, therefore. See that no mists of selfish prejudice dim your sight, no false, deluding song of sensual pleasure fill your ears. At moments when ye think not, the truth of God is speaking, discoursing of those things which belong to your eternal peace. Disregard the truth, heed it not 2% 18 When it comes to your soul, and you doom yourself to still deeper darkness and insensibility; and you will perceive the truth only when it is too late, only when nothing remains to you but tears and remorse. But open your hearts; be on the watch, be ready always for the coming of truth, and it will come and dwell with you and in you, and reveal to you a new beauty, and lead you farther and farther into the kingdom of heaven, and make you one with God, in perpetual communion with the spirit of life and light and love. The Jews, by reason of blindness, were unable to recognize the Son of man, the prophet for whose coming they longed, the beauty and power of God’s truth, in the lowly Nazarene. And we wonder at them, and pity them for being so blind. But, my friends, we may well keep our pity and our wonder for ourselves. The eternal truth of God is speak- ing to this nation at this very hour as distinctly as it spoke to the Jews through the voice of Jesus. A little while ago, when the plan of enlarging the territory of this country was publicly proposed by the established authorities of the land, then, then the sacred cause of our common humanity, the eternal principles of Justice came to us. They presented themselves before us. They summoned us to re- ceive, to reverence them, to bear witness to them, to obey them, to carry them faithfully out, and to see to it that they suffered no harm. As Jesus talked with his countrymen, so did the truth com- 19 mune with us, the truth concerning our duty and the plainest dictates of right. But, alas ! it did not come to us in the shape of a prophet, or angel radiant with a visible glory. It did not speak in a supernatural voice from the sky. It did not plead with us through the rich and powerful, from the lips of gifted Senators and popular Presidents. It only spoke in the dumb wrongs and agonies, in the dark- ness and degradation of a great multitude of despised human creatures, through whose black skins, our eyes, bandaged with the thick clouds of contempt and prejudice, could not penetrate to behold the sacred features of our common humanity, the awful image of God underneath. To an ear made sharp by the truth, the appeal for justice and mercy could not possibly have come in a way more touching and powerful than this. To a tender heart, what voice of man or of angel speaks so eloquently for hu- manity, as the poverty, the helplessness, the brute ignorance, the hopelessness of the slave, who can- not call his own soul his own ' I tell you, brethren, that never from the beginning of the world has the simple truth of God, the sacred principles of right, been urged home upon the Souls of men, as they were upon the men of this country and this generation. Yes, I say, divine, everlasting truth, clad in the majesty of Heaven, came before us in the most powerful shape, and we were admonished and warned to take heed how we rejected it. But we turned away with indifference and contempt, as 20 the Jews turned away from Jesus. They could not discern the authority of truth coming from the lips of a despised Nazarene. And we, like them, were blinded to the sacred rights of man in the de- spised children of Africa; and so we stood by, and allowed wrong to be re-enacted, legalized anew. We consented that an immense extent of territory should be given up to the iniquities and horrors of slavery. But the truth of God, come in what shape it may, is never despised or rejected with impunity. The Jews recognized not the Son of man when he came, and he came and went, and the Jewish nation rushed on to ruin and woe. Has not the same irre- versible law of God been exemplified in our case too P. We despised the truth. We refused to stand forth in its behalf. We let wrong triumph. And where are we now. P Why, this nation, the boasted child of liberty and peace, is plunging deeper and deeper into the barbarism of war. And what can be worse than this P What more awful judgment of God can come upon us? Famine is not worse, nor pestilence. Famine and pestilence assail the body, but war corrupts the will, devastates the hearts of men, strips them of the attributes of humanity, and turns them into demons, exulting in violence, and living upon blood. What is there that we ought not to have been prepared to sacrifice, in order to escape the calamity which now rests upon this na- tion, the curse of these victories, which provoke the appetite of conquest ? We acquiesced in the un- 21 righteousness of Annexation for peace' sake, and we have now got, not peace, but war. We have placed ourselves in a situation in which we are, not suffering, but, what is far worse, doing, evil. We are put to a base and inglorious work. This is our punishment. We are doing all that in us lies to turn back the tide of civilization, and to make our Chris- tianity a mockery. We are blighting the dearest hopes, shaking the best faith of the world. And the oppressed and starving millions of foreign lands, who fondly thought that a star of promise had ap- peared here in the west, find themselves bittery deceived, and are despoiled of that argument for popular liberty which this country once presented. The stain of innocent blood is on our hands, and with the madness of men given over to a strong delusion, to believe a lie, we are pouring out our treasures like water to facilitate and extend the work of death, to crush a sister nation to the dust! What man among us foresees the end of all this f Truly the judgments of God are upon us, and much is it to be feared, that we have, without knowing it, passed through a great crisis, changing the destinies of this people. The Son of man has come to us, and we knew him not. He has gone, and we are left to our own devices, and are busily preparing ourselves, not for the kingdom of God, the reign of peace and of right, but for the sway of a legion of evil passions. What could we do that we have not 22 done, to show ourselves all unworthy to possess the priceless gift of civil and religious liberty f But still, I trust in Heaven, the day of repentance is not wholly gone. We may yet awake. We may yet hear the voice of the Prince of Peace, and, hearing it, may live. Let us individually do what we can to cleanse ourselves of this great national guilt. There is no hope for this country but in a fervent enthusiasm for liberty and peace, an en- thusiasm which will make us eager to hazard property and life for the simple sake of a right principle, and suffer all things rather than share in doing the least wrong. Watch, and again I say unto you, watch At moments when ye think not, truth comes, the principles of Christianity plead with us to be honored and obeyed. Hearken to their voice. Open your hearts utterly. Drive away the devils of pride and prejudice, which tempt you to reject and crucify the truth as the Jews crucified Christ. Let the kingdom of God, the kingdom of Right, be established within you. And though you may not be able to turn the tide of national corruption, you can at least be true to the right, and suffer for it. It is better infinitely to suffer obloquy and loss for the truth, than to share any longer in the plunder of oppression and war. ** **ś A w - \ - - - . . - ºr . . . *::... - rº. -- d . - * : . • ***.xº y - - t t w - * . " | * - t ºt - 3. - * * -> ºf - , *.x rº r - 3. ºx tº * . * * -- # ‘s “aſ A º | - ‘. …& w ** º ar - º * - - sº s - - º - i \ Nº. ~ PREACHED AT- NEW HAMPTON, N. H., JUNE 10, 1854, * --- ar THE | DEDICATION OF A HOUSE OF WORSHIP, 3 *. & ERECTED BY run | Freewill Baptist Church and Society of that place. - | BY GEORGE T. DAY, - - Pastor of the Freewill Baptist Church, Olneyville, R. I. - | º w 3. PAwtucKET: - º A. W. PEARCE, PRINTER, No. 12 MILL STREET, * Christianitn; Our jelp and jopt. A S E R M 0 N, PREACHED AT NEW HAMPION, N. H., JUNE 10, 1854, AT THE DEDICATION OF A HOUSE OF WORSHIP, ERECTED BY THE Freewill Baptist Church and Society of that place. BY GEORGE T. DAY, Pastor of the Freewill Baptist Church, Olneyville, R. I. PAWTUCKET: A. W. PEARCE, PRINTER, No. 12 MILL STREET, 1854. CORRESPONDENCE. cºmmemºmº JNew Hampton, July 1st, 1854. REv. G. T. DAY : Dear Brother:-At the close of the Dedication Services here, a meeting of the Society was holden, at which it was unanimously Voted, “That we return our thanks to the Rev. G. T. Day for his able and interesting discourse, and request a copy for publication.” The undersigned were appointed a Committee to transmit to you a copy of the above vote. Respectfully Yours, P. S. BURBANK, I. D. STEWART, X. Committee. E. FISK, Rev. G. T. Day. Olneyville, July 15th, 1854. Rev. Messrs. Burbank, Stewart and Fisk, Committee, etc.: Brethren:—It would have pleased me better if all had been satisfied to leave the Sermon where the Dedication service had put it. To the sug- gestions of others, however, I cheerfully yield my preference, and herewith transmit a copy, as nearly as my recollection can make it. Being unable, for want of time, to prepare anything more than a pretty complete outline of the discourse beforehand, I cannot assure you that I have preserved the language in all cases. The thoughts and their order are unchanged. Very truly Yours, GEORGE T, DAY. S E. R. M. O N . NEITHER IS THERE SALVATION IN ANY OTHER ; FOR THERE IS NONE OTHER NAME UNDER HEAVEN, GIVEN AMONG MEN, WHEREBY WE MUST BE SAVED.— Acts Iv. 12. For THE LOVE of CHRIST consºr RAINETH US ; BECAUSE WE THUS JUDGE, THAT IF onE DIED FOR ALL, THEN WERE ALL DEAD : AND THAT HE DIED For ALL, THAT THEY which LIVE SHOULD NOT HENCE FORTH LIVE UNTO THEMISELVES BUT UNTO HIM WHICH DIED FOR THEM AND ROSE AGAIN.—2 CoR., v. 14, 15. THE great problem presenting itself to every sincere and thoughtful man, may be thus stated :-Given : A race of beings selfish and sinful by tendency and habit, acting for thousands of years. Required : The available moral force requisite to redeem and purify it. Over this problem, ingenuity, benevolence and conscious ne- cessity have toiled long and earnestly, without reaping any satisfactory or very valuable results. They have constantly varied the process, but missed the solution. Yet, excepting a few disappointed hypochondriacs, no man gives up his hope, or ceases his effort. Recognizing the world’s evils, and conscious of his own defects, each sufferer assumes the functions of the physician, and prescribes for the maladies of his race. In the presence of a thousand failures, and encountering the suspicion which a thousand cheats have confirmed, still he offers his nostrums with an air of confi- dence, while the gulled invalids crowd about him, evermore crying, ‘Give, give.” There is meaning in this aspect of the world. It tells us that men are out of their sphere, and that there is no peace for them in the false position—that to struggle for deliverance is an undying instinct, and that the hope of success survives disappointment. This deep-seated belief that the problem is 4 CHRISTIANITY : to be solved, is prophetic ; this ceaseless struggling of desire and effort proclaims the existence of a goal. The belief in the possibility of redemption is intuitive ; the hope in its ac- tual coming is as a promise of God repeated forever by spir- itual lips within us. To this result the prayer and effort of all good men are tending, and vice groans bitterly because the boon is so far away. If, then, help is to come to the race, from what source shall it emanate 7 Will it be a force springing up among the suffer- ers, or a minister of power coming from abroad? Are the lost to work out salvation for themselves, or expect a deliverance from afar? The text furnishes a reply. The first passage declares the futility of all merely human expedients; the sec- ond shows the means and method of the divine work. Peter shuts us in a prison, whose bars our weak arms cannot break or tear down ; Paul shows a heavenly messenger, at whose touch the ponderous gates swing back, and we leap to the vig- orous life of freedom. - Let us, following the method of the text, look a few mo- ments at some of the chief natural forces at work in Society, which are often confided in as sources of hope and help; mea- sure their moral power, and study their bearing on the redemp- tion of the world. There is, I. SELF-INTEREST. In its behalf it is said, First, That an effort to purify others, guards ourselves most securely against their vices. We render all our interests the more secure in proportion as we teach justice and integrity to others. A child, reckless and maddened, may imperil a city; discipline such hearts till their passions are quieted, and the feeblest citizen walks at midnight without harm or fear through a multitude of brawny men. Self-interest, therefore, will prompt the giving of time and effort and money to the work of purifying those from whose vices it has every thing fear; for their integrity is its only security. It is said, Secondly, That this effort for their welfare will attach them to us by ties of gratitude and sympathy, make them our fast practical friends, who will directly lend us their aid, and be- oUR HELP AND HOPE. 5. come our benefactors when, perchance, they hold the resour- ces and we are the dependants. It is added, Thirdly, That, as our social state has so much to do with our gratification and welfare, to improve that social state by promoting the virtue of those about us, is to make the most effectual, abundant and secure provision for ourselves. Few men will consent to make a home in the midst of a vicious neighborhood, and have only the companionship of those who live by preying on the rights of others; while purely worldly men, for the sake of a promised social harmony and fellowship, have often cheerfully put the hard earnings of years into the treasury of a Fourierite community. In all these forms, it is said, self-interest is prompted to toil for the moral purification of the vicious ; that the reasons for such toil are strong, conclusive, and constantly pressing; that these considerations must in time become influential and con- trolling; that thus the better and more favored in society will become benefactors to the weak, liſting up the depressed and elevating themselves in the same effort; and that in this way the world will ascend to redemption. This is specious and plausible, but is it trustworthy 7 To the whole argument I reply, 1. Admitting the justness of the reasoning, Self-Interest is not wise enough to originate that view, or feel its full force when presented. It is the nature of self-interest to be short sighted. It is not wont to seek gratification in the fields of philanthropy. The toils of benevolence are distasteful to it. Its plans are not thus broad, and its chosen means are not wont to be thus highly rational. Self-interest, because it is self-interest, is strongly averse to moral considerations—to turn philanthropist would be to abandon its own character. The steady aim at self-ag- grandizement, and the continual effort to purify others, are in- compatible. The very argument stated above in behalf of self- interest was suggested—was first contstructed and taught—by genuine benevolence. It is real philanthropy alone that learns how beneficient toil brings back its own reward. Go and pre- sent that argument to a thoroughly selfish man—one who lives 6 CHRESTIANITY : and labors only for himself—and see how much confidence you can awaken in it, and with how much readiness he will spring to the work of moral reform. Bring the poor outcasts up to his door, whose restless eyes flash with passion, and whose faces are all written over with the inscriptions of crime, and observe with how much readiness he hastens to feed, and clothe, and instruct them in duty. Show him the wretch who only last night entered his store and robbed his till of a hun- dred dollars, and who threatens now to burn his dwelling; then tell him that, if he will convert the offender, his property will be safer, and his prosperity receive a new guarantee, and see if his selfish arms will open, and his selfish heart throb with anxiety for his redemption. No | He will only knit his brows with vengeance, as he looks on his assailant, and he will bid you stop your mocking speech. The language of philanthropy falls on the ear of self-interest like the dialect of a barbarian. 2. But suppose the reasoning could be apprehended, and its force felt, there is still another difficulty. The motive is alto- gether too weak. It is no slight task to redeem a sensual soul, and turn the energies of life into a new and virtuous channel. The tax which such a service lays upon the patience, the for- bearance, the charity and the faith of the toiler, is very large. The work is not done by a single wish, or purpose, or effort. The vicious characters which breathe a pestilence and prey on society, are not made white and clean by one ablution, or transformed into models of virtue by one attempt to exorcise the evil spirit. The sea of their boiling passions is not calmed forewer by one cry of “Peace, Be still !” Your words of sympathy may be answered by the sneer of suspicion, your offer of help be met by a threatening scowl or a menacing gesture, your highest sacrifices be so interpreted as to be used for your calumniation, your miracles of love may awaken the charge of being leagued with Beelzebub, and for the generous offer to lay down your life for them, you may be rewarded by a crown of mockery and a malefactor's cross. Surely that is not impossible—nay, not wholly improbable. This is only an outline of HIS history, who was the wisest and divinest of all OUR HELP AND HOPE. 7 philanthropists; and he has said, “It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master.” Do you say that the Master has conquered ? that eighteen centuries of triumph have walked over the path of his thirty years' humiliation? I know it; but will your zeal and patience and faith and self devotion—inspired as they are to be only by self-interest—will they hold out dur- ing the thirty years of humiliation and contempt? Nay, great as Jesus was, in Sagacity, and power, and prophetic insight, do you believe HE would have possessed his soul in patience, if self-aggrandizement had been his only impulse ? It is the yearning heart that weeps over doomed Jerusalem, the appre- ciation of the god-like capacities and measureless worth of the souls for which he toiled—it is this, and only this, that ex- plains his endurance, and brings him off with the victory. Where has self interest turned moral deserts into blossoming gardens of virtue 7 Where are the possessed ones, whom it has rescued from the “Legion” of adversaries, and presented “ clothed and in their right minds?” It has not been wanting in opportunities; it has heard an hundred times the argument for effort; but where are the trophies? “The Five Points" have stood a quarter of a century, staring the capital and the fashion of New York boldly in the face. Self-interest has had its pockets rifled, and its possessions turned to ashes an hun- dred times by the hands there trained early to violence and crime; but did it ever go on a mission into the midst of the filth and peril, with no object but one of moral redemption ? Alas! you know the answer. Self-interest has been there; but it was only to curse the wretched denizens, and fan into high- er fierceness the flame of their ruinous passions. It is self-in- terest that packs those hovels and garrets and cellars with living loathsomeness, that extorts money which can only be raised by the sale of woman’s virtue, and the barter of child- hood’s innocence, and that fights the Christian zeal which at last risks every thing for their rescue. It is not the Broadway merchant, whose ledger is his Bible, that sets about that task of renovation ; he only shakes his head incredulously when the “Ladies' Mission’’ takes a seat in the “Old Brewery,” and brands the heroic work of Mr. Pease as downright folly. Judge 8 - CHRISTIANITY : him not harshly ; he sees from his own low stand-point; and it would be downright folly for self-interest to undertake such a work. It meets no promise of gain in such a sphere that will warrant the effort. * 3. But supposing self-interest could both feel the claim, and exercise the patience necessary to keep itself diligently at work; there is a third difficulty in the way of its success, more formidable still. It is found in the character of the agency which employs itself in the work. It is selfishness that prompts and sustains the effort. Self-aggrandizement is the end, and, being such, it must give form and color to all the effort put forth to compass it. There is no genuine regard for the wel- fare of the depressed ones; they are sought to be elevated only that they may be used as stepping stones, by the aid of which the toiler may climb to a loftier position. Their virtue is thought of only as So much material, out of which some gain may be wrought for himself. This is the spirit in which the laborer goes forth to his work. Now it is just that selfish spirit that constitutes the curse of humanity, and explains all the debasement of character of which the race struggles to rid itself. Sin consists in selfish- ness; its removal will be effected only when love shall take the seat of empire. Self-interest has been schooling the world for sixty centuries, and its success has been the meas- ure of human guilt and wo. The wider the range you give to human selfishness, the more hopelessly you bind the race in fetters. The more calculating you make it, the greater is its power, and the less conscience is connected with its rule. Only as you eradicate selfishness, and enthrone piety and phi- lanthropy and justice, have you done anything for human im- provement. Men's vices may be transposed, but they are vices still ; they may be gilded so that they shall be less hid- eous to the superficial eye, but the corruption festers beneath the surface, as the putridity lay within the garnished sepul- chres of the prophets. Remove the disease by prescribing the very thing which created it? I tell you this Homeopathic principle will never apply to the heart, whatever may be its relation to the stomach. It is trusting to Satan to cast out ÖljR HELP AND HOPE. - 9 Satan ; sending a traitor to teach loyalty; employing an am- bitious chieftain to negociate a peace ; commissioning Judas Iscariot as an apostle of self-devotion. No | That will never do. And the poor sick world looks up sadly and repeats, “never !” We must do better than that. Let us look at another force. This is, II.--THE DISCIPLINE OF EXPERIENCE AND ExAMPLE. Here is the plea in its behalf:- Suffering, or punishment, is less penal than instructive and reformatory. Wrong doing has always sad consequences, grevious to bear; while right doing gives a heritage of bless- ing. In process of time men will learn that sin only curses, and hence be deterred from its commission. The ruin wrought upon others will prove a beacon which time will cause them to heed. They will learn that justice and joy, purity and peace, are in wedlock, to be divorced by no human alchemy ; and so they will practice the duties that they may gather up the rewards. And thus, gradually, will the race be disciplin- ed to righteousness in its work, and rest in the quietness of its own virtuous self-satisfaction. To this it must be replied, - 1. The experience comes after the sin; we are not told of our danger till we are in its jaws and they are fiercely closing upon us; we are acted on by the wrong tendency before being aware that it is wrong. The instruction may come, but not, perhaps, till we are cursed by the false step beyond the hope of recovery. - A child may burn its hand, and so be taught that coals are perilous playthings; but in the experience which teaches that fact, he may be maimed for life. And the soul may be scorch- ed as well as the body thus. We may put ourselves into the power of a tyrant, and his severe exactions may apprise us of his character; but before we have learned our position, we may be prostrate under loads of chains that leave us helpless. And the spirit may thus lie at the footstool of Satan, as well as the body at the feet of Simon Legree. * Sentence against an evil work is not always executed speed- •) * 10 CHRISTIANITY : ily, and so crime may become such a habit while we are pocketing its temporary advantages, that, when judgment overtakes us, fines and prison walls fail to cure ; or a halter is about our neck before obstinacy gives way to penitence. So the spiritual iniquities may be sweet in the eating, and when they suddenly turn to bitterness in the belly, the impe- rious moral appetite may still clamor for the accustomed indul- gence; or the impartial Judge may stand at the door all ready with his sentence. --- The warning was needed over the doorway ; but it came only when the poor soul was being borne headlong to ruin, and at a point where few exercise the decision which stops them, or the heroism which brings them back. 2. Each flatters himself that, however others fall, he shall escape. Men are self-confident, and the weak not less so than the stronger. They attribute some imbecility to those who fall, whose absence guarantees them a firmer standing. The peril is less operative than the pride and the curiosity. “Don’t go to the theater,” besought a mother of her daughter, and sustained the appeal with her tears. “Why not, moth- er ?” “Because, my dear, it is a perilous exposure of one's virtuous principles. I have been there, and seen and felt the dangers.” “Well, I shall be careful; but I want to go and see them too.” That brief colloquy reveals the whole philosophy on this subject. So little heeded is the warning of example. Each commends the lesson to others, but denies that it is need- ful for himself. Every drinker of champagne resolves not to be a drunkard; and though nine-tenths fall, each successor trusts his purpose none the less. 3. Another defect in this force is, that there is no model ex- perience and example which can show the goal and attract to it. Our own experience is full of dissatisfaction and self-re- proach; and the examples of life about us are impressive chiefly by their defects. (I am speaking of life where only these natural forces are at work.) Or if it be insisted that some philosophical Socrates reveals such an example, the masses pronounce it impracticable for themselves, declaring that even the theory of life on which it rests is above their O'UR HELP AND HOPE. 11. comprehension. As a result, it wants power over them ; and because it wants power over them, the philosopher himself lo- ses his faith in it, becomes disheartened, and is likely to sink to the popular level. Why should he walk among the clouds and starve forgotten, when his fellows will not look up at his call, except in derision ? He will go down among them, and learn to check his ambition. º A No! the true experience and the moulding example are wanting. We feel wrong; but do not reach the right. We meet much to condemn ; but we want something to reverence and imitate. Education has its positive as well as its nega- tive side. Prohibition is not more important than precept. Discipline means to plant and train virtues, as well as eradi- cate vices. Our teachers must develop as well as repress. We want something more than fiends to frighten us from paths we ought not to enter; there is need of blessed angels to beckon us up the celestial highways. We want not only to be disgusted with the caricature of a man ; a complete specimen of our species needs to be ever before our eyes, to teach us our capacities, to show the culture we require, to win us to the work of copying. 