LIBRARY 
 
 nil-: 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
 i c > i ^ 
 
 Mrs. SARAH P. WALSWORTH. 
 
 Received October, 1894. 
 t/lcce&sions No. 
 

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SEED-TRUTHS; 
 
 OB, 
 
 BIBLE VIEWS OF MIND, MORALS, 
 AND RELIGION. 
 
 BY 
 
 PHARCELLUS CHURCH, D.D., 
 
 H 
 
 AUTHOR or 'PHILOSOPHY OF BENEVOLENCE;' ' RELIGIOUS DISSENSIONS : THEIR 
 
 AND CURE, A PRIZE KSSAT;' 'ANTIOCH; OR, THE INCREASE OF MORAL 
 POWER IN THE CHURCH,' ETC. ETC. 
 
 Search the Scriptures. JOHN v. 39. 
 
 Comparing spiritual things with spiritual.* COR. II. 13, 
 
 NEW 
 
 SHELDON & CO., No. 677 BKOADWAY 
 
 AND 214 & 216 MERCER STREET, 
 
 UNDER GRAND CENTRAL HOTEL, 
 
 1871. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 EADHTG the Bible in course, or by verse and 
 XX chapter, fails in many cases to bring to light 
 the truths which underlie all its- documents, and which 
 are the same to us as to any previous generation. 
 Human nature and its relations, in their essential prin- 
 ciples, are a unit in all ages. But we are prone to 
 think of what we read as pertaining to another sphere, 
 or quite remote from the order of our present experi- 
 ences. A more interior view of the subject dissipates 
 this illusion, and makes the Bible, more than any other 
 book, a painting of what we now see and experience. 
 
 There may be unfitness of mind for this interior 
 view, just as there may be for enjoying the poets ; and 
 we may turn away from Scripture, as having nothing 
 to interest us, as many readers do from Shakspeare 
 and Milton. But this is not all The reading is too 
 fragmentary to reach foundation-truths. Can we know 
 what a tree is as a whole, by seeing its leaves and 
 its chips ? Commentaries are too ponderous, sermons 
 too excursive, and creeds too summary, great as their 
 value is, to meet this exact demand. Questions are 
 ever recurring to inquisitive readers, which they find 
 it difficult to answer. Why a revelation in such form ? 
 
iv Preface. 
 
 Why such a record of the first man, and his trifling 
 aberration ? Why doom his posterity for a sin in 
 which they had no participation ? Why such a life as 
 that of Abraham, and such a law as that of Moses ? 
 Why such a murderous raid on the Canaanites ? Why 
 such lists of unmeaning names ? On account of such 
 questionings, the Catholics deem the Bible an unsafe 
 book in the hands of the people, unless a priest is 
 present to indoctrinate them in the dogmas of the 
 church. 
 
 That the writer has met all these questions he does 
 not claim, but only that he has developed certain 
 principles in which all those anomalies and our present 
 experiences alike cohere ; just as in nature there are 
 forces binding into one both its explained and unex- 
 plained phenomena. His plan is, first, to sketch the 
 Bible man in his mental, moral, and religious charac- 
 teristics ; and then to trace him out in the states, 
 transitions, and histories recorded of him in Scripture ; 
 and showing, at the same time, their agreement with 
 what we are, what our forefathers have been, and what 
 our posterity is to be to the end of time. 
 
 It is usual, in our systems of education, to detach 
 the science of mind, morals, and natural theology from 
 revelation, and treat them on the basis of consciousness, 
 our relations, or the evidences of design which we see 
 around us. What is thus acquired, on merely human 
 grounds of evidence, is preparatory to the study of the 
 Bible. The divinity student, after being drilled in the 
 study of man as conducted by the schools, is put to 
 interpreting the word of God, as a Chinese lady is put 
 to walking after her feet have been crippled in iron 
 shoes. His mental muscles are indurated into a form, 
 in judging of tlie man of the Bible, to compel him to 
 
Preface. v 
 
 be thus and not otherwise ; or to be a puppet of the 
 schools, rather than a piece of God's handiwork. The 
 young preacher must have a strong decoction of philo- 
 sophy, just a little tinctured with revelation, and then 
 be sent abroad to give the mixture to the sheep and 
 lambs of Christ's flock 
 
 But can the philosophical man act the part of the 
 Bible man ? Is there anything in a metaphysical 
 Adam, or a metaphysical new man in Christ, to meet 
 the descriptions of Moses or the apostles ? Suppose 
 the professor, after shaping human nature by his science 
 of mind, morals, and theology, were to say to his pupils, 
 ' Now you see that' a being so constituted might eat an 
 apple and damn a world,' would not the class laugh 
 him in the face ? There is no fitness in the man 
 elaborated out of his material to act any such part. 
 The idea of being born again would be foreign to his 
 nature. ' If MORALS are not taken up distinctively on 
 the principles of revelation, they had better, as subjects 
 of prelection for young men, be let alone altogether. 
 Not only can there be no true morality without reli- 
 gion ; but the teaching of moral virtues to sinful crea- 
 tures, on grounds independent of the mercy revealed 
 by the gospel, is an inlet to antiscriptural and soul- 
 destroying delusions.' 1 This remark is as true of the 
 science of mind as of morals. No honest pupil can 
 compare the science of man, as studied on merely 
 natural grounds, with what he reads of the race in the 
 Bible, without feeling that there are grave and inexpli- 
 cable discrepancies. 
 
 There must be something in human nature that 
 philosophy has not reached, or the Bible must be given 
 up as a revelation from God. Many of those who 
 
 1 Christian Ethics, by Dr. Ralph Wardlaw, p. 378. 
 
vi Preface. 
 
 strongly adhere to the view of the schools become infi- 
 dels ; and others adhere to revelation on the principle 
 of withdrawing it from the category of humanity, and 
 assigning it to quite another order of things. While 
 speculative philosophy is a very unsettled science, 
 with as many theories of it as there are powerful minds 
 to treat the subject, it should be considered that the 
 writers of the Bible, in all their varied ages and cir- 
 cumstances, are perfectly agreed in their views of man's 
 nature, relations, history, and necessities. They keep 
 to those practical views which ensure uniformity among 
 themselves, and which must have a like effect upon 
 others so far as they are studied. 
 
 The Bible man stands between two distinct worlds 
 that of nature, and that of spirits ; taking impressions 
 and ideas from both, though unlike each other as spirit 
 is to matter, and, heaven or hell is to earth. He trims 
 his sails to breezes from the seen and unseen, from the 
 temporal and the eternal. These opposite influences 
 act upon him through distinct modes of apprehension ; 
 and it is for him to determine whether the one or the 
 other shall rule him. This is a prerogative that allies 
 him to God. It is the basis of his law and of his 
 principle of duty. So totally distinct and unlike is 
 what comes V> him from God from what comes to him 
 from nature, that his whole character, his moral status, 
 and that of those born of him or trained under his 
 influence, are necessarily determined, according as he 
 continues under the rule of spirit from God, or as he 
 recedes to the ruling of flesh, as acted upon by the 
 world. The two necessarily bar each other as ruling 
 powers. 1 Can we wonder that man, as so constituted 
 and so situated, should by one act detach himself, and 
 1 Cor. ii. 14 ; Matt xvi. 23 ; Rom. viiL 6-8. 
 
Preface. vii 
 
 tlrose born of him, from innocence, or at the extra- 
 ordinary means necessary to his recovery ? How much 
 does it cost to civilise a savage, or to make an innocent 
 man of a voluptuary, drunkard, and murderer ? 
 
 Plato, a heathen philosopher, came nearer the Bible 
 idea of man than most others who have considered him 
 merely from a natural point of view. He supposed 
 the soul had a pre-existent life, and that ideas from 
 another world were born with him. He therefore, like 
 the inspired writers, united two worlds in man, though 
 he mistook the manner of it. Kant has a sublime 
 passage on the subject, though he stops short of the 
 Bible idea of a spiritual and natural universe : ' Two 
 things there are which, the oftener and the more sted- 
 fastly we consider, fill the mind with an ever-new, 
 an ever-rising admiration and reverence the STARRY 
 HEAVENS above, the MORAL LAW within. Of neither am 
 I compelled to seek out the reality, as veiled in dark- 
 ness, or only to conjecture the possibility, as beyond 
 the hemisphere of my knowledge. Both I contem- 
 plate lying clear before me, and connect both with my 
 consciousness of existence. The one departs from the 
 place I occupy in the outward world of sense ; expands, 
 beyond the bounds of imagination, this connection of 
 my body with worlds, and systems blending into sys- 
 tems ; and protends it also into the illimitable times 
 of their periodic movement to its commencement and 
 perpetuity. The other departs from my invisible self, 
 from my personality ; and represents me in a world 
 truly infinite indeed, but whose infinity can be tracked 
 out only by the intellect, with which also my connec- 
 tion, unlike the fortuitous relation I stand in to all 
 worlds of sense, I am compelled to recognise as uni- 
 versal and necessary. In the former, the first view of 
 
viii Preface. 
 
 a countless multitude of worlds annihilates, as it were, 
 my importance as an animal product, which, after a 
 brief, and that incomprehensible, endowment with the 
 powers of life, is compelled to refund its constituent 
 matter to the planet itself an atom in the universe 
 on which I grow. The other, on the contrary, elevates 
 my worth as an intelligence even without limit ; and 
 this through my personality, in which the moral law 
 reveals a faculty of life independent of my animal 
 nature, nay, of the whole material world ; at least, if 
 it be permitted to infer as much from the regulation 
 of my being, which conformity with that law exacts ; 
 proposing, as it does, my moral worth for the absolute 
 end of my activity, conceding no compromise of its 
 imperative to a necessitation of nature, and spurning 
 in its infinity the conditions and boundaries of my 
 transitory life.' * 
 
 Thus the Bible view of man, as acted upon by two 
 worlds, is not without a certain kind of response from 
 philosophy. The sense of amenableness to God per- 
 vading ordinary minds, however, is a much stronger 
 proof of the fact. Every one who honestly consults 
 his own heart will find responses from the spirit-realm 
 as unmistakeable as those which he receives from 
 nature through the senses. 
 
 After revolving this subject for some time, it oc- 
 curred to the author to collate what is said in the 
 r.ible of the nature of man ; and when he had done 
 so, he saw clearly that its histories, its ceremonials, its 
 morals, its doctrines, its views of sin and redemption, 
 were all adjusted to certain attributes and relations of 
 human nature. The principles ruling in the case are 
 few and simple, and they are a complete index to the 
 1 A quoted by Sir W. Hamilton, Metaphysics, pp. 28, 29. 
 
Preface. ix 
 
 whole subject-matter of revealed religion. These are 
 treated in the first eleven chapters of his work. 
 
 The writer gave to the public some years ago a 
 volume issued as a Prize Essay on Christian Union, 
 in preparing which he became convinced that our sec- 
 tarian divisions begin with interpreting Scripture by 
 something out of Scripture ; and that, if we would be 
 united, we must ' search ' for its true sense and spirit 
 by ' comparing spiritual things only with spiritual ; ' 
 interpreting the word by the word, or doctrine by 
 ceremony, law by gospel, the historical by the devo- 
 tional, the obscure by the plain, and the Old Testament 
 by the New, and vice versa. This might not restore 
 Papal uniformity in the dark ages, a state of things 
 far worse than our divisions, but it would tend to 
 abate the rancour of schism, by showing each sect the 
 wisdom of moderating its extreme positions by those 
 of its equally zealous and conscientious neighbours. 
 The writer did not expect to attempt a work on this 
 principle of comparing spiritual things with spiritual ; 
 but, Providence favouring, he has devoted about five 
 years to the studies which have resulted in this unpre- 
 tending work. 
 
 The chief part of his labour has consisted in an 
 endeavour to draw his materials from original sources, 
 ignoring what others had made out of those materials. 
 The reading of the original Scriptures throughout, and 
 the re-reading of parts of them over and over again, 
 have been his chief resource. He desired to look 
 beyond translations as far as possible, to the human 
 or material ' form of sound words/ or to the derivation 
 of f the words which the Holy Ghost teacheth.' l He 
 does not claim to be a critic in language, but only to 
 1 1 Cor. ii. 13 ; 2 Tim. i 13. 
 
x Preface. 
 
 look beneath the derived word, which translations do 
 little more than give, if they do that, to the germinal 
 idea which its root was used to express. 
 
 ' The writer has found much instruction in collating all 
 the passages in which important words occur, to elimi- 
 nate the stem-thought in each of them. Ruacli, spirit ; 
 ncpJicsh, soul; torah, law; kapporeth, atonement, and 
 many others, thus collated and compared, have proved 
 a rich placer of the purest gold. He finds, in the use 
 of these words, a discrimination of meaning not to he 
 detected by any other process. The ' spirit, and soul, 
 and body/ as used by the apostle in 1 Thess. v. 23, is 
 a Hebraistic mode of speaking as old as language. 
 
 The writer has also collated much of the Bible re- 
 flected in the articles of our most renowned creeds. 
 This has enabled him the better to judge of the stand- 
 point of our old interpreters. Their work is of great 
 service as a breakwater to lawless innovations, but not 
 as reflecting an unbiassed comparison of spiritual things 
 with spiritual They were too much affected by the 
 controversies of their several periods to admit of this. 
 And their definitions have extensively modified com- 
 mentaries, sermons, interpretation, and the whole range 
 of religious thinking and reasoning. Even the latitu- 
 flin;irian sects have taken form, as the water-line of an 
 iron-bound coast by its jagged rocks and granite bluffs, 
 through the mighty resisting force of these old Athana- 
 sian, Augusti nian, and Calvinistic creed-makers. 
 
 The writer has not the vanity to attempt to improve 
 upon such men, but only to hint, as the result of fifty 
 years' reflection on the subject, that orthodoxy, to retain 
 its hold on the restless thought of the age that is and 
 is to come, must look to a more interior and untram- 
 melled exam million of the word. There is a fear of 
 
Preface. xi 
 
 relaxing our hold upon the old standards, even for the 
 Bible itself ; the cry of heresy may perhaps assail him 
 that attempts it ; but still the work must go on, and 
 the writer trusts that his feeble efforts may prompt 
 others to do better. To indicate a few points of differ- 
 ence between an exterior and interior examination of 
 the sacred text, let a few examples suffice. 
 
 The exterior view makes the primeval man holy in 
 his creation ; the interior finds him innocent and up- 
 right, and the candidate for a virtue and holiness to be 
 acquired by trial. 
 
 The exterior ascribes his fall to an outward tempter ; 
 the interior finds in his doubt, appetite, sesthetical 
 nature, and various specific impulses, a basis for temp- 
 tation, apart from extraneous malign influence. 
 
 The exterior makes depravity total ; the interior 
 makes it the extinction of spiritual life, or life in 
 God, but not of natural conscience and conservative 
 qualities. 
 
 The exterior confines its ideas of sin chiefly to vices 
 and crimes; the interior makes it a nature ruled by 
 the flesh and the world. Everything is sin under that 
 ruling. 
 
 The exterior makes law a series of specific enact- 
 ments ; the interior makes it a principle of duty, of 
 which specific enactments are an emanation. 
 
 The exterior makes penalty an overt infliction of 
 death upon men and animals in this world, and hell- 
 torments in the next ; the interior makes it that extinc- 
 tion of spiritual life which began on the day of the first 
 sin, to continue till that life is restored by divine grace. 
 
 The exterior view regards a decree of election, con- 
 signing a portion of mankind to eternal life, as the first 
 act in redemption ; the interior view refers specific 
 
xii . Preface. 
 
 manifestations of grace, as with believers in Borne and 
 Ephesus, to God's gracious working from the beginning 
 of time, as recorded in the Old Testament. As Dr. 
 Wardlaw says, the way is, ' not to begin with the pur- 
 pose, and reason forward to the event, but to begin 
 with the event, and reason backward to the purpose.' * 
 This is the order in which the apostles uniformly state 
 the case. 
 
 To the exterior, the sacrifice of Christ upon the cross 
 is a price paid to law and justice ; to the interior, it is 
 power to reproduce itself in every believer. 
 
 To the one, the atonement is an abstraction of 
 government ; to the other, it is bruising the serpent's 
 head, or killing the nature which is the head of his 
 power over man, in order to resurrection to a new and 
 heavenly life. 
 
 To the one, the crucifixion was a spectacular scene 
 like a public execution, to exhibit to the universe the 
 vengeance of law ; to the other, it is God on the mercy- 
 seat restoring union between Himself and His mourn- 
 ing people at the door of the sanctuary, or ' that 
 repentance and remission of sins should be preached 
 in His name among all nations.' * 
 
 To the one, regeneration is a change of affections 
 and conduct ; to the other, it is God's restored domi- 
 nion in the soul, of which the changed affections and 
 conduct are a consequence. It is ' seeing ' and ' enter- 
 ing the kingdom of God.' * 
 
 To the one, the blood of Christ is a wrath -appeaser ; 
 to the other, it is spiritual life purifying the heart 
 through faith, and pervading man's whole outward life. 
 ' He that eateth me shall live by me ; ' and all things 
 ;ti. purified by blood. 
 
 1 Christian Ethic*, p. 158. Luke xxiv. 47. John iii. 3-6. 
 
Preface. xiii 
 
 To the one, the church is an outward organization ; 
 to the other, it is a company of believers, who ' by one 
 spirit are baptized into one body.' * 
 
 The author states these as a few of the many points 
 on which the views of thousands will undergo essential 
 modifications as they advance towards a more interior 
 and untrammelled view of the word of God. 
 
 He gives his authorities at the bottom of each page, 
 which the reader can refer to or not as he pleases. 
 The body of the work is complete without them. The 
 same passages and the same sentiments are repeated 
 under different aspects, or to ensure clearness. This 
 seemed to the writer unavoidable. 
 
 He desires to record his grateful acknowledgments 
 to the curators of the University Library of Bonn, 
 Prussia, where the work was written, for the free access 
 allowed him to their valuable collection of books. 
 1 1 Cor. xii. 13. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 MM 
 
 I. HOW TRUTHS BECOME THE SEEDING OF IDEAS, * 1 
 
 II. TWO MINDS qR MODES OF CONCEIVING TRUTH, . 7 
 
 III. ARCHETYPE OF MAN IN GOD, ...... 14 
 
 IV. TERMS OF MIND IN FLESH, . 2M 
 V. INHALING LIFE FROM THE EXPANSE, . ... 34. 
 
 VI. THE SOUL AS THE CONSCIOUS SELFHOOD, . . 44 
 
 VII. THE REALM OF SPIRITS, ...... 66 
 
 VIII. SPIRIT IN INSTITUTIONS, . . . . . ,69 
 
 EX. SPIRIT IN MORALS, . . . . . . .81 
 
 X. SPIRIT IN CONSCIENCE, ....... 94 
 
 XI. HISTORY AN OUTGROWTH OF SEED -TRUTHS, . . .107 
 
 XII. HAPPINESS OF BEING RULED BY SPIRIT, . . .116 
 
 XIII. HOW HEAVEN IS LOST, ....... 128 
 
 XIV. THE SPIRITS IN PRISON, . . . , . .144 
 XV. DOCTRINE IN HISTORY, .161 
 
 XVI. DOCTRINE IN WORDS AND SYMBOLS, . 176 
 
 XVII. WORDS AND SYMBOLS IN POWER, . . . . .189 
 
 XVIII. LAW THE BASIS OF GOD'S RULE IN THE SOUI* . . 203 
 
 XIX. THE NATURE AND USE OF THE LAW IN STONE, . . 216 
 
 XX. THE DIVINE INDWELLING IN OUR SOCIAL RELATIONS, . 235 
 
xvi Contents. 
 
 XXI. THE THEOCRATIC AS A TYPE OF THE SPIRITUAL MAN, . 253 
 
 XXII. GOD BORN OF MAN, THAT MAN MAT BE BORN OF GOD, , 264 
 
 XXIII. DYING TO LIVE, . . 281 
 
 XXIV. THE KINGDOM OF GOD WITH POWER, . . 294 
 r. SUFFERING AS THE INITIATIVE OF POWBS, . 208 
 
SEED-TRUTHS; 
 
 OR, 
 
 BIBLE VIEWS OF MIND, MORALS, AND RELIGION. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 HOW TRUTHS BECOME THE SEEDIK& OF IDEAS. 
 
 A TRUTH can take no root in our minds until it 
 is embodied in words and symbols. Like a 
 wheat-corn, it must die and incorporate its life with 
 elements gross and unlike itself, before it can reappear 
 in enlarged knowledge or improved character. As the 
 identity of the seed is lost in the process, and cannot 
 be known to one who has only seen the plant, so of 
 truths, especially those farthest removed from the 
 senses': they cannot be known without careful search- 
 ing, and are often sadly perverted by those who stop 
 with their symbols. SEARCH THE SCRIPTURES has a 
 peculiar force of meaning in the lips of our Lord. 
 
 The honour bestowed upon a plant has reference to 
 the value of its seed. A mean shrub that enriches 
 us by its products is highly esteemed. So God has 
 magnified His word above all His name, 1 by making 
 that part of the infinite truth in Himself, which He 
 
 1 Ps. cxxxv'ii. 2. 
 A 
 
2 Seed- Truths. 
 
 has deposited in language, fruitful in knowledge, virtue, 
 and salvation to a lost race. This is the word on which 
 He has caused us to hope, and for the fulfilment f 
 which He has taught us to pray. 1 It was incarnated, 
 or made flesh, that we might behold its glory, and be 
 changed into its image. 2 
 
 How much of truth in thought and feeling fails of 
 the embodiment necessary to make it the seeding of 
 ideas to other minds ! How many a poem, great, per- 
 haps, as Homer's or Milton's, has been felt or sung in 
 hearts that had not the tongue to give it expression ! 
 How many inventions in art, that might have blessed 
 the world, passed away like a forgotten dream, because 
 they were not put into wood, iron, or brass ! More are 
 the seeds that perish without germination, than those 
 which yield our harvests. 
 
 Every well-thought-out book has a few leading 
 truths, of which the rest is the husk, into which they 
 are expanded for transmission to other minds. Cowper's 
 idea of the ridiculous spectacle of plain people seeking 
 pleasure in unwonted ways, by shaping itself into his 
 John Gilpin, has yielded amusement to thousands. 
 The analogies of natural and revealed religion, by taking 
 on the reasoning of Butler's Analogy, have given in- 
 struction to succeeding ages. Though the truths in 
 such cases were the same, those results could no more 
 follow, than a harvest from parched corn or burned 
 wheat, if the words were not added. A book with a 
 few good and great thoughts will live and bear fruit in 
 spite of defects of style. Some of our most prolific 
 truths appeared at first in a clumsy form, just as our 
 greatest machines began .with unartistic models. But, 
 having an idea in them, it worked itself out, as the 
 
 > Fo. csis. 19. * John i. 14 ; 2 Cor. iii. 18. 
 
How Truths become the Seeding of Ideas. 3 
 
 crab-apple is said to Tiave produced by culture all the 
 delicious varieties of the apple kind. What a poor 
 thing must have been the first plough ! But, having 
 in it a great idea, it has gone on increasing, till it now 
 breaks up millions of square miles of soil, and tripli- 
 cates the inhabitants of the globe by giving them 
 bread. 
 
 Seed-truths are the only things in the whole harvest 
 which are unchanged. They are the same in all ages. 
 The oaks that shade the valleys, and are reflected from 
 the placid surface of lake or river, tall, expanding, 
 majestic, come from a like chit with their scrubby, 
 gnarled, tempest-beaten, lightning-riven brethren of the 
 mountain-tops. From the first planting by the Crea- 
 tor's hand, this chit truth has remained the same, 
 nothing having changed but the external form, as 
 affected by soil or climate. The vegetable kingdom, 
 however, furnishes no greater examples of identity, in 
 all ages and circumstances, than the word on which 
 God has caused us to hope. In the vast product of 
 ideas from the seeding of revealed truth, which has 
 appeared from Adam to this day, there are a few 
 underlying principles which have never changed. The 
 process has not been one of mutation, so far as they 
 are concerned, but of development. The gospel preached 
 to us was before preached to Abraham. 1 ' Before Abra- 
 ham was, I am,' 2 are words asserting a oneness of 
 thought in redemption from the beginning of time. 
 One mind, one idea, one class of truths. These are the 
 truths of our inquiry in this work. 
 
 That the Bible has yielded a great harvest of ideas, 
 none will deny. And why is it ? Why is it to-day 
 more read and circulated than any other book ? Why 
 
 1 Gal. iii. 8. 3 John viii. 58. 
 
4 Seed- Truths. 
 
 is it so impressed upon the fabric of our common law ? 
 Why is it so wrought into our civilisation ? Why is 
 it so generally quoted, and preached, and reverently 
 listened to ? Why have the most gifted minds, in 
 many cases, ascribed to it their best culture ? Not 
 certainly because its wars are a model for ours. Not 
 because its ritual of bleeding beasts could edify us. 
 Not because we hope to grow its inspired men in our 
 schools. Not because its details of legislation, under 
 the old theocracy, are adapted to our age ; nor because 
 the present descendants of the subjects of that theo- 
 cracy, in their shrewd practices on 'Change, are at all 
 fitted to recommend it to our adoption. Not because 
 the Papal and Mohammedan hierarchies, fashioned 
 after this ancient model of a divine civil government 
 among men, afford the least encouragement for us to 
 attempt anything of the kind. If a theocracy was a 
 blessing under David, it is a curse under popes and 
 sultans. And those who look for its restoration in 
 the Holy Land, to rule all the nations by means of 
 converted Jewish satraps, 'do err, not knowing the 
 Scriptures nor the power of God.' 
 
 Seed-truths live in all ages and climes, because they 
 adjust themselves to the intelligence and wants of a 
 people. Abraham's career, Moses' miracles, David's 
 reign, Solomon's golden and gorgeous throne, was each 
 suited to its age ; though, if attempted in our times, it 
 would prove as dead a failure as a crop of polar mosses 
 tinder equatorial suns. And yet is this any evidence 
 that the same great spiritual truths did not underlie all 
 these histories ? Liberty has allied itself to many a 
 bloody scene in the last three centuries ; but is it there- 
 fore to be repudiated by those who shall live in the 
 quieter days of the future ? Its glory is that it has 
 
How Truths become the Seeding of Ideas. 5 
 
 survived so many a hard-fought field. And the glory 
 of revealed truths is that they have prosecuted their 
 great work of man's redemption with such tools, and 
 in the midst of such scenes. They owe their perpe- 
 tuity to their inherent vitality, and also to taking on 
 forms of thought adapted to the several ages, just as the 
 plough-idea has survived, both by its necessity to human 
 use and by allying itself to the clumsy models, which 
 have repeated themselves from the crotched stick of 
 savages to the shining shares with wheels which now 
 upturn the soil. Eealities at bottom, great, momentous, 
 infinite realities, that man was born to feel, put into a 
 form to be comprehended by all, this is the law. 
 
 As every one of these truths is from a human stand- 
 point, like all seeing from the eye, our first inquiry is 
 as to what the seers saw in man. What sort of being is 
 that to whom truths of God, truths of nature, truths of 
 providence, truths of redeeming love, truths of heaven, 
 hell, and judgment, are addressed ? What fits him for 
 receiving them ? Pictures are not for the blind, nor 
 music for the deaf. Eevelation is not for brutes, but 
 for men ; and what in men makes a divine revelation 
 apropos to their case ? The answer of these questions 
 we take from prophets themselves, not from analysing 
 the facts of consciousness after the manner of our 
 speculative philosophers. The prophets saw what was 
 in man by intuition and not by reasoning, and what 
 they saw they describe. Our business, therefore, is 
 with their language and their symbols. 
 
 If what the seers saw in man is not to be trusted, 
 nor made a basis of science, what is ? Will the meta- 
 physics ever emerge from the quagmire of inconclusive 
 reasoning in which they have been for ages floundering ? 
 They may be an excellent discipline to the intellect, 
 
6 Seed- Truths. 
 
 as rope-dancing is to the muscles ; but their basis is 
 always unsettled, always veering to and fro between 
 realism and idealism, or between points too subtle to 
 admit of a fixed basis, and which are no nearer settle- 
 ment to-day than they were two thousand years ago. 
 However excellent as intellectual gymnastics, they are 
 not likely to enter largely into the concerns of practi- 
 cal life. 
 
 But there is this to be said of the inspired writers, 
 they give us fixed ideas of man and his relations. They 
 present the same ideas from Genesis to Eevelation, and 
 describe them by like words and images. The external 
 and internal organs of the body the adytum and 
 exterior of their temple ; respiration as an inhalation 
 from two worlds ; and like symbols, are the form which 
 their thoughts on the subject assume. Their whole 
 system of doctrinal truth, their record of the race from 
 beginning to end, and, we may add, their anticipations 
 of its final destiny, are to their minds types of the 
 nature and relations of man. The salient points of 
 their teaching on the subject will be considered in the 
 following chapters. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 TWO MINDS OR MODES OF CONCEIVING TRUTH. 
 
 writers of the Bible looked upon human nature 
 .JL as centring in itself currents of thought and 
 influence from the headlands of two worlds, and yet 
 so blended that the thinking agent himself does not 
 always suspect the source of the impulses that direct 
 his conduct. He thinks them wholly of this world 
 if his tendencies are materialistic, or he thinks them 
 from heaven if he is a fanatic, both views being 
 alike false. What is thought to be from earth may be 
 from the spirit-land, and what is ascribed to heaven 
 may be from hell, like the piety of Simon Magus. 
 Human life, in the Bible view, is the blended result of 
 what acts upon us from this outward scene of things, 
 and what acts upon us from heaven and from hell. We 
 have two distinct modes of conception, one through 
 our bodily senses, of which we have no doubt; the 
 other through our spiritual susceptibilities, of which 
 perhaps we are not conscious, but which is none the less 
 potent in making up the sum-total of what we are as 
 moral and intellectual beings. 
 
 The inspired writers claim for our spiritual suscepti- 
 bilities, as ruled by the Spirit of God, the right to con- 
 trol us in all things. These are for dominion, the flesh- 
 or natural life for subordination ; and when they coexist 
 in that relation, they constitute the kingdom of heaven 
 
 7 
 
8 Seed- Truths. 
 
 upon earth. 'We are double,' says an able writer, 
 ' one part of earth, another of heaven ; one part gross 
 body, the other life of the soul. Which of these is 
 the better it is not hard to determine.' 
 
 The apostle speaks of the ruling of the one or the 
 other of these opposite powers in the man as TO c/?o- 
 VTjfjia TT}<? aapKos, the mind of the flesh, and TO ^pov^fia 
 7ov TTvev/jLaros, the mind of the spirit. 1 The one is 
 thought and feeling cast in an earthly mould, and the 
 other is thought and feeling cast in a heavenly mould. 
 In the mind of the flesh natural ideas predominate ; in 
 the mind of the spirit heavenly ideas predominate. 
 The one is carnally-minded, the other is spiritually- 
 minded. The one relates to an earthly, the other to a 
 heavenly life. The one outward, the other inward, not 
 merely as pertaining to body and mind, but according 
 as the ruling influence with the man is from God or 
 the world. ' For ye are dead/ that is, to an earthly 
 life ; ' and your life is hid with Christ in God/ 2 or is 
 kindred to that of Christ, and an emanation from Him. 
 Your sources of hope and joy, your principles of 
 activity, your desires and aversions, the scope and end 
 of your lives, are from spiritual impulses coming to 
 you from God through Christ, and are hid, or of a 
 character not to be detected by one who is ruled by 
 earthly ideas. This distinction of two opposite forces 
 acting upon man, and to be dealt with by him volun- 
 tarily and in freedom, crops out in the history of his 
 creation ; ol his first life in God, or under the ruling of 
 spirit ; of his subsequent relapse under the ruling of the 
 flesh, and consequent apostasy from God ; and is reflected 
 in the inner and outer apartments of the tabernacle 
 and the whole ritual worship for fifteen hundred years. 
 
 1 Eoin. viii. 6. * 2 Cor. iv. 1G ; Col. iii. 8. 
 
Two Minds or Modes of conceiving Truth. 9 
 
 Man's conscious self is indeed a unit, but with two 
 distinct forms of thought, as also with two directly- 
 opposite tendencies of interest and desire, the one 
 natural, the other spiritual. And what can be wider 
 apart than flesh and spirit ? No skill can bridge the 
 chasm between thehi. et tney are united in man. 
 Powers animal and angelic meet in his conscious self- 
 hood, and both may be legitimately exercised by him, 
 provided he assigns to the one subordination and to 
 the other dominion. This seed-trutn enters into all the 
 Bible representations of human nature. If an earthly 
 palace for Jehovah is to be sketched from Horeb, it 
 must have its adytum, with its surroundings of exterior 
 cloisters and courts. If a Jewish doctor is to be taught 
 the requisites to entering the kingdom of heaven, he 
 must be made to understand the difference between flesh 
 and spirit, or of being born of the one and the other, 
 as the initial lesson on the subject. And if the 
 Christian life is to be unfolded, it must be as a ' walk- 
 ing not after the flesh, but after the spirit.' 1 If there 
 are fundamental ideas in revealed religion, this provi- 
 sion for uniting two worlds in man must be reckoned 
 among the number. It is not a distinction superinduced 
 by regeneration, as some suppose, but original to the 
 race. Regeneration does not create new faculties, but 
 merely puts in order those that already exist. It 
 restores the ruling of spirit to one who had been under 
 the dominion of the flesh. 
 
 These two powers of flesh and spirit must coexist 
 under the ruling of the latter, in order to a normal and 
 happy condition of manhood. Yet they tend to bar or 
 exclude each other. To ' the natural man the things 
 of spirit are foolishness, and he cannot receive them, 
 
 1 John iii 1-12 j Horn. viii. 1. 
 
IO . Seed-Truths. 
 
 because they are spiritually discerned. ' 1 When 
 natural ideas and feelings rule us, they exclude from 
 our minds spiritual apprehensions. They are not in 
 harmony with influx from God. But when spiritual 
 truth and love rule us, they enable us to understand 
 not only what is of God, but to appreciate the true 
 value of earthly interests. ' In God's light we see 
 light' in reference to both worlds, and are able to 
 'judge all things.' Wrongly directed, spiritualism 
 bars true ideas of our outward relations ; and we are 
 charged ' not to be righteous over-much ; neither make 
 thyself over-wise : why shouldst thou destroy thyself ?' 2 
 Those whose absorption in spiritual things, to the 
 neglect of earthly duties and enjoyments, is made a 
 necessity of the religious life, as in the recluse and the 
 anchorite, are guilty of this sort of perversion ; ' which 
 things have indeed a show of wisdom in will- worship 
 and bodily austerity, not in what is honourable to the 
 fulness or perfection of the flesh.' 3 They deny the 
 body to improve the spirit, by a process alike corrupt- 
 ing to both. Thus a spiritualism which is not duly 
 balanced by our earthly relations and duties, is scarcely 
 better than the dominion of the flesh. Jesus, who had 
 the Spirit without measure, never lost sight of what 
 belonged to Him as a citizen of this world. His life 
 is a rebuke to all mystical and impracticable piety. It 
 is true that a soul absorbed in spiritual things may 
 momentarily feel an unsettling of earthly ideas ; as 
 when Paul knew not whether he was in the body or 
 out of the body, and Peter was scarcely conscious of 
 what he said. 4 This sort of exclusion of natural 
 thought is an exceptional case, and does not affect tho 
 
 M Cur. ii. 14, 15. i. 16. 
 
 Co,, ii. 23. 4 2 Coi. xii. 2 ; Luke ix. 3& 
 
Two -Minds or Modes of conceiving Triith. 1 1 
 
 general tone of a holy life. The two powers must 
 coalesce into one in order to perfection of character. 
 
 In speaking of these two powers in man, we must 
 not confound them with appetite and reason or con- 
 science, in common parlance. Seneca, the heathen 
 philosopher, makes a distinction between flesh and 
 spirit in the latter sense. Perhaps he borrowed the 
 idea from Paul, of whom he was a contemporary. He 
 no doubt refers to the pleading of lust against philo- 
 sophical reason, both of which alike pertain to the 
 natural man. How many merely worldly men practise 
 great self-denial ! How many a fakir of India, 
 dervish of Turkey, and monk of the Papacy, though 
 totally ignorant of a spiritual mind in the scriptural 
 sense, performs extraordinary feats of bodily discipline ! 
 Our seed-thought of flesh and spirit is quite another 
 thing. This thought contemplates the same mind 
 taking in and properly using the ideas and influences 
 of this world, accepting ' every creature as good, and 
 nothing to be refused,' * and at the same time draw- 
 ing truth and love from the heart of God, as the power 
 ruling over all. However seemingly antagonistic, both 
 must dwell in harmony to make us perfect men in 
 Christ Jesus. One is an open window towards heaven, 
 the other towards earth, and glowing with humanitarian 
 sympathies. One makes man a member of the family 
 in heaven, the other of the family on earth, two 
 branches of the same household under one head and 
 name. 2 The ruling in both is the same, and is re- 
 flected in the natural man when reason governs 
 appetite, and conscience passion. 
 
 But why reason on the subject ? Our business is 
 simply to set before the reader Bible views of human 
 
 1 1 TLu. iv. i. * EI]I. iii. 15. 
 
1 2 Seed- Truths. 
 
 nature. In those views is a being made to be God's 
 throne, or a representative of the life of heaven, here 
 below. No other animal nature unites in itself the 
 power to look out upon tin's material scene through a 
 spiritual medium, and from a heavenly standpoint. As 
 man's inner being is God's throne, so his outer taber- 
 nacle is God's footstool. The two worlds in him are 
 reduced to a single sovereignty. All this is reflected 
 in the terms spirit and flesh, as used by inspired men. 
 The inbreathed divinity of the first Adam, which proved 
 a failure from his succumbing to the flesh and repre- 
 senting a fleshly seed, and afterwards in the second 
 Adam, who is the Lord from heaven and a quickening 
 Spirit, to restore life to a dead race by re-establishing 
 a spiritual rule, and hence called the kingdom of 
 heaven, to which all who believe are admitted : that 
 kingdom came in the person of Christ, and is estab- 
 lished in every spiritual man as a conquering power, 
 to rule out the carnal life of the first Adam, with all 
 its demon influences. 1 
 
 The efflorescence and fruitage of these germinal 
 truths of man are illimitable. As some one pertinently 
 says : ' Were an inhabitant of some distant world able 
 to look down upon our planet, his eye would be most 
 attracted by the glittering painted pagodas of China, 
 Borneo, and Japan ; the rich ornamental temples and 
 splendid rock-shrines of India ; the dome-topped 
 mosques and slender minarets of Western Asia ; the 
 pyramids and vast temples of Egypt, with their 
 avenues of gigantic statues and sphinxes extending for 
 miles ; the graceful shrines of classic Greece ; the 
 basilicas of Rome and Byzantium ; the semi-oriental 
 domes of Moscow ; the Gothic cathedrals of Western 
 
 1 1 Cor. xv. 4G ; Matt. xii. 28 ; Dun. ii. 41 ; Luke xi. 20. 
 
Two A finds or Modes of conceiving Truth. 13 
 
 Europe ; and the grand fire temples of Mexico and 
 Peru, where, in the infancy of reason and humanity, 
 human sacrifices were offered up, as if the Ail-rather 
 were pleased with the agonies of His creatures/ 
 
 In these varied architectural devices for intercom- 
 munion of humanity with divinity, there was a secret 
 shrine, a consecrated adytum, in which the parties 
 were supposed to meet. This comes, if not from 
 revelation, from man's inner consciousness, that his 
 state of communion with spirit was abstracted and 
 separate from his state of intercourse with the objects 
 and interests of this world. If sense opened the latter 
 to him, something higher, and purer, and holier must 
 constitute his medium of intercourse with God. Flesh 
 and spirit are dimly reflected by nearly all the forms 
 of worship. 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 ARCHETYPE OP MAN IN GOD. 
 
 THE inspired idea of human nature may "be seen 
 from the model after which it was fashioned. 
 That model is neither animal nor angelic, but is found 
 only in God. An animal nature acts and is acted 
 upon only by the outward world, or through the bodily 
 senses and organs, while the angels are purely im- 
 material and heavenly. But God acts both in nature 
 and in the realm of spirits. He is supreme in both 
 kingdoms, and unites their sovereignty in Himself. So 
 man is in communication with matter through his senses, 
 and also with God and spirits through his interior or 
 spiritual natura The two kingdoms are united in 
 frim. 
 
 In Moses* vision of creation God appeared, saying, 
 ' WE will make man in OUR image, after OUR likeness.' 1 
 There is no other instance, except in these first chapters 
 of Genesis, in which God adopts the plural pronouns in 
 speaking of Himself; and it gives the idea that the being 
 in reference to whose creation He uses it was to have 
 inherent differences of constitution suggesting plurality. 
 How else are we to account for this mode of speaking ? 
 To suppose that it was a slip of the pen, and without 
 significance, would make this part of Moses' account 
 different from all the rebt. Elsewhere each statement 
 
 i. 26, iii.22. 
 It 
 
Archetype of Man in God. 15 
 
 represents a vast aggregation of facts, as in saying, ' Let 
 light be ; ' ' Let the earth bring forth.' Each phrase of 
 the kind is like a dot on the spectrum of a telescope, 
 representing a continent on the sun's disk greater per- 
 haps than our globe. 
 
 This mode of speaking represents infinite truths. It 
 indicates a basis in God for the distinction of Father, 
 Son, and Holy Spirit, as He existed before all worlds, 
 a truth here hinted, but fully developed in subsequent 
 revelations, especially of the New Testament. It shows 
 also that the Godhead concentrates His radiant glories 
 in the Son of God as the Son of man, whose delights 
 or affinities are ' with the sons of men.' 1 All that is 
 of the Father, and all that is of the Holy Spirit, shine 
 in ' the Son of man,' who is ' the beginning of the 
 creation of God,' and in whom ' dwells the fulness of 
 the Godhead bodily.' 2 He is 'the image of the in- 
 visible God, the first-born of every creature ;' by whom 
 ' all things are created that are in heaven, and that are 
 in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, 
 dominions, principalities, or powers ; all things were 
 created by Him : and He is before all things, and by 
 Him all things consist.' 3 By Him God 'made the 
 worlds, who, being the brightness of His glory, and the 
 express image of His person (or characterization of His 
 essence), upholds all things by the word of His power.' 4 
 ' He is the Word,' or divinity expressed or revealed, 
 ' being in the beginning with God,' and at first dis- 
 embodied, but afterwards embodied or ' made flesh, that 
 we might behold His glory.' 5 It might be convenient 
 to dispose of the WE and OUR of God in speaking of 
 
 1 Prov. viii. 31. 
 
 8 Rev. iii. 14 ; Col. ii. 9 ; Dan. vii. 13 ; Rev. L 13. 
 
 Col. i. 15. 17. 4 Hcb. i. 2, 3. 3 John i. 1-14. 
 
1 6 Seed-Truths. 
 
 Himself, by regarding them as a slip of the pen, or a 
 trick of emphasis, if it were not for the coincident 
 statements of the New Testament. Or these state- 
 ments might be set aside as the hyperbole of sanguine 
 men in glorifying their hero, if the whole revelation 
 and all its views of the nature of the man who was 
 made in the image of God were not shaped to like 
 ideas. If the warp must go with the woof, what have 
 we left ? Without a basis in the divinity for this 
 plurality of representation, how should it have been 
 kept up by men variously educated, and under such 
 diversified circumstances, in documents covering a 
 period of four thousand years ? 
 
 It should be noted that this manner of representing 
 God began with the first mention of the creation of 
 man. It was in the image and likeness of God so re- 
 presented, that man was said to be created. The 
 image of a being is the form which he assumes in 
 manifesting himself; and that form in God has its 
 reflection in man. That form is ' the Son of man, who 
 came to the Ancient of days/ 'whose garments were 
 white as snow, and the hair of His head like pure wool : 
 His throne was like the fiery flame, and His wheels as 
 burning fire/ A like description is given of ' the Son 
 of man ' in the visions of John in Fatmos. 1 The form 
 was that of man, but the accompanying imagery reveals 
 the divine attributes concentrated in it, and shining 
 through it. The word was the expression of what there 
 is in God, according to our human types of thought, or 
 a characterization of His essence or substance in a form 
 of humanity. "We see not how any other idea can be 
 derived frum a careful collation and comparison of the 
 passages of the inspired text which bear upon the 
 1 , . :-. i:j; Ki-v. i. u-18. 
 
Archetype of Man in God. 17 
 
 subject, and we can pretend to no other source of 
 information. 
 
 The Father, thus one with the Son of man and the 
 Holy Spirit as the Divine Proceeding through the Son, 
 or as the emanating energy working in creation, provi- 
 dence, and redemption, is the central sun of the uni- 
 verse, whose energy, whose influence, whose beams, 
 operate in infinitely varied forms of manifestation, 
 according to the natures upon which and through 
 which they act. The brooding Spirit gave life to the 
 chaotic world, understanding to man, instinct to beasts, 
 inspiration to prophets, power to the infant Church, 
 having descended upon her Head at the baptismal 
 waters in the form of a dove, and abode upon Him 
 without measure. ' Thou art God that made heaven, and 
 earth, and the sea, and all that in them is,' is a favourite 
 mode of appeal in prayer on the part of a suffering 
 people, giving the idea that, however weak in them- 
 selves, they cannot but be strong under the protection 
 of Him who worketh all things in and around them. 1 
 
 Man is formed after a like model. The outflowing 
 energy of his interior conscious selfhood, all that is 
 possible to his voluntary agency, goes forth in the 
 direction of spirit, or in communication with God and 
 heavenly life, and also in the direction of matter wield- 
 ing the bodily senses, organs, and muscles, and so much 
 of the world besides as he is able to affect by his 
 efforts. What earth is as compared with what it 
 would have been, if no human mind had acted upon it, 
 is difficult to conceive. Its soil would have yielded no 
 such harvests, its animals would have had no such 
 culture, its minerals and precious stones would have 
 
 1 John x. 30, xiv. 26, xv. 26 : Gt-n. i. 2 j Matt. iii. 16, 17 ; Acts L 
 8, ii. 4, et al. 
 
 B 
 
1 8 Seed -Truths. 
 
 performed no such office of utility and adornment, its 
 wood and stone would have had no such construction 
 into cities and navies, and its sciences no such develop- 
 ment. It is a nature in the image of God, and exercis- 
 ing like functions, that has created our histories, and 
 brought earth into communication with heaven. Man 
 has spirit, man has soul, man has body, all united in the 
 one selfhood, as God is Father, and God is Word, and God 
 is the Holy Spirit, all revealed under the one image of the 
 Son of man, in whom this divine fulness dwells bodily. 
 
 We attempt no lines of demarcation between Father, 
 Son, and Holy Spirit in God, as we cannot always dis- 
 tinguish between spirit, soul, and animal life in our- 
 selves, though we know that they mysteriously coexist 
 in the same conscious selfhood. I know I feel the 
 pain of a burnt finger as well as agony purely mental, 
 moral, and spiritual Between these extremes of matter, 
 how wide the field for diversity of manifestation ! So 
 in God, between His working in crude matter and in 
 seraphic life, can we wonder that Moses saw what 
 suggested to him the idea of plurality ? 
 
 A Trinity in Unity as the archetype of man's nature 
 crops out in the history of his creation. ' The Lord 
 God formed man of the dust of the ground, and 
 breathed into him the breath of life ; and man became 
 a living soul' 1 We have here three distinct stages in 
 the progress of the work : 1st, The creation of man 
 from the ground. 2d, The inbreathing into him the 
 breath of lives from God. 3rf, The result, man be- 
 came a living soul 
 
 We have first the ground-nature, or the earth- 
 man, which must have been fitted for the destiny of 
 the race. It was a tabernacle constructed for a certain 
 
 1 Gen. ii. 7. 
 
Archetype of Man in God. 19 
 
 tenant ; and the constitution, convenience, and activi- 
 ties of the destined occupant must have been provided 
 for. The same adjustment obtained in this case, no 
 doubt, as in all animal natures, whose organs and in- 
 stincts are suited to the element in which they are to 
 live, and the modes by which they are to subsist. As 
 some one has said, No matter how low and bestial a 
 race may be, if it has a human hand, it is susceptible 
 of civilisation. The gorilla and chimpanzee, though 
 above it in capacity to look out for themselves, for the 
 lack of a hand are infinitely below the lowest race of 
 human-kind in their fitness for culture and elevation. 
 
 As the tenant in this ground-structure of the Creator 
 is what the Hebrews call ncpkcsh, or soul in a peculiar 
 sense, to which was assigned the possession of the 
 lower animals, and the dominion of the world, his 
 fleshly tabernacle must have been suited to so exalted 
 a destiny. What we should expect in this regard, 
 from the general analogy between the natures and 
 habits of living creatures, we actually meet with in the 
 earthly constitution of man. It is fitted to ' rule over 
 the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the heavens, 
 and over everything that moves on the earth.' l The 
 organic nature of man, though not so fleet nor so 
 strong as that of many animals, is every way better 
 fitted for the use of the soul in exercising dominion. 
 
 But how much is included in this first act in the 
 process of man's creation ? What were the constitu- 
 ents of his ground-nature ? Was it merely a mass of 
 clay, shaped in the human form by the plastic hand of 
 the Creator, as the artist shapes his model ? Was it 
 without animal life ? Was it without a human soul ? 
 This, I think, is not the idea of what Moses saw and 
 
 1 Gen. L 28. 
 
2O Seed-Truths. 
 
 described For the beasts, with all their instincts, 
 were formed from the earth. They were complete in 
 this first act, and no divine inbreathing added to their 
 faculties or qualities. They came from the earth living, 
 active, sensational, thinking, and almost reasoning crea- 
 tures. They are gregarious, as we are social ; they are 
 great builders ; they have a sort ot instinctive justice 
 or conscience among themselves to live in harmony, as 
 thousands of bees in the same hive, and as prairie dogs 
 in mimic cities with a sort of police. Thus their 
 ground-nature verges towards human intelligence ; and 
 some animals are above some men in ordering their 
 lives. And yet nothing is said of an inbreathing from 
 God, like that which is the crowning fact of man's 
 creation. God simply said in their creation, ' Let the 
 earth, bring forth the living creature after his kind, 
 cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after 
 his kind : and it was so/ 1 And chemistry shows that 
 the bodies of men and animals are of the same constitu- 
 ent properties with the earth itself, and at death their 
 dust is not to be distinguished from vegetable mould. 
 
 The part of our race formed from the ground con- 
 stituted it MAN. And what is a man? Is it clay- 
 mould in human shape ? Or, if the clay-mould were 
 converted into dead flesh, would that make a man ? 
 Or even if animal life and instinct were added, does 
 that reach our conception of manhood, or meet the 
 requirements of Moses' language in saying that * God 
 formed MAN from the dust of the ground ?' No ; such 
 a supposition is an outrage upon common sense, and a 
 confounding of language. What was included in this 
 first stage of man's creation was a being, not only with 
 the clay-mould or animal life of a man, but with those 
 
 1 Gcu. i. 21 
 
Archetype of Man in God. 21 
 
 faculties of thought, intelligence, and reason which 
 supply in our race the place of brutal instincts, or 
 which fit man to he a successful actor among the ele- 
 ments of this world. Anything short of this would 
 not make the first statement in the case true, that 
 ' God formed man from the dust of the ground/ It 
 was the natural or earthly man which was thus formed 
 with understanding, reason, love of the beautiful, powers 
 of social organization, natural conscience, a sense of 
 civil justice, and all those qualities which are neces- 
 sary to the race as the mere tenants of earth, having 
 dominion over nature and the brute creation. It was 
 a being fitted, indeed, to receive something higher, 
 holier, and more spiritual, to make the nephesh or soul 
 ' living ' in the highest sense of that term. But these 
 higher endowments were imparted by another act in 
 the drama of creation. The spiritual or divine must 
 be added to constitute ' life ' in the Bible sense ; and, in 
 the absence of it, all is regarded as death. 1 
 
 The second act is altogether the most significant, and 
 reveals the secret of man's real importance in the scale 
 of being : ' God breathed into him the breath of lives.' 
 The plural is used to denote amplitude, capacity, variety, 
 as including civil and social life of a higher order, not 
 only a life directed by intellectual and scientific truths, 
 but by those which are divine and heavenly ; not only 
 by knowledges reasoned out on natural grounds of 
 evidence, but by intuitional and 'heart communion with 
 God and angelic beings, and of open visions of the 
 divine glory. God infused into a being earth-born and 
 earthly a spiritual and heavenly nature, that he might 
 live, not as the ruler of a material and brutal kingdom, 
 but reign as king and priest in the kingdom of heaven. 
 
 1 Gal. ii 20 ; John xiv. 19 j Eph. ii. 1 ; 1 Tim. v. 6. 
 
22 Seed-Truths. 
 
 These facts prepare us to understand the sense of 
 the last stage in the process, 'and man became a 
 living soul/ The same is said of beasts, where they. 
 are called living creatures, or 'the breath of life' is 
 ascribed to them. 1 But the term life is determined by 
 the being to which it is applied, whether to God, to 
 men, or to animals. Of course it means in this case 
 that man became living in the sense of the life for 
 which the divine inbreathing prepared him. It was a 
 life not consequent upon his ground-nature, for that 
 is described as dead, but upon the divine and heavenly 
 infusion of which his soul became the receptacle. This 
 allied him to God as spirit ; fitted him to receive God's 
 word, which has no response in animal natures ; to 
 take his place among the gods, as those are called to 
 whom the word of the Lord came. 2 It made him im- 
 mortal, and, bodied or disembodied, a citizen of heaven. 
 Death, when man was created, had been the law of 
 animal life from immemorial ages, if the testimony of 
 the rocks is at all to be believed. The language of 
 Moses by no means contradicts this testimony. And 
 death no doubt would have been the law of man's 
 being as he came from the ground ; and even in any 
 case his material nature must have undergone a change 
 to render it immortal It is imposing upon scientiiic 
 men too heavy a tax, to require them to believe that 
 a structure like the human body, made up of solids, 
 llu ids, gases, and nervous tissues, could keep up its 
 action for ever, without a change like that of Enoch 
 and Elijah fitting it for such a destiny. 8 A misinter- 
 pretation of the apostle's words, ' that death entered 
 the world by sin,' and that ' in Adam all die,' has led 
 to the general belief that both animal and human 
 1 Gen. L 26. Jolm JL 33. 3 1 Cor. xv. 50. 
 
Archetype of Man in God. 23 
 
 bodies are rendered mortal by the fall of man. The 
 error comes from failing to consider that the apostles 
 use the term sin for a state as well as an act, and that 
 this state is sometimes called death, and sometimes sin. 
 As an act, ' sin is a transgression of the law/ and as 
 a state, it is the coAduion of tborje who are made 
 sinners, or brought into guilt and condemnation through 
 ' the sin of one man.' This is the death that carrie by 
 sin : l ' Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of 
 God ;' ' Dead in trespasses and in sins ;' ' She that liveth 
 in pleasure is dead while she liveth/ This is the only 
 death inflicted on man the day he sinned, and therefore 
 must have been intended by the threatening, ' The 
 day thou eatest thereof, dying thou shalt die.' 2 
 
 The account given by Moses of the creation of man 
 is the key-note in the epic of revealed religion. It is 
 the prologue of sacred history, throughout which the 
 nepJiesh soul is eliminated from animal life, from 
 spiritual life, and from all the components and rela- 
 tions of man's being, as in no other language and no 
 other book on earth. It shapes not only the language, 
 but the symbols of divine worship ; and its ideas are 
 transferred into Greek by the apostles, using words in 
 a sense that Homer, Xenophon, and Plato never ima- 
 gined. All this comes to view by carefully ' searching 
 the Scriptures,' and 'comparing spiritual things with 
 spiritual/ the work which we propose to ourselves in 
 these pages. 
 
 1 Rom. v. 12-21 ; 1 John iii. 4 ; 1 Cor. xv. 44-51. etc. etc- 
 1 Geu. u. ij. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 TERMS OF MIND IN FLESH. 
 
 WRITERS on speculative science represent the 
 body as inert and powerless, except as Dieted 
 upon by the mind. The mind sees, hears, walks, and 
 performs all like functions. Our bodily organs are 
 merely the instruments with which the mind works, 
 as a lame man uses his crutch ; and they might perish 
 one after another, till all were gone, and yet the man 
 in his conscious selfhood remain intact and unchanged. 
 He loses thus only the implements of his work. 
 Socrates very ingeniously sets this forth by a series ot 
 questions, in which he eliminates the man from all his 
 bodily organs and senses. 
 
 Now this view, in a far more graphic form, is 
 wrought into Hebrew as the language of common life. 
 The nephcsh, or soul, as permeated by spirit inbreathed 
 from God, and connecting man with God, is the re- 
 cognised actor in all our members and movements. 
 It is not mind in our sense, but mind in the image of 
 God mind open to the spiritual as well as material 
 world and receiving contributions from both as a 
 medium power to unite the two, thus making man 
 moral and immortal, a citizen of earth and of the 
 spirit-land, and imparting to his actions a significance 
 unknown to speculative philosophy. Seeing, with 
 inspired men, is knowing, believing, enjoying ; hearing 
 
 24 
 
Terms of Mind in Flesh. 25 
 
 is hearkening, obeying ; smelling is imbibing the sweet 
 odour of goodness, or disgust of wickedness ; baring 
 the arm is power ; putting under feet is subordinating 
 to authority ; carrying in the bosom is affection and 
 care : and thus all muscular movement has a spiritual 
 and divine significance, as the outworking of exalted 
 and enduring forces. I am aware of no language in 
 which these ideas are so framed into the structure of 
 words and speech as in the Hebrew. 
 
 In this language the outer organs of the body give 
 names to things that pertain to the outer life of man, 
 and the inner organs to the interior faculties, or mental 
 states. Adam ground, methim mortals, lasar flesh, 
 golgolcth skull or head, are of the first class ; and 
 Icbdb heart, kelayoth kidneys, kereb inner parts, m&im 
 bowels, are of the second or inner class. 
 
 The term adam, ground, was the name of the first 
 man, and is applied to mankind in general. It is 
 about five hundred times variously used for individuals, 
 nations, and the race. The stem-idea is that of a 
 ground-man, or a being allied to God, angels, and the 
 spirit- world, or immortality, but dwelling in a house of 
 clay, to show forth in this material world the attri- 
 butes and splendours of heavenly life. The subject of 
 ' a kingdom that cannot be moved/ he is surrounded 
 by things shaken and to be removed, in order to give 
 place to ' a building of God, an house not made with 
 hands, eternal in the heavens.' 1 Though thus en- 
 dowed, he is still a ground-man. " His soul, though 
 opaque and grovelling, being of the earth, earthy, was 
 by the divine inbreathing rendered radiant with 
 heavenly light. Heaven is anchored to earth in his 
 person. . Eyes refulgent from communion with God 
 1 Heb. xii. 27, 28 ; 2 Cor. v. 1. 
 
26 Seed-Truths. 
 
 look out upon this earthly scene through him, that 
 ' heaven may not want spectators, God want praise/ 
 The ladder reaching heaven finds foothold in him, 
 on which angelic troops ascend and descend. God's 
 kingdom comes, and His will is done spiritually as 
 in heaven, according to our Lord's prayer. Here the 
 two worlds meet in him, who is formed in the image 
 and after the likeness of God. All this is included in 
 the original conception of the ground-man. 
 
 Mifthim, mortals, points to dissolution, and is used 
 as a term of weakness. Jacob uses it in the words 
 rendered 'few in number/ 1 to indicate "the weakness 
 of his tribe ; and Isaiah, of ' the men of Israel ' as 
 being alike weak with the 'worm Jacob.' 2 There 
 seems to be little doubt that it is made from muth, 
 to die, though it is chiefly applied to men as dis- 
 tinguished from women and children. Whether de- 
 rived from a change original to the race, answerable 
 to what the death of the body now is, or not, we can- 
 not presume to say. It is certain that death in its 
 present form would not have been known had it not 
 been for sin. 'Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt 
 thou return/ 8 is introduced in a way to give the idea 
 that a bodily immortality was originally provided for, 
 without thin return to dust. It may have come, as to 
 Enoch and Elijah, without death, or as to Christ, with- 
 out seeing corruption. One thing is certain, that a 
 glorified body is not a material one, or not subject to 
 mati.'i i:il laws, as our Lord's was not after His resurrec- 
 tion. We call men mortals because they die ; and the 
 ancient Hebrews would appear to have called them 
 methim for the same cause. Death to holy men, how- 
 ever, was not what it is to us. Abraham at his death 
 1 Gen. xxxiv. 30. ' laa. xli. 14. * Gcii. ill. 19. 
 
Terms of Mind in Flesh. 2 7 
 
 was ' gathered to his people/ and was no doubt more 
 alive the day his remains were deposited in the cave 
 of Machpelah than ever before. 1 
 
 Flesh, as a term for man, denotes his exterior life, as 
 that is the enclosing casement of all that is within him. 
 It is often put in contrast with spirit, which is the 
 window of the soul heavenward, as flesh is earthward. 2 
 ' All flesh ' is a term many times used for the whole 
 human family. It is also used for worldly pre-emi- 
 nence, intellectual and material, in the passage, ' The 
 Egyptians are great of flesh.' 3 That nation in the 
 time of Ezekiel was the centre of the world's civilisa- 
 tion. Still it was all flesh or exterior show, and not 
 founded in spiritual power. ' All flesh is grass ' is an 
 expression for the universal frailty of our earthly life. 4 
 
 The skull, or head, is used only in the sense of 
 poll, as ' an omer a head ; ' ' every male according 
 to their polls.' 5 In this connection golgohili denotes 
 personality. 
 
 Another class of words denoting mental or spiritual 
 qualities is derived from the internal organs of the 
 body. The inspired writers had no conception of our 
 understanding, heart, and will, or cognitive, esthetic, 
 and conative faculties, as mapped off and divided from 
 each other by our mental philosophers. Their lan- 
 guage is rather shaped to their ever-present idea of 
 man as the common centre of two worlds, spirit and 
 matter, angelic and animal ; and they offset the fore- 
 going terms, denoting the animal contributions to his 
 material of thought and action, with the internal organs 
 
 1 Gen. xxv. 8 ; Matt. xxii. 32. 
 
 1 2 Chron. xxxii. 8 ; Ps. Ivi. 4 ; Job x. 4. 
 
 8 Ezek. xvi. 26. * Isa. xl. 6 ; 1 Pet. i. 24. 
 
 * Ex. xvi. 16 : Num. i. 2. 
 
28 Seed-Truths. 
 
 of his body, as a reflection of his higher relations 
 These two influences mingle in all he is and does, 
 either for good or for evil ; and if he is a mere beast, 
 he is so with a significance and intensity of application 
 which are impossible to the brute creation. He is 
 more than earthly and sensual, he is devilish. 1 
 
 The word lebdb, for instance, which we render heart, 
 but with no exactitude to the original, includes both 
 the intellectual and pathematic, or affectional nature, 
 or these attributes as affected by our relations both to 
 God and the world. Our heart is used for the affec- 
 tional, as distinguished from the intellectual. Not so 
 the Icbdb of the Hebrew. The heart, as the seat of 
 animal life, derives its action from absorbing chyle 
 from the digested food of the stomach, and from certain 
 properties of air inhaled by the lungs. Without these 
 united contributions, it would soon cease to beat. So 
 inspired intuition seems to recognise the mental action 
 as uniting in itself both thought and feeling. Both 
 must supply pabulum to every mental state and 
 exercise. Without thought, feeling has no being ; and 
 without feeling, thought no impulse. Conscious 
 mental action is permeated and interpenetrated by 
 affectional influences, as melted iron by heat. And as 
 iron loses its fluidity when the heat is gone, so the 
 mind loses thought when no longer impelled by Teeling 
 of some sort I speak of the subject as it seems to 
 me to stand in the representations of inspired men, and 
 this is the case as it exists in fact and in nature. The 
 nej)hcsh, mind or soul, is in their view a unit, with 
 influences acting upon it from flesh and from spirit. 
 Whichever way it went the whole man went, and not 
 a part merely. He could not truly give his thoughts 
 ijaa.iii.15. 
 
Terms of Mind in Flesh. 29 
 
 to God and withhold his affections, nor his affections 
 and withhold his thoughts. He cannot serve God and 
 mammon. He cannot divide thought from feeling. 
 
 Lebab, however, inclines more to the intellectual 
 than the affectional, and was used as a verb, as we use 
 mind when we speak of minding a thing. Thus in 
 Job it is said, ' Man hearts to be wise, or thinks to 
 be, though man be born as a wild ass's colt.' * Wisdom 
 here includes spiritual perception, of which man by 
 sin has become as destitute as a wild animal. The 
 word is also used for doing things skilfully, as Tamar 
 in baking cakes for Amnon, and the spouse in her arts 
 of captivation. 2 Skill united to affectional influence is 
 the idea in both these cases. It is adding feeling to 
 ingenuity. It is ' mind, purpose, intention, under- 
 standing, knowledge, insight.' 3 
 
 Kglayoth, kidneys or reins, are used for a lower order 
 of tendencies than heart, and is made from a word 
 which means to consume, as with grief, sorrow, remorse, 
 lust, voluptuousness, or any strong inward feeling that 
 preys upon a man's nature. It is only twelve times 
 used, being connected in several instances with lebab, 
 as : ' Search my heart and my kidneys/ 4 that is, my 
 thoughts and emotions. ' My kidneys instruct me in 
 the night season,' 5 is a passage referring to the guiding 
 influence of right emotions, or the inward movings 
 of the divine Spirit, 'teaching us all things.' 6 This 
 is the law written in the fleshly tables of the heart. 
 The kidneys and heart stand related to each other in 
 
 1 Job xi. 12. 2 Cant. iv. 9. 
 
 s 1 Kings viii. 17,18 ; 1 Chron. xxii. 7, xxviii. 2 ; Job xii. 3, xxxiv. 
 10 ; Prov. vii. 9. 
 
 4 Ps. vii. 9 ; Jer. xi. 20, xvii. 10 .; Ps. xxvi. 2. 
 
 Ps. xvi 7. 6 1 John ii. 27. 
 
 H^Tm 
 
30 Seed- Truths. 
 
 Hebrew somewhat like appetite and passion in English, 
 the one tending to a fleshly, the other to an intellec- 
 tual exercise. 
 
 Mcim, bowels, is also ten times used, in the sense of 
 a highly emotional state, accompanied by pity or com- 
 passion. ' My bowels boiled ; ' ' my bowels sounded 
 as a harp ;' ' my bowels resounded within me.' 1 These 
 are expressions of affectionate yearning towards a suf- 
 fering object, which the New Testament writers have 
 adopted in the expressions, ' tender [bowel] mercies ;' 
 ' in the bowels of Jesus Christ ; ' * bowels of mercies/ 
 and some others. 2 There are other cases of the like 
 use of similar organs, but these will suffice to show 
 the general scope of the whole. 
 
 Not only is mind the recognised actor in the bodily 
 members, but the name of God is the added superla- 
 tive in setting forth in Hebrew what is extraordinary ; 
 and the great rivers are rivers of God, the great trees, 
 trees of God, the great mountains, mountains of God, 
 and a fertile country is 'the land the Lord hath 
 blessed.' The lilies are painted with beauty by His 
 pencil, the fowls fed from His storehouse, and the very 
 hairs of our head are all numbered. ' They also that 
 dwell in the uttermost parts arc afraid at Thy tokens : 
 Thou makest the outgoings of the morning and even- 
 ing to rejoice. Thou visitest the earth, and waterest it. 
 Thou greatly enrichest it with the river of God, which 
 is full of water : Thou preparest them corn, when Thou 
 hast so provided for it' ' Thou crownest the year with 
 goodness.' ' He rode upon a cherub, and did fly ; and 
 He was seen upon the wings of the wind.' ' Deep 
 
 Job rxx. 2 ; Isa. xvi. 11 ; Jer. iv. 19, XXJCL 20 ; Lam. i. 20, 
 ii. 11. 
 Luke L 78 ; PhiL L 8 ; CoL iii. 12. 
 
Terms of Mind in Flesh. 3 1 
 
 calletli unto deep at the noise of Thy water-spouts ; all 
 Thy waves and Thy billows are gone over me.' ' Day 
 unto day uttereth speech; night unto night slioweth 
 knowledge.' * 
 
 Thus in the inspired intuitions God was as really 
 present in all the objects and forces of nature, and all 
 the events transpiring, as mind is in the organs of 
 man's living body. The spiritual world was a greater 
 reality to them than the natural world, just as the 
 power is greater than the machine through which it 
 operates, the mind than the body wielded by it, the life 
 more than raiment. 
 
 This sense of God's present working, everywhere 
 manifesting itself in the Bible, is not to be confounded 
 either with the fancies of childhood, the local divinities 
 of the heathen, nor with the pantheism of poetry or 
 philosophy. Everything to a child has life or per- 
 sonality. Fairies disport themselves in the summer 
 woods, utter their sweet notes in the babbling brooks 
 and rustling pines ; and thunder, lightning, and storm 
 are to his fervid fancy giant beings over his head, 
 putting the heavens in commotion. This childish feel- 
 ing may be an index to our spiritual instincts, showing 
 how inseparable religion is from our nature, but it has 
 little affinity with the inspired view of God in the 
 visible scene around us. Still more remote is this view 
 from the Greek mythology, which peopled the world 
 with gods of the hills and gods of the plains, gods of 
 the groves and gods of the fountains, gods of learning, 
 war, agriculture, and of all the occupations of life. 2 ISTor 
 is the Hebrew Jehovah the sum of all material forces, 
 
 1 Matt. vi. 26-34 ; Ps. Ixv. 8, 9 ; 2 Sam. xxii 11 ; Ps. xlil 7, 
 xix. 1, 2. 
 
 * 1 Kings xx. 23. 
 
3 2 Seed- Truths. 
 
 according to pantheism, but 'a personal, conscious, de- 
 signing, acting Being, who ' worketh all things after the 
 counsel of His own will.' 1 
 
 What a delightful sense of security in danger does 
 this faith of a present God give to those who have it ! 
 The besieged prophet in Dothan was surrounded by 
 chariots and horses of fire, to assure him that more 
 were they who were for him than against him. 2 Who 
 does not desire to feel himself nestling in the bosom of 
 infinite Wisdom and Love ? ourselves infants, but con- 
 trolled and protected by a Father's care. No flower 
 unfolds to us its beauties, but comes as a gift from His 
 hand. No bird sings its matin song which does not 
 resound His praise. No evils can assail us which He 
 cannot turn to our greatest good. We see Him in the 
 revolving planets ; feel Him in the pulsating life-cur- 
 rent within ; hear Him in the voices of nature ; and the 
 whole visible scene around us is radiant with His 
 beauties and His glories. Nothing comes by chance, 
 but as the dictate of a Father's love. As, when we 
 enter a furnace, and observe around us the currents of 
 fire and the action of huge iron, hammers, or hear the 
 groaning, wheezing, whistling of pent-up steam as a 
 chained lion struggling for freedom, we stand secure, 
 because we have confidence in the mind regulating 
 these forces according to law, so we feel a greater 
 security amid the vaster forces of nature, because 
 Jehovah has fixed the bounds beyond which they can- 
 not pass. His laws assure us that His earth will not 
 fall from under our feet, His stars will not drop upon 
 our heads, His mountains will not crush us, ami His 
 raging deep will not overwhelm us. ' Thou rulest tho 
 
 1 E].h. i. 11 ; Isa. xxviii. 29 ; Jcr. xxxii. 19. 
 * 2 Ivin-H vL 1C, 17. 
 
Terms of Mind in Flesh. 33 
 
 racing of the sea : when the waves thereof arise, Thou 
 stillest them.' * Who is so great a god as our God ? 
 
 Tholuck, in his exposition of the vine emblem in 
 the fifteenth chapter of John, institutes a beautiful 
 parallel between mind and matter. ' The Author of 
 the realm of spirits, he says, ' is likewise the Author 
 of the realm of nature : both kingdoms develope them- 
 selves by the same laws. Wherefore those compari- 
 sons which the Eedeemer derives from the realm of 
 nature are not mere comparisons, serving to throw 
 light upon the topic in hand; they are -inward pro- 
 found analogies, and nature, is witness for the realm of 
 spirits. This truth of correspondence floats dimly in 
 the allegorizing Cabalists, and is also present in Sweden- 
 borg, who did not lack in apprehension of the principle, 
 but only in an application of the principle. Their 
 principle was, everything that is in the kingdom of 
 nature is found also in the kingdom of heaven. Were 
 it not so, those comparisons would not have the power 
 of conviction which they exercise over unperverted 
 minds.' 
 
 Ixxxls. 9, 11. 
 
CHAPTER Y. 
 INHALING LIFE FROM THE EXPANSE. 
 
 AFAR more significant class of words now offer 
 themselves to our consideration. They are four, 
 two of the Old Testament, and two of the New. 
 The Greek terms are, however, a mere rendering of the 
 Hebrew, with little added except greater clearness. 
 Neplicsh, of which psuche is the synonym, and mack, of 
 which pneuma is the synonym, the first in each case 
 being Hebrew, and the others the expression of their 
 meaning in New Testament Greek. Nephesh and psuche 
 mean soul or mind, and ruach and pneuma spirit. 
 The primary or physical idea expressed by the two 
 first is breath, and they are both made from a word 
 which signifies to breathe ; and the primary or physical 
 meaning of the two last is wind, and they are made 
 from verbs that mean to blow. As wind inhaled is 
 breath, and breath exhaled is wind, these words have a 
 peculiar affinity in a natural sense, and equally so as 
 applied to the spiritual of man and the universe. 
 They are words which direct our thoughts from man to 
 the aerial, translucent expanse, on which he is as 
 dependent for life as the mussel upon his rock, or the 
 fish upon his wal-cry home. Detached, he is as sure 
 to die. 
 
 By what association of idoas wore the inspired 
 writers led to adpt SIR-U * mode of representation I 
 
 A. 
 
Inhaling Life from the Expanse. 35 
 
 Why symbolize soul by breath, and spirit by wind ? 
 No doubt it comes from the necessity of breathing and 
 atmospheric influences in order to life. As animals are 
 under a like necessity, they are designated by the same 
 terms. ' Every living creature ' is in the original every 
 living soul ; and ruach, spirit, is applied alike to men 
 and beasts, where it is said, ' The spirit of man goeth 
 upward, and the spirit of the beast goeth downward.' 1 
 The tenuity and evanescence of air, and the shadows 
 and mists encumbering it, are by some thought to be 
 the point of its resemblance to a ghost or ghosts, as 
 they conceive of a soul in its disembodied state. Spirits 
 or ghosts are spoken of as ' shades of the dead.' So 
 far as simple animal life, common to man and beasts, is 
 concerned, or the life that depends upon breathing air, 
 this may be the chief point of comparison. But the 
 soul of man, as a recipient of the divine inbreathing, and 
 rendered immortal, is anything but evanescent in the 
 view of inspired men, and must therefore have its analogy 
 to breath and breathing, to wind and blowing, in a very 
 different class of facts. 
 
 Is a being with capacities for endless existence a 
 puff of empty air ? Matter or material worship is in 
 the Bible represented as shadow soon passing away, 
 but heaven and the objects of faith are substance. 2 
 Breath and breathing, therefore, denote life, not /leath. 
 The absence of them brings death. So long as breath- 
 ing lasts, there is life. And it was this that consti- 
 tuted the salient point, ' In God we live, move, and 
 have our being.' If ' to live is Christ, to die is gain,' 
 because it opens to us a higher form of life, where the 
 
 1 Gen. ii. 19, i. 21 ; Eccles. iii. 21 ; Num. xxxi. 28 ; Lev. xi. 10 
 xxiv. 17, 18, etc. 
 
 2 Ileb. x. 34, xi. 1. 
 
36 Seed- Tnif/is. 
 
 ncphcsk or soul, instead of being lost as a breath or 
 waif in the unbounded ether, will plume itself for a 
 higher flight, and be borne aloft by another and more 
 enduring atmosphere. 1 Such are clearly the ideas of 
 inspiration, and such of course must be the design of 
 the symbolism which it employs. The soul lives in 
 God as the body in air, and out of Him it dies as in a 
 vacuum. 
 
 Still higher ideas are included in the soul as breath. 
 In the atmosphere from which we inhale life, sun, 
 moon, and stars concentrate their radiance and their 
 influence to supply elements wanting to the air itself, 
 without which we should as certainly die as without 
 breathing. Can we live without sunlight ? Can the 
 pulsating tides act without lunar influence ? Can the 
 earth be held in its orbit without that mysterious 
 power which we call the attraction of gravitation, keep- 
 ing it in its place in this great family of worlds ? And 
 do all these facts stand for nothing in this divine sym- 
 bolism ? No ; our dependence upon the expanse for 
 animal life, or for breath and breathing, is the type of 
 the higher and more significant truths of the depend 
 ence of our souls upon God, and the spiritual atmo- 
 sphere investing Him for the more exalted functions of 
 our moral and immortal being. This, I think, is the 
 point of the comparison of animal and soul life which 
 the inspired writers had in view in using the terms 
 breath and wind in this connection. They had in view 
 an immortal soul drawing all right thoughts and affec- 
 tions from God, by a process like that of inhaling bodily 
 life from air ; a soul adrd upon by God Himself, as wind 
 upon hivutliing animals, fanning and inviin. rating them, 
 as it were, by R]>iritn:il lr-i -/i-s. like the currerts of air 
 
 1 AcU Jivii 28 ; I'liil. i. 21. 
 
Inhaling Life from the Expanse. 37 
 
 which purify and assist our natural respiration. ' Pray- 
 ing without ceasing/ * is an exhortation of the apostle 
 which would be impossible on any other principle than 
 such a spiritual respiration. It supposes us living 
 invested by God's real life-giving presence, so that we 
 can draw upon Him by prayer as easily and continu- 
 ously as upon the air we breathe. He holds us in His 
 loving arms, as we are held by atmospheric pressure or 
 by gravitation. 
 
 Our purpose is not to impose upon the reader ideas 
 of our own, or any fanciful interpretation of the sacred 
 text, but simply the thoughts penned by inspiration, 
 and what is clearly legitimate to them. The inspired 
 writers were indeed ignorant of the natural sciences in 
 our sense of that term. But they had what was better, 
 a clear insight into the real forces working in mind 
 and matter, forces which our laboratories and chemical 
 processes fail to reach. Their induction included facts 
 of the spiritual as well as of the natural world, and had 
 therefore a much broader basis than ours. And those 
 which they derived from a spiritual source, when 
 rightly understood and interpreted, will be found per- 
 fectly accordant with all true science. This breathing 
 process, by which they represent spirit and soul life, 
 stands connected with ideas and statements from their 
 pen Avhich singularly accord with our most advanced 
 discoveries in reference to atmospheric influence. We 
 know that our lives do not depend simply upon inhal- 
 ing atmospheric air, but upon innumerable chords of 
 influence from sun, moon, and stars, radiating through, 
 and interpenetrating as threads of lace, the whole aerial 
 expanse. Every star in heaven supplies so important 
 an element to this aerial tissue, that if it were gone it 
 
 1 1 Thess. v. 17. 
 
38 Seed-Truths. 
 
 would destroy the equilibrium of forces ; the earth 
 would be jostled out of its place, and undistinguished 
 ruin would ensue. We should as surely die without 
 sun and moon light, and without the ministering stars, 
 as without an atmosphere to breathe. A congealed 
 ocean and a polar winter overspreading all the earth, 
 would extinguish the last remains of animal and vege- 
 table life. 
 
 Thus in the Bible not only are we represented as 
 'living in God,' as we live in air, but as ministered to 
 by spiritual beings, executing specific commissions 
 from God for the training and preservation of our race. 
 The idea of angelic intermediation in the affairs of men 
 is as constantly kept before our view as the world we 
 live in, or the beings inhabiting it. ' God maketh His 
 angels spirits, and His ministers a flame of fire.' * Are 
 they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister 
 to them who shall be heirs of salvation ? ' * Both these 
 passages are connected with facts of material nature, 
 such as the ' stretching out the heavens as a curtain,' ' lay- 
 ing the beams of His chambers in the waters,' ' making 
 the clouds His chariot,' ' walking upon the wings of the 
 wind,' ' making the worlds,' ' upholding all tilings by 
 the word of His power,' as if angelic ministrations were 
 symbolized by the ministering elements and heavenly 
 bodies. How much had angels to do in the patriarchal 
 histories, in the career of Moses and subsequent pro- 
 phets, and in the New Testament events ! No one can 
 look at this record with an impartial eye, without feel- 
 ing that we breathe a spiritual air, and are ministered 
 to by a spiritual sun, moon, and stars, as well as those 
 which are material. 
 
 Nor do inspired men confine their ideas merely to 
 
 '*?. civ. 4 ; 1Kb. i. 14. 
 
Inhaling Life from the Expanse. 39 
 
 good beings and influences from the spiritual world, 
 but include also those which are bad. The bad they 
 liken to a noxious atmosphere, and speak of it' as ' the 
 prince of the power of the air, the spirit that worketh 
 in the children of disobedience : among whom we all had 
 our conversation/ or impulse to life and conduct, ' ful- 
 filling the desires of the flesh and of the mind.' L As a 
 malarious atmosphere introduces disease to those who 
 breathe it, and excites an abnormal action of the blood, 
 state of the appetite, and of the whole physical man, 
 so inhaling a spiritual atmosphere ruled by the devil 
 and his angels influences lust and voluptuousness, and 
 leads to all manner of error and wickedness. It is 
 only on the principle of an instituted analogy between 
 natural breathing and spiritual influence that such 
 passages as the foregoing can be legitimately inter- 
 preted. The prince of the power of the air acts upon 
 our moral nature or soul-life as malarious air upon 
 those who breathe it. Unclean spirits, of which we 
 have such frequent mention in the Gospels, influence 
 men and beasts on analogous principles, as they left 
 the maniac to madden the swine. We here attempt 
 no explanation of these facts, but simply notice the 
 comparison which the Bible institutes between them 
 and those of breathing and atmospheric influences. 
 
 The infinite Spirit acts both upon matter and upon 
 mind, giving a life-producing power to the waters, and 
 understanding to man. 2 The two, ruacli and ncplicsli, 
 spirit and soul, in man commingle their influence, as 
 wind and blood in the lungs, -the result being what we 
 see, a conscious responsible being, uniting in himself 
 what Tholuck calls ' the realm of spirits and the realm 
 of nature.' These two distinct realms meet in the soul 
 l Eph. iL 2, 3. 2 Gen. i. 2 ; Job xxxii. 8. 
 
40 Seed- Truths. 
 
 of man. Soul is interfused by spirit as melted iron by 
 heat, and at the same time it is interpermeated by 
 material or animal influences. * It sees God on the one 
 hand, it sees the world on the other. There is no like- 
 ness between the two ; for nothing is like God, and 
 no material substance approximates spirit, though, to 
 convey ideas of the former, we are compelled to sym- 
 bolize it by the latter, as we said in our first chapter. 
 The life of a plant is no more soil than breath is soul, 
 or spirit, wind ; but can it live and become seeding 
 without soil ? But though breath is not soul, it is a 
 necessity of the soul's life in the body, and therefore 
 a fitting symbol to represent it. So wind is a great 
 power in nature, and therefore a fitting representation 
 of Spirit, who came upon the apostles as ' a rushing 
 mighty wind/ and so was their promised gift of ' power 
 from on high/ And ' the wind or breath of our nostrils 
 is the anointed of the Lord/ ' the unction of the Holy 
 One by which we know all things, and is truth, and is 
 no lie/ 1 It is spirit as a breathing medium, analogous 
 to our atmosphere, which imparts to us faith, divine 
 communion, the capacity for acceptable worship, and 
 all the highest qualities of our nature. The apostle 
 takes occasion to say that this sort of inspiration is 
 ' truth, and no lie/ and Jeremiah calls it ' the anointed 
 of the Lord/ to rebuke the tendency in us to regard 
 everything unreal which is not material This extra- 
 ordinary gift of power to the Church would have been 
 the normal condition of human nature had it not been 
 for sin. Man was originally created for the exercise of 
 those powers which we now call miraculous ; the divine 
 inbreathing insured them to him. But he lost them by 
 abjuring the dominion of spirit for that of the flesh. 
 1 Compare Luke xxir. 49 ; AcU L 5, il 2 ; Lam. iv. 20 ; 1 John ii. 27. 
 
Inhaling Life from the Expanse. 41 
 
 Thus two kinds of respiration are clearly set "before 
 us by the inspired writers, first, that by which our 
 animal life is preserved; and second, that by which 
 our spiritual life subsists. They had both in view, no 
 doubt, in their references to the material expanse, soul 
 breathing in the properties of air, and spirit breathing 
 in the higher influences supplied by the heavenly 
 bodies. The boundless empyrean, infinite ethereal 
 spaces, the properties of light shining from innumer- 
 able orbs, are subjects of frequent reference in the 
 Bible. ' The heavens declare the glory of God, and 
 the expanse showeth His handiwork.' ' When I con- 
 sider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon 
 and stars, which Thou hast ordained ; what is man that 
 Thou art mindful of him, or the son of man, that Thou 
 visitest him 1 ' * 
 
 But it may be said the seers had not the light of 
 our science to guide them, and they could not there- 
 fore have had our enlarged views of nature. True, 
 they knew nothing of the attraction of gravitation; 
 but do we know what it is ? They had what was better 
 than our name for this unknown thing, the clear view 
 of a divine Power holding all the orbs and elements' 
 in their places, ' guiding Arcturus with her sons,' and 
 ' binding the sweet influences of Pleiades.' 2 Science 
 sees in gravitation a power conterminous with matter ; 
 they saw a Power alike conterminous with a universe 
 of matter and of mind. One Jehovah rules in both, 
 and was infinitely more to them than the name of an 
 unknown power. Spiritual Omnipotence pervades the 
 domain of nature and of spirits, and affords, to the 
 human soul breathing in both, to make sure that, though 
 the animal organism depending upon the one be dis- 
 1 Ps. xix. 1, viii. 4, 5. a Job ix. 9, xxxviii. 28-37. 
 
42 Seed- Truths. 
 
 solved, the soul itself will rise like a phoenix from the 
 ashes of its desolation, and plume itself for everlasting 
 progress in holiness and bliss. The nephcsh of the 
 Hebrews is represented as standing between two worlds, 
 the uniting link between the two. a son of earth and 
 a son of God. 
 
 These views, though pervading the Old Testament, 
 are not so clearly seen as in the New. There centred 
 in the God-man, the archetype of humanity, not only 
 the faculties, attributes, and breathing necessities of an 
 earthly nature, but ' the fulness of the Godhead bodily.' 
 ' All power in heaven and earth ' thus took on the 
 forms and conditions of our common manhood. And 
 through Him a like impartation is made to those to 
 whom ' He gives power to become sons of God.' ' They 
 are born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor 
 of the will of man, but of God.' ' They have put on 
 the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the 
 image of Him that created him.' The idea is, that the 
 true Spirit is Christ, whether manifesting Himself as 
 God or in flesh, in His own person or in that of His 
 renewed people, ' He in us, and we in Him.' 1 
 
 It is only by this twofold view of breathing and 
 living, one of flesh, and the other of spirit, that we can 
 explain many tilings in the Bible. How else can we 
 ' pray without ceasing,' as I have already said ? 
 
 How else can the asking and the having be simul- 
 taneous ? (1 John v. 15.) Inhaling is having breath; 
 and truly desiring a grace or virtue is to have it. 
 
 How else can hungering and thirsting after righteous- 
 ness insure an instant fulness ? (Matt. v. 6.) 
 
 If God as a Spirit were not investing a* supplicating 
 people as their breathing expanse, or if He were not 
 
 1 John L 13, 14 ; Col. ill 10 ; John xvii. 21, xv. 5, etc. etc. 
 
Inhaling Life from the Expanse. 43 
 
 present as speech to a hearing ear, how could what God 
 says be true, that ' before they call, I will answer ; and 
 while they are speaking, I will hear?' (Isa. Ixv. 24.) 
 
 How else can the Holy Spirit be surer to them that 
 ask Him, than good things are from parents to their 
 pleading children ? (Luke xi. 1 3.) 
 
 How else can a hidden life from God reach a soul 
 through Christ ? (Col. iii. 3.) Must there not be 
 spiritual respiration to insure such a result ? 
 
 How else can man live otherwise than by bread 
 alone ? (Deut. viii. 3 ; Matt. iv. 4.) 
 
 Where there is a failure to take in these divine 
 sources of life, the breathing is not in that direction, 
 but towards the world : ' Ye ask, and receive not, 
 because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon 
 your lusts.' 1 Even if desire goes towards a spiritual 
 atmosphere it is to subserve a worldly end, like that of 
 Balaam and Simon Magus ; nothing but demon influ- 
 ences will follow, and we shall be more than ever 
 ' in the gall of bitterness, and under the bond of 
 iniquity.' 2 
 
 1 Jas, iv. 3. * Acts viii. 23. 
 
CHAFER VI. 
 THE SOUL AS THE CONSCIOUS SELFHOOD. 
 
 WHAT is the exact position which inspired 
 writers assign to the soul, as distinguished 
 from flesh and spirit ? That there is a difference, not 
 only appears from the relation in which they are placed 
 to each other generally in the Bible, but by their 
 being specifically used by the apostle for three separate 
 ideas in the same sentence : That ' your whole spirit 
 and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the 
 coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.' 1 We easily dis- 
 tinguish between soul and body, and spirit and body ; 
 but what is the difference between soul and spirit ? 
 This is the question. 
 
 The synonymous words ncphesh of the Old Testa- 
 ment, and psuche of the New, are used with a discrimi- 
 nation which is not expressed by our word soul, by 
 which they are rendered. Soul with us, as applied to 
 mind in distinction from body, is the same as spirit. 
 A man's soul is his spirit But psuche of the New 
 Testament is never used for ruack, or spirit, but always, 
 when applied to men, for nephesh, or soul. The ten- 
 dency of psuche is towards the flesh ; and the adjective 
 made from it, psuchikos, means animal, or the animal 
 nature, and in our common version it is rendered 
 ' natural ' and ' sensual.' 2 But ruach and pneuvia, 
 
 1 1 Thess. v. 'J3. ' 1 Cor. ii. 14 ; Jas. iii. 15. 
 
 44 
 
The Soul as the Conscious Selfhood. 45 
 
 spirit, have a directly opposite tendency, and, from 
 being applied to man's inner being, it supplies a name 
 for God. Or perhaps the order should be reversed, 
 and we should say that, from being applied to God, it 
 became a name for that in man which responds to 
 God, as it was before man's creation, that ' the ruach, 
 or Spirit of God, brooded on the face of the waters.' 
 And in the New Testament it supplies the adjective 
 pneumatikos, spiritual, which is the direct opposite of 
 psitchikos, natural, sensual, or animal. How then can 
 two words, one of which means divine and spiritual 
 life, and the other animal life, be conceived of as 
 expressing the same ideas when applied to the nature 
 of man ? No, soul and spirit are heaven-wide apart 
 in their acceptation by inspired men. True, the inner 
 nature of man is called soul, because connected with 
 animal life ; and spirit, because a recipient of influence 
 from God. So we call a person a cottager because he 
 lives in a cottage, and a scholar because he is a 
 learner ; but does that make cottage and scholar 
 synonymous terms ? 
 
 The stem- thought of soul, as used by inspired men, 
 is that of a conscious, personal, responsible selfhood. 
 It covers the whole ground of man's free voluntary 
 agency. .When the limits of that agency are exceeded 
 in any direction, the things we meet with are not part 
 and parcel of a man's soul. They may pertain to 
 somebody else's soul, or to brute force, but not to that 
 particular individual soul to which one applies the 
 word self when he is speaking of his own. My body 
 may be forced, but not my soul. My outward deeds 
 may be distrained, but not my will. The veriest slave 
 wills to be free. Quite another process is necessary to 
 enslave the soul than that of simple force. It must 
 
46 Seed- Truths. 
 
 be done by perverting the will through deception, 
 ignorance, or some modification of the selfhood, where- 
 by the man is made to choose what he would not 
 choose in a right state of his faculties. This is trading 
 in the souls of men, of which Borne is not alone 
 guilty, but every government and organization which 
 obstructs the march of truth. 
 
 There is no way of moving the soul but through the 
 will ; for the moment the soul were distrained against 
 its consent, whether by God or men, its selfhood would 
 end, and another power come into its place. Suppose 
 the laughing-gas be administered to a man, and he 
 plays various unconscious pranks under its influence, 
 is it himself that acts ? If he is out of his head, as 
 we say, do we not set his doings to another account 
 than his responsible selfhood ? To say that a man's 
 personality is anything but his conscious willing, is to 
 make him a chemical compound, or a mere secretion 
 of matter. He cannot will against his will. Soul 
 inviolability is the great idea of revealed religion. 
 The whole Bible is constructed with reference to it. 
 It is a great argument, influencing men to the choice 
 of truth and good. And what is redemption, but 
 recovering men to the love, preference, and practice of 
 goodness ? How could stronger proof be given of the 
 inviolability of the human will, than God's expedients 
 to induce our choice of Him and His service before all 
 others ? Popes and kings may use coercion in matters 
 of conscience, but God never, for the good reason that 
 virtue is not virtue, and holiness is not holiness, only 
 so far as the soul's unconstrained will and desire go 
 out after them. Man is in the image of God in this 
 absolute supremacy within his own domain, and with- 
 out partnership >iii the throne except as ho consent* 
 
The Soul as the Conscious Selfhood. 47 
 
 to admit one. Such is the ncphesh, or soul of the 
 Bible. 
 
 Bunyan's idea of the soul as a castle is biblical and 
 authentic. It is a castle open to spirit on one side, 
 and flesh on the other, but none can enter except at 
 the option of the reigning lord within. His business 
 is to keep guard at ear-gate and eye-gate, and at all 
 the avenues of sense, on the one hand ; and, on the 
 other, to ' try the spirits whether they are of God, 
 because many false prophets [malign spiritual in- 
 fluences] are gone out into the world.' 1 If he admits 
 evil from either of these sources, it is at his peril, 
 because law, conscience, God, hold him responsible 
 as the ruling power within. No matter how multitu- 
 dinous the army, authority is a unit in its head. No 
 matter how various the powers subordinate to the soul, 
 that, in the view of inspired men, is the seat of all 
 moral responsibility. Each soul, within its own 
 measure of duty, has the question of its virtue or its 
 vice, its holiness or its sin, its happiness or its misery 
 to all eternity, to decide. What questions in national 
 diplomacy can equa^ these ? God, in making each one 
 his own diplomat, puts the utmost dignity upon the 
 soul. 
 
 The metaphysicians have for ages controverted the 
 question as to whether ideas are derived wholly from 
 the external senses, or partly from intuition ; and they 
 are as far now as ever from reaching a satisfactory 
 result. But the inspired writers view the subject from 
 quite another standpoint. They looked upon the soul 
 as the centre of a world of flesh, on the one hand, 
 offering him its contributions ; and of spirit, on the 
 other, reaching him through another channel, or by 
 
 1 1 John iv. 1* 
 
48 Seed- Truths. 
 
 a different mode of apprehension. One is an object of 
 sense, the other of faith. Both unite its experiences 
 in the soul, or selfhood. The Hebrew seers had not 
 reached the point of madness to deny the contributions 
 of either the one or the other. They believed the 
 eye did see light, and not a merely subjective illusion 
 of the fancy. They believed that faith did act, as 
 seeing Him who is invisible. The objective realit}^ of 
 both a spiritual and natural world stood to them on 
 the same basis, the fact of their being conscious of a 
 nature that took truths, influences, and impressions 
 from both. To them a bird's wing supposed the reality 
 of air, and the fish's fin the reality of water. So the 
 power to receive inflowing truth and love from God 
 made His existence a stupendous fact ; just as the 
 power to take impressions from this world through the 
 five senses made that also to them a vast domain of 
 substantial thought and expatiation. All aglow with 
 seraphic fire at viewing the divine glory in both, they cry, 
 ' Alleluia : for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.' 1 
 
 There is recognised in the Bible neplicsh, or soul, a 
 retributive provision, that when he lets in an enemy 
 he cannot drive him out. A dominating sin or lust ' 
 once entrenched in the castle is a strong IIKIII armed, 
 that can only be dispossessed by One stronger than he. 
 To will oneself into crime is easy, but to will one- 
 self back again into innocence is impossible. The soul 
 is indeed still free to follow desire ; but when that is 
 perverted, it is an ignis fatmis, to lead into still more 
 iii'-xtricable error. He is then " the servant of sin." 2 
 Hut this is a servitude of choice, and therefore morally 
 like tin- sl;m- with his car pinned to the door- 
 post of his ma ;< r, who v. ,: so by his own election. 1 
 1 Rev. xix. 6. f Juhii viii. J4. Ex. XXL . 
 
The Soul as the Conscious Selfhood. 49 
 
 The controversy between free-will and necessity, there- 
 fore, ends in this, that men are free and not necessi- 
 tated, because they do as they choose ; and yet they 
 are slaves to evil, because evil dominates their affec- 
 tions, and deprives them of the will to be free from 
 its power. 
 
 Another power accorded to the nephesJi of the Bible, 
 even in its slavery to evil, is that of being a successful 
 actor among the elements of this world. He can apply 
 himself to science, to art, to agriculture, to architecture, 
 and thus lay the foundation of a beneficent civilisation. 
 The loss of one sense leads to a more careful culti- 
 vation of those that remain ; the loss of heaven, as a 
 power in the soul, has turned all human energy, in a 
 certain sense, upon making the most of a purely intel- 
 lectual, animal, and material life. True, it is a soil 
 cursed with briars and thorns ; and while it causes 
 much labour and misery, it affords infinitely less happi - 
 ness than under the ruling of the Holy Spirit. 
 
 It is a mistake of certain sanguine reasoners, how- 
 ever, to claim for Christianity the sole civilising agency. 
 Nations totally unchristian, and unspiritual except 
 demon- worship, are far advanced in an intellectual and 
 material civilisation. The Chinese were, a few cen- 
 turies ago, in advance of all the world in printing and 
 paper-making, in inoculation to mitigate contagious 
 disease, in the use of the magnetic needle, in highly- 
 improved methods of agriculture and of certain arts, 
 and in other means of individual and social progress. 
 The Egyptians, Chaldeeans, Greeks, and Eomans of the 
 ancient heathen ages are to this day our models in art, 
 civil law, and architectural magnificence. Their lost 
 arts are not yet recovered in our age of boasted pro- 
 gress. 
 