4. Such discipline will corrupt ten-fold more than it cures. The Spartans were mistaken when they made some condemn- ed criminal drunk, and sent him staggering through the streets as a warning to their youth—I say they were mistaken when they supposed the vicious example was corrective. It was the public sentiment of Sparta which greeted the sot with the hiss of derision, that taught temperance and sobriety. Let the gravest and most renowned men of that city have made themselves just as drunk, when they marched up to their civil assemblies or their temples of religion, and every Spartan lad would have begged for a sip from his sire's mug of alcohol. Is an experience of sin and an example of vice to teach vir- tue to the race? and the more bitter the experience and the more corrupt the example, the more rapidly and successfully will the needful work of discipline go on ? Is this so 2 Then Bibles should give place to the “Age of Reason,” and the outrages of violence are better than the restraints of whole- 12 CHRISTIANITY : some law ; then Napoleon is to be preferred to Howard, and a carnival at Paris is more valuable than a Sabbath of New England; then you should send your sons to a New York Gambling Hell to form their characters, and your daughters to a brothel to learn the worth of virtue; then a philanthropist is an enemy of his race, and an assassin a harbinger of the millenium ; then— But I forbear. After six thousand years of experience to so little moral profit, I am afraid it will take the race a long time to wash itself clean in the cess-pools of its own corrup- tion. Let those trust this force who can. It speaks no cheer- ing promise in my ear. Let us turn to the next of these natural forces. This is III. CIVII, Gover NMENT. May we not trust this? Is not this the functionary which takes human nature under its charge, and which will effectu- ally school it to virtue 2 I cannot trust it, for the following I’628. SOI) S : 1. Civil government is only a human product—an instru- ment in the hands of men for applying their possessed power. I am not touching, now, the question whether government is of divine origin and appointment. We should not probably dif- fer on that point. I am simply saying that only human forces are employed in the administration of government; and, hence, the power represented or exercised by government can never be greater than the combined power of the men who are allied with it. Government is not power,-it is not the fountain of power; it is only the instrument employed by men for the bet- ter application of their power; for theocracies are past. Now the fact is, that the defect may not be in the instru- ment, but in those who use it; and that is just where the de- fect lies in this case. Men want the moral power which can secure their redemption; that is just the lack; there is too lit- tle moral influence in society—this is the radical evil under which we are suffering. They have too little force for the re- sult; and so, no matter how they may perfect the means of using their force, the means will reveal no more than they pos- sess. If a ten feet fall of water will not drive a given amount Olſſº. HPI, P AND HOPE, 13 of machinery, it is useless to seek the result by building a bet- ter dam. If a horse can draw but a ton, it is folly to hope he will walk off with a ton and a half by giving him a pair of new traces. And society, too feeble to rise to redemption, will not accomplish it by struggling through the avenue of government. But, 2. In the operation of government, a great deal of the force applied to it is used up in overcoming the friction; so that government reveals always less than the whole moral force behind it. Government is thus like an engine, in which a sub- traction must be made from the force acting on the piston, equal to the amount of friction, in order to ascertain its avail- able power for an extrinsic result. The force of a nation in war will be ascertained, after deducting from its whole army, men enough to preserve domestic quiet. The actual moral force of a government must, for this reason, be somewhat less than the moral force of a people who employ it. And to sup- pose that the government—their own instrument—is to avail in redeeming them, is like supposing a man able to lift himself by the ends of a chain, when to lift the chain itself required the exertion of one third of his force. And, 3. Government expresses and employs only the average mor- al virtue and force of the community, if it be popular; only the moral virtue and force of the autocrat, if it be imperial. In the formation of all popular governments there is a compro- mise, either express or implied. The most vicious will not consent to have legislation expressive of as high morality as the most virtuous exercise and desire, and vice versa. The result is, both make a concession, and form a government which is morally below the purest, and above the vilest. The best men are defective enough ; they feel that the race must rise far above themselves to find redemption ; but, in point of morality, the governmental standard is far beneath them, and so it will, nay, must, always be. Does that look as though this force were to turn the world speedily into an Eden?—As to an absolute monarchy, little need be said. The holding of such power is itself a vice; and if it were not, it would al- most certainly corrupt the purest of men to exercise it; or if its 14 CHRISTIANITY : exercise could be necessary, that would imply a debasement in the people which always suggests barbarism. In 1854, the best specimen of autocracy we can exhibit, is Nicholas the Czar and vassal Russia. Moreover, the testimony of history seems to be that govern- ments are purest at their fountain; that they grow into instru- ments of oppression as they rise in power. A steady moral progress upward is a feature which I do not know that any civil government has revealed. If Great Britain be cited as an example, I have only to reply that, even there, government has ascended chiefly over the steps of revolution; and, more- over, to Christianity may be traced every new moral and hu- mane element that has consolidated into English law. From the first, even until now, that great power has resisted pro- gress, until the rising wave of Christian feeling has thrown down the barrier. Exclude all supernatural forces—and it is on the supposition that they are excluded that I am proceed- ing—and I do not know of one government but has degene- rated, until many of them have perished out of sight, and the rest walk by, a sad procession, to the sepulchre they cannot escape. Nor is even that the whole truth. In spite of the highest helps to moral progress, many governments have had only a downward path. Not in ancient times only, but amid our boastful era; not far away in the wilderness, but nearer than we love to own the fact. We call our confederacy a model, and challenge competition. But have the old patriotic fires retained their brightness? Are we worthy of our ancestry 7 Could we carry forward another Revolution with so little of selfishness and so much of heroic martyrdom ? Could we build another Faneuil Hall, or consecrate another Bunker Hill ? Nay, do we keep from pollution the legacies of the last century 2 We began with Washington; but do his suc- cessors wear his mantle 7 We started with the Declaration of Independence, and in eighty years we have reached the Fugitive Act, Nebraska Bill, and the tragedy of Anthony Burns !. And is it to such hands you would commit the hopes and interests of our race? It is as though a mother should oùR HELP AND HOPE. 15 give her sobbing child into the brazen arms of Moloch, to be hugged to his red-hot bosom There is yet one other force to be inspected. This, as it is sometimes termed, is, - IV. THE PROGRESSIVE DESTINY OF MIND. Progress is said to be the law of the universe. Gradual development is the process obtaining every where. The germ, the stalk, the flower, and the fruit—these are the steps by which life climbs to perfection. So man is gradually as- cending. He begins in ignorance and necessity, comes slow- ly up through barbarism ; practice makes his hand cunning, experience sharpens his intellect, his conscious supremacy gives him a royal air, his ambition to improve leads to the subduing of the forces about him, his awaking conscience shows him the law of morality, his growing religious aspira- tions attach him to God; till, at last, his manhood is com- plete. And here, it is said, is the hope, rather the certainty, of human redemption. To this beautiful and imposing theory, it is to be replied, 1. That it is not warranted by facts. The theory was not reached by careful induction; it was evidently framed by some man made for a sentimental poet, but who mistook his function, and aspired to be a philosopher. Throw the influence of Christianity aside, and I do not know of a single people shown us by history, whose path has been one of uniform pro- gress. Nay, there are a multitude of facts that look exactly the other way. Where are the old civilizations, deemed so glorious, and whose broken monuments yet remain to us—the Egyptian, the Assyrian, the Grecian, and the Roman? Gone, all gone ! Imbecility walks listlessly over the land of the Pha- raohs, wondering at the Pyramids, and timid amid the ruins of Thebes. Where Nineveh and Babylon once sat, mistresses of the East, the bittern and the satyr have their lurking places; and the few roving, superstitious descendants of Nebuchad- nezzar and Cyrus wonder at the exhumed bas-reliefs which symbolize their ancestral greatness. The former splendor of Athens, where Homer sang, and Apelles painted, and Aris- totle philosophised, and Demosthenes thundered in the Forum, 16 CHRISTIANITY: seems like a fabulous story to the modern traveler, who wan- ders among its ruins. Rome, after having pulled down and set up as she would, herself fell in pieces, and was buried be- neath the northern avalanche. The great mental masters of those times and lands, have given place to an effeminate and sparse posterity, who are hardly able to read their fathers' epitaphs. Does that look like progressive destiny? Here is another fact. The literature of every people, whether traditional or written, enshrines the history of an early golden age ; when the gods talked with men, and human nature tower- ed up under the discipline until itself grew divine. Each nation glorifies its infancy, and kindles into rapture while it celebrates its early purity and power. Has that fact no meaning? Does it justify the theory of perpetual progression ; or is it an echo of that divine testimony coming up from the first pages of the Bible, and repeated all along the ages—“God created man upright; but they have sought out many inventions?” And one is anxious to know, if the cannibals of the Fejee islands have been progressing steadily for six thousands of years, more or less, what must have been their character and condition when they began the work of life; and if in so long a time they have only reached their present stand-point, how long it will require for them to ascend to a true moral redemption. Alas for them, if that is the highest promise we can give, when they mournfully ask, “Who will show us any good?” No 1 steady progress is not the rule ; it is not even the ex- ception in human experience, where revelation has been with- holden. Left to nature, and themselves, no people has made a long and steady march in the upward direction. I do not know of one such people to-day—not one even that is advan- cing in mental culture and the growth of the arts. Outside of Christendom, if there be any movement, it may be round a circle, it may be offin a tangent, it may be backward; it is not progressive and ascending. Even intellect is asleep, save where the touch of the gospel has startled it. Indeed, where Christianity found its cradle, climbed to its cross, broke open the door of its sepulchre, and walked royally for centuries, the old temples are rebuilt, the crescent overlooks the Holy Sepul- OUR HELP AND HOPE. 17 chre, violence lies in wait beside the paths trodden by the Prince of Peace, and the lips of men curl at the name of Je- sus. I think there is no wave of destiny which evermore sweeps our race toward the gate of heaven. Progress is nor- mal to us, without doubt; but we are not in the normal state. 2. But suppose it were true that growth in knowledge, sci- ence, art and influence, were our destiny. Is piety always in proportion to power 7 Is strength synonymous with goodness? Are human forces all virtuous forces 7 We know the answer. The most terrible forces have come to fight virtue, bearing freshly written diplomas in their hands. Intellect and skill are power ; but they are often power perverted, pledged whol- ly to wickedness. Does Milton's picture of Satan, with intel- lect keen as a sabre and awful like the Alps, furnish a proof that large mental attainments are always a lever to hoist the sensual world up nearer to God? Give Archimedes a fulcrum and he will move the earth. Doubtless he will. But in forc- ing it from its position he may crowd it toward the blackness of darkness, as well as push it up nearer the empyrean. Power may be used to break a demon’s chains, as well as give vigor to the sweep of an angel’s wing. It is better for a madman or an assassin to be weak like a child, rather than strong like Samson. We should not willingly put thunder- bolts into the hands of a man of passion. Till principle find a home in the heart, till duty is felt to be sacred, till love and pity dwell with men, till God be reverenced in the earth, the expansion of intellect and the growth of invention promise us nothing but curses. I will pray that our poor race may rest in an innocent infancy, rather than advance to a reckless ma- turity. Ours had been a far better world, if its Alexanders and Caesars had always lain in their cradles, and been kissed by grateful lips to happiness and dreams.-No! there is no forced march of humanity that termines only at the gates of the sky. - All these forces are defective. I have spoken of the spe- cific grounds of their inadequacy. In general terms they fail; because, 1. They cannot bring the great facts which set forth our 3 18 CHRISTIANITY : state and relations toward God. We need to know our con- dition. We want a host of questions answered. Why are we here ? Whither do we tend ? What is before us? What mean our disquiet, our consciousness of guilt, and our dread of judgment 7 May we be forgiven 7 and how 2 Is there help for our weakness? rest for our spirits? an ample provision for our moral necessities 7 These questions call for replies—not the replies of conjecture or credulity, but of wisdom, truth, authority. Till these are answered, and our faith is satisfied, we cannot rest; but are tossed on treacherous waves, and trembling before destruction. To these inquiries none of these afore mentioned sources afford a response. Self-interest, ex- perience, government, progress—all are forced to be silent, for they have nothing to reply. 2. They set up no definite standard of life which satisfies the heart; they leave duty without exposition; they reveal no distinct goal toward which aspiration and effort may turn and struggle. They leave the purpose aimless, and set human energy to beat the air. 3. They want the moral motive power requisite to over- come the selfish tendencies of the race, and bend the spirit in- to the service of God, and dedicate its power to the welfare of men. This is the great lack. Motive power is the chief de- fect in every system of morality. Men see duty, approve the right, confess its claims; but the selfish nature rebels in prac- tice. And in this fierce struggle, others than Paul have cried out, “O wretched man that I am l’” The hard heart needs to be melted, the wayward affections captivated and held by righteousness. Men, whose souls are magazines of passion, want something more than light and conscience; they want a holy magnetism to which the heart joyfully yields itself. And that motive power is wanting to all and each of these forces which offer their ministry to the needy world. They may be strong for other tasks, but how to save the sinking soul they find not. - And these are man's boasted possessions, the sources of his trust, the helpers that stoop over a prostrate nature. It is mockery to offer such things as these to our race. Smitten OUR HELP AND HOPE. - 19 and afflicted as it is, what can they do for it? It may well turn away as did Job from his friends, saying with a gesture of impatience and a heart of disappointment, “ Miserable com- forters are ye all !” Away ! Leave me alone to die And is our poor race doomed ? Must its long cherished hopes die slowly and sadly out 7 Is its future to be only a repetition of its past 7 Is it to grope on waiting vainly for light; to cry out piteously and listen in vain for the footstep of an approaching Helper ? Look up ! “Who is this that com- eth from Edon, with dyed garments from Bozrah 7 this that is glorious in his apparel, travelling in the greatness of his strength ?” Listen to his reply. “I that speak in righteous- ness, mighty to save.” Yes it is HE,-‘‘the Desire of the na- tions.” “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world !” The Son of God is set forth among us. How does Christ meet our necessities 7 1. He brings the needed truth. He tells us the sad story of our fall, and delineates feature after feature in our corrupt- ed characters; and, as he proceeds, memory and conscious- ness, reason and experience, rise up to proclaim every state- ment true. With great clearness and authority he shows us the way of salvation. Or if ever our suspicion is awakened, and doubt diminishes the force of his testimony, he sees the ne- cessity and hastens to meet it. Some sightless beggar opens his eyes at his bidding; leprous men grow white at a com- mand; Gennesaret sleeps at his fiat ; loaves multiply at his touch ; Lazarus marches from the tomb at his call; and Heaven speaks its approbation in response to his prayer; un- til all distrust vanishes, and each satisfied soul cries out, “We know that thou art a teacher come from God ' ' Henceforth the seal is removed from the book of our destiny, the scales fall from the eyes, and the long sought truth streams steadily on the inquiring spirit. “Whereas we were once blind, now we see.” - 2. He reveals the model character; and so gives definite- ness to our aims, a path and a goal for our aspiration and effort. - The question, “What is virtue 7" is answered when we 20 CHRISTIANITY : look at him. The completeness of manhood is before us, and our critical eye and yearning heart are satisfied. There he stands, solitary in his superiority, yet pouring out streams of sympathy for the lowliest and vilest, purer and deeper than ever flowed from a woman's heart. In him blend majesty and gentleness; the awful face of justice and the pleading eye of love meet at once the gaze of the beholder. Hoary-head- ed and hard-hearted guilt sees something in him more terrible than in the executioner; while innocence, though timid as a fawn, pillows its head confidently on his bosom. In his un- bending integrity he is firmer than a column of granite ; in his touching condescension there is no want so low but he stoops without effort to its level. To serve him would seem an honor for which angels might contend ; but he can wash the feet of the disciple who is planning his betrayal. He discloses the greatness of God, and the meekness of the humblest man. And his life, how full is it of power and beauty . It is at Once heroic as a singing martyr's death, and as beautiful as a mother’s ministry about the couch of her moaning babe at midnight. Now he is driving a cohort of evil spirits into the deep, and now folding childhood with a whispered prayer to his bosom. At one hour his own disciples cry out in terror as his awful form sweeps over the midnight sea, and at another, guilt kneels before him to hear him say, “Go and sin no more.” But I cannot tell you of him or his life. He is Im- manuel; and his life a prolonged benediction. Go and study both, and you will go no farther for a model, or be in doubt about your appropriate work. 3. He gives the motive power which takes control of the wayward heart. Showing us his character, he awakens our reverence and admiration ; exhibiting his love for us in toils for our sake, our hard hearts melt, and our gratitude leaps forward to serve him ; for his great service our self-devotion for his sake be- comes a ruling force; seeing the value of his interests, we ally our all with him and his; his wishes are our chief impulse; his expressed will our highest law; our zeal to please and honor him become a living fire. The heart has become loyal, for OUR HELP AND HOPE, 21 now it has found its sovereign. It is no more a mysterious saying, but a joyful truth of experience, that, “THE LOVE OF CHRIST CONSTRAINETH Us.” A patriot dying for his country, a daughter sacrificing all that a mother's last few days may be less sorrowful—these are feeble illustrations of that motive power with which Christ impels us, of that magnetic bond that draws and holds us to himself. So is the cord of selfish- ness snapped, and the soul has gained redemption. 4. This work accomplished in and for us, we are ready for the Master's bidding. Now let him say, as he does say, to such a captivated soul, “Go seek your fellows, and lead them to God; teach ignorance ; win back the wayward from evil paths; gather in the outcast ; bid the despairing hope, and the dying live; save them for my sake; this is the proof of your love, and the condition of my honor—let Christ say that, and philanthropy shall rest in waiting no longer. No second com- mand is needed. Nakedness will be clothed, hunger fed, sickness blessed, crime forgiven, guilty penitence brought to the Master's feet. If the constraining love has passed within us, we shall not tarry. We are strong to suffer or to do. Reproach, opposition, sneers, temporary ill success, unappre- ciation by those we toil for—what are these ? Our enthusi- asm is fed by the divine fountain. In the moment of irreso- lution we look once at the Cross, and the flagging energies leap to the work again; or we listen, with the ear turned heaven- ward, to hear a high voice say, “Well done" ; and our re- ward and our inspiration have come to us. We are the servants of men, for Jesus' sake, and we bear them the same Gospel that has won us forever. Will they not be won also } Surely it shall not return void. Its mission is to conquer. The desert will blossom. The Sower shall shout to the reaper, as both sit down rejoicing over the gathered sheaves. “The mountains and the hills shall break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands;” “While, nation after nation, taught the strain, Earth rolls the rapturous hosanna round.” 22 CHRISTIANITY : We come, to-day, to dedicate this goodly temple to the great work of redeeming men by means of this gospel of Christ. It speaks not only of the end we would attain, but equally of the means we would employ in compassing it. The chief theme of thought and speech here is “Jesus Christ and him crucified.” It is no place where self-interest may bring its wares, or publish its code of expediency; it is to be no stage over which vicious example may stagger to destruction, at- tracting or disheartening the observers; no high court of poli- ticians is to sit here day after day and promulge the edicts of party; and infidel science is never to make of it a laboratory wherein to experiment God out of the universe. Not to pay homage to such senseless juggling have these altars been rear- ed. The divinity whose presence will be sought here is the universal Father ; the oracle to which the gathered company will listen, is that which spake at Sinai, and Calvary, and Olivet—proclaiming justice, and mercy and redemption. When weary and sad humanity, with heavy heart and dim- med vision, waiting long and vainly for relief beside the Be- thesda pools of nature, comes here to rest from some fresh dis- appointment, it shall start with gladness at the pitying and tri- umphant cry that greets it on the threshold, “Behold the Lamb of God l’’ and then, with beaming eye and face toward heaven, it shall take up its couch and walk up to where frail- ties drop off as a worn out garment, and experience becomes a lofty and eternal paean. Nor is it alone to send hope soaring to the sky, that this house has been erected. The gospel comes to redeem the earth, as well as to enlarge the domain of heaven. “ Thy Ringdom come on earth,” is to be the burden of this sanctuary prayer, and its establishment the end to which all its effort points. Here is the place where all sin is to be rebuked, and all righteousness insisted on. Organic as well as individual wrong is here to be steadily and fearlessly opposed. Heaven forbid that this pulpit should ever cowardly or selfishly connive at injustice, or that these pews should ever presumptuously dictate its utterances. If this sanctuary shall ever become an asylum where mammoth sins find shelter beneath its altar- OUR HELP AND HOPE, 23 cloths; if in the fierce struggle between redeeming truth and destructive falsehoods, which is even now at our doors, this house becomes a Bastile of conservatism, and this pulpit a dumb oracle, then in mercy may the prophetic hand-writing gleam speedily from its walls, and the treacherous Jerusalem. become a heap of ruins. } But I am persuaded better things, though I thus speak. Not here, so near the cradle of our free religious spirit, and close by the yet fresh graves of our connexional ancestry, are we to for- swear our early religious faith; not now, while wearing the scars of seventy years' aggression upon old hoary errors, are we to turn our backs and proclaim a truce ; especially not here, in the eastern focus of our denominational ellipse, are we to announce that we have bartered away the integrity, for whose sake alone we have claimed the right to live. No | a thou- sand times No | As preached in this house, Jesus Christ and him crucified shall mean not only Jesus Christ the giver of heavenly hopes, but Jesus Christ the expounder of duty and the legislator for life. He shall be shown, to be sure, with the weeping Magdalen at his feet, that the guilt- iest penitence may never despair; but he shall not be for- gotten when he makes reputable Phariseeism quiver and turn pale before the artillery of his reproof. I have spoken of four great forces in society, and exhib- ited their inadequacy to reach and save the race—indeed I have shown how they often fight against its welfare. But the pulpit, while preaching Christ, is by no means to ig- nore the existence of these forces, nor pass them by on the other side, either in carelessness or contempt. It is no small part of its business to mould them into a higher image, and then subsidize them into its service—to change them from foes into allies, as the malefactor’s cross, after the Redeem- er had hung upon it, became the symbol of the loftiest virtue. Self-interest will sit here now and then in these pews ; let it go away ashamed of its low maxims and its calcula- ting spirit, as it learns of him who for our sake became poor, that we through his poverty might be made rich. 24. CHRISTIANITY : In the presence of wretched experience and corrupt and corrupting example, here let Christian souls reveal the life of faith, full of inward peace, struggling heavenward with holy aspirations; let them set forth an outward fidelity whose every act is a benefaction, whose energies speak of the might of God, and whose movements are majestic as the triumphant march of righteousness. Åe Politicians will now and then come here—that strange modern race of beings that so wretchedly caricature human- ity—Politicians, who find their decalogue in a party plat- form, their goal of virtue in a successful election, and their highest heaven in a well salaried office. Let them come ; but let them find wide open a statute-book which tests the validity of all civil constitutions; let them find a law which, however it may be sneered at by the mightiest men you ever cradled among your mountains, is “higher” than your Mount Washington, or the Alleghanies, and which spurns all vicious compromises; let them be put face to face with a Ruler before whom even the political giants of the West- ern Republic are but as the small dust of the balance, who remembers every sigh of the oppressed, and forgets no act of treachery. - And not less important, but far more grateful, will be the task set this pulpit, of calling together, from time to time, this gathered company of ingenuous youth,” whose daily culture gives them keener eyes with which to survey the works of God, and larger power for whose exercise they are to be held responsible, and teaching them how to see Jehovah in his creation, and how to honor Christ in the laying of every fresh acquisition at his feet. Beautiful com- panionship—the seminary and the sanctuary—science and religion—the elder and the newer Scripture—the works and the word—the study and the worship—the kindling in- tellect and the aspiring heart. The one shall save from that superstitious devotion, whose mother is ignorance; the oth- er shall guard against that vain philosophy, which begins in * The students of the New Hampton Literary and Biblical Institution. OUR HELP AND HOPE, 25 self-conceit and ends in moral ruin. Each is the complement of the other; let them clasp hands before us in reverent af. fection to-day, while we pronounce over them the sacred form- ula, “What God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.” In erecting this house for the ministry of the gospel, we try no new experiment. We only follow God’s appoint- ment, and confide in the testimony of two thousand years now passed into history. The redeeming power of the gos- pel is now more than a divine prophecy ; it is a solid, liv- ing fact. Wherever faithfully preached, the darkness has fled away, and the true light appeared. So, thank God, the promise pledges it shall ever be. So may it be here ; so let it be. Here may weary, heavy laden ones find rest. Here may guilty penitence be bidden to “go and sin no more.” Here may mourners be comforted. Here may childhood learn to lay itself confidingly in the great Savior’s arms, maturity and strength be taught to give their large resources to God, and trembling age, waiting for its translation, find every shadow fleeing from the tomb it enters. Here may the fellowship of him who shall stand where I stand, and of those who shall sit where you sit, be sweet on earth, and ripen to an eternal union. To these high ends is this sanctuary dedicated. Hail! Father, Savior, Sanctifier . In thy name we set up our banners, and seek thy presence for our waiting temple. “Arise, O Lord, into thy resting place, thou and the ark of thy strength : Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness, and let thy Saints shout aloud for joy.” * } * * * Asia— a > - - - - • ‘ - A “." -- - - v. -- - - - . . . \ . ~ * $. N. BY THEODORE PARKER, . Minister of the Twenty-Eighth Congregational Society. —n - £ & sº - * * - - - PHONoGRAPHICALLY REPORTED BY RUFUs LEIGHion. - r - 1854. , . . . . . .” " . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . | THE MUSIC HALL, IN B0sTON, ON sus DAY, JU NE 18, 1854. e # Bazin & Chandler, Printers, 37 Cornhill, Boston. THE LAW OF GOD AND THE STATUTES OF MEN. *— *- S E R M O N , PREACHED A.T THE MUSIC HALL, IN B0STON, ON SUNDAY, JUNE 18, 1854. BY THEOD OF.E PARKER, Minister of the Twenty-Eighth Congregational Society. PHONOGRAPHICALLY REPORTED BY RUFUS LEIGIITON. B O S T O N : BENJAMIN B. MUSSEY & CO. 1854. S E R M () N , “THOU SEALT worship THE LoRD, THY GoD, AND HrM ONLY SHALT THouſ SERVE.”— Matthew iv. 10. Last Sunday I spoke of Trust in God, endeavoring to show that it involved an absolute confidence in the Pur- poses of God, and an absolute confidence in the Means thereunto, and consequently the practical Use thereof. There is a matter of very great consequence connected herewith, namely this, – the Relation between a man’s Religion and his Allegiance to the Church and the State. So this morning I ask your attention to a Sermon of our Duty to the Laws of God, and our Obligation to the Statutes of Men. It is a theme I have often spoken of ; and what I shall say this morning may be regarded as occasional, and supplementary to the much that I have said, and printed, likewise, before. In its primitive form, Religion is a mere Emotion; it is nothing but a feeling; an instinctive feeling ; at first vague, shadowy, dim. In its secondary stage it is also a 4 a Thought ; the emotion has travelled from the heart upwards to the head. It is an Idea, an abstract idea, the Object whereof transcends both time and space, and is not cognizable by any sense. But finally, in its ulti- mate form, it becomes likewise an Act. Thus it spreads over all a man’s life, inward and outward too; it goes up to the tallest heights of the philosopher's speculation, down to the lowest deeps of human consciousness; it reaches to the minute details of our daily practice. Thus Religion wraps all our life in its own wide mantle. So the sun, ninety-six million miles away, comes every morning and folds in its warm embrace each great and every little thing on the round world. Religion takes note of the private conduct of the individual man, and the vast public concerns of the greatest nation and the whole race of mankind. It is eminently connected with the Creeds and the Statutes of the people, wherein the nation comes to the consciousness of itself, and of its duty. To comprehend the relation which religion bears to these creeds and stat- utes, let us look at the matter a little more narrowly, going somewhat in detail ; and to understand it the more completely, let us go back to the first principles of things. There is a God of Infinite Perfection, who acts as perfect Cause and perfect Providence of all things, – making the Universe from a perfect motive, of perfect material, for a perfect purpose, and as a perfect means º 5 therunto. Of course, if the Universe be thus made, there must be power and force enough, of the right kind, in it to accomplish the purposes of God ; and this must be true of both parts of the Universe, – the World of Matter, and the World of Man. Else, God is not a perfect Cause and Providence, and has not made the Universe from a perfect motive, of per- fect material, for a perfect purpose, and as a perfect means thereto. Now, there are certain natural modes of operation of these forces and powers which God has put in the Uni- verse ; the natural powers of matter and of man are meant to act in a certain way, and not otherwise. These modes of operation I will call Laws, Natural Laws; they exist in the material world and in the human world. |They are a part of the Universe. These Laws must be observed and kept as means to the end that is proposed. In the World of Matter these Laws are always kept, for the Actual of Nature and the Ideal of Nature are identical; they are just the same. When this leaf which I drop falls from my hand, it falls by the Law which the Infinite God meant it should fall by, and keeps that exactly. In Nature—the world of matter—this always takes place, and the Actual of to-day is the Ideal of eternity, -for there everything is accomplished with no finite, private, individual will; all is mechanism, the brute, involuntary, unconscious action of matter passively obedient to the mind and will of God. There God is the 6 only Actor; all else is tool; He is the only Workman ; Nature is all engine and God the Engineer. Accord- ingly, in the world of matter there is a harmony of forces; but not a harmony of purpose, of will, of thought, of feeling, — because there is only one purpose, will, thought, feeling. God alone is the consciousness of the material world; matter obeys his Laws, but wills not, knows not. The ideal of Nature resides in God’s con- sciousness; only its actual in itself. The two are one ; but the material things do not know of that Oneness; God only knows thereof. Nature knows nothing of God, nothing of his laws, nothing of itself;–because therein God is the only Cause, the only Providence, the only Consciousness. On the other hand, in the Human World, man is an actor as well as a tool; he is in part engine, in part also engineer. The ideal of man’s conduct, charac- ter and destination, resides in God; but thence it is transferred to the mind of man by man’s own instinct and reflection; and it is to becomes actual by man’s thought, man’s will, man’s work. The human race comes to consciousness in itself, and not merely to con- sciousness in God. So in virtue of the Superior nature and destination of man, between him and God there is to be not merely a harmony of forces, but a harmony of feeling, thought, will, purpose, and thence of act. Man is to obey the natural Laws as completely as that leaf obeyed them, falling from my hand. But, unlike the 7 leaf, man is to know that he obeys; he must will to obey. So he is to form in his own mind an ideal of the charac- ter which he should attain, of the conduct which he would observe, and then by his own will he is to make that ideal his actual. This is the dignity of man, –he is partial cause and providence of his own affairs In general, man has powers sufficient to find out the natural mode of operation of all his human forces, all the natural Laws of his conduct, his natural ideal. Nar- row this down to a small compass, and take One portion of these powers, the Moral Part of man, and thereof this only,–that portion which relates to his dealing with his fellow-men. There is a moral faculty called Conscience. Its func- tion is to inform us of the Moral Ideal; to transfer it from God’s mind to our mind; to inform us what are the natural modes of operation, the rules of conduct in our relation with other men. Conscience does this in two ways. First, by Instinctive moral action. Here conscience acts spontaneously and anticipates experience, acts in advance of history, and spontaneously projects an ideal which is derived from the moral instinct of our nature. This is the transcendent way of learning the moral Law. And let me add, it is the favorite way of young and enthusiastic persons; the favorite way, likewise, of meditative and contemplative men, who dwell apart from mankind, and look at Ideas which are the causes 8 of action more than at the immediate or ultimate effect of special measures. & The other way is by Reflective moral action. Here we learn the moral Laws by experiment; by observation, trial, experience, we find out what suits the conscience of the individual and the conscience of mankind. This is the inductive way, and it is the favorite mode of the the great mass of men, of practical men who live in the midst of affairs. Each of these methods has its advantage, both their special limitations and defects. We require both of these, – the process of moral instinct which shoots for- ward and forecasts the ideal, and the process of moral induction which comes carefully afterwards and studies the facts and sees what conduct squares with conscience, and how it looks after the act has been done as well as before. In these two ways we learn the natural mode of opera- tion and the natural rules of conduct which suit our moral nature ; that is, we discover the Moral Laws which are writ in the nature and constitution of man, and are thence historically made known in the consciousness of Iſlall. When they are understood, we see that they are the Laws of God, a part of the Universe, a part of the pur- pose of God, a part of the means which God has pro- vided for accomplishing his purpose. 9 These laws are not of man’s making, but of his finding made. He no more makes them than the blackSmith makes the heaviness of his iron, or the astronomer makes the moon eclipse the sun. A man may heed these laws, or heed them not ; make them, or unmake them, - that is beyond his power. Neither the individual nor the race acquires a con- sciousness of these Moral Laws all at once. It is done progressively by you and me ; progressively by the human race, learning here a little, and there a little. The natu- ral moral ideal is not all at once transferred from God's Mind to man’s. We learn the Laws of our moral nature like the Laws of matter, slowly, little by little. A good man is constantly making progress in the knowledge of God’s natural Moral Laws; mankind does the same. The race to-day knows more of the natural Moral Laws of our constitution than the human race ever knew before. A thousand years hence no doubt, mankind will know a great deal more of this natural moral ideal than we know to-day. Accordingly, speaking after the events of history, the Moral Ideal of mankind is continually rising. It may not be always rising in the same man, who goes on for a while, then becomes idle, of old, or wicked, and goes down. It may not always be rising in the same nation ; that also advances for a while, then sins against God sometimes, and goes down to ruin. But, take the human race as a whole, the moral ideal of mankind is constantly rising higher and higher. 10 The next thing is to obey these Laws, consciously, knowing we obey them ; Voluntarily, willing to obey, and make the moral ideal the actual of life for the individual and the race. This also is done progressively; not all at once, but by slow degrees. The Moral Actual of the human race is constantly rising higher and higher. Just in proportion as the ideal shoots up the actual follows after it, though on slow and laborious wings. If you look microscopically, at the condition of mankind at intervals of only a hundred years, you will see that there is a moral progress from century to century ; but sepa- rate your points of observation by a thousand years instead of a century, the moral progress of the race is so obvious that no unprejudiced man can fail to see it when he opens his natural eyes and looks. I will not say it is So with every special nation, for a nation may go back as well as forward ; but it is So with the human race as a whole, so with mankind. Religion—which begins in feeling, proceeds to thought, and thence to action, — in its highest form is the keeping of all the Laws which God writ in the constitution of man: in other words, it is the service of God by the normal use, discipline, development, enjoyment and delight of every limb of the body, every faculty of the spirit, every power' which we possess over matter or over mankind, - each in its due proportion, all in their com- plete harmony. That is the whole and complete religion. II. Now leaving out of sight for a moment the matter of mere sentiment, in religion reducing itself to practice there are two things, – to wit, first, Intellectual Ideas, doctrines of the mind, things to be believed; secondly, Moral Duties, doctrines of the conscience, things to be done. Each man in his private individual capacity, as Edwin or Richard, has his own intellectual ideas, things to be believed, his own moral duties, things to be done. To be faithful to himself he must believe the one and must do the other. It is a part of his personal religion to believe the truths which he knows, to do the duties that he acknowledges. But man is social as well as solitary. So men, in their collective capacity as churches, towns, nations, come to the conclusion that they have certain intellectual ideas which ought to be believed, certain moral duties which ought to be done. As an expression of this fact, men assembling in bodies for purposes called religious, àS churches, make up a collection of ideas connected with religion, which are deemed true. They call this a Creed. It is a collection of things to be believed, and so it is also a rule of intellectual conduct in matters pertaining to religion. They likewise assemble in bodies for a purpose more directly practical, as towns, as nations, and make a col- lection of duties which are deemed obligatory. They call this collection of duties a Constitution or a Code of Statutes. 12 I will use the word statute to mean what is commonly called a law, made by men : that is to say a rule of practical conduct devised by men in authority. I keep the word Law to describe the natural mode of operation which God wrote in the constitution of material or human nature, and the word Statute for that rule of conduct which man makes and adds thereunto. This is a legitimate aim in making the Creed, - to preserve all known religious truth, and diffuse it amongst men. But it is not legitimate to aim at hindering the attainment of new religious truth, or to hinder efforts for the attainment of new religious truth. . This is a legitimate aim in making the Statutes, – to preserve all known moral duty, and diffuse it amongst men; and thereby secure to each man the enjoyment of all his natural rights, so that he may act accord- ing to the natural mode of operation of his powers. But it is not legitimate to hinder the attainment of new moral duty, or efforts after that. The creed should aim at Truth, all truth, and should be a step towards it. The statutes should aim at Justice, all justice, to ensure all the rights of all, and should be a step in that direction, not away from it. Both the creeds and statutes may be made as fol- lows: First, they may be made by men who are far before the people, men who get sight of truths and duties in 13 advance of mankind. Then these men set to mankind a hard lesson, but one that is profitable for instruction, for doctrine, for reproof, that the man of God may be thoroughly furnished to every good work. In such cases the creed or statute is educational; it is prepared for the pupil, set by a master. Or, secondly, these creeds and statutes may be made by men who are just on a level with the average of the people. Then they are simply expressional of the moral character and attainments of the average men. They are educational to the hindmost, expressional to the mid- dlemost, and merely protectional to the foremost, — of no service as helping them forward, only as protecting them from being disturbed, interrupted and so drawn back- wards by those who are behind. Or, thirdly, these creeds and statutes may be made by crafty men who are below the moral average of the peo- ple ; made not as steps towards truth and justice, but as means for the private personal ambition of such as make the statutes or the creeds; by men who are endowed with force of body, and rule over our flesh by violence, or with force of cunning, and rule over our minds by sophistry and fraud. In this case the creed or statute is a step backwards, aims not at truth and justice, but at falsehood and wrong, and is simply debasing, — debas- ing to the mind and conscience. Here it is not a teacher giving lessons to the pupil; it is not a pupil undertaking to set a lesson to another who knows as much as he does; 14 it is a scoundrel setting a lesson of wickedness to the saint and the sinner. Laws may be made in any one of these three ways, and no more ; the categories are exhaustive. Now see the relation of each individual man to the Creed of his Nation or Church. By his moral nature man is bound to believe what to him appears true. His mind demands it as intellectual duty, his conscience demands it as moral duty ; it is a part of his religion ; faithfulness to himself requires this. But he is likewise morally bound to reject everything that to him seems false. He can close his mind and not think about the matter at all, and so he may seem to believe when he does not ; or he can actually think the other way and lie about it and pretend to believe. But if he is faithful, he must believe what to him seems true, and must reject what to him seems untrue. If a man does this, the public creed of the people or church may be a help to him, because while it embodies both the truths that men know, and the errors which they likewise suppose to be true, he accepts from the creed what he deems true and rejects what he deems false. The false that he rejects, harms him not ; the true which he accepts is a blessing. But there is this trouble, – the priest, who has made, invented or im- ported the creed, claims jurisdiction over the minds of men and bids the philosopher “Accept our creed.” 15 “No l’’ answers the philosopher, “I cannot my reason forbids.” “Then, down with your reason l’’ thunders the priest, “there is no truth above our creed The priest and creed are not amenable to reason; reason is amenable to them l’” What shall be done 7 Shall the philosopher submit, and seem to believe 7 Shall he think the other way, and yet pretend to believe, and lie 7 or shall he openly and unhesitatingly reject what seems false ? Ask these prophets of the Old Testament what we shall do! ask Socrates, Anaxagoras, Paul, Luther, Jesus ! ask the Puritans of England, the Huguenots of France, the Covenanters of Scotland, which we shall do! whether we shall count human Reason amenable to the priest, or the priest amenable to human Reason. Sometimes a whole nation violates its mind and submits to the priest’s creed. The many mainly give up think- ing all together, — they can do it and have done it ; the few think, but lie outwardly, pretending belief. Then there comes the intellectual death of the nation ; the people are cut off from new accessions of truth, and intel- lectually they die out. “Where there is no vision the people perish,” says the Old Testament; and there is not a word in the Bible that is more true. Tear a rose- bush from the ground and suspend it in the air, will it live 7 Just as much will man’s mind live when plucked away from contact with Truth. Do you want historic examples? Look at Mahometan countries compared with Christian. Whilst the Koran was in advance of the 16 Mahometans there was a progress in the nations which accepted it. There arose great men. But now when men have lived up to the Koran, and are forbidden to think further, science dies out, all original literature disap- pears, there is no great spiritual growth. In the whole Mahometan world this day, there is not a single man eminent for science or literature ; not a great Ma- hometan orator, poet or statesman, amongst all the many millions of Mahometans on the round world. Look at a Catholic in comparison with a Protestant coun- try. Compare Catholic Spain, Portugal, Italy, with England, Scotland, Germany, noble Protestant countries, and see the odds. In the Catholic countries the priest has laid himself down at the foot of the tree, and says, “Root into me, and you shall have life.” Compare Catholic Brazil with Protestant New England. Nay, in New England, go into the families of private men, fam- ilies where bigotry of the various denominations, Unita- rian as well as Trinitarian,—for there is a “Unitarian” bigotry, has put its cold, hard hand, and forbidden freedom of thought ; — compare the children born and bred there with such as are born and bred in families where freedom of thought is not only tolerated but en- couraged, and see the difference. The foremost men of this country in Science, literature, statesmanship, are men who have spurned that Pharisaic meanness, which chains a man’s mind and fetters his conscience. 17 It is as important to accumulate the thoughts of many men, as to consolidate their property for building a rail- road, a factory, or a town. No single man is so rich as the whole people of Massachusetts; and though before all other in Some speciality; no one man is so rich in thought as mankind. To aggregate the knowledge of a hundred men, each mastering some special subject, is of great value; it embodies the result of very much think- ing, which may be thus hoarded up for future use. That is a good thing; and as each truth is a source of power, it quickens other men and helps them to think. Such is the effect of the scientific associations of Christendom, from the Boston Society of Natural History, to the French Academy, perhaps the most learned and accom- plished body of men on earth. That is a legitimate function of bodies of men coming together, each dropping his special wisdom into the human chest, for the advan- tage of the whole. But on the other hand, the consolidation of the opiº- ions of men who are not seeking for truth to liberate mankind, but for means to enthrall us withal, will embody falsehood and also retard the progress of mankind by hin- dering free thought. This will be the result wherever the actual creed is taken for total, - embracing all truth now known ; as final, - embracing all truth that is to be known ; and as unquestionable, the ultimate standard of Truth. I8 I just said there was not a single eminent man of science or letters in any Mahometan country ; not a great scholar, philosopher, or historian. Yet there is talent enough born into Mahometan countries, – as much as in Christian nations of the same race ; but it has not opportunity for development; the young Hercules is choked in his cradle. Look at the Catholics of the United States in comparison with the Protestants. In the whole of America there is not a single man born and bred a Catholic distinguished for anything but his devo- tion to the Catholic Church : I mean to say there is not a man in America born and bred a Catholic, who has any distinction in science, literature, politics, benevolence or philanthropy. I do not know one ; I never heard of a great philosopher, naturalist, historian, orator or poet amongst them. The Jesuits have been in existence three hundred years; they have had their pick of the choicest intellect of all Europe, – they never take a cºmmon man when they know it, — they subject every pupil to a severe ordeal, intellectual and physical, as well as moral, in order to ascertain whether he has the requi- site stuff in him to make a strong Jesuit out of. They have a scheme of education masterly in its way. But there has not been a single great original man produced in the company of Jesuits from 1545 to 1854. They absorb talent enough but they strangle it. Clipped oaks never grow large. Prune the roots of a tree with a spade, prune the branches close to the bole, what be- comes of the tree ? The bole itself remains thin and I9 scant and slender. Can a man be a conventional dwarf and a natural giant at the same time ! Case your little boy's limbs in metal, would they grow 2 Plant a chest- nut in a tea-cup, do you get a tree ? Not a shrub even. Put a priest, or a priest’s creed as the only soil for a man to grow in ; he grows not. The great God provided the natural mode of operation : — do you suppose He will turn aside and mend or mar the Universe at your or my request ? I think God will do no such thing. Now see the relation of the individual to the Statutes of men. There is a natural duty to obey every statute which is just. It is so before the thing becomes a statute. The legislator makes a decree ; it is a declaration that certain things must be done, or certain other things not done. If the things commanded are just, the statute does not make them just ; does not make them any more morally obligatory than they were before. The legislator may make it very uncomfortable for me to disobey his command, when that is wicked; he cannot make it right for me to keep it when wicked. All the moral obligation depends on the justice of the statute, not on its legality; not on its constitutionality ; but, on the fact that it is a part of the natural Law of God, the natural mode of ope- ration of man. The statute no more makes it a moral duty to love men and not hate them, than the multiplica- tion table makes twice two four : the multiplication table declares it ; it does not make it. If a statute announces, “Thou shalt hate thy neighbor, not love him,” it does 20 not change the duty, more than the multiplication table would alter the fact if it should declare that twice two is three. Geometry proves that the three angles of a tri- angle are equal to two right angles: it does not make the equality between the two. Now then, as it is a moral duty to obey a just statute because it is just, so it is a moral duty to disobey any statute which is unjust. If the statute squares with the Law of God, if the constitution of Morocco corresponds with the Constitution of the Universe, which God writ in my heart, — then I am to keep the constitution of Mo- rocco; if not, disobey it, as a matter of conscience. Here in disobedience, there are two degrees. First, there is passive disobedience, non-obedience, the doing nothing for the statute ; and second, there is active diso- bedience, which is resistance, the doing something, not for the statute, but something against it. Sometimes the moral duty is accomplished by the passive disobedience, doing nothing ; sometimes, to accomplish the moral duty, it is requisite to resist, to do something against the statute. However, we are to resist wrong by right, not wrong by wrong. There are many statutes which relate mainly to mat- ters of convenience. They are rules of public conduct indeed, but only rules of prudence, not of morals. Such are the statutes declaring that a man shall not vote till twenty-one ; that he shall drive his team on the right hand side of the street; that he may take six per cent. per annum as interest, and not sixty ; that he may catch 21 alewives in Taunton River on Fridays, and not on Thurs days or Saturdays. It is necessary that there should be such rules of prudence as these ; and while they do not offend the conscience every good man will respect them ; it is not immoral to keep them. The intellectual value of a creed is that while it em- bodies truth it also represents the free thought of the believer who has come to that conclusion, either by him- self alone, or as he has been voluntarily helped thither- ward by some person who knows better than he. In that case his creed is the monument of the man’s progress, and is the basis for future progress. It is to him, in that stage of his growth, the right rule of intellectual conduct. But when the creed is forced on the man, and he pretends to believe and believes not, or only tacitly assents, not having thought enough to deny it, — then it debases and enslaves the man. So the moral value of a statute is, that while it em- bodies justice it also represents the free conscience of the nation. Then also it is a monument of the nation's moral progress, showing how far it has got on. It is likewise a basis for future progress, being 'a right rule for moral conduct. But when the statute only embodies injustice, and so violates the conscience, and is forced on men by bayonets, then its moral value is all gone ; it is against the conscience. If the people consent to suffer it, it is because they are weak; and if they consent to obey it, it is because they are also wicked. When the foremost moral men make a statute in ad- 22 vance of the people, and then attempt to enforce that law against the consent of the majority of the people, it is an effort in the right direction and is educational ; then I suppose the best men will try to execute the law, and will appeal to the best motives in the rest of men. But even here, if ever this is attempted, it should always be done with the greatest caution, lest the leader should go too fast for his followers, undertaking to drag the nation instead of leading them. You may drag dead oxen, drive living oxen; but a nation is not to be dragged, not to be driven, even in the right direction; it is to be led. A grown father, six feet high, does not walk five miles the hour with his child two years old; if he does, he must drag his boy; if he wants to lead him he must go by slow and careful steps, now and then taking him over the rough places in his arms. That must be done when the law-maker is very far in advance of the people; he must lead them gently to the right end. But when a wicked statute is made by the hindmost men in morals, men far in the rear of the average of the people, and urging them in the wrong direction ; when the statute offends the conscience of the people, and the rulers undertake by violence to enforce the statute, then it can be only mean men who will desire its execution, and they must appeal to the lowest motives which animate mean men, and will thus debase the people further and further. The priest makes a creed against the mind of the peo- ple, and Says, “There is no truth above my creed' 23 Down with your reason it asks terrible questions.” So the Catholic is always taught by authority. The priest does not aim to convince the reason ; not at all ! He Says to the philosophers, “This is the doctrine of the church. It is a true doctrine, but you must believe it, not because it is true, – you have no right to ask ques- tions, – but because the church says so.” The tyrant makes a statute, and says, “There is no Law above this.” The subject is not to ask, “Is the statute right ! does it conform to the Constitution of the Universe, to God’s will reflected in my conscience " '' . He is only to inquire, “Is it a statute law what does the judge say ? There is no Higher Law.” That is the doctrine which is taught to-day in almost every political newspaper in this country, Whig and Democratic ; and in many of the theological newspa- pers. But the theological newspapers do not teach it as a Principle and all at once ; they teach it in detail, as a Measure, telling us that this or that particular statute is to be observed, say conscience what it may. It is assumed that the legislator is not amenable to the rules of natural justice. He is only checked by the constitu- tion of the land, not the Constitution of the Universe. See how the principle once worked. Pharaoh made a statute that all the new-born boys of Hebrew parentage should be killed as soon as they were born. That was the statute ; and instructions were given to the nurses, “Iſ it be a son, then ye shall kill him.” Did it become the moral duty of Nurse Shiprah and Nurse Puah to 24 drown every new-born Hebrew baby in the River Nile ! Was it the moral duty of Amram and Jochebed to allow Moses to be killed ! It is only a legitimate application of the principle laid down by “the highest authorities” in America, – what are called the highest, though I reckon them among the lowest. Ring Darius forbade prayer to any God ór man ex- cept himself. Should the worshippers of Jehovah hold back their prayer to the Creator 7 Daniel was of rather a different opinion. A few years ago a minister of a “ prominent church’’ in this city was told of another minister who had exhorted persons to disobey the Fugi- tive Slave Bill, because it was contrary to the Law of God and the principles of Right. “What do you think of it !” said the questioner, who was a woman, to the Doctor of Divinity. “Very bad!” replied he, “this minister ought to keep the statute, and he should not advise men to disobey it.” “But,” said the good wo- man, “Daniel, we are told, when the law was otherwise, prayed to the Lord! prayed right out loud three times a day, with his window wide open I Did he do right or wrong Would not you have done the same ' " The minister said, “If I had lived in those times, I think, I should — have shut my window.” There was no Higher Law King Herod ordered all the young children in Bethle- hem to be slain. Was it right for the magistrates to execute the order 7 for the Justices of the Peace to kill the babies 7 for the fathers and mothers to do nothing 25 against the massacre of those innocents' The person who wrote the account of it seems to have been of rather a different opinion. Ring Henry the Eighth of England, ordered that no man should read the English Bible. Reading the Bible in the Kingdom was made a felony, -— punishable with death, without benefit of clergy. Was it the duty of Dr, Franklin’s humble fathers to refuse to read their Bibles They did read them, and your fathers and mine also, I trust. King Pharaoh, Darius, Herod, Henry the Eighth, could not make a wrong thing right. If a mechanic puts his wheel on the upper side of the dam, do you suppose the Merrimack is going to run up into New Hampshire to turn his mill 7 Just as soon as the great God will undo his own moral work to accommo- date a foolish and wicked legislator. Suppose it was not the king, a one-headed legis- lator, but the majority of the nation, a legislator with many heads, who made the statutes, would that alter the case ? Once, when France was democratic, the democ- racy ordered the butchery of thousands of men and women. Was it a moral duty to massacre the people 7 I know very well it is commonly taught that it is the moral duty of the officers of government to execute every statute, and of the people to submit thereto, no matter how wicked the statute may be. This is the doctrine of the Supreme Court of the United States of America, of the Executive of the United States ; I know very well it is the doctrine of the majority of the 26 Legislature in both Houses of Congress; it is the doctrine of the churches of Commerce : — God be praised, it is not the doctrine of the churches of Christianity, and there are such in every denomination, in many a town ; even in the great centers of commerce there are minis- ters of many denominations, earnest, faithful men, who swear openly that they will keep God’s Law, come what will of man’s statute. This is practical piety; the oppo- site is practical atheism. I have known some specula- tive atheists. I abhor their doctrines; but the specula- tive atheists that I have known, all recognize à Law higher than men’s passions and calculations; the Law of some Power which makes the Universe and sways it for noble purposes and to a blessed end. Then comes the doctrine : — while the statute is on the books it must be enforced. It is not only the right of the legislator to make any constitutional statute he pleases, but it is the moral and religious duty of the mag- istrate to enforce the statute ; it is the duty of the peo- ple to obey. So in Pharaoh’s time it was a moral duty to drown the babies in the Nile ; in Darius’ time to pray to King Darius, and him only ; in Herod’s time to mas- sacre the children of Bethlehem ; in Henry the Eighth's time to cast your Bible to the flames. Iscariot only did a disagreeable duty. It is a most dreadful doctrine; utterly false ! Has a legislator, Pharaoh, Darius, Herod, Henry the Eighth, a single tyrant, any moral right to repudiate God, and declare himself not amenable to the moral Law of the 27 Universe 2 You all answer, No ! Have ten millions of men out of nineteen millions in America a right to do this 7 Has any man a moral right to repudiate justice and declare himself not amenable to conscience and to God 7 Where did he get the right to invade the conscience of mankind 7 Is it because he is legislator, magistrate, governor, president, king 7 Suppose all the voluptuaries of America held a con- gress of lewdness at New Orleans, and said, “There is no Law higher than the brute instinctive passion of lust in men,”— then would the pimps and bawds and lechers have the moral right to repudiate conscience and crush purity out of the nation ? Imagine that all the misers and sharpers and cheats held a convention of avarice at New York or Boston, and made statutes accordingly, declaring “There is no Law higher than covetousness,”—would they have the moral right to lie and steal and cheat, and “crush out” all the honest men 7 Fancy all the ruffians and man-killers assembled in San Francisco, -it would be a fit place, for there were twelve hundred murders committed there in less than four years, – held a convention of violence, and sought to organize murder, and declared, “There is no Law higher than the might of the lifted arm,” — would they have the moral right to kill, stab, butcher whomsoever they pleased ? y But that is supposing all this wickedness done without the form of an elected legislature. Then suppose the actual legislatures of the nation should revise the Consti- * 28 tution and delegate the power to those persons to do that Work and make statutes for the protection of lewdness, fraud and butchery, - would it then be the moral duty of the rulers to enforce those statutes; and of the people to Submit Just as much as it is the moral duty of men to enforce any wicked statute made under the present Con- stitution of the United States and by the present legisla- tors. The principle is false. It is only justified on the idea that there is no God, and this world is a chaos. But yet it is taught ; and only last Sunday the minister of a “prominent church '' taught that every law must be executed, right or wrong, and thanked the soldiers who, with their bayonets, forced an innocent man to slavery. No matter how unjust a statute is, it must be enforced and obeyed so long as it is on the Law Book Human law in general is a useful and indispensable instrument ; but because a special statute is made for injustice, is it to be used for injustice 7 Massachusetts has some thousands of muskets in the arsenal at Cam- bridge ; but because they were made to shoot with, shall I take them to kill my neighbors; shall the governor order the soldiers to shoot down the citizens ! It is no worse to do injustice with a gun than to do injustice with a statute. It is not merely the means by which the wicked end is reached that is wicked, it is the end itself; and if the means is a thing otherwise good, the wicked end makes its use atrocious. What is the statute in the one case but a tool, and the gun a tool in the other case ? The instrument is not to be blamed, and the gun is no 29 more to be used for a wicked purpose than the statute ; a State statute no more than a State gun. Medicine is a very useful thing. But will you, therefore, go into an apothecary’s shop and take his drugs at random ' If you are killed by a poison it is no better because called ‘medicine.” But the notion that every statute must be enforced is historically false. Who enforces the Sunday-law in Massachusetts 7 Every daily newspaper you will read to-morrow morning violates the statutes of Massachusetts to-day. It would not be possible to enforce them. Of all the millions of bank capital in Massachusetts, within twelve months, every dollar has violated the statute against Usury. Nobody enforces these acts. Half the statutes of New England are but sleeping lions to wait for the call of the people ; nobody wakes them up every day. Some have been so long fast asleep that they are dead. g When the nation will accept every creed which the priest makes, because it is made for them, then they are tools for the priest, intellectually dead; and they are fit to have Catholic tyrants rule over them in the church. When the nation is willing to accept a statute which violates the nation’s conscience, the nation is rotten. If a statute is right, I will ask how I can best obey it. When it is wrong, I will ask how I can best disobey it, — most safely, most effectually, with the least vio- lence. When we make the priest the keeper of our creed, the State the master of our conscience, then it is all over with us. 30 * Sometimes a great deal of Sophistry is used to deceive the consciences of men and make them think a wicked law is just and right. There are two modes of procedure for reaching this end. One is to weaken the man’s confidence in his own moral perceptions by debasing human nature, declaring that conscience is a “most uncertain guide for the indi- vidual,” and showing that all manner of follies and even wickedness have been perpetrated in its name. So all manner of follies have been taught in the name of Rea- son, and foolish undertakings have been set a going by prudent and practical men. But is that sufficient argu- ment for refusing to trust the science of the philosopher and the common sense of practical men'ſ The other way is to pretend that the obnoxious statute is “ consistent with morality and religion.” Thus the most wicked acts have been announced in the name of God. The Catholics claimed divine authority for the Inquisition; the Carthaginians alleged the command of God as authority for sacrificing children to Melkarte. In the Law Library at Cambridge, a copy of the English Bible in Folio was once the first book in the collection; a Profes- sor then used often to point to the Bible and say, “That is the foundation of the law. It all rests on the word of God!” So every wicked statute, each “ungodly cus- tom become a law,” had divine authority The same experiment is often tried with the fugitive slave bill— it is declared “divine,” having “ the sanction of the Law, the Prophets and the Gospel.” 31 With these two poisons do men corrupt the public fountains of morality Religion is the only basis for everything. It must go everywhere, into the man’s shop, into the seamstress’ work-room, must steer the Sailor's ship. Reverence for the Infinite Mind, and Conscience, and Heart, and Soul, who is Cause and Providence of this world, - that must go up to the highest heights of our speculation, down to the lowest deeps of our practice. Take that away, and there is nothing on which you can depend, even for your money ; or for your liberty and life. Without a reverence for the Higher Law of God every thing will be ruled by interest or violence. The Church will collapse into nothing, the State will go down to Juin All around us are monuments of men who, in the name of Truth broke the priest's creed, defied the king's statute in the spirit of Justice. Look at them | There is a little one at Acton where two men gave their lives for their country ; another at Concord ; one at Lexing- ton, — a little pile of dear old mossy stone, “Sacred to Liberty and the Rights of Mankind; ” another at West Cambridge ; another at Danvers, – all commemorative of the same deed; and on yonder hill there is a great stone finger pointing to God’s Higher Law, and casting its shadow on the shame of the two sister cities. All New England is a monument to the memory of those men who trusted God’s Higher Law, and for its sake put an ocean three thousand miles wide between them and 32 their mothers’ bones. It is this which makes Plymouth Rock so dear. Our calendar is dotted all over with days sacred to the memory of such men. What are the First of August, the Twenty-second of December, the Nine- teenth of April, the Seventeenth of June, the Fourth of July, but bright, red-letter days in our calendar, marked by the memory of men who were faithful to God, say the statutes of tyrants what they may say ? Nay, what else are these venerable days, called Christmas, Easter, Pentecost and the Catholic Saints' days throughout the Christian year ! There is one thing which this Bible teaches in almost every page, and that is reverence for the Higher Law of God. The greatest men who wrote here were only men ; to err is human, we all learn by experiment, and they were mistaken in many things; but all teach this, from the littlest to the greatest, from Genesis to Revelation, — RELIGION BEFORE ALL OTHER THINGs, REVERENCE FOR GOD ABOVE ALL | It was that for which Jesus bowed his head on the Cross, and “sat down at the right hand of God.” There is an Infinite God You and I owe allegiance to Him, and our service of Him is the keeping of every Law which He has made ; —keeping it faithfully, ear- nestly, honestly. That is Religion, and to those who do it, on every thundering cloud which passes over their heads, He will cast his rainbow, girdling it with seven- fold magnificence of beauty, and on that cloud take them to His own Kingdom of Heaven, to be with Him forever and forever. TRUTH NOT TO BE OVERTHROWN NOR SILENCED : - SERMON P R E A G H E D A T Do R C H E S T E R. SUNDAY, JAN. 27, 1861. BY NATHANIEL HALL. IBO STON : PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SON, 22, SCIIOOL STREET. i 1861. .* TRUTH NOT TO BE OVERTHROWN NOR SILENCED : SERM ON P R E A C H E D A T D O R C H E S T E R, SUNDAY, JAN. 27, 1861. B Y N A T H A N IF L H A L L. BOST ON : PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SON, 22, School, STREET. 1861. DORCHESTER, Jan. 27, 1861. REVEREND AND DEAR SIR, Believing that the proper time to urge a truth and to defend a right is when that truth is assailed or that right denied, we thank you for your yesterday's testi- mony in defence of free speech; and we beg that you will permit us, through the agency of the press, to spread more widely that testimony. FREDERICK. W. G. MAY. WM. E. COFFIN. RICHARD CLAP. WILLIAM POPE. FLAVEL MosBLEY. J. C. LINDSLEY. John G. NAZRO. FRANKLIN KING. HENRY HUMPHREYS. HENRY G. DENNY. John J. MAY. A. H. SUMNER. THOMAS GROOM. JNO. H. ROBINSON. INCREASE S. SMITH. OTIs SHEPARD. S E R M O N. ACTS W. 39. “IF TIIIs counsEL or THIS work BE OF GOD, YE CANNOT overtHRow IT.” THE words were spoken by a Pharisee to his brother- councilmen as a warning against the continued per- secution of certain reformers, of some note in their day, and some fame in the present, — a fame, indeed, which the world will not only not let die, but persists in widening and brightening as the ages roll. The Pharisee was wise in his generation. His affirmation, whether grounded on a simple faith in God as truth's infinite author and almighty defender, and in man as made to discern and embrace it, or whether based on the facts of history and experience, was nobly spoken, —is immutably true. All truth is God's, and God is with all truth. He stands pledged for it. He is surety for its triumph. Truth has its defeats; but its very defeats have but strengthened it for wider conquests. Persecutions have but lifted it to a more 6 conspicuous height. Through the graves of its mar- tyrs it has struck deeper root, and from their dying faces has caught a diviner illumination. Turned aside from its right-onward progress by the opposi- tion of ignorance or self-interest, it has made for itself other channels, and gained thereby, how often, an accelerated flow ; like a river, which, obstructed in its natural direction, sweeps backward towards its source, as if its way was evermore to be reversed; but bends seaward again, and courses with swifter and broader tide, – plain and valley offering it passage-way, though the lordly hills refuse. “Ye cannot overthrow it.” No : for its home is the bosom of the Infinite, and of all who, through a moral affinity, are fitted to receive it. They who would drive truth from the world must first dis- solve the relations God has ordained between it and the soul, between himself and the soul, and put bar- riers to their intercourse. Each new birth brings the world a new witness to it. Each faithful heart offers a new conduit for its transmission, a new plea for its acceptance. “Ye cannot overthrow it.” Though battled against by the armed forces of the nations; though its advocates and witnesses be hunted and slain, and every page and every monument whereon men had inscribed it should perish, – itself would be ; would be in the world; known, accepted, honored. 7 Down from its eternal summits would it flow into my- riad souls, in the measure of their capacity to receive it. Forth from those souls, in the measure of their op- portunity and fidelity, by speech and by act, would it flow outward and on. The whole history of the past is a rebuke to our distrust of truth. How impotent have been the attempts to arrest and bind it ! — at- tempts, to the eyes above us, like those of childhood to oppose the rising tides of ocean by its mimic sand- mounds. What darker hour apparently for truth has the world known, than that when, scourged and cru- cified in the person of its Great Witness, it was consigned to the sealed and guarded sepulchre, — no voice to lift for it a whispered plea as there it slum- bered in its icy fetters? What a triumph have its foes achieved Wait ! A few hours, – and that tomb is riven, its occupant living and abroad, and his timid, half-disbelieving followers nerved with a dauntless courage, the cloud of their distrust for ever vanished, their souls lighted with new inspiration, ready to suffer, ready to die, in bearing witness to the risen Truth ; while shrine and idol sink to ashes before their “tongues of fire.” The truth which those apostles spoke, the “work and counsel” to which, in its name, they gave them- , selves, has stood the test which Gamaliel proposed for it. It has not been overthrown. It is of God. It is of God, and shall never be overthrown. He will cause its perfect triumph over every thing that op- poses itself. The consummation may be long delayed; but it shall surely come. Meanwhile, let us have pa- tience through our little life-term, as God has patience through the eternal ages, at its slow advance ; work- ing for it as we may ; suffering, dying for it, if such the cost of our fidelity ; rejoicing that so we may enter the glorious brotherhood of prophets, confessors, heroes, saints, who have gone before us, who, “being dead, yet speak; ” yea, live, through their transmit- ted influence, a deathless life on earth. I know not how it may be with you, my friends; but for myself I feel an especial need of views like these, at this present time, to cheer a sadness that would else be overwhelming. You must all know to what I refer ; and I proceed to make it a distinct topic of remark. I could not, believe me, bring you any other theme to-day, without disregarding the plea alike of conscience and of heart. As, three days ago, I sat on the platform of Tremont Temple, and took in the scene there before me, and saw in it more than the eye perceived, I felt then and there that text and subject were given by Providence, which I might for no reason refuse. Do any deem it a theme unbefit- ting the pulpit? Let me say, I know of none more fitting, connected as it is with the very existence of the pulpit, or of the freedom which alone makes its existence worth any thing. There is not a pulpit in Massachusetts, in New England, upon which a threatening shadow has not fallen from that scene of outrage. Such shadow has fallen thence upon you and me, and each one of us. There is not a civil privi- lege, nor a social nor domestic blessing, nor a material possession, which is not less secure by reason of that permittedly successful outrage. Look well, I do not say to your pulpits, your rights, your liberties, only; but to your property, your dwellings, your persons: for there is no law in yonder city — and, if not there, not here — that will protect them, save on certain conditions which conscience may not suffer you to fulfil. Among the circumstances for sadness connected with this outrage, the very least to me was the effect wrought upon the objects of it. Nay, I have no sad- ness in that view. Their cause is unharmed by it; is greatly helped. It has gained to it an awakened attention ; it has won for it a deeper, if not wider, sympathy. “We can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth.” The attempt to silence men from uttering their God-given word makes their very silence more persuasive for it than a host of tongues. The attempt to quench agitation fans it as with a thousand airs. No : the sadness about it is not here. It is 2 10 not in view of the victims, if they can in any sense be called such, but of the authors and abetters of the outrage. And these are many. They are scattered wide in this community. You will not find them in the haunts of ruffianism, not in coarse apparel, not in low bar-rooms, only ; but also amid social decorums and amenities and refinements, in haunts of wealth, in offices of trust, in houses of worship to-day. This outrage would claim no very serious regard, if its visi- ble actors were alone concerned in it. A mob is always possible in a large city. Its elements con- tinually latent, there is nothing strange certainly, nor perhaps alarming, in their occasional outbreak. It is the class alleged to have incited and encouraged and sustained it which makes this mob so alarmingly sig- nificant. It was sad enough to see who were its active par- ticipants: above all, to see, as such, youth, – youth, on whose generous instincts, unchilled as yet by