 D 
 
50 Seed-Truths. 
 
 No doubt a true spiritual condition for a people is 
 infinitely better than any other, just as virtue is better 
 than vice, and truth than error ; but this is not saying 
 that a man without them may not have much valuable 
 knowledge in worldly matters. Those who violate 
 God's laws in some things, and keep them in others, 
 will experience the disadvantage in the one case, and 
 the benefit in the other. I have seen some earnest 
 Christians on neglected farms, with everything going to 
 waste around them, while their infidel neighbours were 
 surrounding themselves with thrift and plenty. The 
 one, perhaps, were faithful to spiritual, but negligent of 
 natural laws ; the other, negligent of spiritual laws, but 
 lived up to the letter of those which concern farming 
 and business. Inspired men never represent the sub- 
 ject in any other light, but insist that if a man will 
 not .work, neither shall he eat. 1 What we call talent, 
 natural endowments, education, worldly advancement, 
 they recognise in the frequent mention of Egyptian and 
 Chaldsean opulence and glory ; but they never regard 
 them as wisdom, for that begins with the fear of the 
 Lord. 2 The nephcsh, or soul, must, in their view, have 
 the Holy Spirit to sanctify and ennoble all worldly 
 good, ail material and intellectual achievements. This 
 is the only visdom, because it alone unites in itself the 
 two worlds cf which man is a tenant. 
 
 The ncplmh of the Old Testament is used about 
 seven hundred times, and psucJie, its synonym of the 
 New, seventy times. In our common version they are 
 nearly four hundred times rendered soul, twenty-seven 
 times as a personal pronoun, seventy times as life, 
 jwenty-five times as person, ten times mind, once 
 will, six times desire, three times pleasure, twelve 
 
 * 2 Tliesa. iii. 10. Pror. L 7 ; Job xxviiL 28 ; Prov. ix. 10. 
 
The Sold as the Conscioiis Selfhood. 5 1 
 
 times heart, once beauty, twice ghost, once spirit, three 
 times appetite. Its application to beasts and dead 
 bodies we omit as not pertinent to our .subject. The 
 stem-idea, as I before said, is that of the man as 
 distinguished from body and from spirit. Hence its 
 use as a pronoun, person, life, mind, spirit, will, de- 
 sire, pleasure, heart, ghost, appetite. These are mere 
 expressions of what the soul is, or what is consequent 
 upon its existence. 
 
 It can live in the body, and it can live out of the 
 body ; it can be in communion with God and angels, 
 or with the world and devils. It is not an ethereal 
 essence, as some foolishly speak of it, to be diffused at 
 death ; but it has an identity of its own which it will 
 never lose. ' Thou wilt not leave my soul in Hades, 
 nor suffer Thine Holy One to see corruption,' * proves 
 that our Lord's soul retained its conscious selfhood in 
 its state of separation from the body. 'To-day shalt 
 thou be with me in paradise' 2 is a promise which 
 insured to the thief on the cross the conscious integrity 
 of his soul after death, as well as to his Eedeemer. 
 Of Eachel it is said, ' Her soul was in departing (for she 
 died),' 3 that is, departing from its dissolving taber- 
 nacle of the body, as a nomad from his falling tent. 
 This is the apostle's view of the relation of the soul to 
 a dying body : it leaves a transient for a permanent 
 house. 4 Thus in many passages the soul is detached 
 from the body as a subsistence by itself, or the sole 
 conscious personality of the man, which is nowise de- 
 pendent upon the body except as a medium of converse 
 with the material world. 
 
 So, on the other hand, the soul is eliminated from 
 
 1 Acts ii. 27. 8 Luke xxiii. 43. 
 
 8 Gen. xxxv. 18. 4 2 Cor. v. L 
 
52 Seed-Truths. 
 
 spirit, as the receptacle from the substance which it 
 contains, or, as I said before, as heat from the iron 
 which it holds in solution. Indeed, the spiritual 
 atmosphere has the same relation to the soul as air to 
 animal life. ' Because I live, ye shall live also ; ' ' He 
 that believes in me hath everlasting life;' 'He that 
 eateth me, even he shall live by me/ 1 are all pas- 
 sages in which the pronouns 'ye' and 'he' denote the 
 soul, the only part of the man capable of everlasting 
 life ; while the life itself which it derives from Christ 
 is spiritual, or divine, and heavenly. It involves the 
 soul's holiness and happiness, the means to which are 
 not in itself, but come from living in Christ as in a 
 spiritual atmosphere, or from believing in Him and 
 living upon Him, as upon our daily food The apostle 
 also speaks of ' dividing between soul and spirit,' 2 which 
 would be impossible if they were identical It con- 
 sists in distinguishing between what the soul derives 
 from its natural life, and its life in spirit or in God. 
 'The anchor of hope*" also supposes that the soul may 
 have a hold upon spirit in God, and so enjoy ' strong 
 consolation ; ' but it is a hold upon what is as distinct 
 from itself as the ship and the bottom of the sea upon 
 which the flukes of its anchor take hold. 8 The spiritual 
 influence of which a witnessing Church is the organ is 
 distinct from ' the soul converted from the error of his 
 ways' by its means. 4 Indeed, if spirit and soul were 
 always the same, then every man, being actuated only 
 by his soul, would be spiritual, whereas we make a 
 broad distinction between being spiritual and having 
 a soul to save or lose. A man's soul may be carnal, 
 sold under sin, and thus remote as possible iroiu 
 
 John iiu 86, vi. 67, xiv. Ifc * Heb. iv. 12. 
 
 Heb. vi.18. Ja*.v. 20. 
 
The Soul as the Conscious Selfhood. 53 
 
 spirit. Soul is the man, spirit his life from God. 
 The one is Bimyan's castle, the other the heavenly 
 king to whom its occupant owes fealty. 
 
 This elimination of the soul from flesh and spirit is 
 wrought into the structure of the Hebrew language. 
 It gives it terms of personality. On a careful review 
 of some hundreds of cases in which soul is used, it will 
 be found that the personal pronouns, or other designa- 
 tion of personality,* would in other languages express 
 the same idea, though not with the same discrimina- 
 tion. ' Every soul [person] must eat ; ' ' Ye know the 
 soul [selfhood] of a stranger ; ' ' If a soul [person] touch 
 an unclean thing ; ' ' Serve Him with all your soul ' 
 [undivided self]; 'Three thousand souls' [persons]; 
 ' Hungry soul ' [hungry man] ; ' Full soul ' [full man] ; 
 and so throughout. 1 Lexicographers speak of it as a 
 Hebraism; but whether original to the language, or 
 infused by the ideas of those using it, is a question. 
 Ideas shape words, rather than words ideas. Hebrew- 
 speaking men, before and after the time of Abraham, 
 had conceptions of human nature that involved the 
 necessity of such a use of words. They were a shep- 
 herd-people, with few arts, small trade, and a limited 
 demand for words in those directions, but of deep 
 spiritual insight, making discrimination in that direc- 
 tion a law of speech. Imagine a people shaping their 
 language to the acutest distinctions of the metaphysics, 
 till in that form it became the speech of common life, 
 and we may have some idea -how spirit, soul, and animal 
 life came to be so carefully distinguished from each 
 other in the original Scriptures! 
 
 This distinction was a necessity of their faith. It 
 
 1 Ex. xii. 16, xxiii. 6 ; Lev. v. 2 ; Deut xi. 13 ; Acts ii. 41 ; Prov. 
 xxvii. 7. 
 
54 Seed-TrutJis. 
 
 was their religion to regard the world, its impressions 
 and its duties, on the one hand, and God, on the other, 
 influencing them as Spirit, and revealing Himself to 
 their spiritual apprehensions. This is the law in the 
 formation of thought from the natural world, the out- 
 ward scene producing in the infant various sensations, 
 and these sensations terminating in thought and memory. 
 All sensation is not thought, though its tendency is 
 towards thought ; nor is all spiritual influence truth to 
 the understanding, but a predisposing cause of objec- 
 tive truth. Eeligious reasoners are full of nonsense on 
 this subject, fancying that nothing could have existed 
 to influence their moral character which is not included 
 in thought and memory. Thought and memory may 
 cover their responsibility, though even that is greatly 
 increased or diminished by the previous influences act- 
 ing upon them. What a savage remembers of himself 
 cannot produce the same responsibility with that of a 
 child in a highly civilised and virtuous family. The 
 unseen forces revealing themselves in our consciousness 
 are greater treasures of character, if possible, than the 
 seen. 
 
 As I have said, spirit, soul, and body were so 
 radically distinct in the Hebrew mind, and so essential 
 in its worship, as to give form to its temple, with its 
 holiest place, its holy place, and its exterior courts and 
 cloisters. But in the gospel they are more marked, 
 and its piety and its virtue involve 'citizenship in 
 heaven/ ' Christ dwelling in us by faith/ ' the hidden 
 man of the heart/ and the like, as distinguished from 
 ' doing ' outwardly ' things contained in the law ' on 
 the part of those who are represented as 'without God 
 in the world/ because their inner sense was not open 
 to God, and they did nothing out of a regard to His 
 
The Sold as the Conscious SelfJwod. 55 
 
 holiness and love. 1 The soul of inspired men there- 
 fore has an outer court of natural virtues, conservative 
 worldly influence, and of civilisation, even when the 
 adytum of spiritual apprehensions is utterly closed 
 against God and heaven, and is actually open to a hell 
 of malign agencies and doctrines of devils. Is not this 
 view a reflection of real life ? 
 
 1 Compare Phil. iii. 20, Eph. iii. 17, 18, 1 Pet. iii. 4, with Kom. it 
 14, 15, Eph. ii. 12. 
 
CHAPTER VH 
 THE REALM OF SPIRITS. 
 
 IF any one asks what spirit is, or where its realm, 
 we should be compelled to answer, as Newton 
 did in reference to gravitation, that we know it in its 
 effects, but not in its nature. That there is a power of 
 mind, extraneous to matter, working out its results in 
 ways that chemistry cannot reach, nor science explore, 
 comes to us with the same sort of evidence as that 
 there are working all around us physical forces that 
 we cannot explain. Who knows but these unknown 
 forces may be spirit, or bordering on its realm ? The 
 more subtle the element, the greater the power; and 
 the gnarled oak and granite ledge are riven by an un- 
 seen bolt hurled by an unseen hand. Can we tell how 
 the sunbeams are generated, and how they work out 
 results so all-pervading, so stupendous ? Can we 
 divine the principles of cohesion by which the sand- 
 grains of a stone are held in such close affinity, ex- 
 plain the needle's adhesion to the pole, or the earth- 
 quake's power to upheave continents ? Or can we any 
 better explain how it is that spiritual ideas should work 
 out results in human nature so magnificent ? 
 
 There is much curiosity at present abroad to explore 
 the realm of spirits. More are taxing their ingenuity 
 in this direction than to find the north pole. Mediums 
 profess to put their gaping audiences into communica- 
 te 
 
The Realm of Spirits. 57 
 
 / 
 
 tion with the souls of the dead. That these souls 
 exist as substantive entities, or as knowing, conscious, 
 active beings, and in connection with worlds infinitely 
 more populous than our own, is no doubt true ; but 
 that they have modes of physical or electrical com- 
 munication with us needs proof that has not yet come 
 to our knowledge. Furthermore, necromancy, or at- 
 tempts to converse with the dead, besides being for- 
 bidden in Scripture, are found injurious to those who 
 practise them. The soul is substance, but not matter ; 
 and when detached from matter by death, it has an- 
 other and higher sphere of action, or is in an element 
 or realm suited to its disembodied nature. Whether 
 in future ages souls in the body will come into more 
 tangible connection with the departed, who is able to 
 say from anything within the range of our present 
 experience ? 
 
 Spirit is not matter, nor can it be believed to be 
 matter even in its subtlest forms. What in matter 
 does thought resemble ? With what effervescing fluid 
 can we compare a mental emotion ? Spirit is sub- 
 stance, no doubt, and of a nature more enduring than 
 any material element ; but what on earth can it act 
 through or with, except the soul of man ? How can 
 the disembodied effect material changes through any 
 other channel ? To suppose that it reverses the order, 
 and works upon the soul by manipulation or magnetism, 
 is to suppose matter a suppler element in the hand of a 
 spirit than the soul which is in affinity with it. When 
 that future age of enlarged spiritual manifestation 
 comes, we imagine it will be through a generation of 
 souls in more intimate affinity with God and heaven, 
 and not one of enlarged magnetic or electric science. 
 We leave all doubtful hypotheses on this subject and 
 
58 Seed-Truths. 
 
 keep to the letter of those inspired men who lived so 
 many ages in open visions of heaven. 
 
 These men are clear on one point, that there is in 
 the soul a capacity to take impressions from the realm 
 of spirits, and in due time to become itself an occupant 
 of that realm. This is the sanctum sanctorum of human 
 nature. Here God sets up His throne and writes His 
 laws. Here His shechinah of truth is to shine, and 
 His rod of authority to bud and bloom. Thence are to 
 go forth the decrees regulating all our outward life. 
 Spiritualism must work outward from this interior life, 
 instead of working inward through the nerves. Here 
 divine truth and love are to have their seat as a sort 
 of heavenly intuition, guiding us into all truth. 1 In- 
 tellectual reasoning is more exterior. It is in the 
 place of daily ministrations, or of natural and worldly 
 knowledges. Those graces which are the fruit of 
 divine influence are independent of the logical faculties ; 
 and hence the ablest reasoners are often deficient of 
 them, but they are revealed unto babes. 2 A child's 
 love to his parents is a surer guide to doing their plea- 
 sure than any amount of logic. If all the virtue of 
 this world had to be reasoned out as an intellectual 
 problem, how much should we have ? 
 
 No; the impulses are deep through which God's 
 Spirit works out its results. The deepest fountains, 
 fed from distant headlands, throw their jets highest 
 into the air. So of those impulses in man which are 
 in communication with the realm of spirits. They 
 gush forth in the most demonstrative deeds. We call 
 them heart, affections, which unconscious children and 
 even animals have as well as we, and sometimes even 
 more decisively ; and yet they have nothing spiritual 
 John xvL 13. * Matt. xi. 25-27. 
 
The Rea Im of Spirits. 5 9 
 
 about them. A change of heart does not express 
 the full idea of regeneration. No ; it is a birth of 
 the Spirit, and is effected upon the spiritual nature, 
 upon the conscience-faculties, or upon those powers 
 which connect man with the realm of spirits as his 
 native land. It opens that land to him which erst had 
 been closed. It cleanses the sanctuary of his inner 
 being, that God may resume His alienated throne. 
 God's entrance into the soul of man, through the 
 hitherto closed gates of a fleshly life, is solemnly 
 heralded : ' Lift up your heads, ye gates ; and be ye 
 lifted up, ye everlasting doors ; and the King of glory 
 shall come in. Who is this King of glory ? The 
 Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle.' 1 
 What is closed against God, but the soul of man walled 
 in and barricaded by fleshly appetites and worldly 
 ideas ? Or what more extraordinary than the Holy 
 Spirit's entrance into the soul in regeneration, heralded 
 as it is by gospel truths awakening the conscience and 
 impressing the heart ? It is effected by power, or by 
 the 'Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in 
 battle/ who is stronger than the strong man armed, and 
 spoils his goods, and is .thus heralded back to His own 
 throne in human nature. The kingdom then comes, 
 ruling within. Is not this a conquest of something 
 more than of the affections ? 2 Are not the affections 
 themselves set right by an anterior influence of Spirit, 
 reopening communication between the soul and the 
 spirit-realm to which it appertains ? 
 
 Besides, all the facts of a Christian life represent it 
 
 as a walk with God, or walking in the Spirit, or as 
 
 maintained to the end by perpetual influx from the 
 
 spiritual world. ' I will come in and sup with him, 
 
 1 Ps. xxiv. 7-10. 2 Luke xi, 21, 22, xvii. 21. 
 
6o Seed- Truths. 
 
 and he with me ; ' ' He shall be loved of my Father, 
 and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.' 1 
 This is to be the experience of one whose soul is open 
 to God, and who truly loves God. He shall sup with 
 God, and God with him. and have continual manifesta- 
 tions of Christ given to him ; and thus the utmost free- 
 dom of intercourse is established between himself and 
 the realm of spirits. He is under the guardianship of 
 angels. 2 He has the feelings of a child, to say ' Abba, 
 Father/ ' The Spirit itself beareth witness with our 
 spirit.' The Spirit intercedes within us, and maketh 
 intercession for us, showing a correspondence between 
 what is passing in the man himself and in heaven, as 
 message responds to message through a hidden track 
 in the sea from Europe to America. ' We have an 
 Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous/ 
 ' who ever liyeth to make intercession for us/ Nor is 
 this an apologetic advocacy or intercession, like that of 
 a barrister for his unfortunate client, to soften the 
 Father's heart towards our sins, but one that consists 
 in a continued supply of spiritual force, to enable us 
 to overcome our sins. The word advocate in the ori- 
 ginal is paraclete comforter, reprover, guide, to call us 
 away from a sinful to a spiritual and heavenly life, of 
 which He is our Mediator to keep the way of access 
 ever open. 3 Advocacy or intercession, as an abstrac- 
 tion, apart from restored power from the spirit-realm to 
 enable us to overcome the world, is a thing unknown to 
 inspired men. ' I have overcome the world;' 'Greater 
 is He that is in you, than he that is in the world ;' 
 ' This is the victory that overcomes the world, even 
 your faith ;' ' Whatsoever is born of God overcometh 
 
 1 Rev. iii. 20 : John xiv. 21. s TTeh. i. 14 ; Ps. xcl 12, 
 
 Bom. viii. 15, 1(J, 20, ii7 ; 1 John ii. 1 ; Heb. vii. 25. 
 
The Realm of Spirits. 6 1 
 
 the world.' 1 These are passages which show the na- 
 ture of Christ's work as our Advocate and Intercessor. 
 It is through Him that spiritual power flows conti- 
 nually into the hearts of them that believe, enabling 
 them to achieve a victory that otherwise would he 
 impossible. 
 
 As regeneration and redemption are returning to the 
 realm of spirit, or the ruling of God in the soul, they 
 are so referred to by the apostle : ' Ye are come unto 
 mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the 
 heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company 
 of angels, to the general assembly and Church of the 
 first-born, which are written in heaven, and to God the 
 Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made 
 perfect, and to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, 
 and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better 
 things than the blood of Abel.' 2 Could anything be 
 more explicit as to what redemption and regeneration 
 amount to ? As heaven was open to man in his first 
 creation, but was closed when he came under the ruling 
 of flesh and the world, so it is opened again, and all 
 its blessed inhabitants become his associates, when he 
 returns to them a new man in Christ. This restored 
 connection with God in spirit is cause, of which the 
 renewed affections and the holy life are effects. Hence 
 the sealing or graces of the Holy Spirit are ' after ye 
 had believed.' 3 
 
 The realm of spirits is unlike that of nature in itself, 
 and in its modes of thought, activity, and happiness. 
 Still, in the normal condition of manhood, it is as 
 accessible as matter to the body. Sin alone can close 
 it to us, and substitute in its place demon influence. 
 
 1 John xvi. 33 ; 1 Johii iv. 4, v. 4. Heb. xii. 22-24. 
 
 fcph. i. 13. 
 
6 2 Seed- Truths. 
 
 Owing to this substitution of hell for heaven in the 
 sensual or natural man, the first step in redemption 
 was ' to destroy the works of the devil/ ' For this 
 purpose was the Son of God manifested/ l His first 
 battle was with Satan, among the wild beasts of the 
 wilderness, the vanquishing of whom was the prepara- 
 tory step to our Lord's public ministry. 2 And He 
 anticipates His final triumph, by saying, ' I beheld 
 Satan as lightning fall from heaven/ 8 This was binding 
 the strong man preparatory to spoiling his goods. It 
 was symbolized in the exode from Egypt, which was 
 effected by means of the ten plagues, and the destruc- 
 tion in the Red Sea of Pharaoh and his host, consti- 
 tuting a redemption of power, and not of purchase, 
 except in a figurative sense. So now the malign 
 spiritual powers dominating man, and rioting among 
 'the wild beasts' of appetite, and passion, and worldli- 
 ness, are the first to be subdued, in securing to God a 
 spiritual Israel to do Him service in this world's wil- 
 derness. All progress begins by a battle with error 
 and the devil 
 
 Nothing can be conceived more imposing than the 
 imagery by which the realm of spirits is represented 
 to us in the Bible : ' I saw the Lord sitting upon a 
 throne, high and lifted up, and His train filled tliB 
 temple. Above it stood the seraphim : each one had 
 six wings ; with twain he covered his face, and with 
 twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did 
 fly. And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, 
 holy is the Lord God of hosts : the whole earth is full 
 of His glory. And the posts of the door moved at 
 the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled 
 with smoke/ The effect upon the prophet, as also 
 
 * 1 John iii. 8. Matt iv. 1-11 ; Mark L 13. Luke x. 18. 
 
The Realm of Spirits. 63 
 
 upon Daniel of like visions, was a recoil upon self, 
 withering and blighting, the latter adding, ' I Daniel 
 fainted, and was sick certain days.' But Isaiah ex- 
 claims, ' Woe is me ! for I am undone ; because I am a 
 man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people 
 of unclean lips : for mine eyes have seen the King, 
 the Lord of hosts.' * ' They saw the God of Israel : 
 and there was under His feet as it were a paved work 
 of a sapphire-stone, and as it were the body of heaven 
 in clearness.' 2 The visions of Ezekiel and John com- 
 bine attributes of power and glory above everything to 
 be met with in real life. 3 The transfigured Saviour, 
 with heavenly glory investing Him, outshone the sun, 
 and was clothed in a radiance which no art can imitate. 4 
 And the words which Paul heard in the third heavens 
 exceeded all the powers of earthly speech. 5 All the 
 mines of earth cannot supply the amount of gold and 
 precious stones brought together in the last chapters of 
 Revelation to represent the New Jerusalem. Nor is 
 the spirit-world of evil represented by images of pain 
 and woe less extraordinary. 
 
 Such is the nature of the world of which the human 
 soul is the tenant, and of whose influences, for good 
 or for evil, it is a recipient. In reference to this 
 capacity of spiritual reception, the same term is be- 
 stowed upon it and the Spirit of God. Ruach in the 
 Old Testament, and pneuma in the New, are, as we 
 have seen, applied both to man and to God. ' The 
 pneuma! says Neander, ' corresponds to the divine 
 pneuma or Holy Spirit, which is destined and adapted 
 
 1 Isa. vi. 1-5 ; Dan. viii. 27. 2 Ex. xxiv. 10. 
 
 8 Ezek. i. 4-28 ; Rev. i. 12-16, iv. 2-4. 
 
 4 Matt. xvii. 2 ; Mark ix. 3 ; Acts xxii. 6, xxvi. 13. 
 
 2 Cor. xii. 2. 
 
64 Seed-Truths. 
 
 to receive His influences, and spread them through the 
 whole of human nature/ This is the Divine Proceed- 
 ing going forth from the Father through the Son, to 
 operate in the souls of His people, ' to will and to do 
 according to His good pleasure,' to realize heaven in 
 them, and at the same time brooding upon the ele- 
 ments of nature, to reduce the two kingdoms to a unit 
 in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is Lord 
 of all. All power in heaven and earth is His. 
 
 Graces and gifts in the Church are the divine pneu- 
 matika, or the result of an importation from the spirit- 
 realm, and not an exercise of natural gifts, whether 
 inherent or acquired. They were obtained for us when 
 Christ ascended up on high, and thus reopened com- 
 munication between heaven and the soul of man. And 
 when the field lacks labourers, He sends us not to the 
 schools for a supply, but to the Lord of the harvest, to 
 pray that He would send forth labourers. 1 Spiritual 
 power is what the world needs ; no other can explode 
 its errors or alleviate its woes. And the channel is 
 open for its influx ; and we have only to ' come boldly 
 unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, 
 and find grace to help in time of need.' 2 
 
 Our spiritual apprehensions are subject to much the 
 same laws as those which are natural. Ideas of taste 
 and ideas of sense can only be conceived by those 
 who have the taste or the sense. No matter how in- 
 tellectual we may be, we cannot see without eyes ; no 
 matter how finished as mathematicians, we cannot ap- 
 preciate art and poetry without a feeling for thi'in. 
 So of truths from the realm of spirit. Without a re- 
 sponsive chord in us, how can we know them ? ' The 
 wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the 
 1 Eph. iv. 8 ; Matt. w. 38. Heb. iy. 16. 
 
The Realm of Spirits. 65 
 
 sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, 
 and whither it goeth : so is every one that is born of 
 the Spirit.' 1 It is necessarily occult to one who has 
 not opened his mind to the heavenly breeze. How can 
 he speak of the odours of paradise, when he has never 
 inhaled them ? 
 
 Impartations from the spirit-realm reveal themselves, 
 like light and sound, not merely by their own force, 
 but by that force as responded to by what is in the 
 man himself, as the breeze is responded to by the 
 vibrating strings of the harp which it sets in motion. 
 Does not the muse of the poet act in the same manner '* 
 Images from without kindle the poetic feeling within 
 and the inspiration is partly of the man, and partly of 
 the influences acting upon him. Seeing is partly of 
 the eye, and partly of the light, and not of either by 
 itself. So is it with all spiritual influence. It comes 
 from God, but takes its cast from our minds, whether 
 as penitence for sin, faith in Christ, joy in the Holy 
 Ghost, supplication in the Spirit, a gift for edifying 
 others, quiet and patient endurance under suffering, 
 the practice of domestic virtues and daily, duties, or in 
 any other form. 
 
 In all cases where moral characteristics are ascribed 
 to the spirit, more is meant than outward virtue. It 
 supposes a divine force acting through the soul, to give 
 a spiritual and heavenly stamp to those virtues, or to 
 make them what they would not be without such force, 
 as sunlight makes a plant what it would not be in the 
 shade. Doing things ' as unto God, and not unto men,' 2 
 may not materially change the outward form of the 
 act, but its spirit how different ! The spirit to do 
 things as unto God remains, in some cases, when the 
 1 John iii. 8. 2 Eph. vi. 5-8. 
 
 E 
 
66 Seed- Truths. 
 
 actions are wholly wanting, or are directly of a contrary 
 character. Peter's crime, in not only neglecting to 
 defend his Master under trial, but in actually denying 
 Him, did not unsettle the spiritual basis of love and 
 devotion to that Master. No ; his flowing tears testi- 
 fied to the hold which his Master still had upon his 
 spiritual affections. On the contrary, the virtues of 
 which the Pharisee perhaps truthfully boasted in his 
 prayer, were still worldly and unscriptural, and there- 
 fore unacceptable. 1 
 
 The term spirit is added to a virtue or a vice, to 
 denote actions performed from a good or an evil im- 
 pulse from the spirit-world. Hence the expressions, 
 ' the spirit which is of God,' ' the spirit of the world/ 
 ' spiritually minded/ ' carnally minded/ ' walking in 
 the Spirit/ ' seducing spirits/ ' Spirit of truth/ ' deceiv- 
 ing spirits/ and many others. 2 By such forms of ex- 
 pression, the inspired writers keep constantly before 
 our minds the currents of influence inflowing from the 
 world of spirits, to give a good or an evil direction to 
 our lives. The idea is, that we have a nature con- 
 stantly acted upon by a spiritual as well as a natural 
 world, and that we are to regulate our conduct in re- 
 ference to this fact. We are to breathe and pant and 
 long after God, but to resist the devil that he may flee 
 from us. 
 
 The spiritual laws of association are like the natural. 
 Like affiliates with like. Good angels cluster round 
 the good, and unclean spirits around the unclean. 
 What we are and what we do is never secret, but 
 under the eye of heavenly spectators. ' There is 
 
 i Luki-xviii. 11. 
 
 1 Cor. ii. 12 ; 1 Tim. iv. 1 ; 2 Cor. xii. 18 ; 1 Cor. xii. 10 ; Rom. 
 viiL 6. 
 
The Realm of Spirits. 6 ^ 
 
 nothing hid, which shall not be manifested; neither 
 was anything secret, but that it should come abroad.' 
 ' A great cloud of heavenly witnesses ever encompasses 
 us,' a cloud more imposing by far than ever looked 
 down from a Eoman amphitheatre. 1 Our evils are 
 enacted against an ever-resisting heavenly force, and 
 our hearts are hardened by the process, as Pharaoh's 
 was by opposing himself to God, and as the Jews were 
 by withstanding the spiritual power that wrought with 
 Christ and His apostles. The intenser the influence 
 from above, the more rapid the process of spiritual 
 decay in us, as with a carcase under a torrid sun. Our 
 power to be wicked is proportioned to our means of 
 spiritual influence. 2 Tares derive their baneful luxuri- 
 ance from the same soil that nourishes the fat of the 
 kidneys of wheat. 
 
 With a hint to those who would be restored to 
 communication with heaven, we will conclude this 
 chapter. This is to be done by turning away from 
 fleshly ideas, to act upon the truths of faith. ' Enter 
 into thy closet : and when thou hast shut the door, 
 pray to thy Father who is in secret ; and thy Father, 
 which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly.' 3 
 Communion with spirit must begin by shutting out 
 worldly influences. Truths of faith, truths of prayer, 
 truths of the divine law, truths of Christ and of fol- 
 lowing Him, truths of the gracious promises, truths of 
 the inner life, truths of spiritual worship, truths of 
 brotherly love, truths of general charity and benevo- 
 lence, truths from searching the Scriptures, and com- 
 paring spiritual things with spiritual, never open upon 
 us, except in a state of abstraction from the thoughts 
 and feelings which dominate our minds as worldly 
 
 1 Mark iv. 22 ; Heb. xii, 1. 2 John xv. 22. 3 Matt. vL 6. 
 
68 Seed-Truths. 
 
 men. This is coming out from the world, and locking 
 the door behind you. Such a course, persevered in 
 with honest intent, will cause heaven to open upon 
 thy soul, and Jesus to appear standing on the right 
 band of God. Try it, reader, try iL 
 
CHAPTEB 
 SPIRIT IN INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 WE will here repeat ourselves, to make sure of 
 being understood. Soul in Hebrew is the 
 man as connected with flesh on the one hand, and 
 spirit on the other. From the one he derives natural 
 ideas, and from the other spiritual : the man is dis- 
 tinct from both. He is not sense, nor is he spirit. 
 If he were without the body and its senses, he would 
 still be a man ; and the same would be true if he had 
 no spiritual apprehensions. Dives in hell had neither 
 bodily senses nor true apprehensions of God, and yet 
 his personal power of knowing and suffering remained, 
 and his natural ideas of family relations were still 
 present to his mind. 
 
 Not only is the man distinct from sense and spirit, 
 but from the objects with, which they render him 
 conversant. He is distinct from what he sees- in the 
 natural and in the spiritual world. The one he sees 
 through the body, the other through the spiritual 
 apprehension with which he is endowed. Spirit in 
 himself is his power to receive spiritual truths, as sense 
 is his power to receive natural truths. Such, it seems 
 to the writer, must be the view which one will arrive at 
 who carefully collates and compares the facts, symbols, 
 and statements of the Bible on this subject. The soul 
 as a nature is a unit, of capacity for influx from two 
 worlds, with duality of results to character. 
 
70 Seed- Truths. 
 
 The realm of spirits is more populous than that of 
 nature, as would appear from the oft-repeated designa- 
 tion, ' the Lord of Hosts/ and also from the mention 
 of angels ' innumerable/ and the devils in one man, 
 whose ' name was Legion, because they were many/ 
 Christ in the garden speaks of being able to command 
 more than twelve legions of angels. 1 It is not only 
 more populous, but more powerful than nature, just as 
 soul is than body, and God than the universe. Spirit 
 acts from within, matter from without ; spirit is the 
 sap-current, matter the efflorescence. The one works 
 out its results not only through individual souls, but 
 by aggregating them into institutions, bound by an 
 occult force, to make it next to impossible to detach 
 them. They stick together like the filings of magnet- 
 ized iron. Paganism, Romanism, Judaism, Islainism, 
 and Christianity are the general terms by which they 
 are called. As existing in most nations, they have a 
 politico-religious character, enforcing their decrees by 
 the sword of two worlds, or by social ostracism. 
 
 The inspired writers regard them as the outworking 
 of spiritual forces, good or evil, in which they are 
 more logical, as well as more truly inspired, than those 
 who ascribe them to climatic influences. If they owe 
 their existence to differences of climate, why does not 
 the same climate produce in all ages the same religion ? 
 Why has not the Druid worship been perpetuated in 
 l;md ? Why are not Bel and Nebo still worshipped 
 on the banks of the Euphrates, and Isis and Osiris on 
 those of the Nile ? Why does not Jupiter still thunder 
 from Ida, and rule from the Capitoline Hill ? 
 
 There is something more enduring than earthly 
 
 1 Heb. xii. 22 ; Luke viii 30 ; Matt. xxvi. 53 ; Dan. yii. 10 ; 
 Eev. T. 11. 
 
Spirit in Institutions. J i 
 
 forces in these religious divisions. So far as man's 
 nature is affected by food or climate, it admits of an 
 easy transition from one condition to another. He can 
 live within the tropics or polar circle, on the diet of 
 Peru or Greenland ; but does bis religion undergo 
 like change ? When a thought, or feeling, or usage 
 takes possession of a people, as sanctioned by God, 
 and binding their conscience, they take it wherever 
 they go. Who can persuade the Hindoo out of his 
 caste, or -the Chinese out of his ancestral worship? 
 Who can unsettle the Arab's faith in Allah and His 
 prophet ? How are two hundred million Eomanists 
 to be dissuaded from picture and saint worship, or 
 reliance on the priesthood for the pardon of sin ? 
 ' Has a nation changed its gods, which are no gods V 1 
 The gospel assumes that the change may be effected, 
 though not by education, not by new climatic influ- 
 ences, not by any earthly power or appliance, but only 
 by the quickening Spirit. ' The gospel is the power 
 of God unto salvation/ 2 As the resistance to be over- 
 come is spiritual power in high places, it must be 
 assailed by a spiritual force. You may break a rock 
 with gunpowder, but to change the currents of human 
 thought, feeling, and desire, quite another power must 
 be brought into requisition. ' Tarry ye in Jerusalem, 
 till ye be endued with power from on high.' 3 
 
 There is behind the reasoning faculties, and the 
 qualities which education affects, an influence directing 
 and determining the ideas and conduct of a people. 
 In the Indian and the Hottentot are not only pecu- 
 liarities of complexion and conformation, but also of 
 thought and feeling, of which no training can fully 
 dispossess them. I once inquired of a Jew how it was 
 1 Jer. ii. 11. * Rom. L 16. 3 Luke xxiv. 49. 
 
7 2 Seed- Truths. 
 
 that they gave their children so uniformly their own 
 peculiar cast of religious thought ' Oh/ he said, ' it is 
 our nature.' Minds thus shaped cast their reasoning 
 in the same mould ; and the libraries of Europe groan 
 under Jesuitical tomes, bringing all argument, all logic, 
 all reason, to the defence of the Roman type of 
 Christianity. The Hindoo, Chinese, and Mohammedan 
 are equally ingenious in the defence of their several 
 systems. Not that truth is thus contradictory, nor 
 reason incapable of discovering it, but there is a dis- 
 guising influence in such cases to darken and pervert 
 the mind. Something besides reason and truth deter- 
 mines its convictions. 
 
 How are we to account for disguising influences of 
 the kind taking possession of races and aggregations of 
 men, and perpetuating themselves from age to age ? 
 Can any better reason for it be given, than those 
 spiritual agencies to which the inspired writers refer 
 them ? They represent a spiritual being, under the 
 form of a serpent, as having a hand in bringing our 
 race into its present guilty and suffering state. A 
 spiritual agency of an opposite character set on foot 
 the* patriarchal and Mosaic worship, with all its 
 histories, institutions, and prophecies, culminating in 
 the incarnation and pentecostal baptism. A like 
 agency brought the united descendants of Noah into 
 relations to each other, by the confusion of tongues, to 
 compel their dispersion as the seeding of races and 
 nations, and fixing the bound of their habitation. l In 
 these cases trains of influence were set on foot, deter- 
 mining the character and condition of man upon earth, 
 as also the specific form and location of national 
 institutions. 
 
Spirit in Institutions. 73 
 
 Though Babylon was a great outward fact, with a 
 history of three thousand years, yet it had a mystical 
 meaning with the prophets, representing ideas rather 
 than material interests. The ancient cry, that Babylon 
 is fallen, was taken up by John in Eevelation, long 
 after the old city had ceased to rule the nations. 1 It 
 was not, therefore, the fall of a material city which 
 was so solemnly heralded, but of errors and delusions 
 corrupting and debasing the nations. It was the 
 breaking up of a nest of satanic powers, called 
 ' Mystery, Babylon the great, the mother of harlots 
 and abominations of the earth.' 2 
 
 Whatever interpretation may be put upon ' the great 
 red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns/ or 
 upon the transfer of ' his power, and his seat, and great 
 authority to the beast with seven heads and ten horns/ 
 and ten crowns, and ' upon his heads the names of 
 blasphemy/ one thing is certain, these are symbols of 
 spiritual power or influence embodied in institutions 
 determining the faith and practice of mankind. 3 Eome 
 pagan and Eome papal are clearly referred to, the 
 former merging its authority, its ideas, and its seven- 
 hilled city into the latter, which it still longs to hold 
 with the same eagerness as ever to subject the nations 
 to its power. Thus the Babylon of inspiration is more 
 than a city, it is an aggregation of spiritual errors 
 and influences, holding vast masses of men subject to 
 its power, and making war upon truth and its advo- 
 cates. 
 
 The idea of representing unseen forces is not con- 
 lined to the true worshippers of God, it is also enter- 
 tained by idolaters. The apotheosis of the ancient 
 
 * Isa. xxi. 9 ; Rev. xviii. 2. Bey. xyii. 5. 
 
 Bev. xii. 3, xiii. 1, 2. 
 
74 Seed- Truths. 
 
 heroes consisted in transferring them to heaven and 
 identifying them with the stars, to act as patrons of 
 the nations and institutions with which they were con- 
 nected on earth. Nimrod, as personating Babylon, 
 became Lucifer the morning star ; and several of the 
 planets and signs of the zodiac are still called after these 
 ancient gods and heroes. The Papacy, as inheriting 
 these ancient corruptions, canonizes its saints, and offers 
 them its worship. These deified heroes and saints are 
 no doubt in imitation of the real powers which the 
 Scriptures represent as influencing nations and institu- 
 tions from the realm of spirits. The divine right of 
 kings is an offshoot of this idea. Governments claim 
 a ghostly origin and authority to strengthen their hold 
 upon the superstition of their subjects ; and true 
 patriotism no doubt includes a sentiment of piety to 
 God as well as loyalty to human institutions. 
 
 The Bible claims for the cause of truth and righteous- 
 ness the guardianship of Almighty God. Angels as 
 well as men are its servitors and its advocates. The 
 covenant with Abraham was not only the result of a 
 divine call, but was brought to mind at the burning 
 bush, ages after, when a large portion of the people to 
 whom it related had ceased to hope for its fulfilment. 
 ' I have heard the groanings of the children of Israel, 
 whom the .Egyptians keep in bondage; and I have 
 remembered my covenant.' 1 What followed in God's 
 dealings with that people in after ages is over and over 
 ii represented as in pursuance of that covenant, 
 the whole extraordinary history being merely the out- 
 working of spiritual forces, the embodiment of heavenly 
 ideas. 
 
 When, the literal descendants of Abraham finally 
 'bit* 
 
Spirit in Institutions. 75 
 
 rejected God in the person of His Son, saying, ' His 
 blood be upon us and our children/ 1 a spirit of unbelief 
 took possession of the nation, ruling them to this day 
 as a malign spiritual power, upon which arguments 
 make as little impression as feathers upon a granite 
 column. Some are indeed plucked as brands from the 
 burning, but not in sufficient numbers to affect the 
 solid framework of unbelief and materialism in which 
 the masses are encased. 
 
 It would almost seem as if the dupes of a great 
 delusion on earth, as Paganism, Eomanism, Judaism, 
 and Islamism, carried their delusion into another life, 
 to react an influence upon those whom they left 
 behind, confirmatory of their error. If Moses and 
 Elijah interested themselves in our Lord's passion, 2 may 
 not evil spirits still share in the evils among men ? 
 Has the light of eternity cured them of the passions 
 and ideas that ruled them on earth ? And if cured, 
 why are they still under the wrath of God ? No ; the 
 idea of continual currents of influence from the spirit- 
 world to make men what they are, or to keep them so, 
 is clearly held forth in the pages of divine inspiration. 
 As a general rule, the greater the number of dead 
 heretics, the greater the power of the living heresy. 
 This is not always so, especially when God vouchsafes a 
 special divine influence to recover men to truth, as under 
 His apostles, under the Eeformers, under the zealous 
 spiritual labourers in revivals and missions during the 
 past hundred years, and on like occasions. But even 
 in such cases there is an instant rallying to perpetuate 
 the old delusions, even if they are compelled to take' 
 on new forms, as the Paganism of Rome reappeared in 
 the Papacy. Various errors corrupted the Eeformers, 
 1 Matt. xxvu. 25. 2 Luke ix. 30, 31. 
 
76 Seed- Truths. 
 
 and their work was counteracted by Jesuitism ; and even 
 now there are causes constantly at work to vitiate and 
 corrupt our revivals and our missions. How far these 
 counteracting forces are purely earthly, or an emanation 
 of the spirit-world of evil, it is difficult to determine. 
 And one who impartially reads the life of Loyola, and 
 the dark and damaging achievements of his Jesuitical 
 institution, can scarcely fail of being impressed with 
 the working of malign agencies more than human. 
 In such cases it may be well said, ' Woe unto the 
 inhabitants of the earth and sea ! for the devil is 
 come down unto you, having great wrath.' l 
 
 In Daniel the great powers of the world are described 
 as the outworking of spiritual agencies. The Grecian 
 and Roman empires were thus presented to the vision 
 of the prophet long before their establishment. Michael 
 stood up for the chosen people ; and Gabriel was delayed 
 in answering Daniel's prayer by the prince of the king- 
 dom of Persia, or by a spiritual personation of that 
 power. 2 Cyrus, the founder of the Medo-Persian mon- 
 archy and restorer of the Jews, was foretold, ages before 
 he was born, as destined to fulfil a divine commission 
 of which he was unconscious. ' I girded thee, though 
 thou hast not known me/ 8 His reign and his con- 
 quests were in fulfilment of the counsels of eternity 
 and of promptings from the spirit-realm. 
 
 The establishment and work of Christianity were 
 more the result of spiritual than of earthly agencies. 
 An angel announced the birth of John the Baptist and 
 of Jesus of Nazareth. Angels hymned the new-born 
 Saviour to the shepherds, and the wise men were mira- 
 culously directed to His cradle. An angel strengthened 
 
 l Rev. xil 12. 
 
 Dan. TiL 6, yiiL 21, 22, ?iL 7, 23, z. 18 V zil L f lav. xlv. ft. 
 
Spirit in Institutions. 77 
 
 Him in the garden, and announced His resurrection. 
 Two angels appeared at His ascension. An angel 
 released Peter from prison, and stood by Paul in his 
 shipwreck. An angel opened the way to the conver- 
 sion of Cornelius, and the preaching of the gospel 
 among the Gentiles. 1 Besides, from the promise in the 
 garden of Eden, that ' the seed of the woman should 
 bruise the serpent's head/ to the setting up of Christ's 
 kingdom, all the particulars of the event were arranged 
 in heaven. They were made known to the prophets, 
 were wrought into symbol and into history ; and thus 
 one institution at least Christianity is the cropping 
 out of divine and heavenly powers. The spirit of just 
 men made perfect took part in the work on the moun- 
 tain of transfiguration ; and at the crucifixion * the 
 graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints 
 which slept arose, and came out of their graves after 
 His resurrection, and went into the holy city, and 
 appeared unto many.' 2 And if nothing exists of the 
 kind on the part of malign spiritual powers, it is the 
 only case, I believe, in which God's genuine working 
 is not counterfeited. 
 
 These are great facts in pursuance of the inspired 
 view of the spirit- world as near and in constant com- 
 munication with men on earth, for good or for evil. 
 When an evil spirit entrenches itself in an institution, 
 how hard to dispossess him ! Argument and reasoning 
 are to him what the green withs were in the hands of 
 Samson. Will arguments persuade Niagara out of its 
 course ? We call it prejudice, education, habit ; but the 
 Bible calls it Belial, ' the spirit of whoredoms,' ' that old 
 
 1 Luke i. 11-35, ii. 8-14 ; Matt, il 1, 2, xxviii. 2-7 ; Luke xxii. 43; 
 Acts i. 10, 11, xii. 7-10, xxvii. 23. 
 8 Matt xxvii. 52, 53. 
 
78 Seed-Truths. 
 
 serpent, the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole 
 world : he was cast out into the earth, and his angels 
 were cast out with him/ 1 Here they hold carnival 
 Their work may be gradual and stealthy, for ' he de- 
 ceiveth them that dwell upon the earth ;' 2 but when 
 once entrenched in the ideas and institutions of a 
 nation or a race, no power but that of God Himself, as 
 one stronger than he, can drive him out. 
 
 Christ never contemplated the conversion of the 
 world otherwise than by an organized spiritual force of 
 greater potency and power. 'He that is in you is 
 greater than he that is in the world.' 8 Christianity is 
 not contesting the palm of learning, diplomacy, money, 
 organization, or of worldly power, but of spiritual truth, 
 holy living, heavenly hope, and resurrection power. 
 As the kingdom of heaven among men, it is in conflict 
 with 'the rulers of the darkness of this world, and with 
 spiritual wickedness in high places.' * 
 
 Jesus, in establishing His kingdom among men, 
 wrote nothing, published nothing, organized neither 
 senate nor army, built no palace, assembled no court, 
 erected neither column nor cathedral, and resorted to 
 no single expedient suggested by human wisdom for 
 the achievement of such a result. What did He do ? 
 "Why, He simply gathered around Him a few personal 
 followers, of no worldly pretensions, with whom He 
 lived and conversed long enough to thoroughly imbue 
 them with His own ideas, and with His new and hea- 
 venly life. Trusting then to divine power to accrue to 
 them at His death, He left them, and returned to His 
 i'iilher. He thus made them what they had no power 
 
 1 Rev. xiL 9. * Rev. xiii. 14. 
 
 8 1 John iv. 4 ; Luke xxiv. 49 ; Acts i. 6. 
 4 Ki.h. vi. 12. 
 
Spirit In Institutions. 79 
 
 to be, and did with them what they had no power to 
 do. The Holy Spirit, restored to His ruling in their 
 nature, according to the original type of man's creation, 
 was the sole efficiency in that institution which we call 
 Christianity. He was joint witness with them of the 
 resurrection ; He endowed them for the offices of the 
 Church ; . He sanctioned the work of conversion among 
 the Gentiles ; He qualified Paul for this particular 
 vocation ; He descended upon the disciples at Ephesus ; 
 He separated Barnabas and Saul; He forewarned the 
 apostles of danger, and directed their preaching in one 
 place, but hindered it in another ; He gave power to 
 their words, and wrought mightily in them ; He wit- 
 nessed to their conscience and to believers ; He gave 
 them inward joy in all their tribulations. 1 How it is 
 possible that, with such a record running throughout, 
 Christianity should have been regarded as a great 
 worldly organization like the Papacy, or anything of 
 the kind, is passing strange. It only shows how hard 
 it is for human nature to conceive or conserve things 
 spiritual and heavenly. 
 
 Are not the laws of Christian progress the same now 
 as ever ? Can we hope for a rapid multiplication of 
 conversions, except by means of a sanctified Church ? 
 Must it not be by men and women swayed by an in- 
 fluence from above, like fields of grain by summer 
 winds ? No other influence can produce conversions 
 worth having. The toys of papal worship may attract 
 an ignorant people, but cannot improve their spiritual 
 condition. Protestant schools, books, tracts, periodicals, 
 learning, science, agriculture, art, civilisation, or states- 
 manship, may be a means to the work, but never can 
 
 1 Acts ii. 4, vi. 3, ix. 17, x. 44, xix. 6, xiii. 2, xx. 28, xx. 23, xvi. 
 6-10; Col. ii. 29 ; Kom. viii. 16, ix. 1 ; 2 Cor. vii. 4. 
 
8o Seed- Truths. 
 
 be a power for accomplishing it, except as wielded 
 by the Holy Spirit. The Bible itself can do nothing 
 except as 'the sword of the Spirit.' A kingdom of 
 heaven among men can only live and grow by heavenly 
 powei. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 SPIRIT IN MORALS. 
 
 THE question now before us is as to the effect of 
 spirit and the spiritual upon the theory and 
 practice of morality. Have they anything to do with 
 conscience ? This is a question which concerns the 
 connection of morality with religion. That there is a 
 very important connection between them, I believe is 
 generally conceded. 
 
 In the Bible view, morality is religion, and religion 
 is morality. The two are not distinguished from each 
 other. All right thinking, feeling, and doing commences 
 with the fear of the Lord, which is the beginning of 
 wisdom. Virtue inheres in piety, and piety in virtue, 
 as light and heat in the sunbeams. Neither can exist 
 in its integrity without the other. A vicious pious 
 man and a pious vicious man are a contradiction in 
 terms. 
 
 There are indeed conservative qualities among men 
 which pass for virtues, with which religion has little 
 directly to do. These the inspired writers recognise as 
 a natural conscience, as I have before said, leading men 
 to do without the law things contained in the law. 1 
 Under their influence civilisation attains in some cases 
 to great worldly pre-eminence, yet it leaves the nations 
 without God, and in a state of great material debase- 
 
 1 Koin. ii. 14, 1$. 
 F 
 
82 Seed- Truths. 
 
 ment. ' Man being in honour abideth not : he is like 
 the beasts that perish.' 1 His very morality is more 
 bestial than spiritual, more earthly than heavenly. Two 
 classes, the opposite of each other in culture, are espe- 
 cially in this state of abstraction from spiritual truth, 
 the lowest savages, and some of our most scientific men. 
 It is doubted by some whether the Caffres have any 
 spiritual ideas ; and our savans are in many cases so 
 occupied with material cause and effect as to lose sight 
 of God in His universe. They are atheists, pantheists, 
 or anything rather than believers in things spiritual. 
 Still the savages are not without conservative qualities ; 
 and our scientific atheists are not without private and 
 patriotic virtues. The Sadducees denied the existence 
 of both angel and spirit, 2 and yet they had an honour- 
 able position among the Jews, and were no doubt men 
 of ordinarily good morals for the age in which they 
 lived. 
 