sordid- ness and self, on whose native sympathies with the just, the manly, the noble, in character and conduct, we feel we have a right to rely in any enterprise of humanity, any struggle of weakness against strength. It was sad. Their very merriment made it more so : the very thoughtlessness, the very shallowness of nature, if it was not depravity, which made that merriment possible in such connection ; allowing, 11 that to be a holiday pastime, which was in truth, though they had not the eye to see it, the meanest and most unmanly of deeds. And did they know what they were doing, — whoever they were, that, keeping themselves in the background, - as well for shame they might, — set forward that band of youth to take those first lessons, under their patronage, in public law- lessness ; and those lessons practised against, in the design of suppressing the exercise of, the dear- est and most sacred of civil rights ; and when, too, that right was being exercised not only law- fully, but benevolently, in behalf of the poor and helpless and oppressed ? Those lessons, in the sub- lime secret of conducting mobs, will not be forgotten ; nor will the corrupting influence cease to work of those who lent their patronage and encouragement to make of Tremont Temple, for that day, a uni- versity of rowdyism, - a battle-ground of a most igno- ble contest, and a more ignoble victory. It is hard to believe that the accounted respectability of the com- munity — any portion of it — should have lent itself to such a work. It is hard to believe, letting alone the meanness and wickedness of the thing, and look- ing at it in the light of policy alone, how men of common intelligence and discernment should not have seen, that not only the ends proposed to be 12 answered by it—if these ends were to silence and crush the party assailed — must fail of being so, save for the time ; but that the very attempt and its tem- porary success would re-act, in manifold ways, for the gain of the assailed. And need they be told that the mob-spirit cannot be laid as readily as it may be evoked, that every triumph emboldens and augments it, and that they themselves may be the first to seek refuge from the very lawlessness they have allowed themselves to sanction They have succeeded in making freedom the dangerous, and oppression the safe, cause to espouse, just now, in our Puritan city, our liberty-cradling city. But the power instructed and incited to this end will not always be schooled to its masters' bounds. In the knowledge of its might, it will soon have no master save its own blind impulses and passions. Once rampant, it will hardly content itself with hunting despised philanthropists from hired halls, — or any one of them, however illustrious, from hall to home ; but will, not unlikely, prefer as victims those who pass and repass from lofty mansions to loftier stores and banking-houses. And then, again, as regards opinions, do they not see, if opinions are to be suppressed, or the utterance of them, on the ground of their obnoxiousness to a certain portion of the community, that it is not one class of opinions only against which the mob-power will be invoked, 13 but against any and all that for any reason are offensive . They cannot inaugurate for a specific end this reign of despotism, and prevent the extension of its threatening domination to whatever may be supposed to militate, though it be the very truth of God, against class-interests or the general outward prosperity. It is but a short step from platform to pulpit ; and, the speech of the former assailed for its unpopularity, its unfavorable political or commercial bearings, – how long before that of the latter will be Indeed, is it not likely to be already the purpose of this new inquisitorial and despotic power, with its secret edicts and its ruffian bands and its social and moneyed resources, to do this? — when it has spread itself a little broader and struck itself a little deeper, to take the pulpit into its closer keeping, and dic- tate to it terms of peace' Well: truth, freedom, right, have always had their martyrs, – always needed them. It may be they need them now. Not the martyrs merely (for these are always) who are such by slowly wasting labors and endurances, but those also who shall seal their testimony with their blood. I believe there are multitudes ready for this; that, with all the reputed and actual worldliness and materialism of the age, there would come forth thousands from the bosom of this community, to lay down, if need were, their 14 lives, for that which is dearer to them than life. Those men and women whom you hunt so, in the interest of slavery; whose lips you attempt to shut, whether by the hands of ruffian violence or the pressure of public sentiment, — do you think they are not ready to sacrifice for the principles to which conviction and feeling have been clinging the closer, year after year, until they are a part of their very being; which have become dearer by the sacrifices they have already endured for them, and which you have made dearer than ever by this latest outrage : do you think they are not ready, many of them, to sacrifice whatever may be the future cost of an un- swerving fidelity, though that cost were life? That one among them who sits to-day in his sick-chamber, worn and feeble by the toils and endurances of more than thirty years for the cause of the bondman; who has given his noble manhood in a single-hearted devotion to it, — never a truer martyr-spirit went up in flame, or soared from rack or dungeon, in all the ages, than lives and burns, as I believe, in him. He is not alone, though foremost. Friends, I desire, in this connection, to speak as I feel (all the more now, because they are under the ban of public odium and the heel of lawless power) of this class of persons called Abolitionists. My tes- timony may be worth little to you ; but it will be 15 worth something to myself to have given it. It is - common in almost all circles and spheres, not only in political speeches but in pulpit discourses (I have been led to note of late how common it is), to style them “fanatics,” “madmen,” “insane,” as if to sig- nify, by these opprobrious epithets, that they are without claim to a respectful consideration. Will it be said that opprobrious epithets are not all on one side : Allowed. It is poor business, whoever ban- dies them. It is poor business, too, to stand aloof from a righteous enterprise, and criticize, in a spirit of prejudice and distrust, the works and words of its earnest and honest toilers, and let what is judged - censurable in these shut from view the great under- lying principles of the movement, and the consistent and uncompromising fealty to them of its followers; allowing nothing to the fervors of a zeal, which, if it be famatical, is so on the side of freedom and huma- nity. Let any one, of fair mind, give himself for a few months only, as they have done for years, to a contemplation of slavery, in all its aspects and details, its inhumanities and wrongs, and I think their zeal would bear to him a different aspect ; that he would forgive, if he did not respect it. “ Fana- tics' " would to God all were such in an unfinching and all-consuming loyalty to the cause of freedom and humanity, instead of being so coldly and selfishly 16 indifferent to it, or languidly and passively in its in- terest, as such multitudes are who yet claim to be in sympathy with it ! Knowing against whom this cry has been raised in the past, those disposed to employ it in this connection would do well to hesi- tate, and look a little more deeply into the matter, lest perchance they may be placing themselves in company they might not feel honored by. For my- self, I cannot withhold my respect, nor the expression of it, from a movement which bases itself on an abstract moral principle, and is unalterably true to it; which recognizes, as no other does, the Scripture- spoken duty of “remembering them that are in bonds as bound with them ; ” which takes the ground, that slavery is intrinsically and absolutely and eternally wrong, an offence and crime against God and huma- mity, - as such, to be unceasingly denounced, and striven against, — as such, on the part of those up- holding or in any way in complicity with it, to be at once repented of, and put away; which throws this assertion in the face of the nation, and challenges the world to a disproof of it; which allows no pallia- tions of slavery, no excuses, no specious sophisms, Il O politic considerations, to veil its naked, essential hatefulness, as seen in the light of God's truth and the divine instincts of the heart; which declares all compromise with it sinful, and all compacts and laws 17 upholding and favoring it, as, by that fact, null and void. I cannot withhold my respect, nor the expres- sion of it, from those who have planted themselves on this adamantine base, and, amidst obloquy and reproach and denunciation and threat, amidst all the variations and whifflings of popular sentiment, and in the face of all consequences, have nobly stood there. I was speaking of the age as needing its confessors and martyrs. And I believe they would be found, at the call of a providential necessity, not alone in those who thus give organized expression to extreme antislavery sentiments; but also in many more, who, repelled from their organization and from any active sympathy with them,-less by their views than by the form and tone of their advocacy of them, - are yet, essentially and at heart, with them. It can- not be that the spirit of the olden time, the spirit of New England's founders, the spirit of a whole-hearted and self-devoting care for human rights and human disinthrallment, has died away, has gone out, among us. Slavery, I know, has done its best towards kill- ing it, and has done, alas ! much,-our constitutional complicity with that accursed barbarism, and the attempts to which self-interest prompts, and a love of peace, and a timid conservatism, to extenuate and jus- tify and defend it. But the spirit lives, – lives and 3 18 spreads. Thanks for this, more than to aught else of human instrumentality, to the antislavery enterprise, as such ; to the voice, clear and stern, crying, long since and still, in the wilderness of our Judaea, “ Re- pent l” and laying the axe at the root of the tree. The Abolitionists are charged with bringing about the present state of things in our land. So far as this state of things is resolvable into a rising of the free spirit of the North to curb and beat back the waves of an arrogant and aggressive despotism, the charge has truth, and, so far, honors them. But, for what is evil in the condition of affairs, they are chargeable only as the truth is chargeable for the passions and violence its assaults provoke. Or, if the truth given them has been too harshly spoken or too personally applied, charge the consequences upon the evil assailed and its upholders, rather than upon its fervid assailants. Oh that this people would consent to see it; that God would couch, from films of custom and self, the heart-blindness which per- ceives it not, — that the fount and origin of all our ills, our disquiets and contests and perils, is Slavery itself. -- that dark anomaly in our republic, floated down from a barbarous past, and anchored by, and joined in baleful alliance to, the ark of our freedom ; refusing to unloose itself not only, but more and more increasing its overshadowing presence and ingulfing 19 weight; slavery, - setting itself against the matural conscience, the dictates of humanity, the spirit of the age. Here is the cause of trouble. The Eternal Justice has a controversy with this nation, which can have no peace till that controversy is settled on the side of God. It is the “irrepressible conflict” of truth and falsehood, right and wrong; irrepressible because the human heart will be true to itself, and God to his own cause. I close, then, as I began. The cause, the “work and counsel,” based on the immutabilities of God's truth and being, — “ye cannot overthrow it.” If Hebrew Gamaliel could say it, much more the Chris- tian of to-day, with eighteen centuries added to the historic retrospect through which the assurance beams; with a purified and ascendant Christianity; with a fraternal Christ and a parental God, - a Christ whose commission was and is to “break every yoke; ” a God, who lays on each soul a like com- mission, and who works in and by each faithful soul for the same end. - prºvened AT THE of THE - REV. JARED SPARKs, TO THE pastonAL care of THE FIRST INDEPENDENT CHURCH IN BALTIMORE, -- MAY 5, 1819. By WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING, ministra or THE cricken of cHRIST, IN FEDERAL streer, Boston, PUBLISHED BY REQUEST. - BöSTON: ##-PRINTED BY HEws & Goss, * 1819. SERMON. i THESS. v. 21. Prove all things ; hold fast that which is good. THE peculiar circumstances of this occasion not only justify, but seem to demand a departure from the course generally follow- ed by preachers at the introduction of a brother into the sacred office. It is usual to speak of the nature, design, duties and ad- Vantages of the Christian ministry; and on these topicks I should now be happy to insist, did I not remember that a minister is to be given this day to a religious society, whose peculiarities of opin- ion have drawn upon them much remark, and may I not add, much reproach. Many good minds, many sincere Christians, I am aware, are apprehensive that the solemnities of this day are to give a degree of influence to principles which they deem false and injurious. The fears and anxieties of such men I respect; and, believing that they are grounded in part on mistake, I have thought it my duty to lay before you as clearly as I can, some of the distinguishing opinions of that class of Christians in our coun- try, who are known to sympathize with this religious society. I must ask your patience, for such a subject is not to be despatched in a narrow compass. I must also ask you to remember, that it is impossible to exhibit in a single discourse, our view of every doc- trine of revelation, much less the differences of opinion which are known to subsist among ourselves. I shall confine myself to top- icks on which our sentiments have been misrepresented, or which distinguish us most widely from others. May I not hope to be heard with candor. God deliver us all from prejudice, and un- kindness, and fill us with the love of truth and virtue. & There are two natural divisions under which my thoughts will be arranged. I shall endeavour to unfold, 1st, the principles which we adopt in interpreting the Scriptures. And 2dly, some of the doctrines which the Scriptures, so interpreted, seem to us clearly to express. e I. We regard the Scriptures as the record of God's successive revelation to mankind, and particularly of the last and most per- fect revelation of his will by Jesus Christ. Whatever doctrines seem to us to be clearly taught in the Scriptures, we receive with- out reserve or exception. We do not, however, attach equal importance to all the books in this collection... Our religion, we believe, lies chiefly in the New Testament. The dispensation of Moses, compared with that of Jesus, we consider as imperfect, earthly, obscure, adapted to the childhood of the human race, a preparation for a nobler system, and chiefly useful now as serving to confirm and illustrate the Christian Scriptures. Jesus Christ is 4 the only master of Christians, and whatever he taught, either du- ring his personal ministry, or by his inspired apostles, we regard as of divine authority, and profess to make the rule of our lives. This authority, which we give to the Scriptures, is a reason, we conceive, for studying them with peculiar care, and for inquiring anxiously into the principles of interpretation, by which their true meaning may be ascertained. The principles adopted by the class of Christians, in whose name I speak, need to be explained, because they are often misunderstood, We are particularly ac- cused of making an unwarrantable use of reason in the interpreta- tion of Scripture. We are said to exalt reason above revelation, to prefer our own wisdom to God's. Loose and undefined charges of this kind, are circulated so freely, and with such injurious in- tentions, that we think it due to ourselves, and to the cause of truth, to express our views with some particularity. Our leading principle in interpreting Scripture is this, that the Bible is a book written for men, in the language of men, and that its meaning is to be sought in the same manner, as that of other books. We believe that God, when he condescends to speak and write, submits, if we may so say, to the established rules of speak- ing and writing. How else would the Scriptures avail us more than if communicated in an unknown tongue. Now all books, and all conversation, require in the reader or hearer the constant exercise of reason; or their true import is on- ly to be obtained by continual comparison and inference. Human language, you well know, admits various interpretations, and eve- ry word and every sentence must be modified and explained according to the subject which is discussed, according to the purpo- ses, feelings, circumstances and principles of the writer, and accor- ding to the genius and idioms of the language which he uses.— These are acknowledged principles in the interpretation of human writings; and a man, whose words we should explain without ref. erence to these principles, would reproach us justly with a crim- inal want of candour, and an intention of obscuring or distorting his meaning. Were the Bible written in a language and style of its own, did it consist of words, which admit but a single sense, and of sentences wholly detached from each other, there would be no place for the principles now laid down. We could not reason about it, as about other writings, . But such a book would be of little worth ; and perhaps, of all books, the Scriptures correspond least to this des- cription. The word of God bears the stamp of the same hand, which we see in his works. It has infinite connexions and depen. dencies. Every proposition is linked with others, and is to be compared with others, that its full and precise import may be un- derstood. Nothing stands alone. The New Testament is built on the Old. The Christian dispensation is a continuation of the Jewish, the completion of a vast scheme of providence, requiring great extent of view in the reader. Still more, the Bible treats of subjects on which we receive ideas from other sources besides it- self; such subjects as the nature, passions, relations, and duties of scº * 5 man; and it expects us to restrain and modify its language by the known truths which observation and experience furnish on these topicks. We profess not to know a book, which demands a more frequent exercise of reason than the Bible. In addition to the remarks now made on its infinite connexions, we may observe, that its style no where affects the precision of Science, or the accuracy of defini- tion. Its language is singularly glowing, bold and figurative, de- mânding more frequent departures from the literal sense, than that of our own age and country, and consequently demands more con- tinual exercise of judgment. We find too, that the different por- tions of this book, instead of being confined to general truths, refer perpetually to the times when they were written, to states of society, to modes of thinking, to controversies in the church, to feelings and usages which have passed away, and without the knowledge of which we are constantly in danger of extending to all times, and places, what was of temporary and local application. We find, too, that some of these books are strongly marked by the genius and character of their respective writers, that the Ho- ly Spirit did not so guide the apostles as to suspend the peculiari- ties of their minds, and that a knowledge of their feelings, and of the influences under which they were placed, is one of the prep- arations for understanding their writings. With these views of the Bible, we feel it our bounden duty to exercise our reason upon it perpetually, to compare, to infer, to look beyond the let- ter to the spirit, to seek in the nature of the subject, and the aim of the writer, his true meaning ; and, in general, to make use of what is known, for explaining what is difficult, and for discovering new truths. Need I descend to particulars to prove that the Scriptures de- mand the exercise of reason. Take, for example, the style in which they generally speak of God, and observe how habitually they apply to him human passions and organs. Recollect the declarations of Christ, that he came not to send peace, but a sword ; that unless we eat his flesh, and drink his blood, we have no life in us; that we must hate father and mother, pluck out the right eye ; and a vast number of passages equally bold and un- limited. Recollect the unqualified manner in which it is said of Christians, that they possess all things, know all things, and can do all things. Recollect the verbal contradiction between Paul and James, and the apparent clashing of some parts of Paul’s wri- ting, with the general doctrines and end of Christianity. I might extend the enumeration indefinitely, and who does not see, that we must limit all these passages by the known attributes of God, of Jesus Christ, and of human nature, and by the circumstances under which they were written, so as to give the language a quite different import from what it would require, had it been applied to different beings, or used in different connexions. Enough has been said to show in what sense we make use of reason in interpreting Scripture. From a variety of possible in- terpretations, we select that which accords with the nature of the 6 subject, and the state of the writer, with the connexion of the passage, with the general strain of Scripture, with the known character and will of God, and with the obvious and acknowledg- ed laws of nature. In other words, we believe that God never contradicts, in one part of Scripture, what he teaches in another; and never contradicts, in revelation, what he teaches in his works and providence. And we, therefore, distrust every inter- pretation, which, after deliberate attention, seems repugnant to any established truth. We reason about the Bible precisely as civilians do about the constitution under which we live; who, you know, are accustomed to limit one provision of that venera- ble instrument by others, and to fix the precise import of its parts by inquiring into its general spirit, into the intentions of its au- thors, and into the prevalent feelings, impressions, and circum- stances of the time when it was framed. Without these princi- les of interpretation, we frankly acknowledge, that we cannot defend the divine authority of the Scriptures. Deny us this lati- tude, and we must abandon this book to its enemies. We do not announce these principles as original, or peculiar to ourseives; all Christians occasionally adopt them, not except- ing those, who most vehementiy decry them, when they happen to menace some favourite article of their creed. All Christians are compelled to use them in their controversies with infidels. All sects employ them in their warfare with one another. All willingly avail themselves of reason, when it can be pressed into the service of their own party, and only complain of it, when its weapons wound themselves. . None reason more frequently than our adversaries. It is astonishing what a fabrick they rear from a few slight hints about the fall of our first parents; and how ingen- iously they extract from detached passages, mysterious doctrines about the divine nature. We do not blame them for reasoning so abundantly, but for violating the fundamental rules of reasoning, for sacrificing the plain to the obscure, and the general strain of Scripture, to a scanty number of insulated texts. We object strongly to the contemptuous manner in which human reason is often spoken of by our adversaries, because it leads, we believe, to universal scepticism. If reason be so dread- fully darkened by the fall, that its most decisive Judgments on religion are unworthy of trust, then Christianity, and even natu- ral theology, must be abandoned; for the existence and veracity of God, and the divine original of Christianity, are conclusions of reason, and must stand or fall with it. lf revelation be at war with this faculty, it subverts itself, for the great question of its truth is left by God to be decided at the bar of reason. It is wor- thy of remark, how nearly the bigot and the sceptick approach. Both would annihilate our confidence in our faculties, and both throw doubt and confusion over every truth. We honour reve- lation too highly to make it the antagonist of reason, or to believe that it calls us to renounce our highest powers. We indeed grant, that the use of reason in religion, is accom- panied with danger. But we ask any honest man to look back on 7 the history of the church, and say, whether the renunciation of it. be not still more dangerous. Besides, it is a plain fact, that men reason as erroneously on all subjects as on religion. Who does not know the wild and groundless theories, which have been fram- ed in physical and political science 7 But who ever supposed, that we must cease to exercise reason on nature and society, be- cause men have erred for ages in explaining them 7 We grant, that the passions continually, and sometimes fatally, disturb the rational faculty in its inquiries into revelation. The ambitious contrive to find doctrines in the Bible, which favour their love of dominion. The timid and dejected discover there a gloomy sys- tem, and the mystical and fanatical, a visionary theology. The vicious can find examples or assertions on which to build the hope of a late repentance, or of acceptance on easy terms; the falsely refined contrive to light on doctrines which have not been soiled by vulgar handling. But the passions do not distract the reason in religious, any more than in other inquiries, which excite strong and general interest; and this faculty, of consequence, is not to be renounced in religion, unless we are prepared to discard it uni- versally. The true inference from the almost endless errours, which have darkened theology, is not that we are to neglect and disparage our powers, but to exert them more patiently, circum- spectly, uprightly. The worst errours, after all, have sprung up in that church, which proscribes reason, and demands from its members implicit faith. The most pernicious doctrines have been the growth of the darkest times, when the general credulity encouraged bad men and enthusiasts to broach their dreams and inventions, and to stifle the faint remonstrances of reason, by the menaces of everlasting perdition. Say what we may, God has given us a rational nature, and will call us to account for it. We may let it sleep, but we do so at our peril. Revelation is addres- sed to us as rational beings. We may wish, in our sloth, that God had given us a system, demanding no labour of comparing, limit- ing and inferring. But such a system would be at variance with the whole character of a present existence; and it is the part of wisdom to take revelation, as it is given to us, and to interpret it by the help of the faculties, which it every where supposes, and on which it is founded. To the views now given, an objection is commonly urged from the character of God. We are told, that God being infinitely wiser than men, his discoveries will surpass human reason. In a revelation from such a teacher, we ought to expect propositions, which we cannot reconcile with one another, and which may seem to contradict established truths; and it becomes us not to question or explain them away, but to believe, and adore, and to submit our weak and carnal reason, to the divine word. To this objec- tion, we have two short