 It must be conceded, however, that comparatively 
 few are destitute of spiritual ideas and influences of 
 some sort and to some extent. As in the coldest days 
 there is enough of the principle of heat to preserve 
 vegetable and animal life, so there may be the working 
 of spirit even in those who seem the most destitute of 
 it. The great majority of men, to say the least, are 
 influenced in their beliefs and actions by what they 
 conceive as lying beyond the range of sense or of 
 the natural world. Whether true or false, it is all the 
 same as to the fact of such an influence. The Jews 
 h;ul no conscience against crucifying Christ; but thc-ir 
 notions of religious purity restrained them from entering 
 the judgment-hall of Pilate, ' that they might eat the 
 passover.' * The Arab would be self-condemned if he 
 > Pa. xlix. 12. Acts xxiii. 8. John xviii. 28. 
 
Spirit in Morals. 83 
 
 neglected his daily prayers, but not for stealing all he 
 can lay his hands on. The IJoman robbers will murder 
 without remorse, but would think heaven shut against 
 them if they did not pay their daily adorations to an 
 image of the Virgin. Who will say that perverted 
 ideas of spiritual realities have nothing to do in such 
 cases ? 
 
 The most absurd icjeas of God and the unseen world 
 are so potent in some cases, as to produce a total dis- 
 regard to life and its comforts. The ^Hindoo widow 
 prefers to burn with her dead husband, rather than live 
 a queen in a second marriage. The anchorite starves 
 himself in the midst of abundance, and makes a con- 
 science of living in rags and filth to gain heaven. Who 
 will say that spiritual ideas, such as they are, have no 
 force in such cases ? Religion is the great power in 
 shaping our moral convictions, and achieves things im- 
 possible to the cold calculations of reason. Moral ideas 
 and impulses, shaped and directed by religion, figure 
 largely in art, architecture, literature, and social orga- 
 nization. They are the greatest forces in history. They 
 direct the expenditure of millions of money. They 
 marshal armies, spirit onward the deadly onset, strew 
 the earth with bones, and rear to the dead their proud 
 mausoleums. The temples and pyramids, surviving the 
 wreck of the ancient world, are monuments to religious 
 convictions of duty and the hope of immortality. The 
 iron caste of India, the savage worship of the red man, 
 who ensures means for the chase in the hunting-grounds 
 of the Great Spirit by burying with his dead brother 
 his bow and arrow, and the undying semi-atheism of 
 the Chinese, have still enough of the spiritual in them 
 to hold the living generations. Such is man in all the 
 phases of his varient life. If doing things as right out 
 
84 Seed-Truths. 
 
 of regard to the unseen powers, or posthumous expecta- 
 tions, be religion, how hard to go beyond its -influence ! 
 
 Must not facts like these be accepted as an assurance 
 of objective reality ? Are the thousand and one failures 
 of reason and science any evidence against objective 
 truth ? Is not the power to fly, to swim, to walk, and 
 the constant endeavour of these exercises, pretty good 
 evidence of air, water, and earth, to perform them in ? 
 So, as men take to spiritual ideas of some sort, as birds 
 to air, anot fish to water, and quadrupeds to land, how 
 can we doubt the objective reality of a spiritual uni- 
 verse ? We may make a thousand mistakes as to its 
 nature, as we do in reasoning, but that cannot unsettle 
 the truth. 
 
 Bat why reason, when we have the safer guide of 
 men divinely inspired ? Their' theory of morality is, 
 that we exist in the twofold relation of flesh and 
 spirit, connecting us with nature on the one hand, and 
 with a spiritual world on the other, with free powers of 
 action to follow the leading of the one or the other at 
 our option. And as spirit obliges us by its very 
 nature to obey its dictates, or God rather than man, it 
 imposes the corresponding obligation of subordinating 
 the flesh to His ruling. Here is the principle of duty 
 on which all laws of duty are founded ; and what is 
 morality but the doctrine of duty ? A being with 
 powers so opposite as appetite and conscience, the one 
 to be subordinated, and the other to be obeyed, must 
 of necessity have a battle of temptations for the exer- 
 cise of his virtue, and the development of his possible 
 excellences. We can conceive no state wherein this 
 necessity does not exist, except that which arises from 
 coming out of the conflict, as our Lord did, to be 
 crowned with &lory. Confirmation in holiness is not 
 
Spirit in Morals. 85 
 
 the first stage in such an existence, as it was not in 
 Adam, but the reward of the conqueror in temptation. 
 
 Appetite tends to unrestrained indulgence ; and to 
 limit it within due bounds, under the spirit's imperial 
 dictation, is the duty imposed upon man, to put his 
 loyalty and his determination to the proof. Nor is an 
 outward tempter necessary to create the trial. Indeed, 
 a devil could no more tempt a man than a stone, with- 
 out a basis for temptation in his own nature. With 
 a perfectly holy universe, no race could start into being, 
 under any form of moral agency known to us as 
 possible to creatures, without beginning its career with 
 temptation. 1 
 
 These facts underlie the whole history of temptation, 
 as is shown by the apostle's 'similitude of Adam's 
 transgression.' 2 Adam's transgression had its rise from 
 impulses of flesh and world in opposition to God, of 
 which the serpent took advantage. If there had been 
 
 1 * The phenomena of man are in part subjected to the laws of the ex- 
 ternal universe. As dependent upon bodily organization, as actuated 
 by sensual propensities and animal wants, he belongs to matter, and in 
 this respect he is the slave of necessity. But what man holds of 
 matter does not make up his personality. They are his, but not he. 
 Man is not an organism, he is intelligence served by organs. For in 
 man there are tendencies, there is a law, which continually urge him 
 to prove that he is more powerful than the nature by which he is sur- 
 rounded and penetrated. He is conscious to himself of faculties not 
 comprised in the chain of physical necessity ; his intelligence reveals 
 prescriptive principles of action, ' absolute and universal, in the law of 
 duty, and a liberty capable of carrying that law into effect, in opposition 
 to the solicitations, the impulsions of his material nature. From the 
 coexistence of these opposing forces in man, there results a ceaseless 
 struggle between physical necessity and moral liberty, in the language 
 of Revelation, between flesh and spirit, and the struggle constitutes at 
 once the distinctive character of humanity, and the essential condition 
 of human development and virtue.' SIR W. HAMILTON'S Metaphysics, 
 p. 21. 
 2 Bom. v. 13, 14. 
 
86 . Seed-Truths. 
 
 no God and no law circumscribing these impulses, there 
 would have been no sin ; ' for sin is not imputed 
 when there is no law.' Still it was in the world as 
 death or inherited depravity, reigning from Adam to 
 Moses even over them who were in no condition to 
 begin their sinful course as Adam began his. They 
 were born under the ruling of the flesh, and therefore 
 in no condition to cast off the spirit's ruling by trans- 
 gressing an obvious law. Inherited drunkenness is a 
 different thing from that which has been acquired by 
 habit. It is equally pernicious, however guilt in the 
 case may be mitigated. It is death. The rites given 
 by Moses put the Israelites into a condition to sin after 
 the similitude of Adam's transgression, not by making 
 them actually holy, but as a test of outward loyalty 
 to God. The rest of mankind, as well as those ' from 
 Adam to Moses,' ' having not the law,' l were equally 
 incapable of sinning as Adam did, and yet the apostle 
 shows that they were equally in a state of spiritual 
 death. No matter how a people come under the ruling 
 of the flesh, the practical result is the same, as con- 
 sumption may be equally fatal from a cold as from 
 inheritance. The question of happiness or misery to 
 men here or hereafter cannot be resolved into the bene- 
 volence of God, but is to be decided as to whether 
 flesh or spirit rules them, or whether their spiritualism 
 is demoniacal or divine. If the latter is their condition, 
 how is the benevolence of God to make them happy ? 
 Will He bring them under the ruling of His Spirit by 
 force in another life, and thus make them happy against 
 tlnnr will, since His persuasions had failed with them 
 here on earth ? The apostles never reason in this 
 way; never speak of the possibility of happiness to 
 1 Horn. ii. 14. 
 
Spirit in Morals. 87 
 
 one who does not choose the Lord to be his God ; never 
 inquire how he came to choose in this manner, whether 
 from his original impulses after the similitude of Adam, 
 or by an inherited taint of evil ; but they accept the 
 fact that sin, as a state of death, rules him, and he can 
 no more be right than a body can be healthy which is 
 diseased in all its organs and processes. Benevolence 
 would dictate that men should not suffer ; but will 
 they not, in case they are sick or sinful ? 
 
 Such is the ruling of the flesh. It. begins by reject- 
 ing God's spiritual ruling, corrupts the whole nature, 
 unsettles all the foundations of a true morality, and 
 entails the sad inheritance upon posterity. What the 
 law, as delivered in Eden and from Sinai, could not do, 
 because the flesh had induced a weakness to render 
 obedience to it impossible, God sending His own Son 
 in the likeness of this very weakness, and for sin, con- 
 demned sin in the flesh ; or overcame it in His own 
 person, and provided to do the same in the person of 
 His elect. Hence it is added, as the end to be gained 
 by the great transaction, ' that the righteousness of the 
 law may be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the 
 flesh, but after the Spirit.' * Christ put Himself into 
 our nature and circumstances, as the brazen serpent 
 took the form of those that had infused the venom, thus 
 cancelling that venom in Himself by a perfectly spiritual 
 and holy life, and providing the requisite power, by His 
 death and resurrection, to restore the ruling of spirit 
 over flesh in all that obey Him. The object was, the 
 restored dominion of God in the soul of man, which 
 could only be effected by spiritual power. Hence He 
 is said to travel in the greatness of His strength, 
 speaking in righteousness, mighty to save. 2 
 
 1 Bom. viii. 3, 4. a Isa, Ixiii. 1. 
 
88 Seed-Truths. 
 
 Without this divine power restoring to the man a 
 spiritual and heavenly ruling, there can be no true 
 morality, no purified conscience in the world ; because 
 nothing else can elevate man above his selfish and 
 worldly life. True, the work may be begun in many 
 cases when it is yet very imperfectly done. The 
 apostle complained of such, that he could not ' speak 
 unto them as spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as 
 unto babes in Christ/ And he adduces their envying, 
 strife, and division, as evidence that they had only 
 partially emerged from the ruling of the flesh. 1 Alas, 
 how large a portion of those in whom we may charit- 
 ably hope that God has begun a good work, are still 
 held by their old habits and ideas ! 
 
 The new life from God may indeed take on many 
 different forms, and yet approach perfection, as we find 
 in James, Peter, and Paul some traces of a difference 
 as to their mode of regarding and treating Judaism. 
 Paul blamed Peter's conduct on one occasion, and for 
 good reason. 2 Judaizing ideas, like our habits in evil, 
 had too strong a hold to be exploded at once, even in 
 the most spiritual men. How hard is it for the Spirit 
 of God to totally revolutionize our ideas of right and 
 wrong, and lay anew our foundation of morality ! 
 Even Luther had not fully escaped from the disguising 
 influence of a papistic training. Fenelon inveighed 
 against the errors of the Catholic Church, but after- 
 wards recanted, and died in its communion ; and yet 
 he was eminently a spiritual and holy man. John 
 Wesley was from youth to old age ruled by his vocation 
 from God, as few others ever have been ; and yet he 
 lived and died in a Church establishment exceedingly 
 unlike the societies which he organized, and which 
 1 Cor. iii 1-8. GaL ii. 11-15. 
 
Spirit in Morals. 89 
 
 grew into one of the most zealous and active of our 
 evangelical denominations. Jonathan Edwards was an 
 equally holy man ; and yet he employed his gig-antic 
 intellect in reconciling necessity and responsible agency, 
 Calvinism and the freedom of the human will, points 
 from which both Wesley and Fenelon earnestly dis- 
 sented. 
 
 As inspired men never conceived of a true morality 
 existing apart from true religion, so they never speak 
 of talent or mental culture apart from the Spirit. 
 Abraham, Moses, and David are not called men of 
 talent, but men after Gqd's own heart. Ahithophel's 
 shrewd state-craft made ' his counsel as if a man had 
 inquired of God,' but, having no divine illumination in 
 it, it became ' foolishness.' 1 ' Where is the wise ? 
 where is the scribe ? where is the disputer of this 
 world ? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this 
 world V ' The world by wisdom knew not God.' 2 
 
 A mind in which the truth and love of God have 
 no place could not have attainments entitling him 
 to be called wise in the old Hebrew sense. Solomon 
 no doubt had natural capacities above most men, and 
 enjoyed the best culture the age afforded, and yet, 
 when God proposed to give whatever he should ask, 
 he chose ' an understanding heart to judge his people, 
 and to discern between good and bad.' 3 In the original 
 it is a ' hearing heart,' fitted to catch the gentle 
 whispers of heaven, and imbibe truth from God. There 
 is no wisdom in man which is not tempered by love 
 and goodness, and illuminated from above. ' The in- 
 spiration of the Almighty giveth him understanding.' 4 
 The term conscience is not used in the Old Testament, 
 
 1 2 Sam. xvi. 23. 2 1 Cor. i. 20, 21. 
 
 3 1 Kings iii. 9. * Job xxxii. 8. 
 
9O Seed- Truths. 
 
 unless the Septuagint is right in rendering 
 
 Idesis, conscience, in the words, ' Curse not the 
 king in thy conscience.' But even here, I think our 
 common version better : ' Curse not the king, no, not 
 in thy thought.' 1 What we call conscience was not 
 made a separate faculty by the old Hebrews, but was 
 regarded as the result of spirit acting upon man to 
 produce his moral ideas, as light in the eye produces 
 seeing. 
 
 In the New Testament this spiritual perception is 
 described by our Lord as single or clear, or as evil or 
 unsound, answering to like conditions in the organ of 
 vision. 2 And the apostles describe it as a good and 
 pure conscience, an evil conscience, a conscience seared 
 with a hot iron, a defiled conscience. 3 In all these 
 cases the idea of influence from spirit is kept up, the 
 same as that of light is in all cases of seeing, whether 
 natural or distorted, clear or confused, acute or blunted. 
 
 Our moral philosophers generally fail in their 
 theories, because they separate the moral sense from 
 religious ideas and influences. Hobbes regarded con- 
 science as simply a thing of power. A government 
 has power to enforce obedience, and therefore we are 
 bound to obey it. Whatever we are compelled to do, 
 we ought to do ; and when compulsion ceases, our 
 obligations cease with it. This is very nearly his 
 statement of the case, though power, as exercised by 
 God over us, he conceives to be the concurrence of 
 motives influencing our conduct, which was determined 
 by a previous concurrence of events, and that by a 
 previous still, and so on, till we reach Omnipotence, 
 
 1 Eccles. x. 20. Matt. vi. 22, 23. 
 
 3 1 Tim. i. 5, iii. 9 ; Acts xxiv. 16 ; Hob. ix, 9, x. :! ; 1 Tim. iv. 
 2 ; Tit. i. 16. 
 
Spirit in Morals. 91 
 
 whose actions are alike determined by necessity, thus 
 producing what is called Hobbes' doctrine of fate. 
 This of course annihilates all free agency, and reduces 
 moral and physical cause to the same category. 
 
 Paley makes conscience the intellect acting on moral 
 subjects, and determining what ought or ought not to 
 be done, on utilitarian principles. We are bound to 
 all actions which seem to us attended by the best 
 results. But does a child wait for results before 
 feeling that it ought to obey its parents ? No one, I 
 believe, now advocates this theory. 
 
 Later writers, as Dr. Wayland, speak of conscience 
 as a ' distinct and separate faculty/ consisting of a 
 ' feeling of the ought or ought not.' It depends neither 
 upon power nor upon reasoning, but stands by itself, 
 and is ultimate and final in its decision of the abstract 
 ought or ought not. This is making man as to his 
 moral feelings a detached item in the universe, or as 
 affected out of himself only by material causes. It 
 makes his mind in its perception of moral obligations 
 what the eye would be if it could see without light. 
 It is true, as I have said, that, as a mere creature of 
 earth, man has, like the beasts, conservative elements 
 in his nature which are a sort of effigy of conscience, 
 but as unlike it as phosphorescence is unlike the sun- 
 beams. That this natural principle accounts for the 
 agony of remorse, the restoring of ill-gotten wealth to 
 those who had not suspected their loss, the confession 
 of concealed crimes, and the extraordinary working of 
 conscience in many ways, no one can for a moment 
 believe. What impulse of man, as disconnected from 
 a higher world, could be conceived as producing 
 results so stupendous ? Did nothing else work in 
 Judas when he went out and hanged himself 2 
 
92 Seed-Truths. 
 
 Bishop Butler's clear discrimination detected in 
 conscience something more than a separate abstracted 
 human exercise. ' Conscience/ he says, ' is a supreme 
 principle of reflection in every man, which distin- 
 guishes between the internal principles of the heart as 
 well as his external actions ; which passes judgment 
 on himself and them ; pronounces determinately some 
 actions to be in themselves just, right, good, others to 
 be in themselves wrong, evil, unjust ; which, without 
 being consulted, without being advised with, majes- 
 tically exerts itself, approves or condemns him, the 
 doer of them, accordingly ; and which, if not forcibly 
 stopped, naturally and always of course goes on to 
 anticipate a higher and more effective sentence t which 
 sliall hereafter second and affirm its own.' 1 
 
 This is making conscience, what the Bible repre- 
 sents, an influence from the spirit-world affirming the 
 man's own sentence upon himself, and awakening in 
 him a sense of God's authority, and of the retributions 
 of eternity. True, it may be ' stopped' and perverted, 
 as may all our other faculties ; but this cannot change 
 the nature of the faculty, nor make it less the response 
 of influences higher than any acting upon the man from 
 himself or the realm of nature. 
 
 Kevelation is framed to this idea. It reasons out 
 nothing ; it offers no scientific facts or principles ; but 
 simply presents truths adapted to the spiritual appre- 
 hension, witji as much confidence of meeting a re- 
 sponse, as an artist in holding up pictures to an appre- 
 ciative audience. True, conscience blends with reason, 
 sometimes to be perverted, and again to find a con- 
 firmation of its decisions. But it is so with all our 
 other sentiments. What the eye sees, and the ear 
 
 1 tiermons on JJunutn Suture, Harvard Edition. 
 
Spirit in Morals. 93 
 
 hears, may "be truly or falsely reasoned upon by the 
 mind. All our domestic and aesthetical affections are 
 subject to a like swaying by the intellectual faculties. 
 The radical difference between the conscience-feelings 
 and the intellectual faculties may be seen from the fact, 
 that persons most endowed with the latter are frequently 
 deficient in the former. The muse of Byron, with all 
 its brilliancy, coexisted with the lowest moral debase- 
 ment. On the other hand, persons without culture in 
 art or science are sometimes distinguished for the 
 piety, purity, and benevolence of their lives. If the 
 eyes are blurred, the seeing is defective, in spite of 
 mental gifts ; and if the conscience is seared, defiled, 
 or perverted to intercept true influx from the spirit- 
 world, what can talent or culture do to correct the 
 evil? 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 SPIRIT IN CONSCIENCE. 
 
 THEEE are four aspects in which religion or spiri- 
 tual influence in conscience may he seen : First, 
 as a sense of right and wrong, or of the ought and ought 
 not ; second, as a sense of a God to enforce the law of 
 right; third, a sense of retribution as a means of 
 enforcing the right ; fourth, as an assurance of immor- 
 tality, or that we shall live after death, to experience 
 the good or ill of what we do in this life. All these 
 several feelings meet in conscience to account for its 
 extraordinary workings. If conscience is a single or 
 separate faculty, as Dr. Wayland supposes, still it is a 
 river of concurrent streams from distinct and various 
 fountains. 
 
 We use the terms sense, feeling, and assurance in 
 this connection for spontaneous impulses, like a little 
 girl's maternal tendencies. She betrays them in affec- 
 tion and care for her doll, long before her reason is 
 informed on the subject of that delicate relation. In- 
 stead of being generated by reason, these tendencies 
 rather direct and control that faculty. It is her 
 motherly nature operating in her before she knows the 
 why or the wherefore. The little boy's thoughts go to 
 his whip, his top, and like amusements, because his 
 nature is different We conceive that the sense of 
 right and wrong, of God, of retribution and immortality, 
 
 N 
 
Spirit in Conscience. 95 
 
 grow up in like manner. They are kindred ideas or 
 impulses, all concurring in the conscience or moral 
 sense. 
 
 As a sense of right and wrong, conscience is a sove- 
 reign critic upon our internal principles and external 
 actions, as Bishop Butler says, ' majestically exerting 
 itself without being consulted or advised with.' It 
 does not wait for reason, or any other faculty, to affirm 
 its decisions. It says, You ought to do so, and not to 
 do so, and that is the end of the matter. It was this 
 authoritative power, giving its decisions within, that 
 made the murderer of Clarence say : 
 
 ' I'll not meddle with it, it is a dangerous thing ; it 
 makes a man a coward : a man cannot steal but it ac- 
 cuseth him ; a man cannot swear but it checks him. 
 'Tis a blushing, shamefaced spirit, that mutinies in a 
 man's bosom: it fills one full of obstacles. It made 
 me once restore a purse of gold, that, by chance, I 
 found. It beggars any man that keeps it.' 1 
 
 This passage truthfully represents conscience as an 
 impulse reasoned against, opposed, or ' stopped ' in its 
 course, as Butler says, as we oppose any one or any- 
 thing that interferes with our prevailing choice. This 
 accords with the Bible truth of sin, as resisting the Holy 
 Spirit, as forsaking God, as contemning God, as forget- 
 ting God, and as casting off fear, and restraining prayer 
 before God. 2 It is not God as appearing to us in any 
 outward form who is thus dealt with, but God working 
 through the principles of that nature which He has 
 given us. His voice is heard in those impulses to 
 right acting which we call conscience. 
 
 1 Richard III. Act i. scene 4. 
 
 2 Acts vii. 51 ; Deut. xxxi. 16 ; Ezra viii. 22 ; John xvi. 13 ; 
 2 Ciirun. xxi. 10 ; Ps. x. 13. 
 
96 Seed- Truths. 
 
 This view is sustained by what we see in real life. 
 The wrong is distinctly perceived by many who have 
 no dread of committing it except the fear of courts, or 
 of being disgraced among men, or of suffering some 
 other worldly inconvenience. The certainty of not 
 being found out puts them at rest in their course of 
 crime, so far as an evil- disposed mind can be at rest. 
 The naked sense of the wrong has no force to deter 
 them from its commission. But where this sense of 
 the wrong is seconded and affirmed by anticipations of 
 a future world and a coming judgment, how different 
 the result ! A man in England, after having been 
 twenty- two years an unsuspected murderer, lately gave 
 himself up to justice, to relieve his conscience, and was 
 hung on his own self-impelled confession. Cranmer, 
 at the stake, held in the flame the hand that had 
 written a recantation of his principles, saying, ' That 
 unworthy hand.' Death, in its worst forms, has been 
 freely accepted by millions, rather than refuse the voice 
 of conscience speaking in the depth of their nature. 
 Something more than a bare sense of right and wrong 
 is present in all such cases. Even animals show signs 
 of having this sense ; and a thieving dog lops his tail 
 and ears, and sneaks from the presence of his master. 
 It is a higher impulse in the human soul, no doubt, 
 than in any animal; but still, detached from spirit, 
 God, eternity, it has not the requisite force to insure a 
 virtuous life. 
 
 Many persons have a distinct perception of the 
 wrong they have done, but feel no remorse. ' Fools 
 i nuke a mock at sin/ l and consider themselves nobler, 
 more courageous, and more manly than those timid 
 soula who are deterred in mi their own wild career by 
 
 . xiv. 9. 
 
Spirit in Conscience. 97 
 
 scruples of conscience. Said a boy who heard the 
 fearful oaths of another, ' I wish I dared swear so/ 
 This is the daring of a conscience relieved of all spiri- 
 tual ideas and restraints. The sense of the wrong re- 
 mains, but unchecked by the fear of God or man, like 
 the unjust judge. 1 
 
 Others have God much in their thoughts, and believe 
 in a future retribution, or profess to do so, and yet 
 these seemingly spiritual views do not make their 
 sense of right and wrong at all more acute and reliable. 
 They will do things manifestly wicked without seem- 
 ing to know it, or having any sense of guilt or shame. 
 How self-complacent were the Pharisees in praying at 
 the corners of the streets, and wearing passages of the 
 law upon their garments, and yet using those very 
 pretences of extraordinary piety to ensnare widows to 
 entrust them with their substance, that they might 
 devour it ! 2 Their religion was divorced from the sense 
 of right and wrong, as that sense in the former class 
 was divorced from religion. In our day, how many 
 become intensely devout, praying and praising night 
 and day, and yet their word 'is not to be trusted in 
 the ordinary transactions of life ! These may be excep- 
 tional cases ; still they exist, showing the effect of de- 
 taching soul from spirit, or morality from religion, on 
 the one hand, or, on the other, of making religion 
 consist in ceremonies, emotions, or anything else, when 
 it does not act as an executive force in conscience, to 
 rectify and enforce its decisions. The true working 
 of spirit in this faculty is illustrated in the case of 
 Zaccheus, rendering him both just and generous. 3 
 
 These facts show that there are distinct and distin- 
 guishable elements in conscience, soul, and spirit, or man's 
 1 Luke xviii. 2-5. 2 Matt, xxiii. 14. * Luke xix. 1-9. 
 
 G 
 
 Of THE 
 
98 Seed- Truths. 
 
 natural sense of right and wrong, sustained by worldly or 
 prudential considerations, and spiritual ideas or influences 
 from God and the realm of spirits. These two elements 
 may be likened to the nerves of sensation and motion 
 in the human body, one of which may be paralyzed, 
 and not the other, so that the diseased member acts 
 while it does not feel, or feels while it does not act. 
 Their united contributions are necessary to muscular 
 health and vigour. So soul and spirit, the natural con- 
 science and spiritual truths and influences, must com- 
 mingle within us, in order to a sound, true, and vigor- 
 ous state of our moral nature. A conscience evil, 
 defiled, cauterized, and encumbered with dead works, is 
 not annihilated,' but is spoken of by the apostles as still 
 existing, though incapable as perverted reason or vitiated 
 feeling of doing its proper office. A paralyzed arm is 
 still an arm, however it may have lost its cunning. No 
 matter how a man may disconnect himself from God, 
 he has still a nature that concerns itself about right 
 and wrong, though it be only 'deceiving and being 
 deceived.' l 
 
 Nothing is plainer or more generally conceded than 
 that this faculty, as it exists among men, is intimately 
 connected with the idea of God. However this idea 
 may have originated, it is still a great fact in human 
 nature. And our concern is with what is, or with 
 what the Scriptures teach, and not with how it came 
 to be. Sir William Hamilton thinks that the idea 
 is derived from our moral, and not our intellectual 
 nature. ' If there be no moral world, there can be no 
 moral governor of such a world,' he says ; ' and we can 
 have no ground on which to- believe in the reality of a 
 moral world, except so far as we are ourselves moral 
 
 1 2 Tim. iii. 13. 
 
Spirit in Conscience. 99 
 
 agents.' 1 This is no doubt very true, but it is a 
 truth far more conclusively affirmed by inspired vision, 
 which throughout recognises man as accountable to 
 God for what he is, and what he does, and affected by 
 influences from a higher world as really as from this. 
 
 The idea of God is not a thing reasoned out, any 
 more than the fact that we exist. No man ever 
 reasoned himself into the belief of his own existence. 
 That comes to him spontaneously, like the little girl's 
 maternal feelings as manifested in her care for her doll. 
 They gush up from her nature ; and so it is with our 
 sense of the divine existence. It comes up spontane- 
 ously, to shape our ideas, and to impel us to worship, if 
 it be nothing better than gold, silver, brass, or wood ; 
 wind, water, storm, or stars ; fowls, four-footed beasts, 
 and creeping things. Some convert their atheism into 
 an object of adoration, and are willing, as Lord Bacon 
 says, to die for it. The African vents his spiritual 
 instincts upon his fetish, the American Indian upon 
 his Great Medicine, the old Greeks upon Jupiter, as 
 the Hebrews found scope for theirs in Jehovah, the 
 Maker of heaven, earth, and sea, and all things therein. 
 Each conceived of his god as the rewarder of what to 
 him seemed right, and the punisher of what to him 
 seemed wrong. However gross and corrupting the idea, 
 still, to the devotee, it is spirit and not matter, as it 
 is spirits that a boy fears in a graveyard, and not 
 dead men's bones. It is the idea of supernatural 
 power of which animals are incapable, because theirs 
 is a world of sense, while ours is a world of spirit, 
 especially in what concerns right and wrong.- We 
 feel that we must be right with the world above as 
 well as that below. 
 
 1 Mttaphysics, p. 23. 
 
i oo Seed- TrutJis. 
 
 ' Tis greatly wise to talk with our past hours, 
 And ask them what report they bore to heaven, 
 And how they might have borne more welcome news.' 
 
 Reasoning against such a tendency of thought may 
 confuse our ideas, but cannot pacify our sense of a God 
 above to supervise our actions. Can we reason our- 
 selves out of the . sense of pleasure and pain ? Even 
 reason is prone to stumble upon the question of a 
 great First Cause, as well as conscience upon that of 
 amenableness to God. Both parts of our nature, the 
 intellectual and the pathemic, are under a like necessity 
 of stepping out of the range of the natural to find the 
 groundwork of its convictions and its moral feelings. 
 No absurdity of worship, no monstrosities of theology, 
 no perversions of the moral code, have ever effectually 
 cured men of their tendency to worship, and to feel 
 that there is a God above to take cognizance of their 
 actions. As our family ties survive in spite of all the 
 corruptions and abuses of the sexual and conjugal re- 
 lations, so our moral feelings, as centring in God, have 
 outlived ten thousand errors in duty and theology. 
 
 The Bible acts advisedly, therefore, in keeping God 
 ever before us as our Sovereign, and His spiritual laws 
 as our rule of conduct. In heaven, the place of His 
 throne, service is done to Him day and night. There 
 the beams of His throne fall so directly and so radiantly, 
 that the angels cover their faces to soften the insuf- 
 ferable brightness. Moses veiled his face, and Paul 
 'sobered' or moderated his language, after being ad- 
 mitted to visions of heaven, for the sake of those who 
 could not comprehend all he thought and all he felt. 1 
 Can we wonder that the sun of such a system, however 
 obliquely shining and darkly obscured by error and 
 
 xxxir. 33; 2 Cor. v. 13, xii. 2; Malt. xvii. 2; 1 Cor. ii. 12, 
 
Spirit in Conscience. 101 
 
 passion, should have its effect in the coldest moral 
 climes of this sin-cursed world ? What may not be 
 hoped to man from the restored idea of the true God ? 
 * This is life eternal, to know Thee, the true God, and 
 Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent/ 1 Eight affections 
 towards God are the only corrective of conscience, the 
 sole basis of a good and happy life. The whole Bible 
 is framed to the idea of restoring God to His proper 
 seat in human nature. The seers and the law of Moses 
 represented this in prediction and by symbol ; ' but we 
 all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of 
 the Lord, are changed into the same image, from glory 
 to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.' 2 The more 
 we know of God, the greater the purifying influence. 
 Familiarity here breeds reverence and not contempt, as 
 handling electricity increases our sense of its power. 
 ' Oh that Thou wouldst rend the heavens and come 
 down,' 3 is a prayer that contemplates the removal of 
 all obstructions between our souls and God, that 
 infinite truth and love may flow in upon us from above, 
 to illumine our darkness, to exalt our aspirations. 
 
 How terrible to the guilty is the sense of the speak- 
 ing Divinity ! 
 
 ' Metli ought I heard a voice cry, " Sleep no more ! " 
 Macbeth does murder sleep.'* 
 
 Even the purpose of a wrong robs the soul of rest : 
 
 ' Between the acting of a dreadful thing 
 And the first motion, all the interim is 
 Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream.' 3 
 
 Conscience, as a mere calculation of earthly conse- 
 quences, could hardly be supposed to attach any such 
 
 1 John xvii. 3. 2 2 Cor. iii. 18. 8 Isa. Ixiv. 1. 
 
 4 Macbeth, Act ii. scene 2. 
 
 6 Julius Ccesar, Act iv. scene 1. 
 
i o 2 Seed- Truths. 
 
 significance to an evil design. The wound goes deeper 
 than the external rind of our existence ; it strikes to 
 the secret core where centre the nerves and fibres of 
 our spiritual being, connecting us with God. It is a 
 cut in the great arteries, through which we feel that 
 our life-blood of purity and peace is oozing out. 
 Conscience, as connected with God, takes the alarm at 
 the first motion to crime, and, as a householder the 
 thief in his open window, seizes us by the throat to 
 deter us from its commission. Its opposition is feebler 
 as we advance, because our hold upon God and right is 
 relaxed, and we come in the end to do with glee what at 
 first we could not think of without horror. Then we are 
 God-abandoned, as a sick man is given up by his friends, 
 when disease has corrupted all the springs of life within 
 him, and left no hope of his recovery. ' It is a fearful 
 thing to fall into the hands of the living God.' ' For 
 our God is a -consuming fire.' 1 
 
 Retribution \& another aspect in which conscience is 
 to be viewed. We are not to think of this as the 
 result of an outward threatening, as a child under the 
 rod, or a state criminal at the bar of his sovereign, but 
 as inherent to the man, and a part of his conscience. 
 The feeling of retribution begins in the unrest of a 
 criminal purpose. A glutton needs no flagellations to 
 punish him. His repleted stomach, and overcharged 
 blood-vessels, and dizzy head, and shaking limbs, and 
 torpid digestion, are his stocks, his thumbscrews, and 
 his whipping-post. ' Dying thou shalt die/ No overt 
 act can increase its certainty. It comes as the inevi- 
 table working of the moral forces which made the sin 
 possible, as breathing carbon ensures death. The guilty 
 one feels that he is 
 
 Heb. x. 81, xii. 29. 
 
Spirit in Conscience. 103 
 
 ' cabined, cribbed, confined, bound in 
 To saucy doubts and fears. ' * 
 
 Retribution dominates him from the working of his 
 own nature, and without interference by others. Insen- 
 sibility, like cauterized flesh, may afford momentary 
 alleviations ; but this is only deadening the sense of a 
 less by means of a greater pain. Nemesis cannot thus 
 be baulked of her purpose. 
 
 Guilty purposes are formed at the instigation of 
 avarice, voluptuousness, ambition, revenge, or other dark 
 impulses, and are .usually sustained by any amount of 
 fallacious reasoning. We come to doubt whether we 
 ought to forego the good within our reach or the redress 
 of our wrongs. The more we turn over the matter, the 
 more our reasons for doing the deed grow upon us, and 
 at length, our scruples cancelled, we rush upon the act, 
 throwing our doubts to the wind. Then comes the 
 recoil. The wind of the day has cooled our hot blood, 
 as in the case of Adam, 2 and conscience collides against 
 eternal truth and justice. The spirit- world opens upon 
 us its terrors. Medusa shakes pestilence from her 
 horrid hair. We 'flee when no man pursueth.' 3 Thus 
 Lady Macbeth, on looking at her murder-stained hands, 
 cried out with an infinite depth of woe: 
 
 ' Here's the smell of blood still : all the perfumes 
 Of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh! oh! oh! ' 4 . 
 
 Such is the outworking of spirit as a retributive 
 element in the wrong-doer. He cannot feel as careless 
 as a beast in doing a deed of blood till he has reduced 
 himself to a bestial condition, and extinguished from 
 his soul all the inbreathed attributes of the divine at 
 
 1 Macbeth, Act iii. scene 4. 
 
 1 Gen. iii. 8. ' Wind ' is the literal rendering. 
 
 * Prov. xxviii. 1. 4 Macbeth, Act v. scene 1. 
 
1 04 Seed- Truths. 
 
 X 
 
 our creation. Retribution is in the criminal himself. 
 It is a part of his nature. It rewards him with inward 
 approval when he is right, and with condemnation 
 when he is indeed criminal. This, therefore, is an 
 e^ment in conscience, and not something extraneous 
 to it, and is an essential constituent of those deep, pro- 
 found, and terrible exercises of the man which we 
 ascribe to this faculty. There is no being in the uni- 
 verse that the criminal has so much reason to dread as 
 what is in himself, ' the demon thought/ 
 
 Another element in conscience is the sense of the 
 'permanency of rewards and punishments. This involves 
 immortality, the belief of which among all nations is 
 far in advance of the intellectual evidences of the doc- 
 trine. The greatest reasoners of heathen antiquity, 
 Socrates, Plato, Cicero, Cato, Seneca, were strong in 
 their hope of immortality ; but when we examine the 
 grounds on which they founded it, we cannot but feel 
 their insufficiency. Cicero makes much account of the 
 younger Scipio's dream, that his dead father appeared 
 to him, saying, ' Do not consider yourself, but your 
 body, to be mortal ; for you are not the being which 
 your corporeal figure evinces; but the mind is the 
 man, and not that form which may be delineated with 
 a finger. Know, therefore, that you are a divine person.' 
 This dream, which is long, and well told, shows the 
 tendency of thought among educated pagans just prior 
 to the introduction of Christianity, in which ' life and 
 immortality are brought to light through the gospel/ 
 without which we have no available hold upon a life 
 to come, as a thing of intellectual bt-l 
 
 Immortality, like the existence of God, moral liberty, 
 and other like truths, we are, as it were, necessitated 
 to believe, though we cannot reduce them to any such 
 
Spirit in Conscience. 105 
 
 form of certainty as that two and two make four, or 
 the whole of a thing is greater than its parts. It is a 
 part of our moral nature to feel that, however punish- 
 ment of wrong may be delayed, it will come in the 
 end, if not in this life, in one that is to come. If 
 we could feel a certainty of dying like the beasts, it 
 would lead us to say, ' Let us make the most of life 
 while we have it. Let us take our fill of its pleasures. 
 " Let us eat and drink ; for to-morrow we die." ' Very 
 few men can really feel this at their death, however 
 they may have acted upon it in life. They still have 
 lingering doubts as to what is to come after death. 
 The question is ever obtruding upon the rustic, as well 
 as the poet and philosopher : 
 
 ' Has man within him an immortal seed, 
 Or does the tomb take all ? If he survive 
 His ashes, where ? and in what weal or woe ? 
 Knots worthy of solution, which alone 
 A Deity can solve.' 
 
 This assurance of immortality, like the eye, though 
 unable to originate light on the subject, is quick to 
 feel its impression when it comes. It fancies it sees it 
 in things very dark and uncertain, as the confidence 
 felt in ghost-seeing, spirit-rapping, and the like, clearly 
 shows. There is in most men a longing after immor- 
 tality, as the infant appetite longs for its yet untasted 
 food, which leads them to seize on the first evidence 
 that comes within their reach. And a certain unreason- 
 ing confidence enters largely into the working of con- 
 science, which is thus graphically depicted by Shake- 
 speare in the oft-quoted passage : 
 
 ' To be, or not to be, that is the question, 
 Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer 
 
 1 1 Cor. xv. 32. 
 
io6 Seed-Truths. 
 
 The stings and arrows of outrageous fortune, 
 
 Or take arms against a sea of troubles, 
 
 And, by one opening, end them ? 
 
 To sleep! perchance to dream, ay, there's the rnb; 
 
 For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, 
 
 "When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, 
 
 Must give us pause ! 
 
 But who would fardels bear, 
 To grunt and sweat under a weary life, 
 But that the dread of something after death, 
 The undiscovered country, from whose bourne 
 No traveller returns, puzzles the will, 
 And makes us rather bear those ills. we have, 
 Than fly to others we know not of? 
 Thus conscience does make cowards of us all.' 1 
 
 This is a true picture of our anticipations of a 
 coming life in the workings of conscience. They give 
 a significance to what we are and do, which is quite 
 out of the question to a mere creature of earth. Even 
 Xenophon felt this. ' That person,' he says, ' who is 
 conscious to himself of having neglected his oaths, in 
 my opinion, can never be happy ; for whoever becomes 
 the object of divine wrath, I know no swiftness can 
 save him, no darkness hide him, no stronghold defend 
 him ; since in all places, all are subject to the power of 
 the gods, and everywhere they are equally lords of all' 3 
 
 This idea of immortality, acting with a sense of God 
 and retribution as a spiritual element in conscience, is 
 precisely what the seers saw in man. How else can 
 we ' have respect unto the recompense of the reward ' 
 in a coming life, in refusing the pleasures of sin for 
 the trials of duty ? How else can ' a certain fearful 
 ing for of judgment and fiery indignation' attend a 
 course of sin ? Morality in the Bible and in real life 
 is a joint influence of two worlds, that of nature and 
 that of spirits. 
 
 ,,ilct t Act iii. scene 1. * Cyrus, Book n. sec. i. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 HISTORY AN OUTGROWTH OF SEED-TRUTHS. 
 
 WHEN we consider the Bible record of man in 
 his several stages, in his innocence, in his 
 transition to guilt, and in his progress towards resto- 
 ration as conducted by divine love and power, we 
 find it every way adjusted to the views which the 
 inspired writers give of his creation and the elements 
 of his nature. The history of animals, as in water, on 
 land, or as amphibious, is not more suited to their 
 organs, than the moral and spiritual developments of 
 our race to its constitution. If the Bible were a 
 fiction, it would be more extraordinary, in the harmony 
 of its various and complicated statements, as a work of 
 human genius or invention, than it is even as a super- 
 natural revelation. How are we to account for the 
 fact that documents written by so many persons, in 
 ages and countries remote from each other, and in 
 such varieties of social condition and educational train- 
 ing, should so uniformly adhere both to one type of 
 humanity and to one theology, except on the prin- 
 ciple of truth in the sources of their information, and 
 in the objects which they describe ? Their views of 
 man contain no such discords of opinion as we see in 
 the metaphysicians, and their doctrines of God are not 
 varient and conflicting. The first chapters of Genesis 
 and the last of Revelation are as singular in theii 
 
 107 
 
io8 Seed-Truths. 
 
 adjustment to each other, as in their imagery of the 
 river, the tree of life, and of paradisiacal beatification. 1 
 Does this look like fiction ? 
 
 It may be well, at this stage of our subject, to con- 
 dense into one view the seed-truths of man considered 
 in the previous chapters, that we may enter on our 
 further inquiries with a clear idea of the race whose 
 record we would follow up in its principal bearings. 
 
 The existence of two distinct worlds, the spiritual 
 and the natural, is clearly set before us in the word of 
 God. The spiritual world vastly transcends the natural 
 in its position, power, and variety of parts, in refer- 
 ence to which Jehovah is called ' the Lord of hosts ; ' 
 ' thousand thousands ministering to Him, and ten thou- 
 sand times ten thousand standing before Him.' 2 Great 
 as the material universe seems to us, the inspired 
 writers made little account of it compared with what 
 opened upon them in the realm of spirits. 
 
 The modes of conceiving truth or of knowing are 
 radically different in the spirit-realm from what they 
 are in the natural man, on account of which, symbols 
 and peculiar forms of representation, such as we meet 
 with nowhere out of the Bible, become necessary to 
 convey spiritual truths to men in the flesh. They 
 must be embodied as seed in soil, before they can 
 yield a harvest of ideas to minds so subject to material 
 laws as ours are. It is a process of spiritual incarna- 
 tion. 
 
 The Hebrew language grew up, to a great extent, 
 from an effort to express through it spiritual ideas ; 
 and hence it has discriminations between soul and 
 
 1 Gen. ii. 8-17 ; Rev. xxii. 1-5. 
 
 2 1 S.ini. i. 11 ; Ps. liv. $ ; Tsn. xlvii. 4 ; .Tor. xlvi. IS ; T>,in. vii 
 10. 
 
History an Outgrowth of Seed-Truths. 109 
 
 spirit which are indigenous to no other language. In 
 other respects also, as well as from the ritual worship, 
 the peculiarities of Hebrew history, and the messages 
 of prophets, it became before all other languages the 
 vehicle of heavenly truths, and the most fitting organ 
 for bridging the gulf between natural and spiritual 
 modes of conception and of thought. 
 
 The mind of the flesh and the mind of the spirit 
 are both proper to man as uniting in his soul, body 
 on the one hand, and spirit on the other; though the 
 one becomes carnal-mindedness when it rules him as 
 now in his carnal state, and the other spiritual-minded- 
 ness when he is ruled by the Holy Spirit. 
 
 The type of man is in God as seen in this, that 
 God unites in Himself both the spiritual universe and 
 material nature; so man unites in himself body on 
 the one hand, through which he communicates with 
 matter, and spirit on the other, through which he is 
 fitted to communicate with the realm of spirits. ' God 
 created all things by Jesus Christ, who is the image of 
 the invisible God, the first-born of every creature ; ' 
 'the Word in the beginning with God;' the charac- 
 terized or expressed Divinity ; who is both the Son of 
 God and the Son of man, and therefore the archetype 
 of humanity. 1 He is the temple in heaven ; and man 
 was created to be such on earth, thus uniting in the 
 adytum of his being the Holy Spirit with his outer 
 life as his ruling power in all things. God would 
 rule the world by man, as He rules heaven by His 
 ' Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things/ say- 
 ing, ' Let all the angels worship Him.' 2 
 
 This twofold connection of man with spirit and 
 
 1 Heb. i. 2-4 ; Col. i. 15 ; 2 Cor. iv. 4 ; John i. 1, 14. 
 1 Heb. i. 2, 6. 
 
no Seed- Truths. 
 
 with flesh is the hinge on which his whole develop- 
 ment turns. It is set forth in a variety of ways hy 
 inspired men, as that of using the outer organs of his 
 body for his earthly life, and the inner organs for his 
 interior life, ground, mortal, flesh, skull, on the one 
 hand ; and heart, kidneys, bowels, and inward parts, 
 on the other. These two classes of terms show the 
 duplicate view which the seers took of man. 
 
 Spirit, soul, and body are also used for a like dis- 
 tinction. They are not three distinct natures, as some 
 incautiously express themselves. The nature is a unit 
 in the soul or conscious selfhood, but a unit with the 
 capacity of fleshly communication on the one hand, 
 and spiritual on the other. The soul in Hebrew is the 
 personality as distinguished from his capabilities of 
 being either a beast, an angel, or a devil What a 
 man is and what he is capable of, are distinct views of 
 his nature as a unit. The soul is not flesh, though it 
 may be fleshly ; nor is it spirit, though it may be spiri- 
 tual, that is, not spirit in the sense that God is so. 
 It is receptive of spirit, and is sometimes called such ; 
 though Dives in hell was not spirit in the sense of 
 being spiritual, any more than he was flesh, however 
 fleshly he seemed still to be in his ideas and feelings. 1 
 The soul is substance, not matter; not an ethereal essence 
 exhaled from God, to be melted at death into the ex- 
 panse, as some foolishly talk, but the basis or sub- 
 stratum of powers rendering it strong to will, to act, and 
 to enjoy or suffer throughout the ages of eternity. 1 
 Such is the nephesh of inspired mea It lives in flesh 
 by breathing air, it lives in God by prayer and holy 
 aspirations. 
 
 1 Lukexvi. 19-31. 
 
 f Mutt xxv. 46 ; Dan. xii. 2 ; John v. 29 ; Rom. il 7. 
 
History an Outgrowth of Seed- Truths. 1 1 1 
 
 Man's spiritual relations occupy the chief attention 
 of inspired men. Their visions, doctrines, laws, cere- 
 monies, histories, sketches of character, and their whole 
 range of thought, are in this respect unlike all other 
 writers, except as ideas have been derived from them. 
 They dwell in the unseen world. Spirit in revelation 
 is what the life is to the body. The all-pervading 
 presence, holiness, and glory of God are their great 
 idea. They are the inspiration of those who cry Holy, 
 holy, holy, in heaven, as they are of our Christian 
 doxology upon earth. 
 
 The realm of spirits is related to our faculties of 
 spiritual apprehension precisely as nature is to our 
 minds, through the bodily senses. And nothing pre- 
 vents our conscious and happy connection with it, 
 except the preoccupation of our minds with things 
 material and earthly. A fleshly life bars communion 
 with God. The petitions which Jesus teaches us to 
 offer, ' Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth 
 as in heaven,' contemplate our restored connection 
 with the spirit-realm> and no doubt the ultimate com- 
 mingling of God's family in heaven with His family 
 on earth, as in the primitive life of the race. 
 
 The great- organizations, politico-religious, are the 
 outworking of spiritual forces, beneficent or malign; 
 and it is this blending in them of seen and unseen 
 agencies that accounts for their hold upon men, and 
 consequent perpetuity. The war spoken of in Reve- 
 lation between ' Michael and his angels ' and ' the 
 dragon and his angels,' seems to Ibe a conflict be- 
 tween the good and evil of these institutional forces. 1 
 
 Morality and conscience owe their chief power to 
 this connection with the spirit- world. 
 1 Rev. xii. 7-9. 
 