answers. We say, first, that it is impos- sible, that a teacher of infinite wisdom, should expose those, whom he would teach, to infinite errour. But if once we admit, that propositions, which in their literal sense appear plainly re- pugnant to one another, or to any known truth, are still to be lit- 8 t erally understood and received, wha possible limit can we set to the belief of contradictions 7 What shelter have we from the wildest fanaticism, which can always quote passages, that in their literal and obvious sense, give support to its extravagancies? How can the Protestant escape from transubstantiation, a doctrine most clearly taught us, if the submission of reason, now contended for, be a duty ? How can we ever hold fast the truth of revelation, for if one apparent contradiction may be true, so may another, and the proposition, that Christianity is false, though involving incon- sistency, may still be a verity. We answer again, that, if God be infinitely wise, he cannot sport with the understandings of his creatures. A wise teacher discovers his wisdom in adapting himself to the capacities of his pupils, not in perplexing them with what is unintelligible, not in distressing them with apparent contradiction, not in filling them with a sceptical distrust of their powers. An infinitely wise teach- er, who knows the precise extent of our minds, and the best method of enlightening them, will surpass all other instructors in bringing down truth to our apprehension, and in showing its love- liness and harmony. We ought, indeed, to expect occasional obscurity in such a book as the Bible, which was written for past and future ages, as well as for the present. But God's wisdom is a pledge, that whatever is necessary for us, and necessary for sal- vation, is revealed too plainly to be mistaken, and too consistently to be questioned by a sound and upright mind. It is not the mark of wisdom, to use an unintellible phraseology, to communicate what is above our capacities, to confuse and unsettle the intellect, by appearances of contradiction, We honour our heavenly Teacher too much to ascribe to him such a revelation. A reve- lation is a gift of light. It cannot thicken and multiply our per- plexities. II. Having thus stated the principles according to which we in- terpret Scriptures, I now proceed to the second great head of this discourse, which is, to state some of the views, which we derive from that sacred book, particularly those which distinguish us from other Christians. First. We believe in the doctrine of God’s UNITY, or that there is one God, and one only. To this truth we give infinite import- ance, and we feel ourselves bound to take heed, lest any man spoil us of it by vain philosophy. The proposition, that there is one God, seems to us exceedingly plain. We understand by it, that there is one being, one mind, one person, one intelligent agent, and one only, to whom underived and infinite perfection and dominion belong. We conceive, that these words could have con- veyed no other meaning to the simple and uncultivated people, who were set apart to be the depositaries of this great truth, and who were utterly incapable of understanding those hair breadth distinctions between being and person, which the sagacity of latter ages has discovered. We find no intimation, that this language was to be taken in an unusual sense, or that God’s unity was a quite different thing from the oneness of other intelligent beings, 9 2 . " $ We object to the doctrine of the Trinity, that it subvértg the unity of God. According to this doctrine, there are three infi- ite and equal persons; possessing supreme divinity, called the Fa- ther, Son, and Holy Ghost. Each of these persons, as described by theologians, has his own particular consciousness, will, and per- ceptions. They love each other, converse with each other, and delight in each other's society. They perform different parts in man's redemptión, each having his appropriate office, and neither doing the work of the other. The Son is mediator, and not the Father. The Father sends the Son, and is riot himself sent; fior is he conscious, like the Son, of taking flesh. Here then, we have three intelligent agents, possessed of different consciousnesses, different wills, and different perceptions, performing different acts; and sustaining different relations; and if these things do not im- ply and constitute three minds or beings, we are utterly at a loss to know how three minds or beings are to be formed. It is differ- ence of properties, and acts, and consciousness, which leads us to the belief of different intelligent beings, and if this mark fail us; our whole knowledge falls; we have no proof, that all the agents and persons in the universe are not one and the same mind. When we attempt to conceive of three Gods, we can do nothing more, than represent to ourselves three agents, distinguished from each other by similar marks and peculiarities to those, which separate the persons of the Trinity; and when common Christians hear these persons spoken of as conversing with each other, loving each other, and performing different acts, how can they help re- garding them as different beings, different minds ! We do then, with all earnestness, though without reproaching our brethren, protest against the unnatural and unscriptural doc- trine of the Trinity. “To us,” as to the apostle and the primitive Christians, “there is one God, even the Father.” With Jesus, we worship the Father, as the only living and true God.” We are astonished, that any man can read the New Testament, and avoid the conviction, that the Father alone is God. We hear our Sa- viour continually appropriating this character to the Father. We find the Father continually distinguished from Jesus by this title, “God sent his Son.” “God anointed Jesus.” Now, how singu- lar and inexplicable is this phraseology, which fills the New Tes- tament, if this title belong equally to Jesus, and if a principal object of this book is to reveal him as God, as partaking equally with the Father in supreme divinity. We chailenge our oppo- rients to adduce one passage in the New Testament; where the word God means three persons, where it is not limited to one per- son, and where, unless turned from its usual sense by the connex. ion, it does not mean the Father. Can stronger proof be given, that the doctrine of three persons in the Godhead, is not a funda- mentalidoctrine of Christianity ? 3. This doctrine, were it true, must, from its difficulty, singularity, and importance, have been laid down with great clearness, guard” * John, 17. 2 10 ed with great care, and stated with all possible precision. But where does this statement appear ! From the many passages, which treat of God, we ask for one, one only, in which we are told, that he is a threefold being, or, that he is three persons, or, that he is Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. On the contrary in the TNew Testament, where, at least, we might expect many express assertions of this nature, God is declared to be one, without the least attempt to prevent the acceptation of the words in their common sense; and he is always spoken of and addressed in the singular number, that is, in language which was universally under- stood to intend a single person, and to which no other idea could have been attached, without an express admonition. So entirely do the Scriptures abstain from stating the Trinity, that when our opponents would insert it into their creeds and doxologies, they are compelled to leave the Bible, and to invent forms of words al- together unsanctioned by scriptural phraseology. That a doctrine so strange, so liable to misapprehension, so fundamental as this is said to be, and requiring such careful exposition, should be left so undefined and unprotected, to be made out by inference, and to be hunted through distant and detached parts of Scripture, this is a difficulty, which, we think, no ingenuity can explain. We have another difficulty. Christianity, it must be remem- bered, was planted and grew up amidst sharp-sighted enemies, who overlooked no objectionable part of the system, and who must have fastened with great earnestness on a doctrine involving such apparent contradictions as the Trinity. We cannot conceive an opinion against which, the Jews, who prided themselves on their adherence to God’s unity, would have raised an equal clamour. Now, how happens it, that in the apostolick writings, which re- late so much to objections against Christianity, and to the contro- versies, which grew out of this religion, not one word is said, im- plying that objections were brought against the gospel from the doctrine of the Trinity, not one word is uttered in its defence and explanation, not a word to rescue it from reproach and mistake 2 This argument has almost the force of demonstration. We are persuaded, that had three divine persons been announced by the first preachers of Christianity, all equal, and all infinite, one of whom was the very Jesus, who had lately died on a cross, this pe- culiarity of Christianity would have almost absorbed every other, and the great labour of the apostles would have been to repel the continual assaults, which it would have awakened. But the fact is, that not a whisper of objection to Christianity, on that account, reaches our ears from the apostolick age. In the epistles we see not a trace of controversy called forth by the Trinity. We have further objections to this doctrine, drawn from its practical influence. We regard it as unfavourable to devotion, by dividing and distracting the mind in its communion with God. It is a great excellence of the doctrine of God's unity, that it offers tº us 9NE object of supreme homage, adoration and love, one infi. nite Father, one Being of Beings, one original and fountain, to whom we may refer all good, on whom all our powers and affec- | 1 tions may be concentrated, and whose lovely and venerable nature may pervade all our thoughts. True piety, when directed to an undivided Deity, has a chasteness, a singleness, most favourable to religious awe, and love. Now the Trinity sets before us three distinct objects of supreme adoration; three infinite persons, hav- ing equal claims on our hearts; three divine agents, performing different offices, and to be acknowledged and worshipped in differ- ent relations. And is it possible, we ask, that the weak and limit- ed mind of man can attach itself to these with the same power and joy, as to one infinite Father, the only First Cause, in whom all the blessings of nature and redemption meet, as their centre and source? Must not devotion be distracted by the equal and rival claims of three equal persons, and must not the worship of the conscientious, consistent Christian be disturbed by apprehension, lest he withhold from one or another of these, his due proportion of homage 7 We also think, that the doctrine of the Trinity injures devotion, not only by jeining to the Father other objects of worship, but by taking from the Father the supreme affection, which is his due, and transferring it to the Son. This is a most important view. That Jesus Christ, if exalted into the infinite Divinity, should be more interesting than the Father, is precisely what might be ex- pected from history, and from the principles of human nature. Men want an object of worship like themselves, and the great secret of idolatry lies in this propensity. A God, clothed in our form, and feeling our wants and sorrows, speaks to our weak na- ture more strongly, than a Father in heaven, a pure spirit, invisi- ble and unapproachable, save by the reflecting and purified mind. We think, too, that the peculiar offices ascribed to Jesus by the popular theology, make him the most attractive person in the Godhead. The Father is the depositary of the Justice, the vin- dicator of the rights, the avenger of the laws of the Divinity- On the other hand, the Son, the brightness of the divine mercy, stands between the incensed Deity and guilty humanity, exposes his meek head to the storms, and his compassionate breast to the sword of the divine justice, bears our whole load of punishment, and purchases, with his blood, every blessing which descends from heaven. Need we state the effect of these representations, espe- cially on common minds, for whom Christianity was chiefly design- ed, and whom it seeks to bring to the Father, as the loveliest be- ing 2 We do believe, that the worship of a bleeding, suffering God, tends strongly to absorb the mind, and to draw it from other objects, just as the human tenderness of the Virgin Mary has giv- en her so conspicuous a place in the devotions of the church of Rome. We believe, too, that this worship, though attractive, is not most fitted to spiritualize the mind, that it awakens human transport, rather than that deep veneration of the moral perfec- tions of God, which is the essence of piety. Secondly. Having thus given our views of the unity of God, I proceed to observe, that we believe in the unity of Jesus Christ. We believe that Jesus is one mind, one Soul, one being, as truly 12 one as we are, and equally distinct from the one God. We com- plain of the doctrine of the Trinity, that nót satisfied with making God three beings, it makes Jesus Christ two beings, and thus in- troduces infinite confusion into our conceptions of his character. This corruption of Christianity, alike repugnant to common sense, and to the general strain of Scripture, is a remarkable proof of the power of a false philosophy in disfiguring the simple truth of Jesus. * According to this doctrine, Jesus Christ, instead of being one mind, one conscious intelligent principle whom we can understand, consists of two souls, two minds, the one divine, the other human; the one weak, the other almighty; the one ignorant, the other omniscient. Now we maintain, that this is to make Christ two beings. To denominate him one person, one being, and yet to suppose him made up of two minds, infinitely different from each other, is to abuse and confound language, and to throw darkness over all our conceptions of intelligent natures. According to the common doctrines, each of these two minds in Christ has its own consciousness, its own will, its own perceptions. They have in fact no common properties. The divine mind feels none of the wants and sorrows of the human, and the human is infinitely re- moved from the perfection and happiness of the divine. Can you conceive of two beings in the universe more distinct 7 We have always thought, that one person was constituted and distinguished by one consciousness. The doctrine, that one and the same per- son should have two consciousnesses, two wills, two souls, infinitely different from each other, this we think an enormous tax on human credulity. We say, that if a doctrine, so strange, so difficult, so remote from all the previous conceptions of men, be indeed a part, and an essential part of revelation, it must be taught with great dis- tinctness, and we ask our brethren to point to some plain, direct passage, where Christ is said to be composed of two minds infi- nitely different, yet constituting one person. We find none. Our opponents, indeed, tell us, that this doctrine is necessary to the harmony of the Scriptures, that some texts ascribe to Jesus Christ human, and others divine properties, and that to reconcile these, we must suppose two minds, to which these properties may be referred. In other words, for the purpose of reconciling certain difficult passages, which a just criticism can in a great degree, if not wholly explain, we must invent an hypothesis vastly more dif. figult, and involving gross absurdity. We are to find our way out of a labyrinth by a clue, which conducts us into mazes infinitely more inextricable. Surely, if Jesus Christ felt that he consisted of two minds, and that this was a leading feature of his religion, his phraseology respecting himself would have been coloured by this peculiarity. The universal language of men is framed upon the idea, that one person is one mind, and one soul; and when the multitude heard this language from the lips of Jesus, they must have taken it in its usual sense, and must have referred to a single soul, all which 13 he spoke, unless expressly instructed to interpret it differently, But where do we find this instruction ? Where do you meet, in the New Testament, the phraseology which abounds in Trinita- rian books, and which necessarily grew from the doctrine of two natures in Jesus. Where does this divine teacher say, This I speak as God, and this as man; this is true only of my human mind, this only of my divine ! Where do we find in the epistles a trace of this strange phraseology 7 No where. It was not needed in that day. It was demanded by the errors of a later age. We believe, then, that Christ is one mind, one being, and I add, a being distinct from the one God. That Christ is not the one God, not the same being with the Father, is a necessary inference from our former head, in which we saw, that the doctrine of three persons in God is a fiction. But on so important a subject, I would add a few remarks. We wish, that our opponents would weigh one striking fact. Jesus, in his preaching, continually spoke of God. The word was always in his mouth. We ask, does he, by this word, ever mean himself? We say, never. On the contrary he most plainly distinguishes between God and himself, and so do his disciples. How this is to be reconciled with the idea, that the manifestation of Christ, as God, was a primary object of Chris- tianity, our adversaries must determine. J If we examine the passages in which Jesus is distinguished from God, we shall see, that they not only speak of him as another being, but seem to labour to express his inferiority. He is con- tinually spoken of as the Son of God, sent of God, receiving all his powers from God, working miracles because God was with him, judging justly because God taught him, having claims on our belief, because he was anointed and sealed by God, and as able of himself to do nothing. The New Testament is filled with this language, Now we ask, what impression this language was fit- tee and intended to make 7 Could any, who heard it, have imag- ined, that Jesus was the very God, to whom he was so industrious- ly declared to be inferior, the very being, by whom he was sent, and from whom he professed to have received his message and power 7 Let it here be remembered, that the human birth, and bodily form, and humble circumstances, and mortal sufferings of Jesus, must all have prepared men to interpret, in the most un- qualified manner, the language in which his inferiority to God was declared. Why then was this language used so continually, and without limitation, if Jesus were the Supreme Deity, and if this truth were an essential part of his religion ? I repeat it, the hu- man condition and sufferings of Christ, tended strongly to exclude from men's minds the idea of his proper Godhead ; and of course, we should expect to find in the New Testament perpetual care and effort to counteract this tendency, to hold him forth as the same being with his Father, if this doctrine were, as is pretended the soul and centre of his religion. We should expect to find the phraseology of Scripture cast into the mould of this doctrine,to hear familiarly of God the Son, of our Lord God Jesus, and to be told, that to us there is one God, even Jesus. But instead of this, the *~ 14 inferiority of Christ pervades the New Testament. It is not only implied in the general phraseology, but repeatedly and decidedly expressed, and unaccompanied with any admonition to prevent its application to his whole nature. Could it then have been the great design of the sacred writers, to exhibit Jesus as the Supreme God 7 I am aware, that these remarks will be met by two or three texts, in which Christ is called God, and by a class of passages, not very numerous, in which divine properties are said to be as- cribed to him. To these we offer one plain answer. We say, that it is one of the most established and obvious principles of criticism, that language is to be explained according to the known properties of the subject to which it is applied. Every man knows, that the same words convey very different ideas, when used in relation to different beings. Thus, Solomon built the tem- ple in a different manner from the architect, whom he employed; and God repents differently from man. Now, we maintain, that the known properties and circumstances of Christ, his birth, suf- ferings, and death, his constant habit of speaking of God as a distinct being from himself, his praying to God, his ascribing to God all his power and offices, these acknowledged properties of Christ, we say, oblige us to interpret the comparatively few passages, which are thought to make him the Supreme God, in a manner consistent with his distinct and inferior nature. It is our duty to explain such texts, by the rule which we apply to other texts,in which human beings are called Gods,and are said to be par- takers of the divine nature, to know and possess all things, and to be filled with all God's fulness. These latter passages we do not hesitate to modify, and restrain, and turn from the most obvi- ous sense, because this sense is opposed to the known properties of the beings to whom they relate ; and we maintain, that we adhere to the same principle, and use no greater latitude in ex- plaining, as we do, the passages which are thought to support the Godhead of Christ. Trinitarians profess to derive some important advantages from their mode of viewing Christ. It furnishes them, they tell us, with an infinite atonement, for it shows them an infinite being, suffering for their sins. The confidence with which this fallacy is repeated astonishes us. When pressed with the question, whether they really believe, that the infinite and unchangeable God suffered and died on the cross, they acknowledge that this is not true, but that Christ’s human mind alone sustained the pains of death. How have we then an infinite sufferer? This language seems to us an imposition on common minds, and very derogatory to God’s justice, as if this attribute could be satisfied by a sophism and a fiction. We are also told, that Christ is a more interesting object, that his love and mercy are more felt, when he is received as the Su- preme God, who left his glory to take humanity and to suffer for men. That Trin tarians are strongly moved by this representa- £ion, we do not mean to deny, but we think their emotions alto- 15 gether founded on a misapprehension of their own doctrines. They talk of the second person of the Trinity leaving his glory, and his Father's bosom, to visit and save the world. But this se- cond person, being the unchangeable and infinite God, was evident- ly incapable of parting with the least degree of his perfection and felicity. At the moment of his taking flesh, he was as intimately present with his Father as before, and equally with his Father fill- ed heaven, and earth, and immensity. This, Trinitarians ac- knowledge, and still they professs to be touched and overwhelm- ed by the amazing humiliation of this immutable being !!—But not only does their doctrine, when fully explained, reduce Christ's humiliaton to a fiction, it almost wholly destroys the impressions with which his cross ought to be received. According to their doctrine, Christ was, comparatively, no sufferer at all. It is true, his human mind suffered ; but this, they tell us, was an infinitely small part of Jesus, bearing no more proportion to his whole na- ture, than a single hair of our heads to the whole body; or, than a drop to the ocean. The divine mind of Christ, that which was most properly himself, was infinitely happy, at the very moment of the suffering of his humanity. Whilst hanging on the cross, he was the happiest being in the universe, as happy as the infi- nite Father; so, that, his pains, compared with his felicity, were nothing. This, Trinitarians do, and must acknowledge. It fol- lows, necessarily, from the immutableness of the divine nature, which they ascribe to Christ; so that their system, justly viewed, robs his death of interest, weakens our sympathy with his suffer- ings, and is, of all others, most unfavourable to a love of Christ, founded on a sense of his sacrifices for mankind. We esteem our own views to be vastly more affecting, especially those of us, who believe in Christ’s pre-existence. It is our belieſ, that Christ's humiliation, was real and entire, that the whole Saviour, and not a part of him, suffered, that his crucifixion was a scene of deep and unmixed agony. As we stand round his cross, our minds are not distracted, or our sensibility weakened, by contem- plating him as composed of incongruous and infinitely differing minds, and as having a balance of infinite felicity. We recognise, in the dying Jesus, but one mind. This, we think, renders his suf- ferings, and his patience and love in bearing them, incomparably more impressive and affecting, than the system we oppose. , Thirdly. Having thus given our belief on two great points, namely, that there is one God, and that Jesus Christ is a being distinct from, and inferior to God, I now proceed to another point on which we lay still greater stress. We believe in the moral perfection of God. We consider no part of theology so important as that which treats of God’s moral character; and we value our views of Christianty chiefly, as they assert his amia- ble, and venerable attributes. It may be said, that in regard to this subject, all Christians agree, that all ascribe to the Supreme Being, infinite justice, goodness and holiness. We reply, that it is very possible to speak of God magnificently, and to think of him meanly; to apply ió to his person high-sounding epithets, and to his government, prins ciples which make him odious. The heathens called Jupiter the greatest and the best ; but his history was black with cruelty and lust. We cannot judge of men's real ideas of God, by their gene- ral language, for in all ages, they have hoped to sooth the Deity by adulation. We must inquire into their particular views of his purposes, of the principles of his administration, and of his dispo- sition towards his creatures. We conceive that Christians have generally leaned towards a very injurious view of the Supreme Being. They have too of. ten felt, as if he were raised, by his greatness and sovereignty, above the princples of morality, above those eternal laws of equity and rectitude, to which all other beings are subjected. We believe, that in no being, is the sense of right so strong, so omnip- otent, as in God. We believe that his almighty power is entirely submitted to his perception of rectitude ; and this is the ground of our piety. It is not because he is our Creator merely, but be- cause he created us for good and holy purposes; it is not because his will is irresistible, but because his will is the perfection of vir- fue, that we pay him allegiance. We cannot bow before a being; however great and powerful, who governs tyranically. We re- spect nothing, but excellence, whether on earth, or in heaven. We venerate not the loftiness of God’s throne, but the equity and goodness in which it is established. We believe that God is infinitely good, kind, benevolent, in the proper sense of these words; good in disposition,as well as in act; good not to a few, but to all; good to every individual, as well as to the general system. We believe too, that God is just; but we never forget, that his justice is the justice of a good being, dwelling in the same mind, and acting in harmony with perfect benevolence. By this attribute we understand God’s infinite regard to virtue, or moral worth, expressed in a moral government; that is, in giving excellent and equitable laws, and in conferring such rewards and inflicting such punishments, as are most fitted to secure their observance. God’s justice has for its end the highest virtue of the creation, and it pun- ishes for this end alone, and thus it coincides with benevolence ; for virtue and happiness, though not the same, are inseparably conjoined. f God's justice thus viewed, appears to us to be in perfect har- mony with his mercy, According to the prevalent system of theology, these attributes are so discordant and jarring, that to , reconcile them is the hardest task, and the most wonderful achievement of infinite wisdom. To us they seem to be inti- mate friends, always at peace, breathing the same spirit, and, seeking the same end. By God's mercy, we understand not a. blind instinctive compassion, which forgives without reflection, and without regard to the interests of virtue. This; we acknowl- edge, would be incompatible with justice, and also with enlight- ened benevolence. God's mercy, as we understand it, desires. strongly the happiness of the guilty, but only through their peni- 17 tence. It has a regard to character as truly as his justice. It dé. fers punishment, and suffers long, that the sinner may return to his duty, but leaves the impenitent and unyielding, to the fearful re- tribution threatened in God’s word. To give our views of God, in one word, we believe in his par- ental character: We ascribe to him, not only the name, but the dispositions and principles of a father. We believe that he has a father’s concern for his creatures, a father’s desire for their im- provement, a father's equity in proportioning his commands to their powers, a father's joy in their progress, a father's readiness to receive the penitent, and a father's justice for the incorrigible. We look upon this world as a place of education, in which he is training men by mercies and sufferings, by aids and temptations, by means and opportunities of various virtues, by trials of princi- ple, by the conflicts of reason and passion, by a discipline suited to free and moral beings, for union with himself, and for a sublime and ever growing virtue in heaven. . Now we object to the systems of religion, which prevail among us, that they are adverse, in a greater or less degree, to these purifying, comforting, and honorable views of God, that they take from us our Father in heaven, and substitute for him a being, whom we cannot love if we would, and whom we ought not to love if we could. We object, particularly on this ground, to that system, which arrogates to itself the name of ortho- doxy, and which is now most industriously propagated through our country. This system teaches, that God brings us into exis- tence wholly depraved, so that under the innocent features of our childhood, is hidden a nature averse to all good, and propense to all evil; and it teaches thatGod regards us with displeasure before we have acquired power to understand our duties, or reflect upon our actions. Now if there be one plain principle of morality, it is this, that we are accountable beings, only because we have consciences, a power of knowing and performing our duty, and that in as far as we want this power, we are incapable of sin, guilt, or blame. We should call a parent a monster, who should judge and treat his children in opposition to this principle, and yet this enormons immorality is charged on our Father in heaven. This system, also, teaches, that God selects from the corrupt mass of men a number to be saved, and that they are plucked, by an irresistible agency, from the common ruin, whilst the rest are commanded, under penalty of aggravated woe, to make a change in their characters, which their natural corruption places beyond their power, and are also promised pardon on eonditions, which necessarily avail them nothing, unless they are favored with a special operation of God’s grace, which he is predetermined to withhold. This mockery of mercy, this insult offered to the misery of the non elect, by hollow proffers of forgiveness, com- pletes the dreadful system which is continually obtruded upon us as the gospel, and which strives to monopolize the reputation of sanctity. 3 18 That this religious system does not produce all the effects on character, which might be anticipated, we most joyfully admit. It is often, very often, counteracted by nature, concience, common sense, by the general strain of Scripture, by the mild example and precepts of Christ, and by the many positive declarations of God’s universal kindness, and perfect equity. But still we think that we see occasionally its unhappy influence. It discourages the timid, gives excuses to the bad, feeds the vanity of the fanati- cal, and offers shelter to the bad feelings of the malignant. By shocking, as it does the fundamental principles of morality, and by exhibiting a severe and partial Deity, it tends strongly to pervert the moral faculty, to form a gloomy, forbidding, and servile reli- gion, and to lead men to substitute censoriousness, bitterness, and persecution, for a tender and impartial charity. We think too, that this system, which begins with degrading human nature, may be expected to end in pride ; for pride grows out of a conscious- ness of high distinctions, however obtained, and no distinction is so great as that, which is made between the elected and abandoned of God. The false and dishonorable views of God, which have now been stated, we feel ourselves bound to resist unceasingly. Other er- rors we can pass over with comparative indifference. But we ask our opponents to leave to us a GoD, worthy of our love and trust, in whom our moral sentiments may delight, in whom our weaknesses and sorrows may find refuge. We cling to the divine perfections. We meet them every where in cre- ation, we read them in the Scriptnres, we see a lovely image of them in Jesus Christ; and gratitude, love and veneration call on us to assert them. Reproached, as we often are, by men, it is our consolation and happiness, that one of our chief offences is the zeal with which we windicate the dishonored goodness and recti- tude of God. Fourthly. Having thus spoken of the unity of God; of the unity of Jesus, and his inferiority to God; and of the perfections of the divine character; I now proceed to give our views of the mediation of Christ and of the purposes of his mission. With regard to the great object, which Jesus came to accomplish, there seems to be no possibility of mistake. We believe, that he was sent by the Father to effect a moral, or spiritual deliverance of mankind; that is, to rescue men from sin and its consequences, and to bring them to a state of everlasting purity and happiness. We believe, too, that he accomplishes this sublime purpose by a variety of methods; by his instructions respecting God’s unity, parental character, and moral government, which are admirably fitted to reclaim the world from idolatry, and impiety, to the knowlegde, love, and obedience of the Creator; by his promises of pardon to the penitent, and of divine assistance to those, who labour for progress in moral excellence; by the light which he has thrown on the path of duty; by his own spotless example, in which the loveliness and sublimity of virtue shine forth to warm and quick- en, as well as guide us to perfection; by his threatenings against incorrigible guilt; by his glorious discoveries of immortality; by 19 f his sufferings and death; by that signal event, the resurrection, which powerfully bore witness to his divine mission, and brought down to men's senses a future life; by his continual intercession, which obtains for us spiritual aid and blessings; and by the power with which he is invested of raising the dead, judging the world, and conferring the everlasting rewards, promised to the faithful. We have no desire to conceal the fact, that a difference of opinion exists among us, in regard to an interesting part of Christ's mediation ; I mean, in regard to the precise influence of his death, on our forgiveness. Some suppose, that this event contributes to our pardon, as it was a principal means of confirming his religion, and of giving it a power over the mind; in other words, that it procures forgiveness by leading to that repentance and virtue, which is the great and only condition on which forgiveness is be- stowed. Many of us are dissatisfied with this explanation, and think that the Scriptures ascribe the remission of sins to Christ's death, with an emphasis so peculiar, that we ought to consider this event as having a special influence in removing punishment, as a condition, or method of pardon, without which, repentance would not avail us, at least to that extent, which is now promised by the gospel. Whilst, however, we differ in explaining the connexion between Christ’s death and human forgiveness, a connexion, which we all gratefully acknowledge, we agree in rejecting many sentiments, which prevail in regard to his mediation. The idea, which is con- veyed to common minds by the popular system, that Christ’s death has an influence in making God placable or merciful, in quenching his wrath, in awakening his kindness towards men, we reject with horror. We believe, that Jesus, instead of making the Father merciful, is sent by the Father’s mercy to be our Saviour; that he is nothing to the human race, but what he is by God’s appointment; that he communicates nothing but what God empowers him to be- stow ; that our Father in heaven is originally, essentially and eter- nally placable, and disposed to forgive ; and that his unborrowed, underived, and unchangeable love, is the only fountain of what flows to us through his Son. We conceive, that Jesus is dishon- oured, not glorified, by ascribing to him an influence, which clouds the splendour of divine benevolence. We farther agree in rejecting, as unscriptural and absurd, the explanation given by the popular system, of the manner in which Christ's death procures forgiveness for men. This system teach- es, that man having sinned against an infinite being, is infinitely guilty, and some even say, that a single transgression, though eom- mitted in our early and inconsiderate years, merits the eternal pains of hell. Thus, an infinite penalty is due from every human being; and God’s justice insists, that it shall be borne either by the offender, or a substitute. Now, from the nature of the case, no substitute is adequate to the work of sustaining the full punish- ment of a guilty world, save the infinite God himself; and accord- ingly, God took on him human nature, that he might pay to his own justice the debt of punishment incurred by men, and might 20 enable himself to exercise mercy. Such is the present system. Now, to us, this doctrine seems to carry on its front, strong marks of absurdity, and we maintain that Christianity ought not to be encum- bered with it, unless it be laid down in the New Testament fully and expressly. We ask our adversaries, then, to point to some plain passages where it is taught. We ask for one text, in which we are told that God took human nature, that he might appease his own anger towards men, or make an infinite satisfaction to his own jus- tice; for one text, which tells us, that human guilt is infinite, and requires a correspondent substitute ; that Christ's sufferings owe their efficacy to their being borne by an infinite being; or that his divine nature gives infinite value to the sufferings of the human. Not one word of this description can we find in the Scriptures; not a text, which even hints at these strange doctrines. They are alto- gether, we believe, the fictions of theologians. Christianity is in no degree responsible for them. We are astonished at their pre- valence. What can be plainer, than that God cannot, in any sense, be a sufferer, or bear a penalty in the room of his creatures 7 How dishonourable to him is the supposition, that his justice is now . so severe as to exact infinite punishment for the sins of frail and feeble men, and now so easy and yielding as to accept the limited ... pains of Christ's human soul, as a full equivalent for the infinite and endless woes due from the world ! How plain is it also, according to this doctrine, that God, instead of being plenteous in forgive- ness, never forgives; for it is absurd to speak of men as forgiven, when their whole punishment is borne by a substitute 7 A scheme more fitted to bring Christianity into contempt, and less suited to give comfort to a guilty and troubled mind, could not, we think, be easily invented. We believe too, that this system is unfavourable to the charac- ter. It naturally leads men to think, that Christ came to change God’s mind, rather than their own, that the highest object of his mission, was to avert punishment, rather than to communicate ho- liness, and that a large part of religion consists in disparaging good works and human virtue, for the purpose of magnifying the value of Christ’s vicarious sufferings. In this way, a sense of the infinite importance, and indispensable necessity of personal im- provement is weakened, and high sounding praises of Christ's cross, seem often to be substituted for obedience to his precepts. For ourselves, we have not so learned Jesus, Whilst we grate- fully acknowledge, that he came to rescue us from punishment, we believe, that he was sent on a still nobler errand, namely, to deliver us from sin itself, and to form us to a sublime and heaven- ly virtue. We regard him as a Saviour, chiefly as he is the light, physician, and guide of the dark, diseased, and wandering mind. No influence in the universe seems to us so glorious, as that over the character; and no redemption so worthy of thankfulness, as the restoration of the soul to purity. Without this, pardon, were it possible, would be of little value. Why pluck the sinner from hell, if a hell be left to burn in his own breast ! Why raise him to heaven, if he remain a stranger to its sanctity and loye? With 21 these impressions, we are accustomed to value the gospel, chiefly, as it abounds in effectual aids, motives, excitements to a generous and divine virtue. In this virtue, as in a common centre, we see all its doctrines, precepts, promises meet, and we believe, that faith in this religion, is of no worth, and contributes nothing to sal- Vation, any farther than as it uses these doctrines, precepts, prom- ises, and the whole life, character, sufferings, and triumphs of Je- sus, as the means of purifying the mind, of changing it into the likeness of his celestial excellence. Fifthly. Having thus stated our views of the highest object of Christ's mission, that it is the recovery of men to virtue, or holi- ness, I shall now, in the last place, give our views of the nature of Christian virtue, or true holiness. We believe that all virtue has its foundation in the moral nature of man, that is, in conscience, or his sense of duty, and in the power of forming his temper and life according to conscience. We believe that these moral facul- ties are the grounds of responsibility, and the highest distinctions human nature, and that no act is praiseworthy, any farther ...an it springs from their exertion. We believe, that no dispen- sations infused into us without our own moral activity, are of the nature of virtue, and therefore, we reject the doctrine of irresisti- ble divine influence on the human mind, moulding it into goodness, as marble is hewn into a statue. Such goodness, if this word may be used, would not be the object of moral approbation, any more than the instinctive affections of inferior animals, or the constitu- tional amiabieness of human beings. By these remarks, we do not mean to deny the importance of God’s aid or Spirit ; but by his Spirit, we mean a moral, illumina- ting, and persuasive influence, not physical, not compulsory, not involving a necessity of virtue. We object, strongly, to the idea of many Christians respecting man’s impotence and God’s irresis- tible agency on the heart, believing that they subvert our respon- sibility and the laws of our moral nature, that they make men ma- chines, that they cast on God the blame of all evil deeds, that they discourage good minds, and inflate the fanatical with wild conceits of immediate and sensible inspiration. Among the virtues, we give the first place to the love of God. We believe, that this principle is the true end and happiness of our being, that we were made for union with our Creator, that his in- finite perfection is the only sufficient object and true resting place for the insatiable desires and unlimited capacities of the human mind, and that without him, our noblest sentiments, admiration, veneration, hope and love, would wither and decay. We believe too, that the love of God is not only essential to happiness, but to the strength and perfection of all the virtues; that conscience, without the sanction of God's authority and retributive justice, would be a weak director; that benevolence, unless nourished by communion with his goodness, and encouraged by his smile, could not thrive amidst the selfishness and thanklessness of the world; and that self government, without a sense of the divine inspection, would hardly extend beyond an outward and partial purity. God, 22 as he is essentially goodness, holiness, justice, and virtue, so he is the life, motive, and sustainer of virtue in the human soul. But whilst we earnestly inculcate the love of God, we believe that great care is necessary to distinguish it from counterfeits. We think that much, which is called piety, is worthless. Many have fallen into the error, that there can be no excess in feelings, which have God for their object; and, distrusting as coldness, that self. possession, without which virtue and devotion lose all their digni- ty, they have abandoned themselves to extravagancies, which have brought contempt on piety. Most certainly, if the love of God be that, which often bears its name, the less we have of it, the bet- ter. If religion be the shipwreck of understanding, we cannot keep too far from it. On this subject, we always speak plainly. We cannot sacrifice our reason to the reputation of zeal. We owe it to truth and religion, to maintain, that fanaticism, partial in- sanity, sudden impressions, and ungovernable transports, are any thing, rather than piety. We conceive, that the true love of God, is a moral sentiment, founded on a clear perception, and consisting in a high esteem and veneration of his moral perfections. Thus, it perfectly coin- cides, and is in fact the same thing with the love of virtue, recti- tude, and goodness. You will easily judge, then, what we esteem the surest and only decisive signs of piety. We lay no stress on strong excitements. We esteem him, and him only a pious man, who practically conforms to God’s moral perfection and gov- ernment, who shows his delight in God’s benevolence, by loving and serving his neighbour; his delight in God’s justice, by being resolutely upright; his sense of God’s purity, by regulating his thoughts, imagination, and desires; and whose conversation, busi- ness, and domestick life, are swayed by a regard to God’s presence and authority. In all things else, men may deceive themselves. Disordered nerves may give them strange sights, and sounds, and impressions. Texts of Scripture, may come to them as from heaven. Their whole souls may be moved, and their confidence in God’s favour be undoubting. But in all this there is no religion. The question is, do they love God’s commands, in which his char- acter is fully displayed, and give up to these their habits and pas- sions. Without this, ecstacy is a mockery. One surrender of desire to God’s will, is worth a thousand transports. We do not judge of the bent of men’s minds by their raptures, any more than we judge of the direction of a tree during a storm. We rather suspect loud profession, for we have observed, that deep feeling is generally noiseless, and least seeks display. We would not, by these remarks, be understood as wishing to exclude from religion warmth, and even transport. We honour, and highly value true religious sensibility. We believe, that Christianity is intended to act powerfully on our whole nature, on the heart, as well as the understanding and the conscience. We conceive of heaven as a state, where the love of God will be ex- alted into an unbounded fervour and joy; and we desire, in our pilgrimage here, to drink into the spirit of that better world. But 23 we think, that religious warmth is only to be valued, when it, springs naturally from an improved character, when it comes un- forced, when it is the recompense of obedience, when it is the warmth of a mind, which understands God by being like him, and when, instead of disordering, it exalts the understanding, invigo- rates conscience, gives a pleasure to common duties, and is seen to exist in connexion with cheerfulness, judiciousness, and a reason- able frame of mind. When we observe a fervour, called reli- gious, in men whose general character expresses little refine- ment and elevation, and whose piety seems at war with reason, we pay it little respect. We hononr religion too much to give its sacred name to a feverish, forced, fluctuating zeal, which has little power over the life. Another important branch of religion, we believe to be love to Christ. The greatness of the work of Jesus, the spirit with which he executed it, and the sufferings which he bore for our salvation, we feel to be strong claims on our gratitude and vene- ration. We see in nature no beauty to be compared with the loveliness of his character, nor do we find on earth a benefactor, to whom we owe an equal debt. We read his history with delight, and learn from it the perfection of our nature. We are particu- larly touched by his death, which was endured for our redemption, and by that strength of charity, which triumphed over his pains. His resurrection is the foundation of our hope of immortality. His intercession gives us boldness to draw migh to the throne of grace, and we look up to heaven with new desire, when we think, that if we follow him here, we shall there see his benignant coun- tenance, and enjoy his friendship for ever. ºr I need not express to you our views on the subject of the benev- olent virtues. We attach such importance to these, that we are sometimes reproached with exalting them above piety. We re- gard the spirit of love, charity, meekness, forgiveness, liberality, and beneficence, as the badge and distinction of Christians, as the brightest image we can bear of God, as the best proof of piety. On this subject, I need not, and cannot enlarge, but there is one branch of benevolence, which I ought not to pass over in Silence, because we think that we conceive of it more highly and justly, than many of our brethren. I refer to the duty of candour, char- itable judgment, especially towards those who differ in religious opinion. We think, that in nothing have Christians so widely de- parted from their religion, as in this particular. We read with astonishment and horror, the history of the church, and sometimes when we look back on the fires of persecution, and the zeal of Christians, building up walls of separations, and in giving up one another to perdition, we feel as if we were reading the records of an infernal, rather than a heavenly kingdom. An enemy to every religion, if asked to describe a Christian, would, with some show of reason, depict him as an idolater of his own distinguishing opinions, covered with badges of party, shutting his eyes on the virtues, and his ears on the arguments of his opponents, arrogating all excellence to his own sect, and all saving power to his own 24 creed, sheltering under the name of pious zeal, the love of domi- nation, the conceit of infallibility, and the spirit of intolerance, and trampling on men's rights under the pretence of saving their souls. We can hardly conceive of a plainer obligation on beings of our frail and fallible nature, who are instructed in the duty of candid judgment, than to abstain from condemning men of apparent con- scientiousness and sincerity, who are chargeable with no crime but that of differing from us in the interpretation of the Scriptures, and differing, too, on topicks of great and acknowledged obscurity. We are astonished at the hardihood of those, who, with Christ's warnings sounding in their ears, take on them the responsibility of making creeds for his church, and cast out professors of virtuous lives for imagined errors, for the guilt of thinking for themselves. We know that zeal for truth, is the cover for this usurpation of Christ's prerogative ; but we think that zeal for truth, as it is call- ed, is very suspicious, except in men, whose capacities and advan- tages, whose patient deliberations, and whose improvements in humility, mildness, and candour, give them a right to hope that their views are more just, than those of their neighbours. Much of what passes for a zeal for truth, we look upon with little respect, for it often appears to thrive most luxuriantly where other virtues shoot up thinly and feebly; and we have no grat- itude for those reformers, who would force upon us a doctrine, which has not sweetened their own tempers, or made them better men than their neighbours. We are accustomed to think much of the difficulties attending religious inquiries, springing from the slow developement of our minds, from the power of early impressions, from the state of so- ciety, from human authority, from the general neglect of the reas- oning powers, from the want of just principles of criticism, and of important helps in interpreting Scripture, and from various oth- er causes. We find, that on no subject have men, and even good men, engrafted so many strange conceits, wild theories, and fictions of fancy, as on religion, and remembering, as we do, that we our- selves are sharers of the common frailty, we dare not assume infallibility in the treatment of our fellow Christians, or encour- age in common Christians, who have little time for investigation, the habit of denouncing and contemning other denominations, perhaps more enlightened and virtuous than their own. Charity, forbearance, a delight in the virtues of different sects, a back- wardness to censure and condemn, these are virtues, which, how- ever poorly practised by us, we admire and recommend, and we would rather join ourselves to the church in which they abound, than to any other communion, however elated with the belief of its own orthodoxy, however strict in guarding its creed, however burning with zeal against imagined error. I have thus given the distinguishing views of those Christians in whose names I have spoken. We have embraced this system, not hastily or lightly, but after much deliberation, and we hold it fast, not merely because we believe it to be true, but because we 25 regard it as purifying truth, as a doctrine according to godliness, as able to “work mightily” and “ to bring forth fruit” in them who believe. That we wish to spread it we have no desire to conceal; but we think, that we wish its diffusion, because we re- gard it as more friendly to practical piety and pure morals, than the opposite doctrines, because it gives clearer and nobler views of duty, and stronger motives to its performance, because it recommends religion at once to the understanding and the heart, because it asserts the lovely and venerable attributes of God, because it tends to restore the benevolent spirit of Jesus to his divided and afflicted church, and because it cuts off ev- ery hope of God’s favour, except that which springs from practical uniformity to the life and precepts of Christ. We see nothing in our views to give effence, save their purity, and it is their purity, which makes us seek and hope their exten- sion through the world. I now turn to the usual addresses of the day. My friend and brother;-You are this day to take upon you. important duties, to be clothed with an office, which the Son of God did not disdain; to devote yourself to that religion, which the most hallowed lips have preached, and the most precious blood sealed. We trust that you will bring to this work a willing mind, a firm purpose, a martyr's spirit, a readiness to toil and suffer for the truth, a devotion of your best powers to the interests of piety and virtue. I have spoken of the doctrines, which you will proba- bly preach; but I do not mean, that you are to give yourself to controversy. You will remember, that good practice is the end of preaching, and will labor to make your people holy livers, rath- er, than skilful disputants. Be careful, lest the desire of defend- ing what you deem truth, and of repelling reproach and misre- resentation, turn you aside from your great business, which is to x in men’s minds a living conviction of the obligation, sublimity and happiness of Christian virtue. The best way to windicate your sentiments, is to show in your preaching and life, their intimate connexion with Christian morals, with a high and delicate sense of duty, with candour towards your opposers, with inflexible in- tegrity, and with an habitual reverence for God. If any light can pierce and scatter the clouds of prejudice, it is that of a pure ex- ample. You are to preach a system which has nothing to recom- mend it, but its fitness to make men better; which has no unin- telligible doctrine for the mystical, no extravagancies for the fa- natićal, no dreams for the visionary, no contradictions for the Credulous, which asks no sacrifice of men’s understanding, but only of the passions and vices; and the best and only way to re- commend such a system is, to show forth its power in purifying and éxalting the character. My brother, may your life preach more loudly than your lips. Be to the people a pattern of all good works, and may your instructions derive authority from a well grounded belief in your hearers, that you speak from the heart, that you preach from experience, that the truth which you 4. 