112 Sced-Trutfis. 
 
 Such are the leading principles at the foundation of 
 all human development, and they shape the course of 
 history. Diet, climate, peculiarities of race, and like 
 causes, have no doubt a modifying influence, just as a 
 river is tinged by the soils over which it flows ; but, 
 like the river, these contributions from a higher world 
 are still an element distinct from all their surround- 
 ings. They are the powers which connect man with 
 immortality. They work in us ; they pervade our life, 
 like the unseen magnetism acting upon our bodies ; 
 sometimes concealed, and again revealing themselves 
 to our faith ; and in them we live and move and have 
 our being. They have no necessitating power over 
 our wills more than the air we breathe ; and yet, like 
 the air, they are a motive-power with us, and the result 
 upon our character and our destiny depends entirely 
 upon how we use them. Such is the teaching of in- 
 spired men on this important subject. 
 
 That the principles thus developed in the preceding 
 pages are the modifying forces in history, who can 
 doubt ? Were not the antediluvians deluged with 
 vice before they were with water ? Did not their 
 whole history turn upon their twofold relation to God 
 and the world ? Were not the Noachian tribes dis- 
 persed as the seeding of nations, to check the mad 
 project of using their united strength to scale heaven 
 and attain to the state of gods ? x Indeed, we have 
 only to look at the world as it now is to find abundant 
 evidence of the Bible view of man and his relations. 
 Millions of the race are so entirely detached from God 
 as to lead wholly a material life. They are savages, 
 and sunk to the level of nature. And yet, to show 
 their inherent iitness for a higher life, they are super- 
 1 Gen. xi. 6, 7. 
 
History an Outgrowth of Seed-Truths. 113 
 
 stitious ; they practise witchcraft ; they have, in fact, a 
 sort of perverted spiritualism, that as clearly evinces 
 higher elements than those of a merely animal nature, 
 as the faith or the devotion of Christians. They are 
 an illustration of what comes from detaching the race 
 from God as Spirit, or from His spiritual worship. 
 This is the view which the apostle gives of the heathen 
 world, in that celebrated passage in which their vices 
 and abominations are said to have arisen from their 
 ignoring the ' eternal power and Godhead,' which are 
 so ' clearly seen ' and so easily ' understood from the 
 things that are made.' ' Because that, when they 
 knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were 
 thankful ; but became vain in their imagination, and 
 their foolish heart was darkened.' 1 Thus heathendom- 
 as a history, including its worship of devils and its 
 vices against nature, is an outgrowth of the seed-truths 
 of man and his relations on which the inspired writers 
 so largely insist. 
 
 And when we turn from this degraded class to the 
 great actors in history, what do we meet with but men 
 expending upon ambition, or schemes of personal power 
 and aggrandisement, the attributes of their nature 
 which fit them to aspire after glory, honour, and 
 immortality ? But for a soul that only heaven was 
 made to fill, how could there have been so wide a 
 grasp upon earthly glory, in their perversion, as we 
 see in Alexander, Caesar, and Napoleon ? Why the 
 miser's far-reaching plan for acquiring what he can 
 never enjoy but in imagination, unless born for a 
 wider field of action and possession than earth can 
 afford ? Indeed, the whole life of man, and his history 
 from the beginning, clearly affirm the inspired ideal of 
 
 1 Horn. i. 20, 21. 
 H 
 
H4 Seed-Truths. 
 
 a being born to be acted upon by two worlds, but by 
 his own act detached from the greater of the two,, to 
 expend his energies upon the inferior and to satisfy 
 himself with its husks. 
 
 In tracing our principles to their results, however, 
 it is not our purpose to follow in the track of general 
 history, but to notice only a few of the states and 
 transitions to which they have given rise, together 
 with the circumstances, agencies, and powers which 
 God has set on foot for our redemption. The whole 
 process of innocence, guilt, and punishment, as well as 
 the means of restoring the race to holiness and heaven, 
 is studiously adjusted to its nature and its inalienable 
 prerogatives. To deal with man otherwise than as a 
 free moral agent, would disqualify him alike for virtue 
 and for vice, for sin and for holiness. Do trees grow 
 by persuasion, or moral excellence by enriching the 
 soil ? The treatment must correspond to the nature, 
 a rule in nothing more rigorously adhered to than in 
 God's dealings with men. 
 
 The great burden of our subsequent chapters lies in 
 the direction of the fleshly life which we have fallen 
 into, and its demoniacal possessions, and of God's plan 
 for breaking it up, by destroying the works of the devil 
 and re-establishing His kingdom here below. Ee- 
 demption is not an abstraction nor a doctrine, though 
 doctrines are used in prosecuting it ; not an organiza- 
 tion, though, like life, it cannot well subsist without 
 it ; but it is a great fact of human history and 
 experience. The Grecian and Roman annals are not 
 more a history. It is a power set on foot by Heaven, 
 wliich has gone on advancing from age to age, 
 gathering momentum as it advanced, and adding to 
 the elect family an innumerable host out of every 
 
History an Outgrowth of Seed- Truths. 115 
 
 kingdom and nation and people under heaven, over 
 whom Christ is enthroned ' King of kings and Lord of 
 lords; who only hath immortality, dwelling in light 
 which no man can approach unto ; whom no man hath 
 seen, nor can see : to whom be honour and power 
 
 everlasting. Amen/ 1 
 
 1 1 Tim. vi. !. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 HAPPINESS OF BEING RULED BY SPIRIT. 
 
 THE right use of a thing is the happy use of it. 
 A machine with all its parts in their place, and 
 doing their office, is in its highest state of efficiency 
 and usefulness. And our bodies are in their greatest 
 health and comfort when their organs and fluids and 
 processes each performs its function and ministers its 
 due share to the general result. So of our minds. When 
 those powers are in the ascendency which have an 
 inherent right to control, we have repose ; but when 
 we are borne away by blind impulse, misery is sure to 
 ensue. Even in the natural man reason is a safer 
 guide than appetite, and conscience than passion ; 
 because that is their office, and the more our impulses 
 are subjected to their ruling, the greater our success in 
 all that concerns our worldly affairs. But when God, 
 a spiritual world, future retribution and immortality, 
 are brought into consideration, what madness to ignore 
 them, or to subordinate them to our momentary lusts 
 and pleasures ! 
 
 It is not of spiritual ruling as truth to the reason 
 that we now speak, but truth wrought into the afl'ec- 
 tions by the Holy Spirit. If the whole subject-matter 
 of divine revelation were before a man's mind in his 
 natural state, and he were required to shape his life 
 by it as a merchant his, by figuring up the results of 
 
 116 
 
Happiness of being ruled by Spirit. 117 
 
 his business, could he do it ? Is not something more 
 than spiritual truth as an idea necessary to make it a 
 power in the soul ? A critic in art may be no artist. 
 One who writes beautifully on the domestic affections 
 may be morose as a tiger in his own family. So one 
 may expatiate eloquently on the doctrines of the Bible, 
 and yet be destitute of their real power. Spiritual 
 ruling is like natural ruling in this, that it is not a 
 thing of mere calculation, but of affectional influence 
 and soul-power. The natural world acts upon thou- 
 sands through their senses, who know very little of 
 it as a matter of science. Maternal love is out of 
 all proportion to the theory of it existing in the mind. 
 Indeed, affection in human nature at large, is, like a 
 mill-pond to its narrow confined flume, a vast reserved 
 force of which but a little escapes through the vent 
 of logical ideas or intellectual truths. It is the great 
 ruling power in history. 
 
 So, in speaking of a spiritual ruling, we include 
 much more than truths from the spiritual world. 
 Truths are indeed the flume through which ' the water 
 that springeth up into everlasting life' 1 flows in upon 
 our souls ; but that water is a fountain of holy affec- 
 tions flowing out in love to God, good-will to men, 
 and spreading fertility and beauty over a landscape 
 otherwise arid and waste. Grace as a ruling power 
 in the soul is this added affectional influx from God, by 
 which He accompanies His truths to our minds ; and 
 our Lord has it in view when He prays, 'Sanctify tliem 
 through Thy truth: Thy word is truth.' 2 The truth 
 is here contemplated as the means by which the puri- 
 fication of the affections was to be reached. It is the 
 sword by which the Spirit cuts off God's enemies of 
 
 1 Jolm iv. 14. 2 Jolin xvii. 17. 
 
u8 Seed-TnMs. 
 
 lust, unbelief, malignity, and worldliness in our souls, 
 and prepares the way for His army of graces and holy 
 affections. 1 
 
 Nearly all attempts to treat theology as a science 
 are a failure, as in painting fire you can get every- 
 thing but the heat. That wanting, and what have 
 you in the picture to convey an idea of fire to one who 
 had never seen or felt it ? Grace as favour, grace as 
 a theory, grace in the schools, what is it as compared 
 with grace in the heart ? It is the life that escapes 
 the surgeon's knife in his attempts to search it out. 
 As men call do nothing without affection, and that is 
 the great power that binds them to their sins, so how 
 are they to be detached and brought under spiritual 
 ruling, except by the counteracting force of divine and 
 heavenly affections ? Now grace is this counteracting 
 power in the soul 'It reigns through righteousness 
 unto eternal life.' 2 That is, by restoring spiritual 
 ruling over the fleshly nature, and thus setting us 
 right with God, right with conscience, and right in all 
 our relations, it produces a new sense of joy and de- 
 light, that so satisfies our craving, that we freely accept 
 it in exchange for the -pleasures of sin. Darkness 
 may be pleasant to one who never knew anything 
 better ; but let him have light, and how will he exult 
 at the exchange ! A fetid atmosphere may be agree- 
 able to vitiated olfactories ; but, after being rectified 
 by inhaling pure air, how they loathe the former 
 stench 1 Such is the reign of grace in the soul It 
 is the corrective of vitiated desires, thus reigning 
 through righteousness, or giving a new and right bent 
 to the soul's pursuit of happiness. Grace came with 
 truth by Jesus Christ, or He provided, by His mission, 
 1 E|h. vi. 17. ' Rom. v. 21. 
 
Happiness of being ruled by Spirit. 1 1 9 
 
 to impart to us a new affecfcional bent as well as a 
 new order of belief, and thus to make us altogether 
 new. 1 
 
 We stand related to a spiritual the same as to a 
 natural universe, but had lost a due sense of the for- 
 mer, and were solely occupied with the latter. So far 
 as spirit acted upon us at all, it was that of 'the prince 
 of the power of the air' exercising dominion over the 
 disobedient. And to be restored, we must not only 
 know spiritual truths, but we must accept them by a 
 ' faith working by love' 2 as our chosen guide in all 
 things ; and they must become even more real to us 
 than anything in our outward life ; and not only more 
 real, but infinitely more desirable. "Was not the spi- 
 ritual world infinitely greater to our Master than this 
 earthly world ? Were not His joy and His peace from 
 this higher source ? And if we are in conjunction 
 with heaven, will it not be the same with us ? ' He 
 that findeth his life shall lose it ; and he that loseth 
 his life for my sake shall find it.' 3 
 
 We will not here stay to describe the process by 
 which a soul comes into this state of deadness to the 
 world and life in God, but proceed at once to consider 
 the ineffable blessedness of it. ' Take my yoke upon 
 you, and learn of me ; for I am meek and lowly in 
 heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.' ' Peace 
 I leave with you, my peace I give unto you.' 4 ' We 
 which have believed do enter into rest,' that is, as a 
 matter of present experience. ' Thou keepest him in 
 perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee ; because 
 he trusteth in Thee.' 5 Passages of this kind might be 
 
 
 1 John i. 17 ; 2 Cor. v. 17. 2 Gal. v. 6. 
 
 3 Matt. x. 39. * Matt. xi. 29 ; John xiv. 27. 
 
 6 Heb. iv. 3 ; Isa. xxvi 3. 
 
1 20 Seed- Truths. 
 
 multiplied, showing the sense of profound repose which 
 arises from feeling ourselves restored to God's ruling 
 within us. 'It is a peace that passeth all understand- 
 ing/ 1 too deep to be fathomed, too expanded to be 
 measured, too enduring ever to end, and too high to stop 
 short of the throne of God. It is God's peace. This 
 peace which Jesus had under all His sufferings, He 
 bequeathed to' us at His death ; and the inheritance is 
 sure to all who learn of Him lessons of meekness and 
 lowliness, to all who wear His yoke or live under the 
 ruling of His Spirit. 
 
 With what gladness and singleness of heart did the 
 disciples eat their meat, when they came at Pentecost 
 under God's own dominion ! It was not a kingdom of 
 meat and drink; not of exactitude in the matter of 
 external rites ; not of creeds and definitions ; not of sa- 
 cerdotal orders or sacred vestments, but of 'righteous- 
 ness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.' Heaven 
 drops down the dews of grace, and all beautiful flowers 
 and fruits respond with fragrance and with joy. 
 
 ' To humbleness of heart descends 
 
 This prescience from on high, 
 The faith that elevates the just 
 
 Before and when they die ; 
 And makes each soul a separate heaven, 
 A court for Deity.' "WoiiDswoiiTH. 
 
 ' I will greatly rejoice in the Lord ; my soul shall be 
 joyful in my God/ 'The fruit of the Spirit is love, 
 joy, peace.' There was great joy among a people \ 
 whom the Spirit was working in ]>n\vn, as in the re- 
 vival at Sam an; i. 2 Such expressions in a great variety 
 
 1 Phil, iv. 7. 
 
 ? Phil. iv. 4; Isa. IxL 10; Rom. xiv. 17; Gal. v. 22; Acts viii. 8; 
 1 ivt. i. 8. 
 
Happiness of being ruled by Spirit. 121 
 
 of forms and circumstances constitute a noticeable 
 future of revealed religion. The Lord was a sun and 
 shield in the view of its writers, giving them grace and 
 glory, and withholding no good thing ; to whom it was 
 ever in their hearts to say, ' Whom have I in heaven 
 but Thee ? and there is none upon earth that I desire 
 besides Thee.' 1 Their faith was a fountain of happiness. 
 It gave them songs even in the night of their cala- 
 mities. The inflowing of God's spiritual influence to 
 the soul is like the form of the Fourth walking un- 
 harmed in the midst of the fiery furnace, and giving 
 protection to those entrusted to His care. As we have 
 seen, Jesus, though a man of sorrow, had no brighter 
 jewel to leave with His Church on earth than His peace. 
 His holy soul, like the sea, was quiet at bottom, 
 however tossed by winds on its surface. So the 
 apostles were joyful in all their tribulations, confi- 
 dently saying, ' Who shall separate us from the love of 
 Christ ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, 
 or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword ? Nay, in 
 all these things we are more than conquerors through 
 Him that loved us/ Their trials made their graces 
 only the more illustrious, producing patience, experi- 
 ence, and hope, and thus intensifying their joy in God. 
 It acted as heat upon gold, to render them purer and 
 more brilliant, fitting them for 'praise, and honour, and 
 glory, at the appearing of Jesus Christ.' The pro- 
 phet's song is a celebration of this joyful influence 
 from heaven under the privations of this life. 'Al- 
 though the fig-tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit 
 be in the vines ; the labour of the olive shall fail, and 
 the fields shall yield no meat ; the flocks shall be cut 
 off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the 
 1 Ps. Ixxiii. 25, Ixxxiv. 11. 
 
122 Seed- Truths. 
 
 stalls : yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the 
 God of my salvation.' 1 
 
 Millions since the ages of inspiration have testified 
 to the happy effect of coming under the Spirit's ruling. 
 Says Augustine, ' By a light, as it were of serenity, in- 
 fused into my heart, all darkness and doubts vanished 
 from my mind.' 2 Edwards, about twelve hundred 
 years after Augustine's time, bears similar testimony. 
 ' I found from time to time/ he says, 'an inward sweet- 
 ness that would carry me away in my contemplations. 
 This I know not how to express otherwise, than by a 
 calm, sweet abstraction of soul from all the concerns 
 of this world ; and sometimes a kind of vision, or fixed 
 ideas and imaginations, of being alone in the moun- 
 tains or solitary wilderness, far from mankind, sweetly 
 conversing with Christ. This sense of divine things 
 would often of a sudden kindle up, as it were, a sweet 
 burning in my heart an ardour of soul that I know 
 not how to express/ 8 These two men were giants 
 of intellect as well as of faith ; and their testimony, 
 though no truer than that of millions of others before 
 and since their respective ages, may be thought to 
 have the greater weight. 
 
 Now these facts accord with Moses' account of man's 
 primeval E^en, showing that the same law obtained 
 as to the effect of the Spirit's ruling in the first 
 innocence of the race, as in its redemption to holiness 
 by Jesus Christ. So far as the garden of God was a 
 scene of fountains, flowers, fruits, and shady groves, or 
 of external beauty, it was so, not for its own sake, but 
 for the man for whom it was provided, or as a reflec- 
 
 1 Job xxxv. 10 ; Dan. iii. 25 ; 2 Cor. vii. 4 ; Rom. v. 3, 4, viii. 
 85-37 -. 1 ivt. i. 7 ; Il;ib. iii. 17, 18. 
 1 Memoirs, p. 167. 8 Complete Works, vol. i. p. 19. 
 
Happiness of being rzded by Spirit. 123 
 
 tion of his blissful life in the companionship of God 
 and angels. It was the abode of heaven upon earth, 
 and a symbol of heavenly life. Wherever there is a 
 human soul in which God has set up His throne, there 
 is a garden of Eden, there flows the water of the river 
 of life, and there is the tree of life in the midst 
 thereof. The secret of his paradise is in being right 
 with God, right with himself, and right in all his 
 relations. The spirit rules the flesh, and not the flesh 
 the spirit. 
 
 ' The Lord God planted a garden eastward of Eden ; 
 and there He put the man whom He had formed.' The 
 place was made for the occupants, and without them 
 it could not have existed. A material garden, great 
 as may be its delights, would come utterly short of 
 Moses' description. Spiritual men have always re- 
 garded Eden as more than an outward fact. It sets 
 forth the infinitely varied and beautiful truths, the 
 accordant feelings, the heavenly joys, and divine com- 
 munion, which, in the person of man, had been dropped 
 among the elements of this earthly world. It is the 
 light in which pictures are seen that brings out their 
 beauty. It is the spiritual medium through which 
 things are contemplated that sheds upon them the 
 glories of heaven. The earth, the mountains, the 
 wilderness, the visible heavens, the course of provi- 
 dence, and even the judgments of God, become to one 
 in the spirit of Edwards a scene of transporting 
 contemplation. 'Alleluia: for the Lord God omni- 
 potent reigneth,' 1 is a psean of praise that finds thence 
 its inspiration. 
 
 Had no mind or moral forces been reflected from 
 Eden, but only brutal instincts or material delights, 
 1 Kev. xix. 6. 
 
124 Seed-Truths. 
 
 think you it would have found a record in God's 
 word ? No ; an inner man, with his immortal powers, 
 capabilities, and associations, must have looked out 
 upon nature and read the Divinity in all its lines, 
 and felt Him in all its events, to make it a scene of 
 joyousness and of beauty, and a field for spiritual 
 expatiation, or Eden would have been what the golden 
 age is in the dreams of the poets, a thing of imagina- 
 tion, the mirage of a sentimental hallucination skirting 
 the horizon of the past. What a poor representation 
 of man's primeval abode are the groves, fountains, and 
 voluptuous delights by which the Oriental monarchs 
 sought to reproduce it ! The cottage is often more an 
 Eden than the palace, because it is the seat of love and 
 devout affections, while malignity, hatred, and hell are 
 found in many a gilded hall and flowery garden. The 
 rustic couple, living in piety and faith, are truer suc- 
 cessors of Adam and Eve than those who dwell in 
 kingly and queenly state. 
 
 This glorious planting of God, so far as it was 
 outward, was the seeding of truths far more vital 
 than anything in itself. Every tree, every leaf, every 
 ripening fig, orange, grape, apple, and pomegranate, 
 glowed with the sunlight of heaven. It was a record 
 of God, and could be read by the spiritual primeval 
 man without book or reasoning. God spoke through 
 it to his heart. The divine love, truth, holiness, and 
 all-pervading presence were revealed to him in every- 
 thing. In this respect Adam's experience was but the 
 prototype of that of every truly spiritual man : God iu 
 everything, God everywhere, God always delightfully 
 near, this is the feeling. This feeling made Eden 
 what it was, and obtained for it a place in the inspired 
 record. It shows what man was and is under the 
 
Happiness of being ruled by Spirit. 125 
 
 ruling of the Holy Spirit. With no nature to be thus 
 ruled, material beauties enough could not have been 
 brought together to invite the visit of angels, or to 
 have sat for the picture of man's primeval innocence. 
 A golden age is a delusion of the past, except as 
 realized in the human soul radiant with heavenly light ; 
 and with that it is equally a reality of the present. 
 
 Hence the paradise of the New Testament is a 
 reproduction of the Eden of the old. It is applied to 
 that heavenly world into which Paul was caught up, 
 where he 'heard unspeakable words, which it is not 
 lawful for a man to utter.' 1 This was wholly a 
 spiritual scene, and so far exceeding all material re- 
 presentation, that it is not lawful to attempt to utter 
 or depict it in that form. Moses' imagery of Eden, in 
 the first chapters of the Bible, is applied by John, in 
 the last chapters of Eevelation, to the New Jerusalem, 
 which also had its 'pure river of the water of life pro- 
 ceeding out of the throne of God and the Lamb,' 
 answering to that which watered Adam's garden, and 
 which ' became into four heads.' * In the midst of the 
 street of it, and on either side of the river, was there 
 the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, 
 and yielded her fruit every month : and the leaves of 
 the tree were for the healing of nations.' 2 Thus the 
 earliest and latest records of inspiration contain like 
 thoughts and like imagery, showing that they were 
 united in the same immutable and eternal spiritual 
 truth ; that the beatification of man in his original 
 innocency, of man in a state of sanctifi cation on earth, 
 and of man as glorified in heaven, has one basis, the 
 absolute enthronement of God in his soul. This is 
 the holy of holies where God has His throne, where 
 
 1 2 Cor. xii. 4. * Gen. ii. 9, 10 ; Rev. xxii. 1, 2. 
 
126 Seed- Truths. 
 
 His laws are deposited, and His rod of authority ever 
 buds and blooms. The same fountain of truth and 
 love flowing from God refreshes the inhabitants in each 
 of these states, and the same tree of life supplies them 
 with its fruits. 
 
 God's spiritual reign over man is as much a fact 
 of primeval Eden as of New Jerusalem. As Cousin 
 justly says, ' When affection has conquered selfishness, 
 instead of loving its object for its own sake, the soul 
 gives itself to its object, and miracle of love ! the more 
 it gives the more it possesses, notching itself by its 
 own sacrifices, and finds its strength in its own self- 
 abandonment. But there is only one Being worthy of 
 being thus loved, and who can be thus loved without 
 illusions, and without mistakes, at once without limits, 
 and without regret, to wit, the perfect Being who 
 alone does not fear reflection, who alone can fill the 
 entire capacity of our hearts.' * 
 
 ' The tree of knowledge of good and evil ' 2 points to 
 a state wherein ideas, reasonings, aspirations, and self- 
 consciousness abate the simplicity and entireness of 
 our love and devotion to God, and which, without 
 questioning and without doubt, give Him the first 
 place. Knowledge is of the outer man, divine love of 
 the inner man ; and the triumph of the former at the 
 expense of the latter as a motive-influence with us, 
 ruling our willa, is the inlet to evil, the opening of 
 hell to the soul of man. As, in the experience of the 
 most of us, the period of undoubting filial love and 
 confidence was the golden period of our life, as com- 
 pared with the succeeding distrust which followed from 
 our own waywardness or the discovery of parental 
 defects; so unreasoning faith in God does infinitely 
 
 Lecture*, i>. 108. * Gen. ii. 17. 
 
Happiness of being ruled by Spirit. 127 
 
 more to make our lives golden and beautiful, than any 
 of the inventions of our self-reliant reason or imper- 
 tinent speculations. Seeking to know from the pride 
 of knowing, exercising our intellects with a view to 
 worldly pre-eminence, or to make ourselves independent 
 of divine guidance, is ' the tree that brought death into 
 the world and all our woe/ 
 
 The word of God can never have its proper effect 
 upon us, while we think of its sketches merely as 
 things of the past, and remote from us as events of 
 another planet. We must feel that they apply equally 
 to ourselves as to any preceding generation. The laws 
 of animal life are not more identical to every generation 
 than those of spiritual life. Adam lived by eating and 
 drinking, the same as we do. He was not more bound 
 to follow God's leading than we are ; nor was its aban- 
 donment to enjoy forbidden gratifications more fatal to 
 him than to us. All seed-truths are the same to us as 
 to him. He was happy in right living, and miserable in 
 wrong living ; and so are we. His harmony with God 
 and holy angels made his Eden ; and if we love and 
 trust ' Him whom we have not seen, we also rejoice 
 with joy unspeakable and full of glory.' * Our modes 
 of coming into these blessed relations with God are 
 different, and so is our nature as affected by sin ; but 
 our happiness equally has a spiritual, holy, and heavenly 
 foundation. It comes from the ruling of God in our 
 souls. 
 
 * 1 Pet. i. 8. 
 
CHAPTER XTTT T 
 
 HOW HEAVEN IS LOST. 
 
 THE reign of God in the soul constitutes its heaven, 
 in reference to which our Lord speaks of Him- 
 self while on earth as ' the Son of man who is in 
 heaven.' He brought with Him heavenly life in the 
 perfection of His character, and imparted it to His 
 devoted followers, insomuch that ' the kingdom of God 
 was said to he within them.' It was a state of grace 
 and salvation, in which is realized the answer of the 
 prayer, ' Thy kingdom come ; Thy will be done on earth 
 as in heaven.' 1 God's kingdom comes in the sancti- 
 fication of the Church as a means to its glorification. 
 It is the reign of heaven in individual souls of which 
 we now speak. 
 
 Now this heaven of the soul consists alike of sub- 
 mission to God in the primeval man, in the sanctified 
 on earth, and the glorified above. It has its subordi- 
 nate varieties, but the principle is the same. In the 
 primeval man it was innocence; in the saints it is 
 growth in grace ; in the glorified it is grace perfected. 
 It is a heaven in which God is the sun ruling all the 
 ] -Juiiets, satellites, and asteroids of thought and desire, 
 and all the active powers, whether of the outward or 
 inward man. This is the only source of their harmony, 
 
 1 John iii. 13 ; Matt. v. 3, 19, 20, vi. 10, xi. 11, 12 ; Luke xvi. 16, 
 xvii. 21. 
 
 128 
 
How Heaven is Lost. 129 
 
 and a necessary condition of heaven. ' The meek shall 
 inherit the earth/ ' Godliness has the promise of the 
 life that now is/ and ' the hundredfold more in the 
 present time to those who forsake all for the gospel/ 
 are promises which have their fulfilment, not in the 
 abundance of the things of this life, but in the heaven 
 of divine love, educing the greatest good from earth, 
 and ending in ' a far more exceeding and eternal weight 
 of glory.' * Such is the Bible representation of God's 
 ruling in the soul ; and it must be accepted, however 
 it conflicts with the experience of those who claim to 
 be subjects of the divine kingdom. This is God's truth, 
 already realized in the faith of some, and not to be 
 invalidated by the unbelief of others. 
 
 In all these cases of beatification, the state of the 
 soul in relation to God, and not its location, is the 
 great point insisted upon by the inspired writers. The 
 mansions of our Father's house are ' prepared ' for those 
 who are suited to them, and they are ' many/ as adapted 
 to all their specific varieties or degrees in glory. 2 They 
 are a paradise of redeeming love, as Eden was of pri- 
 meval innocence, the occupants determining the cha- 
 racter of the dwelling, and not the dwelling that of the 
 occupants. The mind shapes the body, and not the 
 body the mind; and hence, in idiocy, the body loses 
 its comeliness. No greater error can be imagined, than 
 that of conceiving of heaven as a place to go to to 
 make one happy, who has not heaven already in his 
 own soul. Millions of deluded men, who are living in 
 vice and wickedness, feel sure of heaven, on the ground 
 of extreme unction and priestly absolution. Or they 
 have once had certain religious experiences, which, 
 
 1 Matt. v. 5, 1 9 ; Mark x. 29, 30 ; 1 Tim. iv. 8. 
 
 2 Julia xiv. 1, 2 ; 1 Cor. xv. 41, 42. 
 
 I 
 
130 Seed- Truths. 
 
 though now dead, and unsustained by anything in their 
 lives, awaken in them the fallacious hope of going to a 
 heaven of which they have not a single element in 
 their souls. Alas that fictions should take the place 
 of facts on so grave a subject, or that heaven should be 
 for a moment thought of as anything but God the all in 
 all of our being ! 
 
 How much logic has been from first to last wasted, 
 to explain how it is that beings in the heaven of 
 God's ruling should of their own accord abandon it, 
 and accept hell in its place ! And yet do we not see 
 much that is analogous to it in real life ? How many 
 a son and daughter, husband and wife, abandon a 
 happy and honourable home for a career of .infamy and 
 woe ! Such defections proceed by a gradual process of 
 specific pleasures, with eyes blinded to the result, which 
 comes as a final retribution. These cases in men 
 already depraved are, indeed, unlike those wherein a 
 heaven of perfect innocence and bliss is abandoned for 
 the guilt and misery of hell; though the latter, too, 
 will be found, on examination, to be a choice of specific 
 pleasures, rather than of the final result. Temptation 
 has arisen and prospered ven among innocent beings, 
 if the Bible is to be believed. How could this have 
 happened ? 
 
 The difficulty is to accept the scriptural view of the 
 soul, as independent in the production of effects, or in 
 originating acts of praise or blame. The soul's respon- 
 sibility ends where necessity begins. From this re- 
 mark, however, must be excepted the incapacity which 
 arises from previous acts of wrong, just as a criminal, 
 though incapable of being innocent, is still responsible 
 for his guilt. The incapacity of a .sinful state is both 
 our guilt and our punishment But how can a 
 
How Heaven is Lost. 131 
 
 transgression in one previously innocent be extenuated 
 on any such ground ? The question is not as to the 
 incapacity of one already guilty to become innocent, 
 but how an innocent being could originate a sinful 
 act ? It seems to be thought by some, that a necessity 
 of some sort, such as that of the strongest motive, for 
 instance, must have ruled him. As Sir William Hamil- 
 ton says, ' Though an unconquerable feeling compels us 
 to recognise ourselves as accountable, and therefore free 
 agents, still, when we attempt to realize in thought 
 how the fact of our liberty can be, we soon find that 
 this altogether transcends our understanding, and that 
 every attempt to bring the fact of liberty within the 
 compass of our conceptions only results in the substi- 
 tution in its place of some more or less disguised form 
 of necessity.' * 
 
 Reasoners on this subject, a hundred years ago, 
 thought to escape the difficulty by inventing the dis- 
 tinction of natural and moral necessity. Though both 
 are alike absolute and irreversible, yet, since motive 
 is cause in moral necessity, and physical agencies in 
 natural necessity, therefore the actor is responsible. 
 If I do a wicked thing, I dp it from motive, and am 
 guilty ; but if a malarious atmosphere gives me a fever, 
 it is my misfortune, and not my crime. The motive as 
 cause is not blame or praiseworthy, but only the effect, 
 or the act resulting from the motive. Hence God 
 could decree a motive to be the cause of sin, without 
 being implicated in the sin itself. Hopkins and 
 Emmons 2 were not satisfied to stop here, but held 
 that God creates all sinful volitions as well as all good 
 ones, in the same sense that He created the world. 
 
 1 Metaphysics, p. 24. 
 
 2 Celebrated American divines in a past age. 
 
132 Seed-Truths. 
 
 Still He is not implicated in their guilt, because guilt 
 is not in the creator of a sinful volition, but in the 
 one who exercises it. The absurdity of the conclusion 
 has exploded the reasoning; and though many hold 
 moral necessity as an incontrovertible axiom, very little 
 use is made of it in our religious discussions. We 
 have drifted away from it into the currents of modern 
 thought, and are out at sea, while we suppose ourselves 
 still moored to the doctrine of necessity. 
 
 The moment we look beyond the soul itself for the 
 cause of its responsible actions, and ascribe them to 
 God, to the strongest motive, or to some influence acting 
 upon the will to necessitate its determinations, we 
 stumble upon ' the supposition that acts of volition are 
 results of the same iron necessity which determines 
 the phenomena of matter/ and thus ' we subvert the 
 foundations of religion, natural and revealed.' 1 The 
 freedom of the will is as sure to us as our own exist- 
 ence, and yet it is one of those things which we cannot 
 formulate in thought ; nor can our volitions be reasoned 
 about as effects, like those produced by ordinary causes. 
 They have their cause in the man, and that is the end 
 of it. ' Lo, this only have I found, that God made 
 man upright ; but they have sought out many inven- 
 tions.' ' Let no man say, when he is tempted, I am 
 tempted of God ; for God cannot be tempted with 
 evil, neither tempteth He any man : but every man is 
 tempted, when he is drawn away of his lusts^ and 
 enticed. Then, when lust is conceived, it bringeth 
 forth sin ; and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth 
 death.' 2 No more reliable account of the origin of evil 
 than this can be given. 
 
 Men are called gods, in reference, no doubt, to their 
 
 1 Sir W. Hamilton'* Milu^/ii/^icn, pp. 21, 22. * Jas. i. 1U-15. 
 
How Heaven is Lost. 133 
 
 resemblance to the Divine Being in this moral freedom 
 of originating volition. ' God standeth in the congre- 
 gation of the righteous ; He ruleth among the gods ;' 
 that is, among those whose prerogatives were like His 
 own. ' Worship Him, all ye gods.' * Thou shalt not 
 revile the gods,' or those to whom the word of God 
 came, as interpreted by our Lord, who justifies this 
 application of the term. It was also said by the pro- 
 phet to the idols, ' Do good, or do evil, that we may 
 know that ye are gods,' involving the idea that to act 
 voluntarily constituted likeness to the freedom of the 
 Divine Mind. 1 This likeness of the soul to God in 
 the freedom of action is our sole clue to the divine 
 character ; for we can have no conception of Him as 
 an Almighty Intelligence, except as we take the idea 
 from the attributes of our own mind. We never think 
 of our acts as necessitated by something going before 
 or apart from our voluntary agency ; but the sense of 
 responsibility as the sole originators of them, inheres 
 in us in spite of all our reasonings to the contrary. 
 And as we cannot feel our acts to be necessitated 
 except by ourselves, so we cannot think of God as 
 necessitated in what He does, except by His own sove- 
 reign pleasure. If it were otherwise, and we could 
 think of any prior cause as necessitating our own acts, 
 we should think the same of God ; and the result would 
 be a ruler of the universe ruled by Fate as the highest 
 source of power, the real Divinity, to which the homage 
 of all hearts is due. Thus moral necessity, by imperious 
 laws of logic, ends in natural necessity, and Pantheism 
 or Positivism is the unavoidable issue. 
 
 In Scripture, all ideas of moral responsibility ter- 
 minate in the soul itself as an independent cause-pro- 
 
 1 Ps. Ixxxii. 1, 6, cxxxviii. 1; Isa. xli. 23; Ex. xxii. 28; John x. 34, 35, 
 
134 Seed- Truths. 
 
 ducer, and not in anything outside of itself. "Within 
 the limit of its free voluntary agency it is absolute 
 and supreme, as we have already seen ; no power being 
 able to trespass upon it against its will Within that 
 limit lie all its moral responsibilities, as the inspired 
 writers abundantly teach. ' It is accepted of a man 
 according to what he hath, and not according to what 
 he hath not/ ' Tor unto whomsoever much is given, 
 of him shall much be required.' 1 ' It is only as man 
 is a free intelligence, a moral power, that he is created 
 in the image of God ; and it is only as a spark of 
 divinity glows as the life of our life in us, that we can 
 rationally believe in an Intelligent Creator, a Moral 
 Governor of the universe.' 2 
 
 Still, absolute as man is in his own domain, he is 
 subject to a law which cannot fail to hold him under 
 God's authority, if not by precept, then by penalty. 
 The precept and penalty are both alike inseparable from 
 man's nature. They are a part of his constitution as 
 a free moral agent. A man is free to take poison, but 
 will not the penalty of the wrong act be sure to follow ? 
 If the precept enjoining or interdicting an act fails to 
 secure our obedience, then the penalty takes effect to 
 hold us still under God's authority. Both are a sweet 
 savour unto God, the one of life unto life, and the other 
 of death unto death. God's authority is maintained in 
 both cases ; and so He does not lose His power of 
 control over us by reason of our freedom. It is not a 
 control, however, which consists in an an- ing the causes 
 of crime, nor in creating the sinful volition, as some 
 have supposed, but in leaving our nature to work out 
 its own destiny. In that the divine authority is sufti- 
 
 1 2 Cor. viii. 12 ; Luke xii. 10. 
 
 1 Sir Win. Hamilton's Mtluj'/tysiet, pp. 21, 22. 
 
How Heaven is Lost. 135 
 
 ciently secured. Moral freedom, therefore, does not 
 involve a power to escape from under the government 
 of God, who reigns as absolute in hell as in heaven, 
 and by the same love too ; though in the one case it is 
 commuted into wrath, and in the other into unspeak- 
 able bliss and glory. The difference is not in the 
 authority, but in the soul-powers of those upon whom 
 it is exercised, just as the excellence of a government 
 is as fatal to the disobedient as it is happifying to 
 the obedient. God needs no fines, imprisonments, or 
 overt punishments, because His laws work out their 
 appropriate results by the very constitution of a moral 
 agent. 
 
 Now, temptations to evil in holy men, or in a state 
 of primeval innocence, are, like rewards and punish- 
 ments, the outworking of their faculties while in a 
 state of trial. They arise from specific impulses which 
 are perfectly innocent in themselves, each tending 
 towards undue indulgence, in which alone the wrong 
 exists. These specific impulses impose upon the man 
 the duty of duly balancing one against another, and of 
 subordinating all to God's spiritual reign in his soul. 
 This is therefore the duty, and this the law of duty. 
 Animals are led by instinct to regulate their faculties, 
 eating, sleeping, and living as their condition and 
 the necessity of their nature require. But reason 
 and conscience supply in man the place of instinct 
 in animals, wherein God reveals His spiritual truths 
 as ' a light to our feet and a lamp to our path.' l Our 
 souls are open to God and the realm of spirits on the 
 one hand, supplying a peculiar and distinct law of 
 thought, feeling, and action ; and to the realm of nature 
 on the other, from which we derive ideas and impulses 
 1 Ps. cxix. 105. 
 
136 Seed- Truths. 
 
 equally peculiar, but requiring always to be subordi- 
 nated to the former. We converse with the first 
 through faith, and with the other through sense ; in 
 the one case acting as seeing invisible truths, and in 
 the other as affected by the visible and the tangible. 
 Spirit in conscience, and flesh in appetites, passions, 
 and worldly ideas, are the two forces that unite in our 
 moral agency to constitute our duty and our law of 
 duty. These are the facts, beyond which we cannot 
 go, any more than we can go beyond properties and 
 attributes in our natural sciences. 
 
 A moral agent could no more exist without these 
 conditions, than pleasure and pain without sensibility. 
 Reason is nothing without occasions for its exercise. 
 Conscience is nothing, except as connected with some- 
 thing to be regulated by it. A metallic hand is a 
 watch-regulator, only as part of a watch to be regulated 
 by it. The authority of God could be nothing to us, 
 except as the enforcement of a law of duty in our own 
 nature. Can His authority as a moral ruler act upon 
 a stone or a beast ? The right and wrong is not in the 
 faculties to be regulated by God's law of duty, but in 
 the use we make of them. In the power to see, hear, 
 smell, taste, or feel, what evil is there, till we have 
 used it for an evil purpose ? Or what evil is there in 
 the love of food, light, sound, odours, or agreeable 
 sensations, till we have in some way indulged them at 
 the expense of conscience or of the divine law ? Where 
 is the evil of loving wife, children, houses, lands, money, 
 merchandise, bank-stock, or any other good, so long as 
 it is subordinated to God and the best interests of man- 
 kind? The crime is not in the sense, affection, or 
 impulse, but in exercising it criminally, or out of due 
 proportion to otli^r nflVctions or claims upon us. I am 
 
How Heaven is Lost. 137 
 
 now speaking of the faculties in an uncorrupted state, 
 and not as vitiated by inherited or habitual sins. Every 
 one will see the difference between sin as a judicial 
 con-up ti on of nature, and sin as a first act ; nor did 
 this difference escape the notice of an apostle, as we 
 see from his comparison between those who had and 
 those who had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's 
 transgression. 1 
 
 How could a nature with so many specific impulses 
 work out its destiny without temptation ? No matter how 
 innocent, it could make no difference, till by exercise and 
 habit it had attained to the strength and consistency of 
 holiness. Innocence does not repress the onward ten- 
 dency of an impulse, when it has reached its proper 
 limits, as a fly falls with singed wings when he touches 
 the flame. No, it may be more active than ever as it 
 approaches the boundaries of wrong, which God seems 
 to have had in view when He prohibited not only the 
 eating, but also the ' touching,' 2 to suggest that we 
 should stop short of the boundaries of wrong, and thus 
 let our moderation be known. 3 To dally with tempta- 
 tion is the next step to committing sin. Here, on the 
 extreme boundaries of right, comes the temptation to 
 take one step more into wrong. With no evil, and no 
 extraneous malign influence in the universe, a being 
 with the nature of man could not act without occa- 
 sional inward conflicts in checking specific desires ; nor 
 could his innocence become virtue and holiness with- 
 out such conflicts. Victories are not to be won with- 
 out battles, nor praiseworthiness without a resolute 
 resistance to becoming blameworthy. The very laws of 
 moral development involve temptation, so far as we 
 know the history of God's universe. This is as much 
 
 1 Rom. v. 14. 2 Gen. iii. 3. 3 Phil. iv. 5. 
 
138 Seed- Truths. 
 
 a fact as a theory. How was it with Adam ? how with 
 Christ ? how with those who have come out of gretit 
 tribulation, and washed their robes and made them 
 white in the blood of the Lamb ? That those who 
 overcome will wear crowns and palms of victory, as 
 denoting exemption from further conflict, rather con- 
 firms than unsettles the principle of temptation as the 
 law of moral and spiritual progress, at least in that part 
 of God's moral government which is subjected to our 
 inspection. 1 
 
 We look into the Bible, and what do we find ? Was 
 it not an impulse right in itself that betrayed the man 
 after God's own heart into sin ? God Himself con- 
 cedes the right of David's desires ; and enumerating 
 how much He had done for him, He adds, ' If that 
 had been too little, I would moreover have given unto 
 thee such and such things.' That is, all his desires 
 had their limits, within which gratification was lawful. 
 So Moses, in his highest state of spiritual power, be- 
 came provoked at the people's obstinacy, or into undue 
 consciousness of what he could and must do to con- 
 found the ' rebels ;' and these specific impulses be- 
 trayed him into sin, and closed against him the promised 
 land. Self-reliance and panic urged Peter forward into 
 a very wicked act, though the core of his piety remained 
 intact and unchanged. 2 In each of these cases the 
 specific impulse came in an exalted state of spiritual 
 power and faith, laying ' the foundation for repent- 
 ance from dead works,' but not ending in permanent 
 apostasy. 8 
 
 Moses' account of the first sin is more to our pur- 
 
 1 Rev. vii. 9, 14. 
 
 2 Sam. xii. 8 ; Num. xx. 10-12 ; Mark xiv. 66-72. 
 
 1 Heb. Vi. 1. 
 
How Heaven is Lost. 139 
 
 pose, because it shows the working of specific impulses 
 in producing temptation to those .who were in a state 
 of perfect innocence. ' And when the woman saw that 
 the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to 
 the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, 
 she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also 
 unto her husband with her, and he did eat.' Prior to 
 this she had listened doubtingly to the serpent's denial 
 of God's authority as to the effect of eating the fruit of 
 that tree. 1 We have here five specific impulses in the 
 tempted to create an internal struggle, of which the 
 serpent took advantage ; to wit, doubt, appetite, taste, 
 the desire of knowledge, and ambition. It was to 
 develope these inward powers of man, or his faithful- 
 ness in subordinating them to the God-ruling in his 
 soul, that this prohibition of one of the trees of the 
 garden was no doubt given. His internal faculties 
 imposed a duty and a law of duty ; and the prohi- 
 bition was a test of his obedience. The act of eating 
 or not eating of that particular tree was of little con- 
 sequence, except as a test of his obedience to the higher 
 truths and laws of his being. 
 
 The first element in the temptation was doult in 
 itself a right exercise when rightly directed. All ad- 
 vance in knowledge and virtue begins with a doubt as 
 to whether there is not something better for us than 
 we have yet attained to. Doubt is the parent of in- 
 vestigation and of growing knowledge. It is holding 
 the mind in an attitude of waiting for more evidence 
 before coming to a decision. But where the question 
 of maintaining our moral purity becomes a matter of 
 doubt, it is a first step to sin. Such it proved to Eve. 
 She listened hesitatingly to the serpent's charge of false- 
 
 1 Gen. iii. 4-6. 
 
1 40 Seed- Truths. 
 
 hood upon God, saying, ' Ye shall not surely die ; for 
 God doth know, that in the day ye eat thereof then 
 your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall become as gods, 
 knowing good and evil.' Herein her defection began, 
 in giving a wrong direction to an innocent and im- 
 portant impulse. 
 
 Appetite for the fruit was a subsidiary impulse, to 
 increase the doubt whether it was not best on the 
 whole to eat of it. This, too, is not only innocent, but 
 necessary ; for how can we live without eating ? It 
 was not appetite that constituted the wrong, but only 
 exercising it towards a forbidden indulgence. ' When 
 the woman saw that the tree was good for food/ and 
 dwelt upon the idea, then ' the lust was conceived 
 which bringeth forth sin/ She thought with herself, 
 no doubt, Why should so innocent a gratification be 
 denied ? It is unworthy of God. The serpent must be 
 right.' Thus doubt and appetite mutually strengthened 
 each other. 
 
 Taste, or the love of the beautiful, added its current 
 to the evil impulse. The fruit was ' pleasant to the 
 eyes.' There is certainly no wrong in being delighted 
 with what is beautiful. Beauty is akin to holiness. 1 
 But when used as an impulse to things wrong in 
 themselves, or which God has forbidden, it becomes a 
 sublimated licentiousness ; and the more we feel it, 
 the greater our danger. All the most voluptuous and 
 damning pleasures are embellished with every charm 
 to the eye, to increase their attractiveness and multiply 
 their victims. Thus one of the noblest impulses of 
 our nature may be easily converted into our strongest 
 temptation, to demand a vigorous resistance on the part 
 of a virtuous mind. 
 
 1 Ps. xc. 17, ex. 8. 
 
How Heaven is Lost. 141 
 
 The desire of knowledge, one of the noblest passions, 
 also lends its attractions to that which is evil, when it 
 contravenes truth and right. But when conjoined with 
 love and goodness, it acquires a new and higher cha- 
 racter ; it becomes wisdom. ' The wise shall inherit 
 glory.' * It is only when knowledge puffeth up, when 
 it robs us of our simplicity, and renders us crafty, 
 cunning, and. impertinent in our investigations and our 
 character, that it is an offence to God, and a curse. The 
 worst heresies of the world began with men gifted in 
 everything but 'truth, holiness, and the love of God. 
 ' The world by wisdom knew not God/ for the good 
 reason, that another element than simple knowing, that 
 of faith, is necessary to apprehend God. 2 An eager 
 curiosity concurred with other innocent impulses to 
 create the first temptation. ' A tree to be desired 
 to make one wise,' came to Eve's mind in a way to 
 corrupt the simplicity of her trust in all that God 
 required. 
 
 The ambition to be ' as gods, knowing good and evil,' 
 had also its charm to Eve. Who can set limits to the 
 aspiring of the human soul ? And is it not quite right 
 when it seeks perfection in goodness, and in the power 
 of good to others ? Did not our Lord mount the cross 
 to reach the throne of the universe ? 3 Ambition thus 
 directed is godlike. But when it is a selfish desire 
 of pre-eminence, that seeks its gratification by over- 
 riding millions, or in claiming infallibility for fallible 
 men, and the viceroyalty of God on earth, what can 
 be conceived of more absurd or blasphemous ? 
 
 ' If, aspiring to be gods, angels fell, 
 Aspiring to be angels, men rebel.' 
 
 Such are the specific impulses which Moses repre- 
 
 1 Prov. iii. 35. 8 1 Cor. i. 21 ; Isa. xxix. 14. 3 Heb. ii. 9. 
 
142 Seed- Tru ths. 
 
 sents as working in an innocent being to produce 
 temptation and a fall. They would have operated in 
 man without an outward tempter, as they seem to 
 have operated in the race to which that old serpent 
 the Devil and Satan belonged, to produce its relapse 
 into eviL The laws of moral action, as consisting in 
 specific desires to be regulated and controlled out of a 
 regard to our duty to God, are no doubt the same in 
 all the intelligent and responsible races ; as it is found 
 by the spectroscope that matter has the same elements 
 in the sun and stars as in our earth. Beings may be 
 created innocent ; but to acquire virtue and holiness, 
 they must exercise their moral faculties under tempta- 
 tion in a way to ensure praiseworthiness. But for 
 this elementary condition of man himself, the lies and 
 seductions of the serpent would have fallen upon him 
 as persuasion upon a stone, or arguments upon a shrub. 
 Moses' record of the fall of man is a perfect pro- 
 logue to history, bringing to light and anticipating the 
 great forces which have from first to last been most 
 active in shaping events. What has done more than 
 scepticism, or the extinction of faith in God and the 
 spiritual world, to produce this universal earthliness 
 and impiety for which the race has been distinguished ? 
 What has proved a greater power in history than the 
 fleshly appetites ? Beauty, natural and artistic, how 
 has it in all ages ministered to voluptuousness ! Art, 
 architecture, priestly robes, gorgeous processions, and 
 various a-stlietical contrivances, hold millions in error 
 and wrong, as the serpent's eye the charmed bird ; and 
 all argument and persuasion fail of bringing them to 
 the knowledge of the truth. Science falsely so called, 
 as well as the abuse of much that is true, is it not 
 now, as it always has been, a great antagonist of faith, 
 
How Heaven is Lost. 143 
 
 and the source of fatal and damning errors ? How 
 extensive the materialistic tendency of denying all 
 truth, except what may be formulated to the reason, 
 or reduced to the conditions of a defined conception 
 or axiom ! whereas nothing within the range of our 
 knowledge can be so defined, the simplest forms of 
 matter always including things which our reason cannot 
 embrace in its idea of them. And yet, because spiritual 
 truths are addressed to our faith rather than to our 
 reason, therefore in the pride of our knowledge we deny 
 them altogether, and come to the monstrous conclusion 
 that mind is merely a secretion of matter ! And ambi- 
 tion inflating us to the state of divinity, and arrogating 
 honour due only to God, has created nine-tenths of the 
 gods which still claim the homage of mankind. Who 
 can imagine a greater power in history than ambition ? 
 ISfor has demon influence been less active in human 
 history than it was in the first sin. How potent was 
 it in the time of our Lord ! How has it associated 
 itself in the form of witchcraft, necromancy, magic, 
 and astrology, with nearly all the false religions of the 
 world ! Corrupt spiritualism is even more prevalent 
 than the true, and thousands believe in it who have no 
 faith in Qod or His word. Thus the events of Eden 
 are singularly adjusted to human nature, as it has 
 proved itself to be in its career of nearly six thousand 
 years. "Why then speculate about the fall of man as 
 a distant and doubtful event, when the same elements 
 are active in us all, and the same event is transpiring 
 in all our experiences ? The causes which lost heaven 
 to Adam may lose it to us. 
 
CHAPTEK XIV. 
 
 THE SPIRITS IN PRISON. 
 
 TO profit by the Bible, we must read it as applying 
 to our present experience, and not merely to 
 that of the dead generations. The search for a cure of 
 our actual diseases is very different from that of an 
 amateur student or of a professional man. It is as a 
 record of man's unchanging characteristics, imposing 
 the same duties and laws of duty, the same rewards 
 and penalties, and the same hopes and fears, that it 
 becomes a book alike for all ages. The seed-truths 
 of man, like the acorns of the first and last genera- 
 tion of oaks, have an undying life. What God enacted 
 for Adam and all previous individuals and nations, has 
 the same significance for us as for them. Those who 
 receive the gospel in power as well as in word, and 
 those who preach it with a personal application, are 
 those who get from it the greatest good to themselves, 
 and do with it the greatest good to others. And our 
 object in these pages is to set forth a few of the under- 
 lying truths, which, from being universal to our race, 
 are as useful and as essential to us as to any going 
 before. 
 
 We have seen what it is to have heaven in our 
 souls, and what it is to lose it ; and we come now to 
 consider what follows from so great a loss. 
 
 There are few subjects on which we deceive our- 
 
 144 
 
The Spirits in Prison. 145 
 
 selves more than upon this. We think of the death 
 penalty inflicted upon Adam as bodily dissolution, or 
 as a great physical fact like a public execution, in 
 which not only man, but the beasts and the elements 
 of nature, alike participated. We suppose that death, 
 as an extinction of organic life, then began its reign 
 over everything that hath breath ; that brutes had 
 else been immortal ; and, if brutes, why not trees, 
 foliage, fruit, and every product of the soil ? Why 
 not ascribe to sin vegetable as well as animal death ? 
 Milton represents the animals as then changing their 
 nature, the hitherto docile lion now beginning to growl, 
 and the placid skies to be overcast and weeping sad 
 drops upon the face of the earth, a sort of weeping, by 
 the way, that no form of life can well dispense with. 
 But we fail to find in the prologue of Moses anything 
 of all this. The day succeeding man's sin opened 
 with just as sweet a dawn ; the teeming earth exhaled 
 as delightful a fragrance, and has to this day scenes 
 that might be copied for a picture of Eden ; the land- 
 scape was sown with pearls and gold ; and Eve was 
 no doubt outwardly as beautiful, and Adam as majestic 
 in form and stature, as before the fatal deed was done. 
 The birds warbled melodious notes from overhanging 
 branches ; the lambs disported themselves in luxuriant 
 pastures ; and the heavenly bodies poured radiant light 
 upon the joyous scene. These blessings have been 
 attendant upon the human race in its subsequent 
 career, and how should they have been suspended on 
 the occasion of the first sin ? The avenging angel did 
 not strike down the guilty pair, nor inflict upon nature 
 any sudden convulsion. The bowers of Eden were 
 still their hiding-place. 
 
 To get round these facts, and still preserve the idea 
 
 K 
 
146 Seed- Tru ths. 
 
 of bodily death as the threatened penalty, various 
 schemes have been devised, such as a reprieve of 
 threescore years and ten, or death in posse if not in 
 esse, or assured if not at once inflicted ; and thus much 
 special pleading has been resorted to in accounting for 
 the fact that the penalty threatened was not inflicted 
 on the day of the sin. But, after all, was it not in- 
 flicted in manner and form as intended in the threaten- 
 ing ? Was not the changed state of man's soul, from 
 the moment he came voluntarily under the ruling of 
 his fleshly nature, an infinitely greater death penalty 
 than a thousand bodily dissolutions, or any imaginable 
 amount of physical disaster ? When shall we learn 
 that God's revelation is a thing of mind, and not of 
 matter ? Its rewards and punishments infinitely ex- 
 ceed all our ideas of a paradisiacal millennium amid the 
 groves and material delights of a restored world, or of 
 a lake of literal fire and brimstone. No outward scene 
 of horror can compare with the loss of God's sensible 
 favour, happy communion with heavenly beings, or 
 the inward peace and joy of a rightly regulated soul. 
 These made Eden ; and the loss of them was succeeded 
 by a hell whose anguish no outward alleviations could 
 effectually mitigate. Who can estimate the amount of 
 woe of which the soul of man has been the seat ? It 
 is a boundless, bottomless sea of agony. 
 
 The divine word contemplates our state under a 
 variety of figures, imprisonment, bondage, servitude, 
 impotence, death. Deliverance from it is 'liberty to 
 captives, the opening of the prison to them that are 
 bound, proclaiming the acceptable year of the Lord ' as 
 a year of release from debt and enslavement. 1 ' Who- 
 soever committeth sin is the servant of sin ; and the 
 
 1 Luke iv. 18, 19 ; Isa. xlii. 7, xxxv. 5, xlix. 8, 9 ; / . h. :.\. 11, 12. 
 
The Spirits in Prison. 147 
 
 servant abideth not in the house for ever/ but is cast 
 out of the family as no part of it ; while ' the Son 
 abideth ever,' as homogeneous with its members, and 
 an inheritor of their privileges. 1 Such is our Lord's 
 interpretation of this bondage. It is the extinction 
 from the soul of that which constitutes its free life in 
 God. But He adds : ' If ye continue in my words, then 
 are ye my disciples indeed ; and ye shall know the 
 truth, and the truth shall make you free/ 'If the 
 Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free 
 indeed.' 2 What can be intended by these words, but 
 the freedom of a soul under God's ruling, or guided in 
 all things by the true and the right ; and the enslave- 
 ment of one in whom lust, and appetite, and ambition, 
 and malignity, and every dark passion, reign unchecked 
 and uncontrolled ? ' The liberty wherewith Christ 
 maketh us free ' is deliverance from this hell within. 3 
 
 The impotence and death of this state are set forth 
 in terms equally graphic : ' The heart of this people 
 is waxed gross,' or fleshly and brutal, 'and their ears 
 are dull of hearing, and their eyes have they closed ; 
 lest they should see with their eyes, and hear with 
 their ears, and understand with their hearts, and be 
 converted, and I should heal them.' ' God has given 
 them the eyes of slumber ; ' or torpidity and insensibi- 
 lity to spiritual things have ensued from giving them- 
 selves up to the flesh and the world, and they are as 
 impotent as if born without eyes. And to complete 
 the dark picture, they are represented as ' dead in tres- 
 passes and sins/ a deadness that consists in ' walking 
 according to the course of this world, according to the 
 prince of the power of the air, the spirit that worketh 
 in the children of disobedience/ and therefore purely 
 
 1 John viii. 34, 35. 2 John iii. 31, 32, 36. 3 Gal. v. 1. 
 
1 48 Seed- Truths. 
 
 the result of coming under a fleshly dominion. No 
 power but that which raised Christ from the dead can 
 recover them from this state. 1 
 
 Peter took a like comprehensive view of the con- 
 dition into which the race relapsed at the fall : ' For 
 Christ also hath suffered for us in the flesh, the just 
 for the unjust, being put t& death in the flesh, but 
 quickened by the Spirit ; by which He went also and 
 preached to the spirits in prison; which sometime 
 were disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God 
 waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a pre- 
 paring, wherein few, that is, eight souls, were saved by 
 water. The like figure whereunto, baptism, doth also 
 now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the 
 flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God), 
 by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who is gone into 
 heaven, and is on the right hand of God ; angels, and 
 authorities, and powers being made subject unto Him/ 2 
 We quote this passage, not for critical disquisition, nor 
 to attempt the settlement of its disputed points, but to 
 call attention to a few points which bear directly upon 
 our subject. First, that the antediluvians were spirits 
 in prison, not in the sense of being outwardly locked 
 up either in a future hell, in the heart of the earth, in 
 Hades, or in any such confinement ; for there is a total 
 lack of evidence that Christ ever preached in any such 
 prison. Second, that still it is Christ's mission to 
 preach to the imprisoned spirits spoken of. Third, 
 their imprisonment is in some way connected with the 
 ill tli of the flesh, from which they are relieved by 
 st's resurrection power as represented in a baptism 
 which denotes a conscience or spiritual purification. 
 Fourth, that in heaven, as head of those thus raised up 
 L 17-21, ii. 1 ; Ruin, vi 4-11. * 1 Pet. iii. 18-22. 
 
The Spirits in Prison. 149 
 
 with Him, He will have the supremacy of angels, 
 authorities, and powers. Here we have a comprehen- 
 sive view of the state into which the human family 
 relapsed, as an imprisonment in the flesh and the 
 world, so dominating them as to deprive them of their 
 free life in God, a freedom never more to be enjoyed 
 till the Son makes them free, and they become spiritual 
 men. 
 
 The apostle here writes of sin as a physician of a 
 disease which is alike in all ages, taking his example 
 of it from aggravated cases thousands of years ago, to 
 show its symptoms and its malignity. In the next 
 chapter he changes the figure from preaching to spirits 
 in prison to 'preaching to them that are dead, that 
 they might be judged according to men in the flesh, 
 but live according to God in the spirit/ 1 Their fleshly 
 state is arraigned, condemned, and executed, as it were, 
 by gospel truth brought home to the conscience ; but 
 out of their death comes forth the new man in Christ, 
 whose life is 'according to God in the spirit.' 2 A like 
 comprehensive view of the remedy preached as the 
 same in all ages, is presented in the first chapter of 
 this epistle : ' Eedeemed by the precious blood of 
 Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot ; 
 who verily was fore-ordained before the foundation of 
 the world, but was manifested in these last times for 
 you, who by Him do believe in God, that raised Him 
 from the dead, and gave Him glory; that your faith 
 and hope might be in God.' 3 The blood of Christ 
 here represents a spiritual power working in all the 
 
 1 1 Pet. iv. 6. 
 
 2 1 Pet. iv. 6, with which compare Gal. ii. 19, 20, Rom. vi 11, 
 2 Cor. v. 15, etc. 
 
 3 1 Pet. i 19-21. 
 
150 Seed- Truths. 
 
 ages, to relieve the imprisoned, and the dead in fleshli- 
 ness and worldliness, and to raise them up to ' laith 
 and hope in God,' or to a spiritual and heavenly life. 
 
 What was this imprisonment of the antediluvians 
 which the apostle employs to represent that of men in 
 all ages ? It was fleshly lust intensified, killing out 
 every devout and noble sentiment, and becoming the 
 worst of imprisonments and deaths. 'They ate, they 
 drank, they married and were given in marriage.' 1 
 The sons of God even were ensnared by the voluptuous 
 daughters of men, repressing and extinguishing their 
 small remains of spiritual vitality, and rendering it 
 unavailing to their children, who became the ncpliilim? 
 giants, ' strong of appetite,' 3 only the more skilful in 
 wickedness for what few religious truths they inherited. 
 Every imagination of the thoughts of their heart was 
 evil continually ; all flesh was corrupted by this beastly 
 life ; violence too, as usual, went hand in hand with 
 lust, of which the deluge was a fitting catastrophe. 4 
 The ten generations preceding the flood, having few 
 arts, giving limited attention to government, and to a 
 great extent without armies, courts, diplomacies, organi- 
 zations, or other means of diversified interest, such as 
 grew up among the descendants of Noah, would seem 
 to have lived merely a bestial life, with a few rare ex- 
 ceptions. This was their imprisonment. After the 
 flood it was otherwise, and men became warriors, 
 hunters, builders of cities and states; thus finding 
 channels for their teeming activity, which rendered 
 them no less worldly, no less dead in sin, but still more 
 conservative, and therefore not so fitting an illustra- 
 
 1 Matt. xxiv. 37-30. 
 
 * Tin- uonl H-ji/iiliin means monstrous births. 
 
 Ia. IvL 11. * Ucn. vi. 1-13. 
 
The Spirits in Prison. 151 
 
 tion of Peter's idea of sin as a state of imprisonment 
 to fleshly lusts, and death to all spiritual and holy 
 affections. 
 
 ' The spirits in prison,' like men in whom slavery 
 has extinguished all manly aspirations, had lost the 
 idea and the desire of spiritual freedom. Such ideas 
 and desires were dead in them, constituting the worst 
 feature of their imprisonment. Children stolen by 
 the Indians from the border settlements of America, 
 have in some instances lost all notions of civilised life, 
 and become savages in their feelings, predilections, and 
 habits, to the extent of being irreclaimable by their 
 sorrowing friends. Attempts to change their nature 
 after finding them, by introducing them to the customs 
 and usages of civilisation, have proved a failure, and 
 at the first opportunity they would escape again to the 
 freedom of their wilderness life. In such cases, some- 
 thing more than a knowledge of the contrast between 
 savagery and civilisation is necessary to reclamation. 
 They must in some way be brought to view their con- 
 dition from a civilised standpoint, just as, in the 
 fabulous doctrine that human souls transmigrate into 
 animals, a man who has become a dog, for instance, 
 must be made to feel as a man before he can know 
 the degradation of a dog's life. While the nature of a 
 dog is still in him, how can he aspire to anything 
 better ? So men must have a changed nature, or must 
 in some way be made to conceive the degradation and 
 misery of being carnal, and the excellence of a spiritual 
 and holy life, before they can know what they are, 
 and what they must become in order to be saved. 
 This is the great point to be gained by preaching to 
 the spirits in prison, and to men that are dead, that 
 the quickening power of the Spirit attending the word 
 
152 Seed- Truths. 
 
 may bring them to a sense of their lost estate, and of 
 the only way of salvation. 
 
 The idea of the prison, of the death, or of ' the sin, 
 the most mysterious and the most sorrowful of all 
 ideas/ as De Quincey says, must be infused into a 
 man's soul, before the work of reclaiming him to holi- 
 ness can commence. ' Sin is a taint in the individual, 
 not through any local disease of its own, but through 
 a scrofula equally diffused through the infinite family 
 of man/ Conviction of sin is not merely the feeling 
 of specific wrongs, as theft, lying, murder, or drunken- 
 ness, under the remorse of which men's consciences 
 sometimes rankle, though this may be included; 
 but beyond all this, it is a feeling that our nature is 
 corrupt, and that when we 'would do good, evil is 
 present with us/ 'We are shapen in iniquity, and 
 conceived in sin/ are 'the degenerated plants of a 
 strange vine/ and our 'whole head is sick, and our 
 whole heart faint/ 1 Our nature is dominated by the 
 flesh, or by natural ideas and interests ; and there is 
 no redemption for us, except that which consists in re- 
 establishing the spiritual ascendency over us in which 
 the race was originally created. Sin is a constitution, 
 a body, an organism, called ' the old man/ c the natural 
 man/ and ' the body of the sins of the flesh/ and as 
 such is propagated from father to son, the same as 
 any other quality of our common manhood. 2 This is 
 as much a physiological fact as a doctrine of divine 
 revelation. It is the ascendency of the outer nature, 
 causing us more anxiety as to what we shall eat, drink, 
 wear, how we shall rise to wealth and power, and 
 
 1 Ps. li. 6 ; Jer. ii. 21 ; Isa. i. 5. 
 
 Rom. vi. 6 ; Eph. iv. 22 ; Col. iii. 9 ; 1 Cor. ii. 14, 15 ; Col. ii. 11 ; 
 fioui. v. 15-21. 
 
The Spirits in Prison. 153 
 
 transcend others, than how we shall lay up treasure 
 in heaven or be rich towards God. 1 Man, as made to 
 be ruled by spirit, could not become wholly earthly, 
 without entailing a nature and circumstances upon his 
 posterity to make them so too. 
 
 The account given by Moses of the manner in 
 which man glided into this carnal state is worthy of 
 particular notice. Though all at once, or on the day 
 of the sin, according to the threatening, it was by 
 successive stages. In symbolizing them to us, acts are 
 ascribed to God which were His only in the sense of 
 their being wrought out by those laws which He had 
 established in our nature, as the architect whose mind 
 supplied the model is said to build a structure on 
 which he never struck a hammer. Thus God drove 
 out the Canaanites, and He drove the Jews into cap- 
 tivity, when the first was effected by the hard-fought 
 battles of Israel, and the other by the Chaldee in- 
 vasion. 2 So the sufferings of the church are Christ's 
 sufferings, and those who despise His servants despise 
 Him, because His Spirit is in them as the moving 
 power. 3 
 
 'God walking in the garden in the wind of the 
 day/ as in the original, or when the evening breeze 
 had tempered the heat, denotes the subsidence of those 
 passions which had impelled to the sin, and preparing 
 the sinner to hear the voice of God as formerly ; but 
 O how different the impression ! What had been his 
 heaven, was now his hell. He skulked ; he hid him- 
 self among the trees of the garden; he resorted to a 
 
 1 Matt. vi. 19, 20 ; Luke xii. 21. 
 8 Josh. xiii. 14, 15 ; Jer. viii. 3. 
 3 CoL i. 24 ; 1 Thess. iv. 8 ; Luke x. 16 ; Acts ix. 4, 'Why per* 
 
 secutest tliou me ? ' 
 
154 Seed- Truths. 
 
 subterfuge to cover his naked deformity ; and thus 
 reflection put him upon an escape from evils which he 
 felt to be impending. 
 
 Well, I'll hide the body in some hole, 
 Till that the duke gives order lor his burial : 
 And when -I have my meed, / will away ; 
 For this will out, and 1 must not stay.' 
 
 Did this murderer wait for a pursuing executioner 
 before making his escape ? No, there is a law through 
 which God more speedily and more effectually works 
 out His ordeal of trial ; and that took effect in Adam 
 the moment reflection succeeded to the vehemence of 
 passion, and he sought concealment. Moses and Shake- 
 speare agree as to this feature of human nature. 
 
 The adjudication equally reflects principles common 
 to mankind. It began with Adam, who charged the 
 blame on Eve, and she on the serpent, who accepted 
 the charge in silence. The hopeless criminal, instead 
 of casting the blame on others, glories in it as all his 
 own, and relates with gusto his hardihood and bravery 
 in doing the deed. He asks no partner to share his 
 hellish honors; nor did Satan on this memorable 
 occasion. In the judgment the order is reversed, and 
 the demon is first to be doomed to dust as his home 
 and his meat, and to final destruction under the heel 
 of the woman's Seed ; the woman is next given over to 
 sorrow and subjection ; while the man is last assigned 
 to toil and sweat in extracting bread from a thorn and 
 thistle infested soil, and to the dust from which he 
 was taken, as his only road to that immortality into 
 which his nature had else been commuted by a process 
 as happy as it would have been glorious. Our change 
 from mortal to immortal is now painful, and we arc all 
 oui- lives in bondage through fear of death. But \viili a 
 
The Spirits in Prison. 155 
 
 sinless race, it would no doubt have been anticipated 
 as the nuptial or coronation day of the soul ; and it 
 becomes so even to us in the full exercise of a faith 
 enabling us to say, ' death, where is thy sting ? 
 grave, where is thy victory ? ' l 
 
 The expulsion from Eden resulted from a necessary- 
 separation of spiritual life from one in a carnal state. 2 
 Ko power could perpetuate such a life as that of Eden 
 in those who have assumed an attitude of hostility to 
 God. The fall of man is not an abstraction, but a 
 great fact of history. It is indeed represented to us 
 by imagery to a certain extent symbolical, but it is 
 none the less a matter of fact. Even this imagery 
 is suited to the idea of imprisoned convicts, or to 
 criminals under restraint. What is uppermost in the 
 minds of men thus situated ? Is it not the dread of 
 justice and of the executioner, and also a desire to 
 escape ? The dread of justice is a silent, sullen feeling, 
 which is rarely expressed, as to acknowledge a fear of 
 justice would be a confession of guilt. In conversing 
 with criminals, I have found the claim of innocence 
 almost universal ; but the desire of escape is an active 
 loquacious principle, ready for any subterfuge to elude 
 justice. Plea of innocence, turning State's evidence, 
 breaking jail, nothing comes amiss on which hangs 
 the least hope of deliverance. These two ever-present 
 forces in a guilty mind are, no doubt, brought to view 
 by the symbols of the cherubim and the flaming 
 sword at the eastern gate of Eden to guard the way to 
 the tree of lives, the representative of spiritual freedom 
 and life in God. ' So God drove out the man ; and 
 He placed at the east of Eden cherubim, and a flaming 
 sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the 
 1 1 Cor. xv. 55. * Geii. iii. 23 \ Rom. vii. 14. 
 
156 Seed-Truths. 
 
 tree of life.' l To Adam, Eden was liberty ; expulsion, 
 slavery : he and his posterity were thenceforth spirits 
 in prison. 
 
 The cherub, the symbol of a retributive Providence, 
 denotes power, majesty, and avenging justice. Those 
 at the gate of Eden are no doubt a symbol of the 
 forces in criminal natures which indispose them to 
 innocence, and which therefore render it impossible for 
 them to resume their free life in God. They cannot, 
 because in their vitiated state they will not. The 
 idea of God is repulsive to them, and how then should 
 they be attracted towards Him ? ' God riding upon a 
 cherub ' denotes rapid execution in His works of power 
 and punishment 2 Ezekiel's vision gives a graphic idea 
 of the various- agencies executing God's decrees. The 
 whirlwind, the flame like amber, the variously formed 
 living creatures, the man, the lion, the ox, the eagle, 
 with wings having hands under them, all moving with 
 wheels touching the earth, or connected with man's 
 material life, and impelled by one mind, these are 
 some of the features by which God's infinitely diversi- 
 fied providence over a guilty and imprisoned race are 
 set forth in prophetic vision. 8 The great power in this 
 complicated mechanism was the unseen but living soul, 
 showing that in nature as well as in man mind is 
 the 'supreme force. 
 
 The cherubim, as God's all -comprehending provi- 
 dence, are a terror to guilty men. They are never re- 
 presented as speaking, except in the language of events. 
 Those of the Jewish temple were gigantic human figures, 
 
 Gen. iii. 24. 
 
 * 2 Sam. xx ii. 11 ; Ps, xcix. 1. 
 
 3 Kx.-k. i. ; Fldi. xi. 27. [In vinvnf this invisible providence 
 
 eiulimd.J 
 
The Spirits in Prison. 157 
 
 standing in the darkness of the holy of holies, where 
 God had His throne and His law, unseen to mortal 
 eyes, continuing from age to age as conservators of the 
 divine government against the iinpotent opposition of 
 men and devils. At the gate of Eden they sat, too, in 
 solemn silence, as time notched its centuries. No 
 word proceeds from their lips ; no emotion agitates 
 them amid the wrecks of generations or of empires 
 passing under their view; no vacillation of purpose 
 disturbs them in executing the eternal decrees. 
 
 It is a fact worthy of note, that the winged bulls 
 exhumed at Nineveh stood to the living generations 
 who chiselled them out of stone as guardians of their 
 gateways ; that the Egyptian and Grecian sphinxes, 
 and, I believe, the Scandinavian griffins, and also the 
 fabulous animals of India, performed a like office. 
 They were invested with attributes of terror to inter- 
 lopers ; and, from the Grecian story of (Edipus and the 
 sphinx, there can be no doubt that they were among 
 heathen nations a type of man's fears in the hand of 
 an inexorable Providence. (Edipus as the murderer of 
 his father, the husband of his mother, the father of his 
 brothers and sisters, the persecuted of his sons, and 
 then voluntarily blinded to hide from him these evils, 
 sets forth a pagan's idea of the malignant influences 
 working in providence. I suppose there are no visible 
 links to trace this idea as represented by these fabu- 
 lous animals to the same source with the cherubim of 
 Moses ; and yet one cannot but feel, from the use made 
 of them to guard gateways, and the general dread with 
 which they were associated, that they must have had 
 the same origin. The feeling of not being right with 
 God is alike prevalent among all nations ; and can we 
 wonder that it should be expressed under a like sym- 
 
158 Seed- Truths. 
 
 "holism? Is it not as a law-work essential in re- 
 demption ? 
 
 The sword of flame appeals to the universal desire 
 of imprisoned criminals to effect their escape. It sup- 
 poses the gateway still open, but guarded by the che- 
 rubim against those who had no right to enter; while 
 the sword denotes authority and illumination, to assist 
 those who come in the right way. They were to ' keep ' 
 the way of the tree of life, not to close it. This sword 
 suspended over the gateway, and ' constantly turning 
 itself,' as Gesenius renders the passage, ' reflects light 
 not only within the garden, but to those without who 
 would enter. It is a light to assist the spirits in prison 
 to effect their escape, and to return and eat of the tree 
 of life, and live for ever.' This is a gospel for the 
 imprisoned and the dead ' a light shining in a dark 
 place ' the voice of the Son of God calling the dead to 
 life, arraigning and condemning them, as 'men yet in 
 the flesh, that they may live according to God in the 
 spirit ; ' and thus the sword of flame can mean nothing 
 but God's truth preached ' in demonstration of the Spirit 
 and of power ' to men in their fleshly state, to restore 
 them to a heavenly life. 1 The gospel is a sword, not 
 only as spoken with authority, and unlike the scribes, 
 but as being an executioner to kill as well as to make 
 alive, to ' crucify the flesh, with its affections and lusts,' 
 as the only mode of a sinner's escape from impending 
 wrath. We must die to sin before we can live unto 
 God ; we must leave our worldly life before we can 
 enter into the strait and narrow gate, and thus find our 
 way back to ' the tree of lives,' and eat, and live for ever. 2 
 
 1 2 Pet. i. 19 ; John v. 25 ; 1 P-t. iv. 6 ; 1 Cor. ii. 4. 
 * Mutt. vii. 29 ; Ual. v. 24 ; Hum. vi. 6 ; Mutt. vii. 13, 14 ; Luke 
 xiiL 24, 
 
The Spirits in Prison. 159 
 
 This idea of the gospel as a killing power as well as a 
 power to make alive is too obvious a feature of revealed 
 religion to need further comment. 
 
 The word of God is often represented as a sword. 1 
 In this application of the symbol of Moses, therefore, 
 we are not fanciful, but are fully sustained by the 
 interpretation which inspired men put upon their own 
 symbols. It is a two-edged sword, to signify, no 
 doubt, that it cuts towards the interests of man as 
 a citizen of this world and of heaven. It asserts 
 our duties towards men and towards God, and cuts 
 off our vices as well as our impieties. The same idea 
 seems to be included in the ' tongues ' of fire being 
 cloven which sat upon each of the apostles on the day 
 of Pentecost. Each tongue darted jets of flame in 
 opposite directions, to indicate not only a power to pro- 
 pagate truth, but truth of man in his embodied as well 
 as disembodied relations. Though some critics give a 
 different interpretation, this to the writer seems more 
 analogous to the use of the term in other places, as 
 well as to the contents of the divine word as bearing 
 upon two worlds. The sword of flame turning every 
 way opened the dispensation of symbol; the cloven 
 tongues of flame, the dispensation of power. The one 
 reflected a measure of light upon all the nations, their 
 pagan ideas variously perverted being borrowed from 
 it ; while the other has reflected some truth over the 
 whole area of human civilisation. ' That was the true 
 Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into 
 the world.' 2 ' Its turning itself continually ' is like 
 the flame of a lighthouse shining far off on the 
 
 1 Eph. vi. 17 ; Heb. iv. 12 ; Deut. xxxiii. 29 ; Rev. i. 16, ii. 12, 
 xix. 15. 
 * JoLu i. 9. 
 
1 60 Seed- Truths. 
 
 ocean expanse, to guide the passing marine of all 
 nations. 
 
 Among the thousand religions and inventions de- 
 vised for the soul imprisoned in fleshly lusts and 
 worldly ideas to effect its escape, this is the only one 
 that accomplishes the object. This goes direct to the 
 root of the evil in a heart alienated from God, and 
 teaches us that we must be born again in order to enter 
 the kingdom of heaven. Ceremonies, priestly absolu- 
 tion, the cattle on a thousand hills, the first-born of our 
 flesh for the sin of our soul, are without avail here. 
 As our bondage is enslavement to the flesh, our freedom 
 is in the spirit of adoption, crying, Abba, Father. 1 
 1 Joliii iii. 4-7 ; Fs. 1. 8-15 j Hie. vi. 7, 8 ; Rom. viii. 15, 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 DOCTRINE IN HISTORY. 
 
 THE Old Testament! what can we find in that 
 suited to our present civilisation ? Who can 
 live as Abraham did, or utilize Moses' obsolete laws ? 
 Who would not abhor to kill off a whole race, as 
 Samuel the Amalekites ; or to hang sons for the sins of 
 their father, as David did the house of Saul ? Who 
 dances in worship except fanatics, or observes ox-killing 
 ceremonials except at a political barbecue ? Are such 
 stories fit to read to our families or congregations ? 
 Such is the language and feeling of many, and we 
 have heard like feelings expressed even by Christians 
 of intelligence and piety. The Old Testament out of 
 date since the New came into vogue ! Indeed, why 
 then did the Son of God and His apostles make it the 
 text of so many sermons and epistles ? 
 
 The error of this reasoning is in conceiving that 
 a doctrine could exist without a history, or in failing 
 to consider that history, in working its way into doc- 
 trine, necessarily allies itself to what accords to the 
 thought and usage of the living generations. Thought 
 in a child is evolved from sensations, and not sensa- 
 tions from thoughts. It is several years before a 
 thought becomes so grooved into a child's mind as to 
 be a memory of his after life. Why did not the plough 
 idea start up into' its present perfection thousands of 
 
 L 
 
1 6 2 Seed- Tru ths. 
 
 years ago ? Why this long history of clumsy con- 
 structions of that useful implement running through 
 so many ages \ Why did not some statesman a thou- 
 sand years ago invent the British Constitution, and 
 thus prevent the wars of the Eoses, and Henrys, and 
 Stuarts, and Georges, and Long Parliament this infinite 
 flow of human blood ? Why did not Pastor Eobinson 
 put the American Constitution into the hand of the 
 Mayflower Pilgrims, to be worked up to in the New 
 World ? 
 
 The truth is, a doctrine without a history is like a 
 constitution without national development, a thing to 
 dream over, as Plato over his ideal republic, or as the 
 French savans over their ne plus ultra governments in 
 the time of their Eevolution ; but not a thing to walk 
 on all fours in this matter-of-fact world. Creeds, like 
 constitutions, become a fixed fact only as they are 
 shaped by history. The Nicene Creed embodied ages of 
 philosophical discussion ; religious controversy, national 
 war and diplomacy, and the great interests of Christen- 
 dom, giving it birth, and form, and perpetuity. The 
 Westminster Confession was backed by Presbyterian 
 history; and the Thirty-nine Articles by an English 
 National Church which, under Eome, had had a thou- 
 sand years' growth and formation. The Methodist 
 Book of Discipline took form from a widespread and 
 powerful religious movement, and from a series of 
 antecedent events involving the action of thousands of 
 earnest minds. History, and usage, and the Bible, 
 answer to the Baptists, Quakers, and some other sects, 
 all the purposes of denominational cohesion without a 
 general creed, showing that standards of faith and 
 practice are quite as dependent upon fact as upon 
 doctrine. What would Eume be without her history, 
 
Doctrine in History. 163 
 
 her material forms, or her vast accumulations in money, 
 cathedrals, sacred foundations, and priestly orders, vest- 
 ments, and prestige ? 
 
 So of revealed religion as contained in Holy Scrip- 
 ture : as an abstraction, it would have but a feeble hold 
 upon us, if any at all ; but as a history flowing onward 
 with the actual current of human events, it has grown 
 to a power wide as the world. But if it had been 
 given to man in scientific definitions, or in the care- 
 fully-worded articles of a creed, or in the essay-style of 
 those who object to the barbarous record of the Old 
 Testament, it would have been as incomprehensible and 
 unavailing as Emerson's lectures to a congregation of 
 Digger Indians. The Bible as it is shows the out- 
 working of the real forces in human nature from the 
 beginning of time, together with God's various modes 
 of supernatural illumination, to point out its wander- 
 ings and direct it in the way it should go. The causes 
 producing the history are the antecedent forces in the 
 case, just as the plough idea is grounded in the neces- 
 sities of agriculture, constitutions in the demand for 
 social organization, and religion in a spiritual faculty, 
 which, however repressed, will for ever assert its claims 
 in one way or another. And as the history follows the 
 causes producing it, so doctrine comes after the history, 
 and supposes an age of reflection and of ripe intellec- 
 tual culture, like that of the man in working up into 
 poetry, philosophy, or instruction, the feelings and 
 fancies of his childhood. 
 
 Thus of Christian doctrine. Up to the time of 
 Moses there was no prescribed creed or ritual. Sacri- 
 fices were merely free-will offerings, prompted by devout 
 minds, but required by no recorded commandment. 
 The patriarch who had special tokens of God's presence, 
 
1 64 Seed-Truths. 
 
 or an abundant harvest, gave expression to his grateful 
 or glad emotions by the killing of animals, or the offer- 
 ing to God of fruits and libations, the same as when 
 he was made happy by a friend's visits or benefactions. 
 Thus Cain and Abel, on some such special occasion 
 the one from a receipt of worldly good, in which his 
 heart was bound up, and the other in view of spiritual 
 truths opening upon him with unusual clearness, and 
 kindling his devout emotions brought each his free- 
 will offering. The different result to Cain from what 
 it was to Abel arose, I think, not from wliat they 
 sacrificed, as many suppose, for the offerings which 
 both brought were alike required under the law of 
 Moses, but from the different spirit and character of 
 the two men. ' By faith Abel offered unto God a more 
 acceptable sacrifice than Cain,' faith not as a doctrine 
 of the reason, but faith as the power for a spiritual 
 and heavenly life. 1 But the history of Cain shows him 
 to have been as worldly in his religion as in his malig- 
 nity, and that, like the son of the bond-woman, he was 
 born after the flesh, and not by promise. 2 This differ- 
 ence of character made the history of the two men so 
 different, their offerings being alike spontaneous, but 
 from dissimilar motives. 
 
 That sacrifice arose rather from God's laws working 
 in human nature than from specific enactment, would 
 appear from other remarkable cases. Thus Abraham, 
 at his tent-door in the plains of Mamre, hastened to 
 prepare a feast for the three heavenly messengers by 
 whose presence he was made happy. The ' calf, tender 
 and good,' the hastily-baked cakes of Sarah, the butter 
 and inilk, the water of purification, those usual accom- 
 paniments of a sacrifice, were soon in readiness, and 
 1 Heb. 3d. 4; Gcu. iv. 4-7. Gal. iv. 23. 
 
Doctrine in History. 165 
 
 the patriarch stood under the shade of his oak to wait 
 and tend while the meal was served to his guests. 1 All 
 was spontaneous, gushing up from a fountain of spiritual 
 delight in the soul, and in obedience to no other law. 
 Such was Gideon's sacrifice, when -he besought his celes- 
 tial visitor not to depart till he came bringing a present, 
 and set it before him. He, too, ' brought unleavened 
 cakes, and meat in a basket, and broth in a pot,' which 
 the angel dissolved into flame by fire coming out of 
 the rock, when he took his departure. 2 And Manoah, 
 when made happy by the promise of a son, ' took a kid, 
 with a meat-offering, and offered it upon a rock unto the 
 Lord ; and the angel did wondrously ; and Manoah and 
 his wife looked on,' ' for he ascended in the flame of the 
 altar.' 3 Though there be no divine command originating 
 sacrifices, with so many like examples before us, how 
 can we doubt that God instituted them through the con- 
 vivial principle of man's nature, called into- exercise in 
 celebrating special visitations from heaven ? 
 
 The patriarchal history is full of these gracious 
 visitations from God, filling devout souls with ineffable 
 delight : they gave expression to their feelings in the 
 universal language of such occasions, by the killing of 
 animals, by offerings of fruits and libations, by solemn 
 assemblies, sometimes by music and dancing, much the 
 same as when they were made happy by the visits of 
 their earthly friends. 4 The paschal supper and the 
 Jewish feasts were provided for by law, not as origi- 
 nating sacrifices, but as reducing to form and doctrine 
 the results of a spontaneous impulse which had wrought 
 in holy men from the beginning of time. 
 
 1 Gen. xviii. 1-8. 2 Judg. vi. 11-21. 3 Judg. xiii. 19, 20. 
 * Lev. iv. 15 ; Judg. xxi. 21 ; Deut. xvi. 14-17 ; Ex. xv. 20, 21; 
 2 Sam. vi. 12-14. 
 
1 66 Seed- Truths. 
 
 The corrupted ritualism of heathen nations had 
 doubtless a similar origin, being either derived from 
 the early patriarchs or from their own imaginary visits 
 from their gods. Agamemnon feasted his heroes in 
 honour of the gods to celebrate his victories. The 
 gods of Olympus had their feasts, when they were 
 excited to laughter by limping Vulcan acting as cup- 
 bearer, which were no doubt types of the royal cele- 
 brations in Homer's time, rather than of anything 
 occurring among the celestials. Heathen offerings 
 were largesses given to the malignant divinities, such 
 as those with which they bought the favour of their 
 tyrants, and sometimes consisted of human sacrifices. 1 
 They hoped thus to commute with Heaven for the 
 punishment of their crimes, and buy the privilege of 
 sinning, like the Catholics, in paying for priestly dis- 
 pensations. These tendencies of human nature are 
 universal ; and can we wonder that sacrifices should 
 have arisen without an express command ? They 
 have a history in the workings of the human soul, 
 just as every thought in a child's mind has a long 
 series of antecedent sensations, sympathies, and en- 
 deavours. 
 
 Jesus took advantage of this feature of human 
 nature, in giving us His last supper as a perpetual 
 memorial of Himself. As in the old dispensation 
 redeeming truths, in anticipation of their fuller revela- 
 tion by the Messiah, were symbolized by sacrifices, 
 feasts, and various ceremonials, so we celebrate them 
 as accomplished facts which we would ever keep in 
 rnind. Our memorial is simple, deriving its signifi- 
 cance from the greatness of the facts, and not from the 
 imposing character of the ceremonial The whole 
 
 1 2 Kin-s iii. 27. 
 
Doctrine in History. 167 
 
 ritual worship of holy men from Adam to Christ, 
 however, had in view the reality of redemption as a 
 recovery from the world, the flesh, and the devil, to 
 walk with God as Enoch 1 did. They had the truth 
 as an experience of inward power, though not as a 
 symbolized doctrine. Abel, Noah, Abraham, and 
 others, were priests of the Most High each in his 
 day, who resorted to sacrifice in the exercise of their 
 function, and to express their joyful fellowship with 
 heavenly beings. ' God had respect unto them ; ' the 
 witness of it they had in their inmost being ; it was 
 like the smiles of grace still felt in believing souls, 
 the Lord testifying of their gifts ; 2 and they constitute 
 an order of events which are the most potential facts 
 of history. They are God's tokens, not by creeds and 
 laws, but in what is antecedent to both, except the 
 creed and law of supreme love and obedience to God. 
 They are the white stone with a new name, which no 
 man knoweth, saving he that receiveth it ; a token of 
 hospitality which gives unfailing access to the hidden 
 manna that really comes down from heaven. 3 Abel's 
 experience was that of Bunyan's Pilgrim at a view of the 
 cross, when his burden left him ; it was the same with 
 Jacob's in Luz, and of Augustine and Edwards, which 
 have before been noticed. A like experience in the 
 Mayflower Pilgrims took them to New England, to 
 realize among nature's wilds and savage men their 
 own exalted ideal of spiritual life in God. It wrought 
 powerfully in Luther, and Knox, and Calvin, and 
 others, to precipitate the great Eeformation. It was 
 fire in their bones, and they could but speak and 
 act in setting forth God's truth to an ungodly age. 4 
 
 1 Gen. v. 22. 2 Heb. xi. 4. 
 
 3 Rev. ii. 17 ; John vi. 32, 33. * Jer. xx. 9 ; Pa. xxxix. 3. 
 
i68 Seed-Truths. 
 
 God's power in the soul will find expression, as by the 
 sacrificed lanib in Abel, the ladder in Jacob, the lie- 
 formation in Luther and his coadjutors; in the reli- 
 gious settlement of the JSTew World by earnest men ; 
 in the field preaching of Whitfield and the Wesleys ; 
 in the missions of Brainerd, Martyn, and others. 
 ' All these worketh that one and the same Spirit.' 1 
 Who will say that these are not potential facts of 
 history ? 
 
 Though piety before Abraham's time, a period of about 
 two thousand years, was without organization or sym- 
 bolized doctrines, yet its spirit was the same as now ; 
 in reference to which our Lord no doubt speaks when 
 He says, ' Before Abraham was, I am/ a thought that 
 refers, I think, not merely to eternity of being, but to 
 His working in the earliest times, in reference to which 
 Jesus says, ' Abraham rejoiced to see my day ; and he 
 saw it, and was glad.' 2 Under that patriarch the doc- 
 trines of the gospel took form; and 'the Scripture, 
 foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through 
 faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, 
 In thee shall all nations be blessed.' 3 Justification to 
 Abraham was precisely what it had been before to 
 pious men, consisting in no outward form, but in the 
 restored life of God in the soul. To call anything 
 short of this justification, or to speak of a man under 
 the power of his lusts as right with God, is to call 
 slavery freedom, and hell heaven. 
 
 The doctrine of the new birth, as consisting in a 
 separation from our carnal state to live and walk in 
 tin; Spirit, is the first doctrine set forth in Abraham's 
 history: 'Get thee out of thy country, and from thy 
 kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that 
 1 1 Cur. xii. 11. a Jokii viii. G iS. Gal. iii. 8 ; Gen. xii. 3. 
 
Doctrine in History. 169 
 
 I 'will show tliee.' 1 What Abraham's life had pre- 
 viously been we are not told, except that he lived 
 among ancestors who ' served other gods/ having their 
 household divinities, and therefore the unfitting asso- 
 ciates of one solely devoted to Jehovah. 2 The histo- 
 rical fact of his transfer to Canaan was the symbol of 
 a great truth that no man since the fall can become 
 a servant of God, without a separation from his old 
 life in the flesh, and becoming a new man in Christ 
 Jesus. It was an acted, not a written, doctrine 
 with Abraham, and yet is the same with that so often 
 expressed by the apostles : ' Ye see your calling, 
 brethren;' 'that ye may know what is the hope of 
 your calling ; ' ' ye are called in one hope of your 
 calling ; ' ' the prize of the high calliitg of God in 
 Christ Jesus ; ' ' we pray always that God may count 
 you worthy of this calling ; ' * make your calling and 
 election sure.' ' Come out from , among them, and be 
 ye separated, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean 
 thing; and I will receive you, and will be a father 
 unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith 
 the Lord Almighty.' Indeed, the acted principle of the 
 Hebrew polity, as well as of the Christian church, was 
 one of detachment from other nations, or from a fleshly 
 life and worldly men, to signify a difference of origin, 
 like being born of spirit and being born of flesh. 3 
 
 Abraham's first step, therefore, symbolized a great 
 doctrine, the lack of which seems to have caused the 
 retrocession of his ancestors into idolatry, as it had 
 the sons of God before the flood into voluptuousness. 
 Though in spirit separated from the world, they were 
 
 1 Gen. xii. 1. 2 Josh. xxiv. 2 ; Gen. xxxi. 30-35. 
 
 8 1 Cor. i. 26 ; Eph. iv. 4 ; Phil. iii. 14 ; 2 Thess. i. 11 ; 2 Tim. i. 9 ; 
 Heb. iii. 1 ; 2 Pet. i. 10 ; 2 Cor. vi. 17, 18 ; John iii. 6, vi. 63. 
 
1 70 Seed- Truths. 
 
 not in fact, but lived intermixed with the carnal and 
 worldly, and hence their apostasy. Abraham lived a 
 life of separation, or of consecration, and thus sym- 
 bolized a doctrine which has become a permanent 
 article of the true faith. 
 
 Another doctrine brought out in his life is that of a 
 divine, call, as the source of all true godliness. True 
 religion is not intellectual culture, nor a change of 
 opinion, nor a new status of the outward life ; but it 
 is an infusion of grace, or a new life, from God. ' Ye 
 have not chosen me, but I have chosen you.' ' We 
 love Him, because He first loved us.' 1 Why should 
 God interest Himself in recovering us from our natural 
 state, if there was any possibility of our doing it for 
 ourselves ? Can the guilty make themselves inno- 
 cent ? Theology is prior to the church, as seeding is 
 before the harvest. Abraham might have emigrated 
 to Syria from Mesopotamia, as thousands of others in 
 all ages have changed countries ; and it would have 
 had no significance beyond the improvement of his 
 worldly condition. But doing it in obedience to a 
 call from God gave a religious character to the act, 
 and made it to all subsequent ages the symbol of a 
 life directed by the Spirit of God instead of our 
 natural impulses. As a man must live before per- 
 forming the functions of life, so a soul dead in sin 
 must be quickened together with Christ before begin- 
 ning his pilgrimage to the New Jerusalem. The 
 outward shaping of the church in any particular age 
 is somewhat like the course of a river, which meanders 
 through valleys, rushes in cascades, or winds around 
 mountains, according to the country through which it 
 flows. Abraham's life was nomadic, like that of tho 
 
 1 John xv. 10 ; 1 John iv. 19. 
 
Doctrine in History. 171 
 
 tribes among whom he lived. The institutions of 
 Moses were a revision of many previous customs, 
 adapting them to sacred uses, and the subsequent 
 career of his nation became a part of general his- 
 tory, being more or less mixed up with the ideas and 
 doings of other nations ; while the Christian church 
 took form from the synagogue worship, and was more or 
 less modified by the state of civil society. Thus the 
 heavenly call or power wrought out its results like 
 leaven in meal, not to convert barley into wheat, but 
 to assimilate both the one and the other class of mind 
 and culture into its own forms of spiritual thought 
 and feeling. -It melts Jew and Gentile into one spirit, 
 not into one form of civil government, nor into the 
 same social customs, modes of dress, or general usage. 
 Those who think to accept Christian doctrine as some- 
 thing dropped into them directly from heaven will be 
 disappointed. ' Search the Scriptures,' said our Lord ; 
 ' Compare spiritual things with spiritual,' 1 taught an 
 apostle ; neither of which can be done without going 
 over the inspired documents from Moses to John the 
 evangelist. This is the channel through which the 
 pure river of doctrine comes from God to us ; and let 
 no one demur at following up this river because it 
 flows upon rocks, around headlands, over sands, and 
 through regions so much more barbarous and inhos- 
 
 O O 
 
 pitable than our own. Truths from God must be 
 sought in the writings'' which He has dictated in his- 
 tories, and institutions moulded by His own hand. 
 
 Covenant relationship to God is another doctrine lived 
 by Abraham. It is ' avouching the Lord to be our God, 
 to walk in His ways, and to keep His statutes, and com- 
 mandments, and judgments, and to hearken unto His 
 1 John v. 39 j 1 Cor. ii. 13. 
 
172 Seed- Truths. 
 
 voice ;' and it is to have ' God avouch us to be His 
 peculiar people.' 1 This is a personal matter between 
 God and our own souls, and cannot be done by proxy. 
 It admits of no sham, but is a great fact of the in- 
 ward life, in which God alone reveals Himself. It is 
 admitting God to the throne of our hearts, in place of 
 that world by which we have been so long and so 
 disastrously ruled. A man under the oath of allegiance 
 to a government is bound in all things by its laws and 
 institutions. And when God said to Abraham, ' My 
 covenant is between thee and me/ and the agreement 
 was ratified by mutual consent, there was no disan- 
 nulling it, or avoiding its responsibilities: ' It was an 
 everlasting covenant.' 2 Whatever God should require, 
 the soul under such bonds is bound to do. 
 
 But could he do it without fq.Hk ? How could a 
 soul be justified or right with God, without implicitly 
 relying upon all that God told him ? Unbelief un- 
 settles confidence and annuls the contract. God has 
 no outward police to compel submission in a refractory 
 spirit. When our will rebels, the flesh is supreme in 
 us, and how can we serve God and the world at the 
 same time ? 8 How can we be in covenant with hostile 
 forces ? The compact with God takes effect primarily 
 upon our souls, and is an individual and not a com- 
 munity transaction. 4 The nation of Israel did indeed 
 stand for a time in that relation ; but it was for the 
 special purpose of representing outwardly the spiritual 
 compact between individual souls and God. They 
 lost their position, however, through unbelief, and the 
 apostles explicitly show, that ' only they which are of 
 
 > Dent. xxvL 17, 18. f Gen. xvii. 3-7, 13. Luke xvi. 13. 
 4 It becomes a community influence, by ' baptizing those who feel it 
 Into one Udy,' the church. 1 Cor. xii. 13. 
 