26 dispense has wrought powerfully in your own heart, that God, and Jesus, and heaven are not merely words on your lips, but most af. fecting realities to your mind, and springs of hope and consola- tion, and strength, in all your trials. Thus labouring, may you reap abundantly, and have a testimony of your faithfulness, not only in your own conscience, but in the esteem, love, virtues, and improvements of your people. #3rethren of this church and society.—We rejoice with you in the prospects of this day. We rejoice in the zeal, unanimity and liberality, with which you have secured to yourselves the admin- istration of God's word and ordinances, according to your own understanding of the Scriptures. We thank God, that he has dis- posed you to form an association, on the true principles of Chris- tianity and of protestantism, that you have solemnly resolved to call no man master in religion, to take your faith from no human creed, to submit your consciences to no human authority, but to repair to the gospel, to read it with your own eyes, to exercise upon it your own understanding, to search it, as if not a sect ex- isted around you, and to follow it wherever it may lead you. Brethren, hold fast your Christian and protestant liberty. We wish you continued peace, and growing prosperity. We pray God, that your good works may glorify your Christian profession, that your candour, and serious attention may encourage our young brother in the arduous work to which you have called him, and that your union with him, beginning in hope, may continue in joy, and may issue in the friendship and union of heaven. To all who hear me, I would say, with the apostle; “Prove all things, hold fast that which is good.” Do not, brethren, shrink from the duty of searching God’s word for yourselves through fear of human censure and denunciation. Do not think that you may innocently follow the opinions, which prevail around you, without investigation, on the ground, that Christianity is now so purified from errors, as to need no laborious research. There is much rea- son to believe, that Christianity is at this moment dishonoured by gross and cherished corruptions. If you remember the darkness, which hung over the gospel for ages; if you consider the impure union, which still subsists in almost every Christian country between the church, and the state, and which enlists men's selfishness, and ambition, on the side of established error; if you recollect in what degree the spirit of intolerance has checked free inquiry, not only before, but after the reformation; you will see that Christianity cannot have freed itself from all the human inven- tions which disfigured it under the papal tyranny. No. Much. stubble is yet to be burnt; much rubbish to be removed; many gaudy decorations, which a false taste has hung around christian- ity, must be swept away; and the earth-born fogs which have kong shrouded it, must be scattered, before this divine fabric will rise before us in its native, and awful majesty, in its harmonious t 27 - proportions, in its mild and celestial splendours. This glorious reformation in the church, we hope, under God's blessing, from the demolition of human authority in matters of religion, from the fall of those hierchies, huge establishments, general convoca- tions or assemblies, and other human institutions, by which the minds of individuals are oppressed under the weight of numbers, and a papal dominion is perpetuated in the protestant church. Our earnest prayer to God is, that he will overturn, and overturn, and overturn the strong holds of spiritual usurpation, until HE shall come, whose right it is to rule the minds of men; that the con- spiracy of ages against the liberty of Christians may be brought to an end; that the servile assent, so long yielded to human creeds, may give place to honest and fearless inquiry into the Scriptures; and that Christianity, thus purified from error, may put forth its almighty energy, and prove itself, by its ennobling influence on the mind, to be indeed, “the power of God unto sal- Vation.” * * * NOTE. THE author intended to add some notes to this discourse, but they would necessarily be more extended than the occasion would justify. He wished to offer some remarks on the word JMystery, but can only refer his readers to the disertation on that subject, in the inestimable work of Dr. Campbell on the Gospels. He was prevented, by the limits of the discourse from enlarging on that very interesting topick, the great end of our Saviour's mission ; and he would refer those, who wish to obtain definite views on this point, to an admi- rable treatise on the design of Christianity, by Bishop Fowler, which may be found in Bishop Watson's tracts. Had I time, I should be happy to notice the principal texts adduced in the Trinitarian controversy, particularly those which are either interpolations, or false or doubtful readings, or false or doubt. ful translations, such as 1 John v. 7. Acts xx. 28. 1 Tim. iii, 16. Philip. ii. 6, &c. These last texts should be dismissed from the controversy, and they cannot be needed, if the doctrine, which they are adduced to support, be a fundamental truth of Christianity. A fundamental truth cannot, certainly, want the aid of four or five doubtful passages ; and Trinitarians betray the weakness of their cause, in the eagerness with which they struggle for those I have named. But I cannot enlarge. The candour of the reader will excuse many omissions in a sermon, which is necessarily too limited to do more, than give the most prominent views of a subject. THE CHARGE, BY ELIPHALET PORTER, D. D. OF ROXBURY, MASS. tº-ººººº- * * *- MY DEAR BROTHER ;—Conscious, as I trust you are, of the purity of your motives in entering into the Christian ministry, and of the sincerity of your desires to fulfil the duties of the sacred office, and the important station into which you have now been publickly and solemnly inducted; you will receive, I doubt not, with all readiness and seriousness of mind, the charge, which, in conformity with ancient usage, and the duty assigned me, I am now to pronounce. This charge will be solemn, impressive, and worthy of your regard, in proportion as it shall be immediately drawn from the lively oracles of God. Permit me, therefore, to charge thee, before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the quick and the dead at his appearing ; Take heed to thyself, to the flock over which divine providence hath made thee an overseer, and to the ministry, which thou hast received of the Lord, to fulfil it. Our gracious master, you will recollect, spake a parable to this end, that men ought always to pray. This duty is, in a peculiar manner, incumbent on those who minister in holy things. Habit- ual prayer will have an important influence on your character and ministry. It will fortify you against the power of temptation, ele- vate your views, and sanctify your affections; cherish good prin- ciples, desires and purposes ; strengthen and animate you in the discharge of duty; and have a powerful tendency to draw down the choicest blessings on yourself, and on the people of your charge. To you it will belong to lead in the devotions of the Sanctuary, and of various occasions of a more private, though not less interesting nature. Let this part of your ministerial duty engage a due portion of your attention and meditation, that it may ever be performed in a manner appropriate, impressive, edifying and availing. - Preach the word; preach the truth as it is in Jesus, holding fast the form of sound words, as contained in the holy Scriptures, and calling no man on earth master. Be instant in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering and doc- trine. Keep back nothing, which may be profitable to your hear- ers. But let not an indiscreet, though honest zeal, to declare the whole counsel of God, betray you into the error of striving about words to no profit, or of seeming to be wise above what is written. 30 Still less suffer yourself, through a mere affectation of superior fidelity, to indulge in uncharitable denunciations, and in announ- cing opinions with an air of confidence exceeding your inward conviction of their truth. Imitate that teacher, who came from . God, and in whose mouth guile was never found. In his example you will see a wonderful prudence, united with perfect integrity; and occasional reserve, with unequalled faithfulness to HIM whose messages he was sent to declare. Study to shew thyself appro- ved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. Give thyself to reading, meditation, and doctrine. Intermeddle with all divine and useful knowledge ; not forgetting however, that much study is a weariness to the flesh, and that there is an application too intense to be long endured, without endangering health, and life, and usefulness. *N. Administer the ordinances of baptism, and the Lord's Supper, to such subjects, and in such a manner, as shall be best adapted to rescue, and preserve those institutions from superstitious abuse, and profane contempt, and have a tendency to render them exten- sive, and effectual means of exciting and binding men to a relig- ious life; of promoting their growth in grace, and in the know- ledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; and of securing the perseverance of the saints. Maintain Christian order and discipline, and behave thyself im- partially and wisely in the house of God. If any man, through inadvertence and surprise, be overtaken with a fault, restore such an one, in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself lest thou al- so be tempted. Them who sin habitually, and openly, rebuke be- fore all, that others also may fear. A man that is an heretic, one that is aspiring and contentious, causing divisions and offences, af. ter a first, and second admonition, reject, in order that peace and unity may be maintained. When called, in providence, to separate others to the work of the gospel ministry, you will not forget the apostolic injunction, lay hands suddenly on no man; but will have satisfactory evidence of the religious character, blameless life, theological attainment, and aptness to teach, of those whom you shall ordain elders in the churches. Remember, that as a minister of Jesus Christ, you are set for the defence of the gospel; and are required to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints, in opposition to those who deny the only Lord God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, his mes- senger of light, and love to the world. Know the state of thy flock, and give to every one his portion in due season. Visit the sick, console the afflicted, support the weak, be patient toward all men. Surrounded by Christians, whose religious opinions, and modes of ecclesiastical government, may not entirely accord with your own, you will cherish towards them sentiments of affection and respect, and treat them as breth- 31 \ ren. Should any feel, and conduct towards you in a different man- ner, you will still remember, that the servant of the Lord must not strive, but be gentle unto all, patient, in meekness instructing those that oppose themselves, if God, peradventure, will give them repentance to the acknowledgment of the truth. Let no man despise thee, or have just occasion to speak of thee with reproach, that the ministry be not blamed, and the truth hin- dered. But by propriety, and dignity of deportment, and useful- ness of life, commend yourself to the esteem, and consciences of all in the sight of God. Be an example of believers in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity. In all things show thyself a pattern of good works. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. Situated as you are, the application and use of this saying of our Lord will be readily perceived. Stir up the gifts that are in thee, and let thy profiting appear unto all. Observe with due attention the burning and shining lights, which may be placed in the golden candlestick around you. This may afford useful excitement to trim your own lamp, and thus cause it to burn with a purer and brighter flame. Having been allowed of God to be put in trust with this minis- try, so speak, so live, so fulfil its various duties, not as pleasing men, but God who trieth the heart. To make men wise, and good, and happy, is the great end of your sacred vocation. Keep this end constantly in sight. Let all inferior, and comparatively unworthy aims and motives, which are so apt to insinuate and wind themselves into the human heart, be eaten up by a holy zeal for doing good, as the deceptive magic serpents of Egypt were once swallowed up by the holy rod of Aaron. Be steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as you know your labour is not in vain in the Lord. And now unto him who is able, not only to keep you from falling, but to make you eminently useful in his service, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with ex- ceeding joy ; to the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen. JADDRESS TO THE SOCIETY, BY NATHANIEL THAYER, D. D. OF LANCASTER, MASS. CHRISTIAN FRIENDS ;—From the monitory lessons of my elder brother, you will be led to appreciate the labours and responsi- bility of your minister. In view of his situation, and the event- ful consequences of this day, “his soul would be cast down, and disquieted within him,” had he not the pledge you have given of respect, confidence, and affection, and the animating promise of the great head of the church. The union, which has been consummated, is a source of obli- gation to a people. Attending circumstances give it, in your case, a vast solemnity and weight. In executing the appointment of this ecclesiastical council, you will permit me, with plainness of speech, and a solicitude for the welfare of my brother and yourselves, to “stir up your mind by way of remembrance.” * * Ye need not, that I address you on the importance of saving your minister “from entangling himself with the affairs of this life.” “Be not weary in well doing ;” for the good things, which you shall minister to the convenience and comfort of this servant of the Lord, you may expect to reap an hundred fold in the spir- itual things, which he will be enabled to dispense. He will have no worldly perplexity to prevent his giving himself wholly to the ministry. He may intermeddle with all wisdom. He may “seek for the truth as for silver, and search for it as for hid treasures.” You have the promise, that in thus doing, “ he shall find the knowledge of God.” When you deal kindly with the teacher of religion, you may be animated by the belief, that you are acting in obedience to a solemn ordinance of your master. “Even so hath the Lord ordained, that they who preach the gospel should live of the gospel.” e To the accomplishment of your raised hope of his usefulness, who is “set over you in the Lord,” cherish towards him a dispo- sition to candour. In individuals in the Christian community, there appears, and it is no new thing under the Sun, a propensity to judge hardly of ministers. It gave rise to that reproof of the great founder of the religion which they preach. “We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced ; we have mourned unto 33 you, and ye have not lamented.” We are not to consider this propensity the fruit of a godly jealousy. In its operation it pro- vokes the captious, and such as are disinclined to a charitable judg- ment, to many railing accusations. Exemplary and faithful min- isters are accused of being worldly minded, proud, seekers of pop- ularity, friendly to the rich, negligent of the poor, wanting in compassion to the sick and afflicted, deficient in charity or zeal. From your advantages for refinement, and a candid interpretation of motives and actions, we hope better things. Let your fellow Christians behold you as a society, each member of which consid- ers himself appointed by providence, as the depository of the character of his minister, and resolved to guard it with the vigi- lance of true friendship. We do not urge you to have a mantle, of charity broad enough to cover defects, which shall bring dis- grace upon the ministry, or “give occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.” But we do represent it to you as a sol- emn duty, to repress a capricious, uncandid, censorious spirit. Be always ready with an apology for the omissions and errors, which can fairly be ascribed to human frailty, or to circumstances and causes beyond human control. Be particularly cautious in your re- marks on the indiscretions and faults of your minister, in presence of your children. You will be in danger of producing an impres" sion, which will grow into a strong prejudice, lessen his usefulness, and obstruct their edification. Be reasonable in your expectation of pastoral visits. A reli- gious society should never forget, that “the strength of their minister is not the strength of stones, neither is his flesh brass.” If solicited to mingle in the pleasures or dissipations of life, at the expense of what he believes to be professional duty, the re- ply should be received as magnanimous, and coming from a just sense of obligation to his master, if he says, “I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down; why should the work cease, while I leave it, and come down to you ?” Since inspiration has ceased, the man, who brings an intellectual and spiritual repast into the temple, must have time to prepare it. If the sick and afflicted receive due attention, and a reasonable anxiety appears for the temporal and spiritual welfare of his people, it will be only a suitable expression of their confidence, to leave with their minister the appropriation of seasons for ordinary and social in- tercourse. You will not be unmindful of a great purpose of an established ministry, and which has professedly influenced you in the erection of this temple, and in the preparatory measures for this solem- nity. It is that you may enjoy the stated administration of the word and ordinances. You will be singularly privileged, if there are none of your number, who, by reason of a corrupt education, licentious examples, a confirmed habit of negligence, an addict- edness to dissipation, distorted views of religion, or a general unconcern about their souls and eternity, have contracted a dis- 9 34 relish for Christian institutions. “ Exhort them daily while it is called to-day.” In the exercise of a Christian spirit, give them rational and interesting representations of the gospel and its ordi- nances. You may hope to correct their moral taste. Address their love of order, their patriotism, their desire for present and future happiness. A divine blessing attending your labours, you may convert these sinners from the error of their ways, and save their souls from death. You will fill them with joy and gladness, when it is said unto them, let us go into the house of God. You may excite in them “the preparation of heart,” which shall make them welcome guests at the table of the Lord. You will be “helpers of your minister in Christ Jesus.” Ministers are commanded to “preach the word.” Were there no positive precept for an enforcement of the duty, we might in- fer the indispensable obligation of all Christians to be hearers of it. A people cannot more surely abate the ardour, destroy the courage, and check the improvement, of a conscientious teacher of piety, than to “forsake the assembling of themselves together, as the Inanner of some is.” Let parents, and men of wealth and elevated rank, give the aid of their influence and example for the encouragement and support of publick worship. * When you approach this temple, come not to indulge a critical and fastidious taste; to feast upon strains of eloquence ; to hear this or the other theory of Christians denounced, or those who embrace or preach them stigmatized as bigots and subverters of Christian truth. The admonition to beware of such denunciation is too pointed and solemn to be slighted, by the enlightened and humble servants of the Redeemer; “ why dost thou judge, thy brother, or why dost thou set at naught thy brother ? for we must all stand before the judgment seat of Christ.” Come not with the expectation of hearing in every sermon a body of divinity. Your minister is called to address a mixed as- sembly, formed of the learned and unlearned ; the rich and poor; the afflicted and prosperous; the unholy and the good; adults and youth. Believe that he is faithful to him, who hath placed him in the vineyard, if he shall “give to each his portion in due season.” Come not with a disposition to indulge an unprofitable curiosity, by listening to abstruse speculations upon subjects, which “minis- ter to strife rather than to godly edifying.” Bear upon your mind, when you come hither, the solemn counsel of the son of Sirach, “Seek not out the things that are too hard for thee, neither search the things that are above thy strength. But what is commanded thee, think thereupon with reverence; for it is not needful for thee to see with thine eyes the things that are in Secret. Be not curious in unnecessary matters, for more things are shewed unto thee than men understand, for many are deceiv- ed by their own vain opinion, and an evil suspicion hath over- thrown their judgment.”. If the discourses you shall hear be plain 35 and practical, and there be no attempt of their author to reach the unfathomable depths of the divine counsels, consider him as justified in this course by the inspired lesson; “Secret things be- long unto the Lord our God; but the things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.” | Rest not your faith on any minister of Christ. You are to take the Son of God only for your master and Lord. By his gospel you are to test the truth or errors of men, who profess to address you in his name. May you be added to the catalogue of Chris- tians, who “search the Scriptures daily, whether the things . which they hear are so.” Pray for your minister. He needs your sympathy, your friend- ship, your counsel, but especially your prayers. Pray that he may have grace to execute his purpose of this day, that “he will Know nothing amongst you save Jesus Christ and him crucified.” iMay he “save himself and those who hear him.” We assure you of our joy and our thanksgiving to the author of all good influences, when we heard of “ your-order, and the steadfastness of your faith in Christ.” We recognise you as a branch of the Christian church. We applaud you for your open- ness to declare your belief in “one God, and in one mediator be- tween God and men, the man Christ Jesus.” While you are hos- tile to a spirit of prosélytism, while you resolve and encourage your fellow Christians to “call no man master upon the earth,” your duty does not wholly consist in this. You are to prove yourselves the true disciples of Jesus, by “contending earnestly for the faith, which was once delivered to the saints.” Use all means consistent with “charity out of a pure heart, and a good conscience, and faith unfeigned” to understand, defend, and diffuse important truth. Bring your understanding with you to the inter- pretation of Christian truths. Let your “ zeal be according to knowledge.” Act under the conviction, that “it is good to be zeal- ously affected always in a good thing.” Justify the confidence which we, and the churches we represent, have reposed in you, by remaining “steadfast, immoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord.” Now, Christian Friends, our hearts’ desire and earnest prayer for you and your minister is, that you may long “know how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity;” that this church may be “built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone ; that you may realize, that “a preached gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth;” that “whether we come and see you, or being absent shall hear of your affairs, we may hear that you stand fast in the faith, striving together for the furtherance of the gospel;” and that hereafter you may join “the redeemed of the Lord, who shall come to Zion with songs, and with everlasting joy.” :=== *::: -*. * * 4 § - wº º º:sº - - - - º º º § ſº : tº: º ſº sº º º ſº - º sºvº sº : § gº ..º.º. §§§ &: ºś sº º §: sº º º & º §º: £º: sº §: º: §§§ ºº:: º º º : : º º zº º º 㺠%: §º 㺠-> º sº º É C- º º º §º :ºº:::::::::::::::: § º gºš º §§ sº § º lº. ś § §: º ºº:::::::::::::::::: £º ##: §§§ 3-ºxº~º §::::::::::::::::::::::::::: & Bºžº § sº - - jº w sº º gº †: ã º º: *:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::$: § : § - tºº - gº - N- º d - º ..º. sº ºº º : ; º --> --> § § º § § º tº: 㺠|Tºº º º º º º i § º º º : - § sº sº § § § - ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: c. £º ſº sº ºº:: º Bºº § : §§ É §§ º º º :::::::::::::::::::::: Rº: § º ; :::::::::::: º - § § º º V. : # º §º : º: º :- º º É; º: º § º º d jº §: § - §: §§ § º ; § : § § . º : . § : º sº º §: º ºº: º: sº º *::::::: º gº º sº º º: w : º --- - - --> gº § º: §º ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: º tº sº §§: sº º sº º § ~ ºš & º & º §§ K. i º rº : º * §§ - # º: * ---- º § 3: :łºś §§ § º § º: sº Nº. ºº:: § §: § - : º: §§ & #: § : §: º *::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: º º º º ſ: º º e. gº º: §§§ - wº - - º: º † fºº: : -; § * : # º º ºº º tº gº gº §§º º sº º gº sº & rºº #º & jºº § : §: § º sº º 3. - º Bº: 3 - > º o £º º º ~ - - º £º jº º Fº º ºf ººº-ºº: sº Fº º tºº § º º: §º § - ºś *::::::::::: º: º º § º （ºf º º : #: sº Gº --- § gº º º º º º * - - º º: § § sº º: § - -**Tº sº §§ w - º w ºx_ixº $3. -----> º tº: Gºf º: - §: º > -º- - -º- º º § º º º º º º -º-, --> c tºº §§ § ; *. š #:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: §ºść º §§ § º sº ;# ºº:: *.* §: º º: § #: ** ź :: # ; : § º º § 2.º:º : º § § ;-- : º §:-§ 2. º - §: ** º - : § - ; º *: - § º º § ºf :33. § §§ § § - º sº š. É : §§ ºś ºš § gº º §§§ §§º sº §º : ; §: :* º % ;: . **** gº. ºrs ºf : sº-s ** fº # º: *ś # Bºº §: § 4& ----- ***. Fº: N- - º zº ;################## tº: º º § §º # tº § § jºxº ; # º c § ſº § § §: § §§ § { º º º § .# t 3. º sº x +. & g : º ::- * º§# º } *...* 3.