Doctrine in History. 1 73 
 
 faith are the children of faithful Abraham/ 1 Our faith, 
 like that of Abraham, must have its trials ; and ' by 
 works it must be made perfect,' as his was when he 
 offered up his only son of promise, and thus became 
 heir of the world, and the father of all that believe. 2 
 Who does not see that the significance of this trans- 
 action is in elevating faith to its true position, as that 
 exercise by which spiritual truths are made real and 
 potential to us, and which alone makes us pleasing to 
 God and in union with Him ? This is everywhere the 
 doctrine of faith in the New Testament. 3 
 
 The Divine Incarnation is another doctrine included 
 in Abraham's history. ' He saith not, To seeds, as of 
 many, but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ/ 
 is the apostle's reasoning on the subject. 4 The Incar- 
 nation in the person of Christ was in order to the 
 indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the /church ; as He 
 Himself says, ' I in them t and Thou in me, that they 
 may be made perfect in one ;' or as the apostle ex- 
 presses it, ' that we might receive the promise of the 
 Spirit through faith.' ' This promise is to you and your 
 children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as 
 the Lord our God shall call,' as He called Abraham 
 to a spiritual and holy life. 5 All these passages are 
 founded in the old Hebrew idea of the nephesh or soul 
 as open to two worlds, the spiritual and the natural, 
 and the destined sanctuary and throne of the Most 
 High in establishing His kingdom here below. It had 
 been lost by man's rejection of God in order to come 
 
 1 Gal. iii. 7-9; Kom. iv. 9-13, ix. 8. 
 
 2 Jas. ii. 21-23; Gen. xxii. 9-12. 
 
 3 Heb. xi. 6 ; John xi. 25, 26, iii. 36 ; Mark xvi. 16 ; Acts xvi. 31. 
 
 4 Gal. iii. 16 ; Gen. xii. 3, 7. 
 
 * Jolm xviL 23; Gal. iii. 14; Acts ii. 39. 
 
174 Seed-Truths. 
 
 under the ruling of the flesh, and is now restored in 
 the faith of Abraham and in his promised seed as the 
 re-enthroned Divinity in all that believe. This is the 
 doctrine of Abraham's seed. 
 
 Circumcision also was more a doctrine than a fact. 
 As a fact, it was a mark of distinction between Israel 
 and other nations ; but as a doctrine, 'it is of the heart, 
 in the spirit, and not in the flesh/ ' We are the cir- 
 cumcision, who worship God in the spirit, and rejoice 
 in Christ Jesus, having no confidence in the flesh ;' 
 it is ' made without hands, in putting off the body cf 
 the sins of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ/ 
 or by the excision of worldly desires by His grace 
 operating in our souls. 1 Even the prophets deduced 
 from the rite a like significance, calling upon the 
 people to circumcise their hearts, to put away their 
 worldly appetites, and come under God's spiritual 
 dominion. 2 Here we have the same ideas brought to 
 view as in our baptism, in which we are buried and 
 raised with Christ, as the apostle shows, and are ' sanc- 
 tified and cleansed with the washing of water by the 
 word, that we may be presented to Christ a glorious 
 church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing ; 
 but that it should be holy and without blemish.' 3 Thus 
 in all the rites and histories of the Old Testament 
 come to view underlying doctrines of man's spiritual 
 state, and the changes which it undergoes in redeem- 
 ing him to God out of every kingdom, and tongue, and 
 people under heaven. All are founded in the fact of 
 the soul's twofold relations to spirit and to matter. 
 
 Another doctrine of Abraham's career is that of 
 
 * Rom. ii. 29; Phil. iii. 8; Col. ii 11. 
 8 D.'iit. x. 16; Jer. iv. 4. 
 Col. ii. 12; Eph. v. 26, 27. 
 
Doctrine in History. 175 
 
 Jirrnrn as an aggregation of kindred spirits. 'In a 
 good old age, an old man, full of days and satisfied, lie 
 was gathered to his people.' ' Satisfied,' as the word 
 means, or happy to go, like a man from a long journey 
 reposing again in the bosom of his family, he took 
 his place in ' the better country, that is, an heavenly ; 
 wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God : 
 for He hath prepared for them a city/ And our Lord 
 adduces the fact that God called Himself ' the God of 
 Abraham' as evidence of the soul's immortality; 'for 
 He is not a God of the dead, but of the living.' 1 
 Abraham never owned a foot of the land in which he 
 sojourned, except a burial-place, for his dead, showing 
 how entirely his hopes centred in the promised seed 
 and in his heavenly home. In Abraham's history, 
 therefore, fact is doctrine, and doctrine is fact. 
 1 Gen. xxiii. 3, 4, xvii. 20, xxv. 8 ; Heb. xi. 16 ; Matt, xxii 32. 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 DOCTRINE IN WORDS AND SYMBOLS. 
 
 AS doctrinal truths were inward experiences or 
 intuitions to the early patriarchs, and history 
 in Abraham so under Moses they took on the form 
 of words and symbols. The process reminds one of 
 growth in a child's mind from sensations to ideas, and 
 from ideas to words and symbols. The endeavour of 
 sensation is towards thought, and of thought towards 
 expression. Thus, twenty-five hundred years of de- 
 tached revelations and experiences among holy men at 
 length found embodiment in the ceremonial law. And 
 they were still further chiselled out in the Israelitish 
 history. The redemption of that people from Egyp- 
 tian slavery by power and a stretched-out arm sym- 
 bolized our escape from the bondage of the flesh by the 
 power of grace ; their wilderness life of forty years, and 
 partial conquest of Canaan, where many enemies re- 
 mained as 'pricks in their eyes and thorns in their 
 hands/ 1 is a type of our earthly warfare and partial 
 sanctification ; their apostasy and subsequent captivity 
 but too faithfully resemble our backsliding and its sad 
 consequences ; and thus the whole outward life of that 
 nation put into form and expression the inward work- 
 ing of antagonistic forces in Christ's church. 
 
 Our purpose is not to expound these symbols, but 
 1 Num. xxxiii. 55. 
 176 
 
Doctrine in Words and Symbols. 177 
 
 to show their position and necessity in redemption, or 
 in recovering a people to God's praise out of this cor- 
 rupted and enslaved world. The ceremonial law and 
 Jewish history will be found singularly pertinent to 
 what the seers saw in the nature of man. 
 
 Truths are realities, and words the expression of 
 them. Words and symbols are the soil which the seed 
 must take on in order to a harvest. They do not 
 originate truths nor change their nature, but put them 
 into a form to be understood and used by men in the 
 flesh. Multiplication and interest tables do not make 
 or alter the relation of numbers, but they are a great 
 convenience to learners and business men. So spiritual 
 truths existed in full force before they were expressed 
 in terms to be apprehended by us. But now that they 
 are so expressed, our business is to search for them 
 in words and symbols as for hid treasures. 'Search 
 the Scriptures;' 'Hold fast the form of sound words;' 
 ' Having the form of knowledge and truth in the law;' 
 these are passages that clearly show where saving truths 
 are to be found, and our duty in reference to them. 1 
 The practice of Christ and His apostles, of casting their 
 ideas in the symbolical mould of the Old Testament, is 
 an example for us ; and those who follow it the most 
 closely make the most effective sermons, and have the 
 greatest spiritual power. The essay style of our modern 
 pulpit is mere moonshine in comparison. Books to 
 melt the truths of the Bible into the fashionable litera- 
 ture of the present day are a dead failure. We can 
 scarcely better dispense with Bible words and symbols 
 than with Bible truths themselves. 'The form of 
 sound words ' is as much a revelation from God as the 
 doctrines which they contain. 
 
 1 Pi-uv. ii. -i; 2 Tim. i. 13; Horn. ii. 20. 
 M 
 
178 Seed- Truths. 
 
 God's plan of symbolizing His truths proceeds on the 
 principle that the world was as destitute of appropriate 
 modes of expressing them as of the truths themselves. 
 Indeed, how should it be otherwise ? How can men 
 invent words to express ideas which are not in their 
 minds ? Ideas must precede and create a necessity for 
 language before language can exist. And as spiritual 
 truths had perished from the human mind, except in 
 detached cases, and natural ideas alone remained, how 
 could the languages that took their rise from Babel 
 under these circumstances be a fitting vehicle of a reve- 
 lation from heaven ? As well use a Hottentot dialect 
 to express Locke's work on the Understanding. In all 
 languages, the etymology of words shows that they had 
 their origin in material ideas. Soul was breath ; spirit, 
 wind; understanding, standing under; circumspect, look- 
 ing around ; circumvent, coming round : and thus words, 
 even most abstract and spiritual in their present mean- 
 ing, began with a material idea. There are a few ex- 
 ceptions in words used by inspired men ; as Jehovah, 
 for instance, made from the verb to be, and meaning 
 Being or Eternal, which is a special invention to denote 
 an idea utterly lost to the nations. 1 They had their 
 Eloliim or local gods, a term often applied to Jehovah, 
 but in a very different sense from their use of it. 
 
 Greek is confessed to be the most finished language 
 in the world, and was deeply imbued with poetry, 1 
 philosophy, and oratory ; and yet it had no terms to 
 express a single New Testament doctrine, except as 
 Hebraized or accommodated to its new use. De Quin- 
 cey says justly, that 'the ancients (meaning the Greeks 
 and Romans before the time of Christianity) had no 
 idea, not by the faintest veetige, of what in the scrip- 
 1 Ex. vi. 3. 
 
Doctrine in Words and Symbols. 1 79 
 
 tural system is called sin. The Latin word peccatum, 
 and the Greek word amartia, are translated continually 
 by the word sin ; but neither one word nor the other 
 has any such meaning in writers of the pure, classical 
 period. When baptized into a new meaning by the 
 adoption of Christianity, these words, in common with 
 many others, transmigrated into new philosophical 
 functions. But originally they tended towards no such 
 acceptations, nor could have done so ; seeing that the 
 ancients had no avenue opened to them through which 
 the profound idea would have been even dimly intel- 
 ligible. Plato, four hundred years before Christ, or 
 Cicero, more than three hundred years later, was fully 
 equal to the idea of guilt in all its gamut; but no 
 more equal to the idea of sin, than a sagacious hound 
 to the idea of gravitation or central forces. It is the 
 tremendous postulate upon which this idea reposes that 
 constitutes the initial moment of that revelation which 
 is common to Judaism and Christianity/ He then 
 adds, in words before quoted : ' Guilt, in all its modifica- 
 tions, implies only a defect or wound in the individual. 
 Sin, on the other hand, the most mysterious and the 
 most sorrowful of all ideas, implies a taint in the indi- 
 vidual, not through any local disease of his own, but 
 through a scrofula equally diffused through the infinite 
 family of man. This idea was utterly and exquisitely 
 inappreciable by pagan Greece or Rome.' 1 
 
 The race of man from Adam to Moses, a period of 
 twenty-five hundred years, was so occupied and domi- 
 nated by natural or fleshly ideas, as to completely lose 
 the sense of its moral and spiritual status. Though 
 infinitely removed from the spiritual life of Eden, they 
 were as insensible of it as we of the millions of miles 
 
 1 Am. ed. of bis works, pp. 2S, 239. 
 
 
180 Seed-Truths. 
 
 intervening in absolute space between our location in 
 summer and winter, because we have no faculties by 
 which to detect the earth's daily movement in its 
 orbit. Men had no landmarks by which to tell what 
 holiness is, or how far they had wandered from it. 
 How, then, should they have any words or symbols to 
 express a true idea of either sin or holiness ? To im- 
 part to them spiritual truths was even a greater task 
 than to elevate the lowest and most beastly race of 
 savages to the highest state of civilisation. 
 
 The words and symbols of doctrine were created to 
 meet this great necessity. It must be an outward 
 process, of course, because there was no chance of de- 
 veloping the requisite truths and ideas from within, 
 as thoughts spring from sensations, and words from 
 thoughts, in the growth of a child. ' Who can bring 
 a clean thing out of an unclean ? Not one.' l As the 
 human mind had become closed to all but natural ideas, 
 in order to reach it at all, it must be through that 
 channel in reference to which God is said to ' come 
 down to deliver/ to ' come down upon Mount Sinai,' 
 to ' bow the heavens and come down.' 2 There is no 
 change of location in God, but only of His attitude in 
 dealing with us, which was originally through the spi- 
 ritual or higher faculties of our nature, but now through 
 our natural or lower faculties. He condescends to us, 
 since we cannot rise to Him. He knocks at the outer 
 gateway of the soul, seeing that the inner is closed. 
 We meet with God by attending prayerfully to the 
 outward word, and opening to Him that door, that ITe 
 may 'come in and sup with us, and we with Him.' :J 
 The apostle expresses a like idea, when he speaks of 
 
 * Jol, xiv. 4. Ex. iii. 8 ; Num. xi. 17 ; Isa. Ixiv. 1. 
 
 ikv. iii. *;). 
 
Doctrine in Words and Symbols. 1 8 1 
 
 talking as with babes to those who were too carnal to 
 be spoken to as men. He condescended to their low 
 apprehensions. 1 The material forms of the ceremonial 
 law grew out of this necessity of reaching men through 
 this carnal channel, and thus educating them to the 
 effigy of spiritual truths, preparatory to their ultimately 
 receiving those truths in their own nature, or as ' spiri- 
 tually discerned.' 2 
 
 But why not do all this at once ? "Why protract 
 the process through two thousand years ? Was not 
 God able to do it for all men, as He did it for Abraham 
 and Moses ? No, not in accordance with His own laws 
 of moral agency and development. These inspired 
 men had been prepared for their mission, not only by 
 their own training, but by ages of previous divine illu- 
 mination descending from their forefathers, and centring 
 in their minds. Is it not easier to induct into science 
 one born of scientific ancestors, than one born in a 
 savage condition, and of savage forefathers ? The writer 
 claims no ability to explain the motives of God's con- 
 duct, but only to interpret obvious facts. The fire 
 from heaven must have wood and a victim to light 
 upon ; and also it must work its miracle of burning 
 among minds attent and anxious for the settlement of 
 great moral questions, as with Elijah on Mount Car- 
 mel ; or how could a spiritual result be expected to 
 ensue ? The whole nation was ' halting ' between the 
 worship of Jehovah and that of Baal, and the fire came 
 to settle their minds. A band of savages might have 
 stared at the burning, but it would have conveyed no 
 lesson to their minds, for lack of previous preparation. 3 
 
 But why did not God create among men the requi- 
 site preparation, so as to complete the whole work in a 
 
 1 1 Cor. ifi. 1. 2 1 Cor. ii. 14. 3 1 Kings xviii. 17-40. 
 
1 8 2 Seed- Truths. 
 
 single generation ? The answer is obvious : it would 
 have withdrawn them from the moral category, and re- 
 duced them to a government of force, like the changes 
 of the seasons. Man's free moral selfhood cannot be 
 influenced in a way to invade its prerogatives, without 
 making him merely a thing to be disposed of by natu- 
 ral laws ; and the result would be neither spiritual 
 nor moral Within its castle of free-will the soul is 
 absolute, and no being in the universe more carefully 
 respects its authority than God Himself, as His deal- 
 ings with an untoward and rebellious race from the 
 beginning of time fully show. If it were in our power, 
 as in His, to annihilate the things which we deem giant 
 wrongs, how long w r ould they hold out ? The Pope's 
 (Ecumenical Council would be deluged with ashes from 
 Vesuvius, like Pompeii and Herculaneum, if our policy 
 were to prevail instead of His, who ' suffereth long, and 
 is kind.' 1 Man's freedom would have perished, and 
 his hope of spirituality with it, had God acted on our 
 narrow policy in governing the world. When the 
 Spirit's baptism came on Pentecost, it came to men ex- 
 traordinarily prepared, not only by their intercourse 
 with the Son of God, but by a two thousand years' 
 previous history, shaping their thought and their lan- 
 guage, and preparing the world for their message. 
 Scarce a province could be found on which the religion 
 of Abraham and Moses had not reflected its light. 
 
 Look now at a few of the truths chiselled by the 
 ceremonial law into relief upon the granite surface of 
 Inn nan nature. Take, for example, the distinction be- 
 tween clean and unclean, in beasts, persons, utensils, 
 garments, places, and everything pertaining to daily 
 life. It was sure death to a person deemed unclean 
 1 1 for. xiii. 4. 
 
Doctrine in Words and Symbols. 183 
 
 to obtrude within the sacred precincts of the temple. 
 More than once, Paul's intercourse with the Gentiles 
 well-nigh cost him his life among the Jews. Peter 
 could be persuaded only by a miracle to . enter a 
 Gentile's house. 1 To eat with unwashen hands was 
 an enormous crime. 2 These and a thousand other 
 things, perverted no doubt, yet even in their per- 
 version showed how deeply Moses' law had ploughed 
 the distinction between clean and unclean into the 
 Jewish mind, and through that people into a wide area 
 of Gentile thought and feeling.' When, therefore, this 
 thought and feeling were turned from ceremonial to 
 moral pollution, as consisting in the general depravity 
 of the race and in all wrong-doing, how tremendous 
 were the ensuing throes of conviction ! Under Peter's 
 sermon three thousand suddenly awoke to such a sense 
 of their utter moral corruption, as to cry out at once, 
 'Men and brethren, what shall we do?' 3 Their par- 
 ticipation in our Lord's crucifixion no doubt wrought 
 in their minds ; but their training under the law, 
 giving them an intense horror of being considered 
 unclean before God, no doubt had its effect. The 
 time had come, foretold by the prophet, when they 
 should discern the real distinction between clean and 
 unclean that it was not ceremonial, but in being 
 righteous or wicked, serving God or serving Him not. 4 
 They now -first understood what it is to be unclean. 
 
 The ceremonial law reduced to symbol truths that 
 became power under the gospel, as the building of the 
 tabernacle provided a seat for the theocratic govern- 
 ment. Without some such embodiment to the idea 
 of men, or upon which their materialized thought 
 
 1 Acts x. 28. * Matt. xv. 2. 
 
 a Ads ii. 37. 4 iJal. iii. 18. 
 
1 84 Secd-TrutJis. 
 
 might take hold, spiritual truths could have gained no 
 foothold in human nature. They must be seen acting 
 in outward life, or they would be, like numerical ab- 
 stractions or unexpressed geometrical relations, utterly 
 inaccessible to minds without spiritual apprehension. 
 And now that these truths are expressed in the altar 
 service of the Jewish tabernacle, the terms and forms 
 of thought thence derived have become essential to the 
 understanding and propagation of them. A latitudi- 
 narian missionary, who, in disgust of Hebraistic forms 
 of thought, should invent some other vocabulary with 
 which to graft Christian ideas upon the pure reason of 
 the literary Chinese, for instance, would live and die 
 in a nightmare. It would be an agonized effort to 
 speak without a voice, and to be heard by those who 
 have no ears. The forms of thought supplied by the 
 law of Moses and Hebrew history are as much a part 
 of Christianity as a man's body is of himself. 
 
 It may be difficult to illustrate our precise idea of 
 the position of ceremonial law and Hebrew history in 
 the plan of redeeming mercy. Suppose, however, that 
 there was no civilisation in the world, no such nations 
 as London, Paris, and New York represent, but all 
 mankind wer Caffres and Patagonians, and an at- 
 tempt were made to introduce civilisation, how should 
 it proceed ? Suppose the more favoured denizens of 
 another planet were to engage in the work, could they 
 do anything with words explaining a condition of 
 civilisation ; its advantages over a savage state ; its 
 sciences, arts, and exquisite refinements in thought and 
 manners ? No, for the languages of earth would have 
 no words for such ideas. And how could they teach 
 by example, when no model community could be 
 ottered to their consideration ? and if there were, a 
 
Doctrine in Words and Symbols. 185 
 
 savage mind would deem his own state vastly pre- 
 ferable. What could be done in the case, but to 
 introduce law and order into things pertaining to daily 
 savage life ? These they understand ; and by enacting 
 under severe penalties that they must wash themselves 
 every day, to recover them from their filthy habits, 
 you come within the range of their comprehension. 
 They are cannibals, or they eat the vilest animals ; 
 and by putting them upon a specific diet on pain of 
 death, you give them some notion of clean and unclean, 
 or of the food fit for a civilised people. They have no 
 standard of right and justice among themselves, and 
 this must be enacted and enforced. And so of every- 
 thing relating to their enjoyments. Law and order 
 are essential elements of civilisation, as well as truth, 
 justice, and intelligence ; and these can be enforced in 
 reference to the lowest things of life equally with those 
 which are highest, and the one may be made to reflect 
 the other. And the term law as used by the apostles, 
 though it has respect to the ceremonies required by 
 Moses, manifestly includes, by representation, some- 
 thing far higher and more spiritual than the outward 
 acts in which they consisted. 1 So of the civilising 
 process which we have supposed: though beginning 
 with the things on a level with a savage, still it would 
 be to represent law in a higher sense, as pertaining to 
 greater intellectual advancement. 
 
 Now the foregoing case is an approximate statement 
 of the position of the ceremonial law, 'which stood 
 only in meats and drinks, and divers washings, and 
 carnal ordinances,' ' a figure for the time then present/ 
 but ' imposed until the time of reformation,' or till men 
 
 1 Rom. ii. 15, 20, 25, iii. 19-31, v. 13-20 ; Gal. ii. 16-21 ; Hub. 
 Tii. 11. 
 
1 86 Seed-Truths. 
 
 * 
 
 could be educated up to something better. 1 The holy 
 place, or outer sanctuary, where the priests performed 
 their daily ministrations, being open to the comers and 
 goers in the surrounding courts, gives an idea of the 
 natural faculties of man illuminated by divine truth 
 as represented in the candlestick, 2 showing that those 
 activities which are concerned about the affairs of this 
 life, are to be guided by the law of God. These mini- 
 strations in outward things had thus a spiritual signifi- 
 cance, just as laws regulating a savage life would be 
 with a view to something higher. Separated from this 
 room by a thin veil was the holy of holies, where were 
 the ark, the tables of the law 1 , the cherubim, and the 
 earthly throne of Jehovah, who administered there by 
 visible tokens the government of His people. It was 
 then a kingdom of symbols ; it is now a kingdom of 
 grace ; but hereafter it is to be a kingdom of glory. 
 The way into the holy of holies is our medium of 
 access to God through the human nature of Christ, who 
 says, ' I am the way,' and ' No man cometh unto the 
 Father but by me.' 3 The clean animals, as alone fit 
 for sacrifice, are the purified affections and the holy 
 life, which God can alone accept as offerings from us. 
 The universal sprinkling of blood shows the neces- 
 sary inflowing spiritual current of life from God, of 
 which blood is the emblem, to render our prayers and 
 offerings, and everything pertaining to our activities, 
 acceptable to God. As the inbreathed life from God 
 made Adam spiritual, and put a heavenly impress upon 
 his whole outward life, so with us, it is 'the spirit that 
 quickeneth, the flesh profiteth no tiling;' 4 and our whole 
 
 1 I Id), ix. 6-12. Heb. ix. 2. 
 
 Heb. ix. 8 ; John xiv. 6 ; Eph. ii. 13. 
 
 4 Lev. xxii. 20, 21, 25-, John vi. 03 ; I'ph. v. 27 ; Heb. xiii. 15. 
 
Doctrine in Words and Symbols. 187 
 
 being is thus purified by what blood represents. 1 The 
 burning of the refuse without the camp, and the escape 
 of the duplicate goat, denote a total annihilation of our 
 fleshly impurities, or their ' separation from us as far as 
 the east is from the west.' 2 
 
 These are a few of the points which show the 
 general spirit of the Mosaic ritual, as reflecting a 
 character purified from fleshly ruling, and restored to 
 God's dominion in the soul. How clearly do they 
 contemplate a state of perfection far in advance of the 
 present attainments of professing Christians! We havo 
 an example of the sort of life contemplated by the law, 
 in Him who came to fulfil all righteousness, and to 
 magnify the law and make it honourable. 3 He ful- 
 filled and magnified it, by converting its doctrine into 
 fact, its shadow into substance. This He did, not as 
 John the Baptist, by leading an ascetic life, but by 
 attending weddings, feasts, and mingling in all the 
 affairs of men, and subjecting them to the absolute 
 ruling of the ' Spirit which God gave Him without 
 measure.' 4 f There are ideas of power in God's ap- 
 pointed symbols of faith which have never been fully 
 reached except by the God-man. 
 
 Thus altar, sacrifice, holy place, holy of holies, the 
 tabernacle and its ceremonial, with God's administered 
 government over Israel from Dan to Beersheba, were 
 to the material age for which they were instituted, 
 what object-teaching is to our children. This is a sort 
 of teaching to which the infant is committed as soon 
 a.s he opens his eyes upon the world ; and it would be 
 vain for us to attempt anything for him higher than 
 
 1 Ex. xxiv. 5-8 ; Lev. xvii. 11 ; Heb. ix. 22 ; 1 John iii. 5, i. 7. 
 * Lev. iv. 11, 12, xvi. 8-10; Ps. ciii. 12; 2 Cor. vii. 1; Eph. v. 4. 
 8 Matt. iii. 15 ; Isa. xlii. 21. 4 John iii. 34. 
 
1 88 Seed-Truths. 
 
 sensible impressions, if these had not first supplied 
 him with a fund of ideas as the basis of a more intel- 
 lectual li*e. We show him sheep, oxen, lions, trees, 
 triangles, squares, " parallelograms, circles, cones, and 
 tell him that they are called so and so, and have such 
 and such natures and uses, and by this process it was 
 that the greatest minds rose to power and pre-eminence. 
 By a like process, God has educated a materialized race 
 to spiritual truth and heavenly life. Words would be 
 an empty sound, without truths in the mind for tLeiu 
 to represent. 
 
CHAPTEE XVH. 
 WORDS AND SYMBOLS IN POWER. 
 
 THE power of words and symbols is not in argu- 
 ments to convince the reason, nor in imposiiig 
 scenes to impress the senses, nor in eloquence to move 
 the feelings, but in an energy from God acting 
 through them to restore our consciousness of His 
 presence, and of our amenableness to Him. As there 
 is a spiritual universe of which our race had lost the 
 view by reason of sin, and it must regain its place 
 in our minds in order to the due balance of our 
 characters, nothing can avail with us which does not 
 effect this object. No one who reads the Bible can 
 fail to see that it was penned by men to whom the 
 realm of spirits was as much a reality as that of nature, 
 and its truths and facts transcendently the greater of 
 the two. The one is mind, the other body ; the one 
 imperishable, the other perishable ; and as every volun- 
 tary muscular movement is an act of the mind, so 
 all material events, from the feeding and falling of 
 sparrows, the numbering of our hairs, and the painting 
 of lilies, to* the ordering of the heavens with their 
 luminaries, are acts of an infinite and everywhere- 
 present intelligence. Viewing things thus is the habit 
 of all spiritual men. 1 
 
 The general state of thought and feeling among men, 
 
 1 Matt. vi. 26-30, x. 29, 30 ; Ps. viii. 3. 
 189 
 
1 90 Seed- Tru tJis. 
 
 it must be obvious, is quite otherwise. 'God is not in 
 all their thoughts/ and they prosecute their enterprises 
 with indistinct a$d unavailing conceptions of anything 
 above and beyond their earthly life. 1 Or if they give 
 attention to church-going, Sabbath-keeping, or other 
 exercises implying a higher world, it is more with 
 regard to the decencies of society than from any 
 inward feeling of their relationship to God and im- 
 mortality. Many have great talent with little con- 
 science, ' ever learning, but never able to come to the 
 knowledge of the truth ;' growing rich perhaps, but not 
 ' towards God ; ' having a wide intellectual grasp, but 
 no wisdom to give it a beneficent direction. 2 They 
 are paralytic on the side towards God and the spiritual 
 universe, turning all their force upon the world-side, 
 which is, however, encumbered, misdirected, and un- 
 availing. Is it not easy to see, that the first thing 
 in healing them is to restore this paralyzed side to 
 its sensibility to God and spiritual truths ? Can a 
 conscienceless man have his other powers improved, 
 without danger to himself and society ? 
 
 Much is said of setting men right with their con- 
 dition ; a necessity which all parties concede, though 
 they differ widely as to how it is to be done: Some 
 speak as if education and civilisation were the only 
 panacea; others think the cure must be effected by 
 exploding all ghostly ideas, and bringing men to the 
 positive and the tangible, or to live according to what 
 they call nature ; and others still insist upon sub- 
 mission to a worldly hierarchy and its rites, in order to 
 ensure present peace and future salvation. But the 
 inspired writers have but one idea on the subject, 
 
 1 Ps. x. 4, xiv. 1, liii. 1. 
 
 2 Tim. iii. 7 ; Luke xii. 21 ; Ps. xciv. 11. 
 
Words and Symbols in Power. 191 
 
 which is, that as God and spiritual truths have lost 
 their hold upon us, and this is the primary source of 
 our evils, there is no setting us right but by re-estab- 
 lishing their dominion, and bringing us to the faith 
 that acts as ' seeing Him who is invisible.' This is a 
 separate transaction between every soul and God ; and 
 words and symbols are the intermediate means of 
 carrying on the negotiation. Training is not the thing ; 
 civilisation is not the thing; a priesthood is not the 
 thing ; words and rites are a dead letter, in themselves 
 considered ; but it is to be ' quickened together with 
 Christ,' in the sense of having our lost spiritual connec- 
 tion with God and His throne re-established within. 1 
 
 This sensible connection with God, as the only 
 perfection for human nature, is the thought with which 
 the Bible begins, and it is that with which it ends. 
 The divine inbreathing opened heaven to the first 
 man ; he talked with God ; and with the clear vision 
 of a seer he no doubt * saw the Lord sitting upon His 
 throne, and all the host of heaven standing by Him on 
 the right hand and on the left,' his purity of heart 
 fitting him for such a vision ; and he lived the life 
 of heaven here below. 2 But when he fell under the 
 ruling of fleshly impulses and natural ideas, all this 
 was lost ; and God, even to those who are restored to 
 Him, is seen not by a vision, but by faith. ' The just 
 shall live by faith;' and 'believing, we rejoice with 
 joy unspeakable and full of glory.' 3 Faith with us 
 takes the place of vision with Adam and the inspired 
 prophets, in giving reality to the spiritual world. It 
 
 1 Eph. ii. 5 ; Col. ii. 13 ; Matt. vi. 10. 
 
 2 Gen. ii. 19, 20 ; Matt. v. 8 ; 1 Kings xxii. 19. 
 
 3 Matt. xi. 27 ; Heb. xi. 27 ; 1 Pet. i. 8 ; Hab. ii. 4 ; Heb. x. 38 ; 
 Gal. iii. 11 ; Rom. i. 17. 
 
i g 2 Seed- Truths. 
 
 is as if lightning and thunder had at first made 
 electricity visible to men, but afterwards ceased ; so 
 that though now, as ever, animal and vegetable life 
 is pervaded by this fluid, and subsists by means of it, 
 yet it can only reveal itself to our faith from an 
 electric battery, and not, as formerly, by flashes to the 
 eyes and intonations to the ears. To do this, the 
 battery must be more than mechanism ; it must be 
 charged with a power wholly unlike itself, of which it 
 must act as the medium to our nerves and muscles. 
 Electricity gives us the shock, not the battery; and 
 that shock becomes the basis of our faith in what we 
 have not seen. So of words and symbols; unless 
 charged with a spiritual power totally distinct from 
 themselves, they can produce no faith, and no salva- 
 tion. Is not faith the gift of God I 1 
 
 Words and symbols, then, are the battery, but spirit 
 is the power. We must be in some way assured that 
 God is speaking to us, and that the spiritual world is 
 no delusion. Preaching and ceremonials unattended 
 by this cannot be the power of God unto salvation. 
 The process is not one of education, but of regenera- 
 tion ; not a development of what was before in us, but 
 a ' creation in the image of Him that created him ; ' 
 and it is the work not of the Adam who was ' a living 
 soul,' but of the Adam who is a ' quickening spirit.' 
 All these truths of the divine word concur in this, 
 that though God's dominion over us is re-established, 
 it is different from the old, in being one of faith rather 
 than of open vision. 2 
 
 Can we wonder, therefore, that a Book of such aims 
 should deal largely in the supernatural ? Whether its 
 
 Eph. ii. 8. 
 
 Matt. xix. 28; Tit. iii. 6; Col. iii. 10; John iii. 3; 1 Cor. xv. 45-48, 
 
Words and Symbols in Power. 193 
 
 miracles are true or false is not the point for us to 
 consider in these pages ; but whether, admitting that 
 there is a spiritual world, to which our minds had been 
 closed, it can be reopened to us, except by means which 
 are out of the order of nature ? As our minds had 
 been dominated by things in that order, to the extent 
 of losing the consciousness of anything beyond, how 
 can what is beyond be opened to us otherwise than by 
 miracle ? If the miracles of the Bible fail us, we must 
 look for them elsewhere, to put us into communication 
 with a higher world. The supernatural claims of the 
 Bible are what most of all fit it to our necessities. Signs 
 and wonders attested the mission of Moses, of our Lord, 
 and of all the prophets. God maintained His position 
 on the mercy-seat of the temple, giving responses to 
 the people out of the order of nature, so long as its 
 ritual retained its efficacy. The Holy Spirit is repre- 
 sented as the sole efficiency in the Christian church, 
 in reference to which our Lord says, ' Without me ye 
 can do nothing/ and, ' Lo, I am with you always, even 
 unto the end of the world.' 1 
 
 It is a favourite idea with some, that miracles are 
 of no force except in an age of infancy and credulity. 
 They ask, What effect would miracles have among a 
 scientific people, who can do things with their sciences 
 which would have been regarded in the ignorant Bible 
 generations as even more wonderful than anything 
 done by the prophets ? ' WE depend upon logic and 
 an induction of facts, not upon magic and necromancy.' 
 With how good a grace such a boast comes from an 
 age in which spirit-rappings and Joe Smith's revela- 
 tions have obtained such foothold, let truth arid can- 
 
 1 Ex. iv. 8, 17, xxv. 22; Deut. xviii. 21, 22; Acts ii. 19; Johnxv. 5: 
 Matt, xxviii. 20. 
 
1 94 Seed- Truths. 
 
 dour determine. Does this look like the emancipation 
 of the human mind from the influence of miracles? 
 The truth is, men have a natural aptitude for such 
 manifestations ; and when cut off from the true spiritual 
 universe, is it wonderful that they should betake them- 
 selves to lying miracles ? They may be harder to con- 
 vince of those recorded in the Bible than some former 
 generations, but in reference to all others they are 
 sufficiently gullible. 
 
 The truths and events of the Bible are claimed to 
 be by supernatural attestation, as much as English 
 history claims to be a record of the English people. 
 Beings not embodied in flesh are the principal actors, 
 speakers, and dictators from beginning to end. We 
 can hardly read a page without having our thoughts 
 directed to something not in the order of nature. This 
 is a necessity of the case ; for how can spirits other- 
 wise reveal themselves to our consciousness ? If the 
 burning bush had not been a ' great sight,' and out of 
 the order of Moses' previous experiences, how should 
 he have turned aside to inquire into it ? And the voice 
 speaking to him out of the bush, calling him by name, 
 and entrusting with him a great commission, assured 
 him of the miracle, and that he stood on holy ground, 
 and in direct communication with the God of Abraham, 
 of Isaac, and of Jacob. A like attestation was given 
 to Jacob when he said, ' The Lord is in this place, and 
 I knew it not.' 1 
 
 But it may be said, If miracles were ever necessary, 
 why not now ? Why do not heavenly beings thus 
 manifest themselves in all ages, and to all men ? Be- 
 cause they would then become ordinary events, and 
 would lose the effect of miracles. A single sunrise 
 
 1 Ex. iii. 2-6 ; Gen. xxviii. 10. 
 
Words and Symbols in Power. 195 
 
 occurring out of the order of nature once in thousands 
 of years would be the greatest of all supernatural mani- 
 festations ; but coming as it does every morning, it 
 makes little impression. Besides, miracles no more 
 contain in themselves the power to make us spiritual 
 men, than words and symbols. They are a part of the 
 battery through which the requisite power reaches us. 
 They are not educators, but confirmations of the truth, 
 by means of which the Holy Spirit calls us from our 
 death in flesh to spiritual life in God. If God had 
 come down upon Sinai in the wonderful manner 
 described, in the midst of thunder, and lightning, and 
 tempest, and yet no law had been given, and no truths 
 affirmed thereby, what more would it have bee*n than 
 the passing wonder of a day ? Men would Have gazed, 
 and wondered, and perished. 1 The seemingly super- 
 natural manifestations of modern spiritualism call atten- 
 tion from wondering crowds ; but having no great truths 
 of faith and duty to enforce, they fail of the required 
 effect. Nobody is made truly spiritual and holy by their 
 means. But the miracles of Moses established a polity 
 which lasted fifteen hundred years, and exerted a wide- 
 spread influence upon the affairs of mankind. The 
 Jews exist to this day as a monument of its moulding 
 power ; while Christianity, as the realization of its 
 highest ideal, is at the head of our civilising agencies. 
 If miracles contained in the'mselves the power to raise 
 men to a heavenly life, then they would be alike neces- 
 sary to all. Our Lord recognises the difference between 
 them and the truths they confirm, in the saying, ' They 
 have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them ;' 
 and, ' If they will not hear them, neither will they be 
 persuaded though one rose from the dead.' 2 Those 
 
 1 Ex. xix. 16 ; Heb. xii. 18-21. 2 Luke xvi. 29-31. 
 
196 Seed- Truths. 
 
 whom truths fail to reclaim are in no state to be bene- 
 fited by miracles. 
 
 The Old Testament is throughout a miracle. As 
 one has said, ' its prophecies are so numerous, and so 
 closely connected together, that one might regard the 
 Old Testament, considered as a whole, as forming one 
 great prophecy. As soon as sin had entered into the 
 world, it announces, under the name of " the Seed of 
 the woman," a Restorer who will destroy the work of 
 the tempter, and raise fallen man. From this passage, 
 which is found in the third page of the book, the Old 
 Testament is but, as it were, a pre-existing history of 
 the Restorer, and of a certain kingdom which He will 
 found on earth. The country and people of the Messiah 
 are already indicated in the twelfth chapter of Genesis. 
 He was to be born of the seed of Abraham, in the land 
 of Canaan, which God gave to Abraham for this very 
 purpose. It was this well-known promise which led 
 Abraham to Palestine ; which brought back his descen- 
 dants after an exile of four hundred years ; in short, 
 which formed the Jewish nation. It is this which leads 
 Pascal to say, that " there is a great difference between 
 a book made by a private individual and sent forth 
 among a nation, and one which makes a nation itself." 
 . . . Take from the Jewish history the promise of a 
 Messiah, and you annihilate it. You can no longer ac- 
 count for the origin, nor the religion, nor the manners of 
 this singular people, whose distinctive characteristic has 
 always been, and still is, the expectation of a Messiah. 
 
 ' After the call of Abraham you may trace the course 
 of prophecy throughout the whole of the Old Testament. 
 You will see it unfold and display itself from age to 
 age, from prophet to prophet, during an interval of two 
 thousand years, till at length it is accomplished in 
 
Words and Symbols in Power. 197 
 
 Jesus Christ, whose name signifies Jesus-Messiah. Each 
 prophet in his turn seems only to have been sent to 
 bear witness of Him, and to add his link to the chain 
 of narrative, in which we find clearly indicated the 
 people descended from Abraham, the tribe of that 
 people, the family of that tribe, the time, the place, 
 in which the Messiah should appear, with all that He 
 would do, and all that would be done to Him. Hence 
 this profound expression in the Apocalypse, " The testi- 
 mony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy." 1 Besides all 
 these prophecies, or rather this perpetual prophecy, tho 
 Old Testament contains a succession of facts and insti- 
 tutions which bear reference to the Messiah and to His 
 work. I allude especially to those sacrifices which 
 prefigured a sacrifice to come, and to which, according 
 to Daniel, the Messiah would put an end. 2 And, won- 
 derful to relate, Jesus Christ did indeed put an end 
 to them. They were constantly offered till His appear- 
 ance, but ceased almost immediately after His death ; 
 yet the Jews have the same reason for offering them 
 now which they had before the Christian era, since 
 they are still in expectation of the Saviour for whom 
 their fathers waited.' 3 
 
 A well-attested miracle, as evidence of a power 
 superior to nature, is the same to those who do not 
 witness it as to those who do, the same to every other 
 age as to the one in which it occurred, provided the 
 proof of its existence is well authenticated. But in 
 the case before us there is an unbroken series of 
 proofs from Adam to this day, if the present condition 
 of the Jews be regarded. For if the miracles them- 
 selves be not repeated as specific signs and wonders, 
 
 1 Rev. xix. 10. 2 Dan. viii. 11, xi. 31, xii. 11. 
 
 3 Lucilla, by Adolph Monod, pp. 49-51. 
 
198 Seed-Truths. 
 
 what but the veritable record of their existence, as -we 
 find it in the Bible, can account for the oneness of idea 
 among that peculiar people in their eighteen hundred 
 years' dispersion among all the nations of the earth, 
 an idea still so potent among them, as to keep them 
 distinct from those among whom they have so long 
 lived ? And when we add to this the influence of 
 Christian truths of a Jewish origin, or as a fulfilment 
 of the Old Testament rites and prophecies, in mould- 
 ing the present civilisation of Europe, or as the source 
 of its best ideas in religion, morals, civil and common 
 law, personal freedom, institutional charity, and public 
 education, an influence which no one can deny ; 
 when all these things are considered, I say, the miracles 
 of the Bible become as great a reality to us as to those 
 who witnessed them. Indeed, they are even more 
 potential, just as the life of Christ, as expatiated on 
 by the apostles, made many more converts among 
 those who had never seen Him, than were made by 
 His personal presence among the witnesses of His ex- 
 traordinary power in word and deed. Quite another 
 process is necessary to make us spiritual men than the 
 surprise and commotion of seeing a miracle. It is a 
 process by which our faith is secured to the truths 
 affirmed by miracle, and our hearts are won to a 
 spiritual and heavenly life. 
 
 God's ordinary working in the temple of old, and at 
 present in the Christian ministry, though supernatural, 
 is not, strictly speaking, miraculous ; for the good 
 reason that it is ordinary, and follows a fixed connec- 
 tion of cause and effect. ' How shall they call on 
 Him in whom tljey have not believed ? and how shall 
 they believe in Him of whom they have not hoard ? 
 and how shall they hear without a preacher ? and how 
 
Words and Symbols in Power. 199 
 
 shall they preach, except they be sent ? ' 3 These 
 questions reveal an order beginning in miracle, and 
 sustained by influences above nature, though quite in 
 another line from the signs and wonders of inspired 
 men. So, God's daily responses from the mercy-seat, 
 in administering the theocracy of old, were according 
 to a fixed arrangement like the order of nature, though 
 of a character to keep before the minds of the people 
 a power above nature, and of a continual efflux from 
 the spiritual world. It is so under the ministry of the 
 word : when it is in power, we feel that God is speak- 
 ing to us, and eternal realities open upon us with 
 extraordinary clearness and pungency. 
 
 It is proper to add a remark as to the particular 
 rites selected, and the particular miracles wrought in 
 attestation of them. How often are these things 
 thought or spoken of as puerile, and unworthy of 
 God ! ' Suppose a man were to do the same things 
 now-a-days, what would be thought of him ? If it 
 were known that he was desolating a country or 
 drowning a whole army, the innocent with the guilty, 
 would he not be remonstrated with by every humane 
 society in the world ? Why kill a whole herd of 
 defenceless swine in recovering a lunatic to sanity ? 
 Would not the Society for Preventing Cruelty to 
 Animals immediately take it up V Though it is not our 
 mission to apologize for God, or explain the motives 
 of His conduct, we cannot shut our eyes to the fact 
 that rites and miracles, though having one object in 
 all ages re-establishing God's spiritual authority over 
 man yet were of a character suited to the particular 
 people for whom they were designed. The ceremonies 
 sanctioned on Sinai, though different in their combina- 
 
 1 Rom. x. 14, 15. 
 
2OO Seed-Truths. 
 
 
 
 tions and uses from all others, were made of things 
 with which the people were familiar, such as a reli- 
 gious house with its adytum, altars, sacrifices, priestly 
 orders and ceremonies, incense, intercession, and the 
 whole paraphernalia of the tabernacle worship. The 
 demand of Moses for a three days' journey into the 
 wilderness, to do sacrifice with his people, was an idea 
 familiar to Pharaoh and his court, in reference to the 
 surrounding tribes, who worshipped different gods, and 
 in their own chosen sacred places. The nomadic life 
 of Israel in Arabia for forty years was an idea 
 familiar to that country, and is so to this day. The 
 plagues of Egypt were suited to impress a Nile-wor- 
 shipping, agricultural-loving country ; and the escape 
 of Israel through the Red Sea, and the returning tide 
 to overwhelm their pursuing enemies, were best of all 
 fitted to make the Egyptians and surrounding peoples 
 feel that there was no God but Jehovah, and to 
 ' declare His name in all the earth.' * What can be 
 conceived more impressive than the scenes of Sinai, 
 occurring as they did among the most jagged peaks 
 and broken ledges in all the world, and in the view of 
 a people from the Nile valley who had hardly seen a 
 mountain before in all their lives ? 
 
 Whether such rites and miracles are best adapted 
 to us is not the question ; but whether they were not 
 most effective in that and subsequent ages under the 
 theocracy, to impress upon a fleshly and brutalized 
 race the idea of an Infinite Intelligence dwelling in 
 a spiritual universe, whose laws and operations are 
 entirely apart from and above anything in this earthly 
 world. The only question of interest to us is, whether 
 they are well -attested manifestations from such a 
 1 Ex. ix. 14-16 ; Rom. ix. 17. 
 
Words and Symbols in Power. 201 
 
 Being and such a universe ? I maintain that we 
 have the means of settling this question, which no 
 Jew under the theocracy ever had, unless he was 
 divinely inspired. We have the accumulated evidence 
 of thousands of years, and can well afford to say with 
 Peter, that we have followed no cunningly-devised 
 fables in giving our faith to divine revelation, but 
 have been witnesses of its majesty in the later events 
 of the world. 1 Though the words and symbols adopted 
 in embodying celestial truths are an appropriation of 
 things previously known and in use, as they must be 
 to graft them upon human nature, we see in them 
 something higher, holier, and more divine. No people 
 can greatly anticipate the ages before them ; and one 
 of the greatest evidences of divine inspiration is, that 
 it blends in with the current of human thought and 
 language, as a river shapes its course by the features 
 of the land through which it flows, and not by the 
 topography of an imaginary or an unknown country. 
 Moses not only sprinkled with blood the people and 
 all the utensils of divine service, but the book of the 
 law ; not because the law needed purifying, but the 
 language in which it was recorded had been so exclu- 
 sively devoted to worldly and material ideas, that, 
 without being purified or adapted to its new use, it 
 could not be the vehicle of truths so spiritual and 
 holy. A new language was not created, but one 
 already spoken and understood received a new and 
 heavenly deposit of ideas and meanings. 2 
 
 This is the policy throughout the use of common 
 
 things for sacred purposes. The Christian church is 
 
 modelled on like principles. It is not a society of 
 
 angels living on earth, but a purely human institution, 
 
 1 2 Pet. i. 16. 2 JIfcb. ix. 9. 
 
2O2 Seed-Truths. 
 
 conforming in its order, ordinances, ministrations, and 
 discipline very much to the synagogue worship of 
 previous ages, and its social surroundings in the 
 ancient Eoman world. The point was to open heaven 
 to a materialized race, and not to organize a great 
 worldly power like Judaism or the Papacy, and to do 
 it with as little interference with the political ideas 
 and social order of the people as consisted with the 
 accomplishment of its main purpose. Spiritual wor- 
 shippers were the object of pursuit, not monarchists 
 nor republicans, not the social forms of Judaism nor 
 those of heathenism. Not only Jerusalem and Gerizim 
 lost their position as the necessary seats of acceptable 
 worship, but the whole paraphernalia of priestly robes, 
 orders, sacrifices, and ceremonials lost their significance, 
 or became the expression of heavenly truths. They 
 passed into spiritual meanings, or words in power. 1 
 Power, power to open a closed heaven to a race 
 imprisoned in worldly ideas and carnal lusts, this is 
 the mission of revealed religion ; this alone gives 
 value to its words and symbols. 
 
 1 John iv. 23 ; Heb. viii. 1-1* 
 
CHAPTEE XVIII. 
 
 LAW THE BASIS OF GOD'S RULE IN THE SOUL. 
 
 WHAT law or religion is it that God uses the 
 power of miracles, of inspiration, and of the 
 Holy Ghost, to establish among men ? Let the reader 
 earnestly and prayerfully follow us in our inquiries on 
 this subject. Is what you realize of heavenly life in 
 yourself, or in the ecclesiastical order to which you are 
 attached, the thing which God employed so many ages 
 of supernatural manifestation to establish ? Is it the 
 Papacy, with its vast worldly appliances ? Is it any 
 existing organization, religious or civil ? Is it our 
 modern civilisation, with all its pretensions ? Alas 
 that so many should look outward for ' a kingdom that 
 cometh not with observation I' 1 So absorbed are they 
 in material ideas, that the real domain of humanity, 
 which needs to be reconquered to God and occupied by 
 the Holy Spirit, is lost sight of. The province from 
 whence alone must come the civilisation which is of 
 lasting value to the world the soul-province in its 
 relation to spirit is put last, as a thing to be reached 
 by education, science, social culture, or that hollow- 
 hearted thing which we call refinement. These absurd 
 ideas are in many cases fostered by mistaken views 
 of the ceremonial law established at Sinai, as if that 
 demanded a great worldly realization in some form, 
 
 1 Luke xvii. 2(^ 
 203 
 
2O4 Seed- Truths. 
 
 either of creed, organization, ritualistic show, or of 
 Church and State administration, when the apostle 
 expressly teaches that 'God found fault' with that 
 order of things ; that it 'made nothing perfect,' but was 
 merely 'the bringing in of a better hope;' and that it 
 was a dead failure as a means of making men just and 
 righteous before God. 1 And yet what are our great 
 ecclesiastical organizations, but attempts to galvanize 
 into life this ritualistic carcase ? 
 
 The law of God in Scripture is, directly or repre- 
 sentatively, a spiritual force acting in the domain of 
 the soul, to regulate its faculties, or to bring its inward 
 life into harmony with God, and from that vantage- 
 ground to extend the kingdom of heaven over all the 
 outward affairs of this world. It is therefore by its 
 very nature individual, and not organic or corporate, 
 except as it affects communities, nations, and govern- 
 ments, by improving the spiritual character of the in- 
 dividuals composing them. 2 The spiritual universe 
 where God is enthroned, but to which men are to a 
 great extent dead, is infinitely greater than the natural ; 
 and the divine law is given to restore their conscious- 
 ness of it, and re-enthrone God in His dominion within 
 them. It is that heaven may rule them, not earth. 
 This is the cardinal idea of the divine law. Love is 
 the sum of the law, a spiritual and not a natural affec- 
 tion, as is shown both by Moses and by our Lord. On 
 this hang all the law and the prophets. 3 
 
 The law is a force, not an ideal to be lived up to, as 
 a philosophic sect make it a point of conforming to cer- 
 
 1 Heb. vii. 19, viii. 8; Rora. iii. 20; Gal. ii. 16 ; Heb. ix. 9, xi. 40. 
 1 In what sense it works itself out organically in ' the body of 
 Christ' will 1. Ml ii lion-nftiT. 
 3 I>cut. vi. i> ; Malt. \ii. iJ, x\ii. 37-39. 
 
Law the Basis of GocCs Rule in the Soul. 205 
 
 tain rules. To one who obeys the law, God is a power 
 everywhere present, everywhere supreme, as air is 
 everywhere and always alike necessary as a life-force. 
 We live, move, and breathe in God; and there can be no 
 moral law which has not the sense of God, or the exer- 
 cise of supreme love to Him, for its basis. Where 
 that is wanting, the god of this world is the ruling 
 and legislating divinity in the formation of laws and 
 institutions. Selfishness in such a state of things is 
 the sole basis of individual action and of social order. 
 Is not this clear from the policy of governments, and 
 from the whole life of man upon earth ? There is no 
 repose, but all is 'like the troubled sea which cannot 
 rest, but casteth up mire and dirt ;' and to men in this 
 state it is that our Lord addresses the invitation, 'Come 
 unto me ' me, the law of God personified ; ' take my 
 yoke upon you' my law of love: 'for my yoke is 
 easy, and my burden is light ; and ye shall find rest 
 unto your souls.' 1 What a comment upon the law 
 as an inward force ! Is not such a law entitled to 
 all the miracles of the Bible, to re-establish it among 
 men? 
 
 We are so prone to conceive of spiritual force as an 
 axiom of reason, or as a thing to be defined and measured 
 by outward rules, that we fail in our treatment of this 
 subject of law. Can we define seeing to a blind man, 
 or poetical inspiration to one who has no poetry in him? 
 The family ties, true patriotism, and indeed the greatest 
 forces acting in real life, are just as liable to be mis- 
 taken as the divine law, provided our knowledge of 
 them were to depend upon a definition or an axiom of 
 the reason. To love God with all the heart seems to 
 the intellectual sceptic an utter impossibility. And it 
 
 1 Isa. Ivii. 20 j Malt. xi. 30, 31. 
 
206 Seed-Truths. 
 
 would be so, if God had not provided the grace to fulfil 
 the law in them who walk after the Spirit, or who have 
 an inward fitness to understand and practise it in its 
 true meaning and interest. 1 The infinite intelligence 
 revealed to the human intelligence by reasoning from 
 effect to cause, till we had reached the First Cause, is 
 as far removed from the process by which we receive 
 and walk in the light of God's law, as dealing with 
 fox-fire is from basking in the sunbeams. No man can 
 know the Father, but he to whom the Son shall reveal 
 Him. We learn from Him to say, Abba, Father, as 
 we first learned the lesson from our parents, by an 
 affectional and not by an intellectual process. 2 The 
 divine law is a power from God to order our lives by, 
 on the one hand, as on the other we order them by the 
 objects of sense. 
 
 The spiritual men in Israel of old give abundant 
 evidence of accepting their law in a similar sense, as 
 may be seen from their devotional language : ' Thy law 
 is within my heart ;' ' Grant me Thy law graciously/ or, 
 Let me feel its power in my soul ; ' Thy law I love ;' 
 ' Thy law is my delight ;' 'His delight is in the law of 
 the Lord ;' and many like passages, for which no out- 
 ward rites can account, except as the representative of 
 an inward power. 3 The prophets are equally explicit, 
 speaking of ' the law as in the heart/ as 'in the inward 
 parts, and written upon the heart/ ' Forsaking the law ' 
 with them meant more than a neglect of ceremonials ; 
 for even ' the multitude of sacrifices ' were alike com- 
 plained of when not performed in a right spirit. 4 'The 
 fire of God's law' refers not so much to the lightning of 
 
 1 Rom. viiL 1. * Rom. viii. 15 ; John i. 18. 
 
 I's. i. 2, xl. 8, cxix. 29, 113, 174. 
 
 Jer. xxxi. 33, ix. 13, xvi. 11 ; l>u. L 11-15. 
 
Law the Btisis of God's Rule in the Soul. 207 
 
 Sinai, as to the inward warmth of which the Psalmist 
 speaks : ' My heart was hot within me ; while I was 
 musing, the fire burned/ 1 A law producing this divine 
 heat in the soul is fitly called ' fiery.' If it was so in 
 a dispensation of ceremonies, what must it have been 
 when it became ' the law of the spirit of life in Christ 
 Jesus?' Then it was accepted as a heart-force, and 
 malice was murder, lust adultery ; and ' the law' was 
 felt to ' be spiritual/ and antagonistic to a life * carnal, 
 c-old under sin/ Then the righteousness of the scribes 
 and Pharisees, as merely outward, lost its value ; and 
 'the righteousness of the law was fulfilled only in those 
 who walked not after the flesh, but after the Spirit/ 2 
 Not that the divine code had itself changed, for it was 
 the same to Adam, to Abraham, and to Moses as to us; 
 but only that the human mind was in different states 
 of receptivity or of spiritual discernment. 
 
 This idea of the law as a spiritual force proceeding 
 from God, is contained in the Hebrew word by which 
 it is expressed. That word is torah, of which nomos is 
 the synonym in the New Testament ; both words being 
 used about five hundred times. The Greek word nomos 
 has not with the apostles the same sense as in classical 
 usage, but is determined by the meaning of torah, the 
 general word for law in Hebrew. A word charged with 
 so much of God's truth to man, should be prayerfully 
 considered in 'comparing spiritual things with spiritual;' 
 and in doing this, natural ideas or worldly modes of 
 thought must be as far as possible excluded. It is 
 true that, as a word of law or sovereign decree, tm*ali 
 is applied to specific enactments, such as burnt-offer- 
 ings, jealousy, leprosy, uncleanness from contact with 
 
 1 Deut. xxxii. 22 ; Ps. xxxix. 3. 
 
 8 Malt. v. 22, 28 ; Horn. vii. 14, viii. 2, 4 ; Malt. v. 20. 
 
2o8 Seed- Truths. 
 
 the dead, and the like ; and it is sometimes used for 
 civil laws or royal decrees, and once for the temper of 
 a good woman, ' upon whose tongue is the law of kind- 
 ness.' l But these various applications of a term do not 
 weaken or invalidate the stem thought or radical truth, 
 which in a great majority of cases it is used to express, 
 if indeed that thought is ever lost sight of. Torali is a 
 verbal noun formed from a verb which means to run 
 as a small stream, to trickle as water into a reservoir, to 
 flow, to inseminate, to lay a corner or foundation stone; 
 and Jonathan uses .it for hurling a javelin. 2 The pre- 
 vailing idea is action, as in running water, depositing 
 seed, laying a stone, hurling a javelin ; and not only so, 
 but action from one point to another, or from one hand 
 to another. This seems to have suggested the idea of 
 mental action in imparting thought from one mind to 
 another ; and hence, as in this process the teacher and 
 taught concur to a common result, the same word is 
 used to teach 9 and to learn; and torah, the derived 
 word, means doctrine, erudition, law, instruction, which 
 is an insemination of truth, or the shedding of thoughts 
 into the mind as rain upon the earth. 4 It includes also 
 the idea of casting the mind of the learner into the 
 mould of the teacher's by the interaction between them, 
 as a building takes form from the design in the archi- 
 tect's mind. This is the cardinal idea of inspired law. 
 It is an impartation from God to us, effected by con- 
 current action between Him and us, as it is said, 'Draw 
 me, we will run after Thee ;' ' No man can come unto 
 
 1 Lev. vii. 37, xiii. 59; Num. v. 80, xix. 14; Ezra vil 26; 
 Kstl.. i. 9, iii. 14; Dan. vi. 9,13, 15. 
 
 1 Sam. xx. 20, 36. 
 
 1 Judg. xiii. 8. Manoah entreated that the angel might 'teach* him, 
 or impart his own ideal of training a deliverer for Israel. 
 
 L>eut. xjtxii. 2 ; Ia. Iv. 10, 11 ; 1 Cor. iii. 7-9 ; Ps. Ixxii. 2. 
 
Law the Basis of God's Rule in the Soul. 209 
 
 me, except the Father who sent me draw him ;' and 
 many are the prayers in which God is desired to ' lead 
 the soul in His righteousness/ ' in His truth/ ' in a plain 
 path/ and to ' send out His light and truth to guide' 
 and 'lead in the way everlasting.' 1 It is not providen- 
 tial drawing and leading which is chiefly contemplated 
 in these passages, but a drawing to the true, the right, 
 and the good, in obedience to the holy law. 
 
 Nor let it be supposed that this is too spiritual a 
 law to be enforced by penalties. As in nature the 
 greatest forces work the most silently, so in this case 
 the greatest power acting upon man as a moral agent 
 comes from his relation to God as a moral governor ; 
 and to violate the law of this relation entails a greater 
 curse than to violate all the physical laws of our being. 
 It is this that has reduced man from an angel to a 
 devil, from a heavenly to a bestial life. It is this 
 voluntary detachment from God that constitutes the 
 pains of the second death. ' Depart, ye cursed, into 
 everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels/ 
 is a sentence which simply affirms our own determina- 
 tion not to be ruled by God's law. If there is affinity 
 between two trees growing near each other, their 
 branches will interlace and intertwine into one globular 
 top, and their duality can only be seen in their separate 
 trunks. But if there is antipathy, as between a maple 
 and a cedar, they will repel each other, and the maple 
 will incline the other way, and will send out few and 
 feeble branches on the side of its neighbour ; and thus, 
 though no contact ever takes place between them, its 
 top will become mean and misshapen. If an unseen 
 influence produces such effects among trees, what may 
 
 1 Cant. i. 4 ; Jolm vi. 44 ; Ps. v. 8, xxv. 5, xxxi. 3, xliii. 3, 
 cxxxix. 24. 
 
 
 
2 1 o Seed- Truths. 
 
 we expect from a soul in affinity with, or antipathy to, 
 the Spirit of God ? While the one developes beauti- 
 fully, growing as it were into God, and becoming one 
 spirit with Him, the other becomes deformed, leafless, 
 twice dead, and plucked up by the roots. No contact, 
 no overt act on the part of God, is necessary to ensure 
 this damnatory result. The one ' is like a tree planted 
 by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in 
 his season ; his leaf shall not wither ; and whatsoever 
 he doeth shall prosper. The ungodly are not so ; but 
 are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.' 1 
 What but a silent, unseen force produces the agony of 
 a convicted conscience ? What gives a sense of repose 
 in God, but feeling that in Christ we have accepted 
 the holy law as our rule of life ? Can a man have 
 this repose while his heart rebels against any divine 
 precept ? Is not ' he that offends in one point guilty 
 of all ? ' 3 
 
 Not a little is done to kill the life of piety by mis- 
 taken views on this subject. They detach law from 
 the nature on which it acts, or from the personal rela- 
 tion between God and the soul, and conceive of it as 
 a separate power in God, or in the universe, or in a 
 sort of universal conscience of how things ought to be, 
 which, demands to be satisfied, if not in one way, then 
 in another. And they are more concerned to be 
 assured that this universal conscience or this unde- 
 finable something is satisfied, than they are to be 
 personally holy before God. This way of thinking 
 comes from shaping our spiritual ideas to things as 
 we see them in human governments. In our courts 
 of adjudication, the judge, the jury, the prisoner, the 
 witness, the advocate, and all who participate in the 
 1 P. L 8, 4. Jaa. ii. 10. 
 
Law the Basis of God's Ride in the Soul. 2 1 1 
 
 proceedings, are held by the supreme power of law, aa 
 written in the statute books, to conduct the trial, to 
 find a verdict, and to punish or acquit, according to 
 prescribed principles, which the court has no more 
 power to change than the criminal or any other 
 person. They are, in a certain sense, tools which law 
 uses to carry out its behests. Whatever their private 
 sympathies for the poor man whom they doom to 
 death, still the law and their oath compel them to 
 execute the sentence. So, we conceive of God as alike 
 bound by a law, or a principle, or an irresistible moral 
 force of some sort, to punish without pity those who 
 rise up against His government. If pity caused Him 
 to waver in the least, the sceptre would fall from 
 His hands, and the secret would be out that God 
 countenanced sin, and trampled under foot His own 
 law. By this view law is made a Moloch, to 
 whose honour millions must burn in hell for ever, or 
 somebody else must accept the entail of woe on their 
 account. 
 
 The evil of this view comes not from establishing 
 the certainty of a sinner's punishment, for that is 
 fixed in the irreversible laws of his own constitution, 
 but in foisting into a spiritual subject natural ideas, 
 and judging of it by our human affairs. Dives in hell 
 is separated by an impassable gulf from Lazarus in 
 heaven, it is true ; but what made it impassable ? 
 Was it that God's pity for the poor sufferer was over- 
 ruled by law ? Was it that the heart of Abraham and 
 Lazarus was steeled towards him ? Nothing of the 
 sort is intimated. But he had lived and died an un- 
 pitying worldling and voluptuary, without one feeling 
 qualifying him to share in the happiness of heaven. 
 Indeed, heaven would have been worse to him than 
 
212 Seed- Truths. 
 
 lielL 1 Moses and the law had been lost upon him in 
 life, as they were likely to be upon his worldly brothers, 
 failing to bring him to the divine law as his standard 
 of character ; and how could one from the dead do it ? 
 or how could the scenes of eternity make that law any 
 more tolerable to him ? No, the impassable gulf was 
 in his own rebellion of heart against God a rebellion 
 just as stubborn, just as persistent, in hell as it had 
 been in his marble palace and robes of purple and fine 
 linen upon earth. It is in reference to this fixed and 
 irrevocable nature of hostility to God in a worldly 
 mind, this incapacity for any pleasure which is not 
 remote from holy love and heavenly life, that the 
 apostle calls it a law, a ' law of sin and death,' a ' law 
 in the members/ and ' the body of the sins of the 
 flesh/ which must be wholly ' put off ' in order to 
 that harmony with God which the holy law requires, 
 but which it has no power to bring a worldling to 
 accept. It was ' weak through the flesh/ or from the 
 strength of the resisting force of worldliness; and it 
 would be the most unpitying thing that could be done 
 to Dives or any other man to take him to heaven, 
 unless ' the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus had 
 made him free from the law of sin and death.' 2 No 
 idea ever betrayed greater ignorance of what is written 
 in the Bible than this, of supposing that pity or bene- 
 volence would alleviate a worldly man who is only 
 fitted for hell, 'made to be taken and destroyed/ by 
 admitting him to heaven. So far from its being true 
 that God is bound by this Moloch of law, of which 
 some speak, to torture sinners up to the extent of their 
 power of endurance, He allows them all the happiness 
 of which their natures are capable. 'He maketh Ilia 
 Luke XVL 31. Rom. viii. 2, 8, 7-23 ; CoL ii. 11. 
 
Law the Basis of God's Rule in the Soul. 213 
 
 sun to rise upon the evil, and sendeth rain upon the 
 unjust/ ' doing them good, and filling their heart with 
 food and gladness ; ' and He even commands us to 
 do the same, if we would ' be perfect, as our Father 
 in heaven is perfect.' * Such is the policy of God's 
 government in dealing with sinners, so far as we see 
 it ; and how should we suppose that it is, or will be, 
 anywhere or ever, different ? Instead of being at the 
 beck of an unpitying law, God is all love in His deal- 
 ings with His enemies. 
 
 But it may be said, If law is so exclusively a matter 
 between the soul and God, what guide does it furnish 
 for the affairs of practical life ? Is it not remote 
 from any use to be made of it upon earth ? I answer, 
 Though the cardinal principle of God's law is thus a 
 spiritual unit of love and devotion to God, yet it is 
 reflected by many specific enactments, covering the 
 whole outward life of man. Some of these were tem- 
 porary an<J individual, and did not descend to the next 
 generation ; as the interdiction of a certain fruit to 
 Adam considered as an outward fact, the duty en- 
 joined upon Noah to build an ark, that upon Abraham 
 to offer up his son, and many others. The outward 
 duty imposed in such cases is based upon that of 
 inward fealty to God ; and apart from that, it would 
 have no force. God's government has no outward 
 police, and hence it cannot hold except Joy binding 
 the spirit. Indeed, in the case of Adam the outward 
 law was a test of inward obedience, and that obedience 
 had no means of being otherwise put to the proof to 
 develope either guilt or innocence. 'Where there is 
 no law, there is no transgression,' and no obedience, 
 for the voluntary nature is without a moral regulator. 2 
 
 1 Matt. v. 44, 45 ; Acts xiv. 17. 'Horn. iv. 15. 
 
214 Seed- Truths. 
 
 In the case of Abraham, faith, as an act of duty to 
 God, was put to the proof. Some of the outward laws 
 were for a particular race, as circumcision, the Sinai 
 ritual, the entail of Canaan to Israel, and David's 
 rights as a civil ruler. The object of all these, how- 
 ever, was to set forth in some of its relations the law 
 as a spiritual force binding the soul to God. 
 
 The word torah law covers all these enactments, 
 and indeed the whole word of God ; though it is 
 usually accompanied by more specifications, such as 
 statutes, ordinances, commandments, judgments and tes- 
 timonies. The word covenant is usually applied to the 
 promises to Abraham, or to the tables of the covenant, 
 the ten commandments, of which we propose to speak 
 in our next chapter. All these subordinate provisions 
 of law regulating the whole outward life of Israel, re- 
 present the spiritual law in some of its relations. They 
 were addressed to men ruled by the flesh, and incapable 
 of anything more spiritual, putting them under a rigid 
 discipline as to their whole outward life, and making it 
 death to swerve from any of the prescribed rules, except 
 as purified by certain appointed ceremonies. This was 
 to convict them of the sinfulness of their fleshly life, 
 and how impossible it was for them to become right 
 with God and His law without purification, or without 
 becoming spiritual and holy. Men had lost all idea of 
 a spiritual law; and how could they know what sin is in 
 that state, any more than a dog can know what intel- 
 lect is, or how degraded is his dog's life ? The whole 
 tendency of the enactments to Israel, and of God's 
 dealing with them for fifteen hundred years, was to 
 show them the difference between sin and holiness, 
 clean and unclean, a life of fleshly and a life of spiritual 
 ruling; and the extreme punctiliousness of the 
 
Law the Basis of Gods Rule in the Soul. 2 1 5 
 
 in the time of Christ shows that they had outwardly 
 grasped the idea, ignorant as they were of its spiritual 
 and real import. The day of Pentecost, however, con- 
 verted into power the letter of the law ; and what sin 
 and pollution really are as a fleshly and debased life of 
 opposition to a spiritual law, flashed upon three thou- 
 sand at once, extorting the agonized cry, ' Men and 
 brethren, what shall we do ? ' These were perhaps as 
 ceremonially pure as any men in th'e nation ; but sin 
 and holiness they found quite another thing from any 
 idea derived from their misinterpreted law. Now was 
 realized one of the last predictions of the last of their 
 prophets : ' Then shall ye return, and discern between 
 the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth 
 God and him that serveth Him not.' 1 
 
 Thus the cardinal truth of law in the Bible bears like 
 the atmosphere upon the whole outward life of man, 
 by acting as a regulating force upon all that gives a 
 moral character to that life. It purifies the fountain, 
 and how should not its streams be pure ? This is not 
 done by the law and the prophets, not by the Abra- 
 hamic or Sinai covenant, except so far as they con- 
 vinced of sin, and predicted a future Deliverer from its 
 power; but it is effected by 'the precious blood of 
 Christ' as applied by the quickening Spirit. The Holy 
 Ghost is the sole power of killing the flesh that the 
 spirit may live ; which killing He effects not only by 
 the law, but by the crucifixion of Christ, with whom 
 we must be crucified, if we would have Christ, and 
 law, and heaven live in us. Thus one idea of law 
 obtains throughout the word of God a law spiritual, 
 holy, and heavenly. 
 
 ii. 37; Mai. iii 18. 
 
CHAPTEK XIX. 
 
 THE NATURE AND USE OP THE LAW IN STONE. 
 
 IF all divine laws are based upon a relation to God 
 and the spiritual world, to which our fleshly state 
 renders us insensible, of what use are the ten com- 
 mandments ? What, in fact, is the use of any law 
 founded in that relation ? Is it not as unavailing as 
 lessons in seeing to blind men ? Certainly, they would 
 be so in any other view than as a means of restoring 
 the lost faculty. There is not a special enactment 
 in the Bible that has not redemption in view, directly 
 or indirectly, except that which prohibited a certain 
 tree to the primeval man. All laws which God has 
 enacted since the fall, are with a view to recovering 
 men from the dominion of the flesh, and restoring them 
 to the adoption of children in His spiritual family. 
 Such legislation would be a farce of the gravest and 
 most horrible kind among the hopelessly lost. 
 
 What makes redemptive legislation necessary is sin, 
 not specific sins, such as lying, theft, murder, and the 
 like, but sin as a nature, a force or constitution which 
 is just as susceptible of being propagated from gene- 
 ration to generation as any other characteristic of the 
 genus homo. 'For when we were in the flesh, the 
 motions of sin which were by the law did work in our 
 members to bring forth fruit unto death.' 1 Being f in 
 the flesh' describes the corrupted nature as the seeding, 
 
 1 Rom. vii. 5. See also Horn, v. 14-21, viii. 2, which clearly in- 
 volves the idea of prupagsitiuu. 
 
 216 
 
Nature and Use of the Law in Stone. 2 T 7 
 
 of -which all specific motions, passions, or tendencies to 
 evil as developed in act, are the harvest. It is a har- 
 vest ' unto death,' as being devoid of all spiritual life in 
 God. This idea of propagated evil enters as fully into 
 the natural history of the race as the carnivorous 
 appetite of a lion or a tiger, though it is only from the 
 Bible we learn that it had its origin in sin as an act, 
 becoming sin as a nature. As the normal condition of 
 human nature involves sensibility to God and the realm 
 of spirits as an all-controlling life-element, what but 
 an abnormal and sinful condition could follow the loss 
 of it ? And such is the nature of the case, that the 
 loss of it in the only two existing parents would ensure 
 it in their children. 
 
 Now it is to break up this deep incrustation of 
 carnality and materialism that the law is given, and 
 especially the ten commandments. 'The motions of 
 sin are by the law/ in the same sense that latent disease 
 is by the potion which developed it, or as the convul- 
 sions of a drowned man are produced by the means 
 used to restore him to life. The law does not create 
 the sin, but brings it to the surface, reveals it to the 
 man's consciousness, and awakens in him efforts to 
 escape its dangerous power. ' I had not known sin 
 but by the law ; for I had not known lust, except the 
 law had said, Thou shalt not covet;' 1 that is, I should 
 not have known it as lust and a crime against God, and 
 death to all my spiritual and immortal .hopes. Sinai 
 thunders are an assault upon the earthly enclosure in 
 which the soul has encased itself, like some power that 
 might be supposed to be brought to bear upon a savage 
 race to convince it of its savagery, to show it in its 
 most hateful light, and thus to act as a primary im- 
 1 Horn. vii. 7. 
 
218 Seed-Truths. 
 
 pulse towards civilisation. ' The law was added "because 
 of transgressions/ just as medical science is added 
 because of disease. /'It is a ministration of death, 
 written and engraven in stone,' but ministering death 
 with a view to a life not on the principle of law, but 
 of grace. It is ' the strength of sin,' which without law 
 could have no conscious existence and no power of 
 conviction. ' What shall we say then ? Is the law 
 sin ? ' By no means. ' But sin, that it might appear 
 sin, working death in me by that which is good ; that 
 sin by the commandment might become exceedingly 
 sinful.' 1 Sin is not made exceedingly sinful by the 
 law, for it is so in itself; but it is made to appear so in 
 the soul's consciousness. 
 
 Having thus seen the use which inspired men 
 ascribe to the ten commandments, the question arises 
 as to what effect it can have upon men in a state of 
 total indifference or deadness to spiritual truths ? I 
 have spoken of God's addressing us in our natural 
 state in ways adapted to our apprehension, and thus 
 of ' coming down' to us, and of ' knocking' at the outer 
 gateway of the soul. This is especially true of the ten 
 commandments as delivered from Sinai. It is an ap- 
 peal to fear, the same as the cherubim at the gate of 
 Eden, which we have already noticed. Fear of death, 
 and of what is to ensue in another world, is one of the 
 most active principles of human nature. What but 
 this has given such force to Shakespeare's words, ascrib- 
 ing to it the consent to live under the world's irretriev- 
 able calamities ? 
 
 For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, 
 The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, 
 
 > Gal. iii. 19 ; 2 Cor. iii. 7 ; 1 Cor. xv. 56. 
 
Nature and Use of the Law in Stone. 219 
 
 The pangs of despised love, the law's delay, 
 
 The insolence of of lice, and the spurns 
 
 That patient merit of the unworthy takes, 
 
 "When he might his quietus make 
 
 With a bare bodkin, 
 
 But Hue, dread of something after death?* 
 
 "\Vliat sacrifices, what self-inflictions, what outlays, to 
 ensure the cover of a priesthood ! what various devices 
 of men to ease their burdened conscience, and assure 
 themselves that all will be well with them when they 
 meet their final doom ! Though without right ideas 
 on the subject, and with little regard to justice or 
 truth, their selfish fears make them unwilling to die 
 unshrived or unpardoned. Tribes sunk to the level of 
 nature, anct without even the idea of a God, if there 
 be such, still cling to their amulets as a mysterious 
 power to ward off evil and ensure them happiness. 
 Intellectual men, who scout the idea of a hereafter, 
 often find their courage failing as death approaches, 
 and gladly seize on any semblance of faith as a support 
 in entering the dark valley. 
 
 This is the principle to which the ten command- 
 ments make their appeal They are thundered from 
 Sinai, or uttered from the wilderness in the rough 
 tones of John the Baptist, arousing men from their 
 deep slumbers in sin to exercise repentance towards 
 God. They give no power for the enforced duty, it is 
 true ; and yet, is it nothing that a race dead in sin 
 should be made to stir in its sepulchre ? Is it nothing 
 to awaken in them the sense of needing something better 
 than this fleshly life ? It is a killing process ; but how 
 can they reach a resurrection till the sin in which they 
 are dies, or till the nature from which they reap such 
 a harvest of sins and woes is crucified with Christ ? 
 The law asserts God's righteousness ir contrast to our 
 
2 2 o Seed- Truths. 
 
 own defilement, and thus is a schoolmaster to bring us 
 to Christ. 1 
 
 This killing work of law is as necessary as a pre- 
 paration to salvation, as grace in effecting it. Those 
 who have not learned enough of law to feel their help- 
 lessness, or who have not entered ' the inner chamber ' 
 of the soul's ' imagery, to see the abominations ' that 
 cover themselves there in darkness, need expect no 
 signal victory over the world, the flesh, and the devil. 2 
 Their piety is a legalism of perpetual resolves to do 
 better, in which failing, they are all the time miserable, 
 and basing their hopes of salvation, perhaps, on the 
 fact of this misery, as a sort of claim upon Christ's 
 merits to make up the deficiency. If the law makes 
 them cry out, ' O wretched man that I am !' it seems 
 to suffice them, without their ever being able to say, 
 ' I thank God, through Jesus Christ my Lord,' or to 
 feel that they are ' free from condemnation ' by being 
 actually and consciously ' in Christ.' 3 I fear that the 
 great majority of those who have named the name of 
 Christ are in this dubious position between law and 
 grace, living and .dying without ever knowing the 
 gospel, or the full freedom of the sons of God. I hope 
 more fully, by God's grace, to enlarge upon these ideas 
 in another place. 
 
 The fitness of the law in stone to do this killing 
 work, may be seen from the manner of its delivery, from 
 the place and circumstances of its conservation, from the 
 sense of guilt and helplc-ssness which it awakens, and from 
 the consenting response which it extorts from conscience. 
 
 1 Gal. iil 24. The idea is that of a servant leading the children to 
 end from school, and not of one to teach them. Christ is the school- 
 master or teacher. 
 
 luck. viii. 6-18. Roiu. vii. 24, 25, viii. L 
 
Nature and Use of the Law in Stone. 221 
 
 The delivery or proclamation of an important enact- 
 ment by European Governments is, by royal authority, 
 by certain impressive ceremonies, and by threatened 
 penalties, to awaken- in the people the fear of trans- 
 gressing it. But what ever equalled in this respect 
 the proclamation of the ten commandments from 
 [Mount Sinai ? They were first spoken by God Him- 
 self, from the smoking, lightning-riven summit of the 
 holy mount, and reached the ears of the people in 
 more than tones of earthly thunder. And as if spoken 
 words, however impressive, and a visible scene so ter- 
 rible that the people besought that it might not be 
 repeated, 1 were not to be trusted with so great a de- 
 livery, they were engraven in two tablets of stone by 
 God's own finger, to indicate a permanency attaching 
 to no other part of the Sinai ceremonial. 2 They are a 
 condensed view of how we are to work out in conduct 
 our inward fealty to the Supreme Legislator ; they 
 enforce universal and eternal obligations ; they have a 
 basis in natural conscience as well as in revealed re- 
 ligion; and they assert the great principle, that no 
 ceremonial in worship, no faith or professions of inward 
 piety, and no claims upon God by pious parents or 
 interceding priesthoods, can render tis acceptable with- 
 out good morals. Can we wonder that God should 
 have surrounded Himself with the terrors of Sinai in 
 delivering such a law, and that He should have added 
 to its oral utterance its miraculous inscription in stone ? 
 And yet, such is human nature, that the event proved 
 how impotent was the fear excited by the delivery of 
 the law, since, a few days after, these same people who 
 
 1 Ex. xx. 19. 
 
 2 Ex. xxiv. 12, xxxii. 15, 16, xxxiv. 28, 29 ; Deut iv. 13 v. 22 ; 
 Ex. xx. 1. 
 
222 Seed-Triitks. 
 
 heard and accepted it as their rule of life, violated its 
 first and chief precept not to have any God but 
 Jehovah and were shouting to a golden calf in their 
 nakedness and revelry, ' These be thy gods, Israel/ 
 after the manner of the bestial worship in Egypt. 
 And Moses, when he looked on the disgusting scene, 
 was so indignant, that he broke, beneath the mount, 
 the two tables on which God had written the law, to 
 indicate the utter failure of all legal expedients to raise 
 man from his earthliness to the spiritual and heavenly 
 life for which he was created. 1 It was then proved 
 that the law could only convince of sin. 
 
 The place and circumstances for conserving the law 
 were as remarkable as its delivery. The two tablets, 
 after being renewed by God Himself, 2 were deposited in 
 a casket of shittim wood overlaid with gold, the lid of 
 which was the earthly throne of Jehovah in admini- 
 stering the government over Israel The law was the 
 basis of this throne, called the mercy -seat, to show 
 impressively how impossible it is for God to exercise 
 mercy on any basis but law ; or, in other words, that 
 it would be no mercy to man to take him into favour 
 with Himself, and raise him to heaven, in any way but 
 that of restoring him to a holy and heavenly life. 
 'Make the tree good, and his fruit will be good.' 
 Cleanse the fountain, and its streams will be pure. 
 Dives in heaven, as before said, would be more miser- 
 able than in hell. The gulf is impassable. This ark 
 was placed in the holy of holies a large room from 
 which light was excluded, to show that Cod dwells to 
 us, as fleshly men, in thick darkness. 3 Over it, two 
 
 1 Ex. xxxii. 1-19. Ex. xxxiv. 1, 28. 
 
 * * Kelt. x. 20. Christ has removed this darkm-ss, by musm-ating 
 for us, ' through the veil oi' His ilcsh, a iicw uud living way.' 
 
Nature and Use of the Law in Stone. 223 
 
 cherubim, with expanded wings, stood face to face, the 
 throne of God and His law being between them, upon 
 which they kept watch and ward, to represent how 
 intent all heavenly beings are to Him who sitteth upon 
 the throne, and to His divine behests. This place 
 where the law was deposited was separated by a veil 
 from the holy place, and that again was surrounded by 
 a circumvallation of courts and cloisters ; and thus the 
 two tables were excluded from all profane eyes, and 
 could only be approached by the high priest onCe a 
 year, after purification by blood, and while sacrifices and 
 prayers were offered in his behalf on the part of the 
 priests and people without. Can any outward device 
 be imagined, to show more impressively that the pre- 
 cious .blood of Christ must first flow, before the law can 
 be fully restored to us, and that, when it is restored, it 
 will be in the secret recesses of the soul, upon which 
 no eye can look but our High Priest, ' who has passed 
 into the heavens,' and ' who is set on the right hand 
 of the throne of the Majesty on high?' 1 Unless the 
 reader keeps in view the law of God as a unit of His 
 ruling within our souls, from which He had been cast 
 out by our coming under the ruling of natural ideas 
 and fleshly lusts, and that this is the present condition 
 of humanity, all this symbolism will be lost upon him ; 
 and what is worse, it will fill his mind with false ideas 
 and corrupted theology. It is only by searching Scrip- 
 ture, and comparing spiritual things with spiritual, that 
 the chaff can be eliminated from the wheat, or truth, 
 as in the thought of holy seers, can detach itself from 
 material symbols. You and I, reader, must accept the 
 law as God's dominion in our souls by the Holy Ghost, 
 or we can make no advance in salvation. 
 1 Heb. iv. 14, viiL 1. 
 
224 Seed- Truths. 
 
 Another aspect in the working of the law written 
 on stone is, that of the sense of guilt and helplessness 
 which it produces in one who honestly endeavours to 
 keep it. Who can by any effort of his own love God 
 with all his heart ? Who can repress concupiscence ? 
 How have millions, by their own confession, vainly 
 struggled in the endeavour ? Can we detach ourselves 
 from our own nature, and take on one as foreign to our- 
 selves as spirit is from matter, earthly from heavenly 
 ideas ? No ; there must be a death of what we are, 
 before we can have a resurrection to a state so exalted. 
 And a dying process is always one of helplessness : the 
 grave closes only upon those who were too weak to 
 conquer disease and death ; and a law that can only 
 consign us to the sepulchre, or that can only say, 
 ' Cursed is every one that continue th not in all things 
 written in the book of the law, to do them,' comes 
 infinitely short of the necessities of our condition. 1 
 To return to a former illustration : Suppose transmi- 
 gration were possible, and you had a friend whose soul 
 had gone into a dog, would it be enough to awake him 
 to a sense of his condition ? That would only torment 
 him, unless it were a necessary measure of restoring 
 him to his former state of manhood. This is all the 
 law can do convince us of the strength of our flesh, 
 and of its own consequent impotence to raise us to a 
 new life. 'The law entered that the offence might 
 abound ; ' but we must look elsewhere for deliverance 
 from its power. 2 By what we have before said, and 
 are to say, in reference to the mode of reaching a 
 resurrection life, the exact position of the ten com- 
 mandments in the Bible, we trust, will become sulli- 
 cicntly clear. That after fifteen hundred years they 
 1 Gal. iii. 10. f Rom. v. 20. 
 
Nature and Use of the Law in Stone. 225 
 
 had failed to give righteousness to any Jew, as the 
 apostle states in Romans, or any independence of faith 
 for justification more than a Gentile, shows how hope- 
 less they are as a basis of salvation. 1 
 
 The tables of stone were a covenant as well as a 
 law, not being statutes imposed without the consent of 
 the governed, but a contract between God and men. 
 They were of a nature to obtain even from natural 
 conscience a consenting response. Who can claim the 
 right of turning from the God who has 'redeemed* 
 him, the reason assigned for having no God but 
 Jehovah ? Who is not forced to confess, that he 
 ought not to steal ? Such is the law, that it must 
 hold upon moral natures like ours ; and thus it cannot 
 fail to awaken a sense of guilt in those to whom it is 
 fairly brought home, however they may still continue 
 joined to their idols of flesh. Hence we have not 
 only God speaking the law from Sinai, but the people 
 responding, ' All that the Lord hath spoken we will do ; 
 and Moses returned these words of the people unto the 
 Lord.' 2 Though in one sense an absolute Sovereign 
 in redemption, God rules only a consenting people. 
 No being in the universe more clearly and decidedly 
 respects the freedom of the human soul than He who 
 endowed it with its prerogatives. Indeed, it would be 
 reducing mind to a level with matter, to coerce it under 
 any but a representative government, or a government 
 depending upon the consent of the governed. If their 
 consent is not obtained, they pass under another god 
 and under another code, in hostility to Jehovah ; but 
 that cannot succeed in resisting the thunder of His 
 power. They are free, but it is the freedom of hell. 
 
 1 Rom. iii. 18, 19. 
 
 1 E-v. ***. b ; i^uit. v. 27 ; Ex. xxiv. 3, 7. 
 
 P 
 
226 Seed- Truths. 
 
 In reference to this agreement between God and the 
 people, the tables of the law were called ' tables of 
 testimony/ the ark 'the ark of the covenant/ and the 
 tabernacle 'the tabernacle of witness/ because they 
 were a sort of register-office to stand as a perpetual 
 witness of the precise terms of the contract, and as 
 a means of convicting delinquents of their violated 
 pledges and dishonest dealings with God. 1 It is 
 viewed in the light of a nuptial bond wedding the 
 soul to God; and both Israel and the apostolic 
 churches were charged with conjugal infidelity when- 
 ever they forsook their Head and Husband. Thus in 
 the prophets ; 2 and Dean Alford understands the 
 adulterers and adulteresses whom James addresses 
 among Christians in the same light, and he renders 
 the succeeding passage accordingly: 'The Spirit He 
 placed in us jealously desireth us.' He is ' grieved ' 
 by our wandering worldly desires, as a husband by the 
 alienated affections of his wife. 3 The oneness of the 
 parties in a marriage is spoken of as ' a great mystery/ 
 because it pertains 'to Christ and His church/ or a 
 'joining o"f the soul in one spirit with the Lord.' 4 
 Who will say, that a law which represents sin not 
 only as violating a solemn contract, but the heart's 
 most sacred pledges, is not pre-eminent in its con- 
 victing power ? 
 
 It is objected to the importance and perpetuity of 
 the law in stone, that it tells us what not to do, but 
 not what we ought to do. It is negative rather than 
 
 > Ex. xxxii. 15 ; Heb. ix. 4 ; Num. xvii. 7, x. 33 ; Deut. xxxi. 26. 
 Jer. iii. 2, 9; Kz.k. xxiii. 37, xvi. 38; Hos. iii. 1, iv. 12; Lev. 
 xvii. 7 ; 2 Cliron. xxi. 11 ; Ex. xxxiv. 15, and many others. 
 8 Jas. iv. 4. 5 ; Kpli. iv. 30. 
 4 1 Cor. vi. 17 ; l^.li. v. 32. 
 
Nature and Use of the Law in Stone. 227 
 
 positive. Eight of its precepts are negative ; one of 
 the other two has changed its form, and no such 
 Sabbath as it enjoined upon the Jews now exists ; 
 while the other, enjoining duty to parents, is an in- 
 stinct of nature, and therefore unnecessary. 
 
 It is sufficient to reply to this, that Moses, our 
 Lord, and the Apostle Paul, condense the whole spirit 
 of the law into love to God and man, showing thaf" 
 they at least conceived of it as expressing a principle 
 that was not done away by the gospel, like the rest of 
 the Sinai ceremonial, but is of perpetual obligation. 1 
 This is the principle considered in our last chapter, 
 growing out of the soul's direct relationship to God as 
 Spirit, involving the duty of coming under His ruling 
 in all things, which is the meaning of loving God with 
 all our hearts. Besides, each of the negative com- 
 mandments involves positive duties; nor can it be 
 observed without doing those duties. It guards a 
 point at which the soul's affections and activities are 
 liable to flow in a wrong direction ; and if the crevasse 
 is. stopped, they will be confined to the true channel 
 of love, duty, and obedience. It is as if a mighty 
 river, now overflowing a wide extent of country, con- 
 verting it into a vast quagmire, covering it with a 
 deadly miasma, and causing it to breed crocodiles, 
 serpents, and every noxious animal, were diked and 
 confined to its proper channel, and this country was 
 thus restored to green fields, blooming gardens, beau- 
 tiful forests, and all the glories of cultivation. Thus, 
 if the human affections and activities were confined at 
 the points guarded by the law, they would flow in the 
 direction of all that is virtuous, holy, and beneficent. 
 
 We have only to look at the terms of the first table 
 1 Deut. vi. 5; Mark xii. 30; Rom. *&. 10. 
 
223 Seed-Truths.' 
 
 of the law, to see how fully it justifies making its ful- 
 filment consist in supreme love and devotion to God. 
 If we had no other God but Jehovah, what would 
 ensue but the centring of all love, devotion, and obe- 
 dience in Him ? We are so constituted, that some 
 passion and purpose will rule us. If it is not one 
 thing, it will be another. By cutting off the stream 
 in other directions, what can follow but its concen- 
 trated force in the only remaining channel ? A man 
 cut off from all other gods and all other ruling powers 
 within or around him, cannot do otherwise, as he is 
 constituted, but give Jehovah the supreme place in 
 things, and thus fulfil the cardinal principle of all 
 divine law, that of having God rule us in all things. 
 ' Thou shalt have no other gods before me ' is a pre- 
 cept that admits of no construction but that of loving 
 God with all our soul, and mind, and strength. 1 The 
 wisdom of such a principle both in the individual 
 and in society makes it worthy of God, and of a first 
 place in 'His law. Who can be happy with divided 
 and conflicting passions ? Who does not need some 
 such ruling force within him, in order to the har- 
 monious action of the various impulses of his own 
 being? 'Unite my heart to fear Thy name' is a 
 prayer as necessary to one's peace as to his piety. 
 And as to social order, how can we have it without 
 a common and all-controlling centre, like the sun in 
 the solar system ? Never will the nations be secured 
 against war till the principle of this divine enactment 
 is adopted, and all are held by some supreme power of 
 international law as a central force to regulate their in- 
 tercourse among themselves. Philanthropy and states- 
 manship can never devise 'a better code than that 
 1 i:.\. .\x. 
 
Nature and Use of the Law in Stone. 229 
 
 which was enunciated nearly four thousand years ago 
 from the broken summits of Peninsular Arabia. 
 
 The second commandment guards against the uni- 
 versal tendency of men to materialism in their theo- 
 logies. As the flesh, the world, and natural ideas rule 
 them to the exclusion of spirit, what could be expected 
 of them but the worship of images in gold, silver, and 
 precious stones ; or that they should pay their adora- 
 tion to animals, four-footed beasts, and creeping things ? 
 So wrapped up in these had the nations become, that 
 they could conceive of only local divinities nothing 
 better, at least, than sun, moon, stars, and the forces of 
 nature ; and the idea of the one living and true God 
 as an infinite intelligence had actually perished from 
 the minds of men. Even Israel, for more than a 
 thousand years of its national life, was ever back- 
 sliding into image-worship, and the other five hundred 
 it gave to the idolatry of its ritual, which in the time 
 of our Lord was little better than the heathenism of 
 the surrounding nations. And even to this day, by far 
 the greater portion of the world are idolaters, a re- 
 mark which may even apply to Christendom so called, 
 since pictures, statuary, architecture, and a thousand 
 ritual devices, enter so largely into its worship. The 
 Catholics have even cancelled this second command- 
 ment, to save themselves from its maledictions in a 
 practice which is as God-dishonouring as it is debasing 
 to mankind. In all lands where this material theo- 
 logy obtains, an incubus rests upon civilisation and 
 morals. ' Thou shalt not worship any graven image ' 
 is an interdiction that would preclude nine-tenths of 
 the world's worship, and of its causes of depression and 
 demoralization. 1 Considering the state of the nations, 
 
 1 Ex. xx. 5, 6. 
 
230 Seed-Truths. 
 
 can we wonder that such a precept should be second 
 in the tablets of stone written by God's finger, or that 
 the Old Testament should be such a continual protest 
 against idolatry ? Not only material images are for- 
 bidden, but ideal ones, as consisting in false views of 
 God and corrupt theologies, that all our thoughts of 
 Him may be worthy of His adorable character, and 
 that we may ' sanctify the Lord God in our hearts, and 
 make Him our fear and our dread.' l 
 
 The third commandment touches a most active prin- 
 ciple, that of introducing the name of God into speech. 
 It does not forbid this ; but only the ' taking of it in 
 vain/ or with lightness, irreverence, and profanation: 
 ' The Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh His 
 name in vain.' 2 Not only is cursing and swearing for- 
 bidden, but using God's name as an expletive to set off 
 discourse or give power to affirmations. The idle re- 
 petition of it, as in heathen worship, where the name 
 of the god is called over and over again, ' Baal, 
 Baal/ as a Catholic counts his beads, or a savage his 
 amulets, as if we were to ' be heard by our much speak- 
 ing/ or by the charm of a name, is forbidden by our 
 Lord ; and our words are to be few and simple. 3 It for- 
 bids also the profanation of hypocrisy in worship, or of 
 ' drawing nigh to God with our lips while our hearts are 
 far from Him/ thus imposing on ourselves and others, 
 but not on the Searcher of all hearts. 4 This precept 
 contemplates a purified speech, wherein the yea shall 
 be yea, and the nay nay, to which truth and sincerity 
 shall add force, and manifest integrity shall secure con- 
 viction. 5 "Who can estimate the wide-reaching results 
 
 l Isa. viii. 13. Ex. xx. 7. 
 
 Alsitt. vi. 7 ; 1 Kings xviii. 20. 
 
 . la j licv. ii. 2a. * Matt. v. 37. 
 
Nature and Use of the Law in Stone. 231 
 
 of such a law ? It would secure the house of God 
 against mimicry and pantomime; it would purify and 
 exalt social intercourse ; it would put an end to the 
 oaths which tremble on the lips of age, and are caught 
 up and reverberated by the young ; and it would ensure 
 in discourse ' that which is good to the use of edifying, 
 that it may minister grace to the hearers.' l Men will 
 talk; men will employ the name of God; how else 
 can they worship ? And ' by their words they shall be 
 justified, and by their words they shall be condemned/ 
 because words are not only determinative of what is in 
 them, but of what they are doing for the weal or woe 
 of others. 2 Can we overestimate the law which gives 
 God His due place in language ? 
 
 The seed-thought of the fourth commandment is that 
 of the divine holiness : ' Eemember the Sabbath-day, to 
 keep it holy' 3 We are to ' hallow ' the Sabbath, not 
 in the sense of making the time holy, but as a memo- 
 rial of the divine holiness, and by cultivating in our- 
 selves that holiness without which no man shall see 
 the Lord. 4 The two ideas of holiness and rest are con- 
 joined in the Bible, because they are inseparable in 
 experience. Holiness is that harmony in God, or that 
 due balance of His attributes, without which power 
 would be tyranny, omniscience craft, justice revenge, 
 and even the amiable attribute of mercy would degene- 
 rate into blind prodigality or undiscriminating fond- 
 ness. And a mind in harmony within itself is in 
 repose. No tempest of passion agitates it ; no unsatis- 
 fied desires canker within. Hence our Lord assigns 
 meekness and lowliness, that is, harmonized desires, as 
 a reason why the weary and heavy laden would find 
 
 1 Epli. iv. 29. 2 Matt. xii. 37. 3 Ex. xx. 9-11. 
 
 4 Jcr. xvii. 22 ; Ezek. xx. 20, xliv. 24 ; Heb. xii. 11 
 
232 Seed- Truths. 
 
 rest in Him ; and the perfect holiness of His nature 
 ensured for Him, under all His pains and conflicts, the 
 peace which He has bequeathed to His people. 1 The 
 apostle also applies the term Sabbath to the rest into 
 which believers enter, likening it to that into which 
 God entered on the seventh day of creation ; and He 
 adds, ' There remaineth therefore a scibbatizing, or Sab- 
 bath of rest, to the people of God.' And they have already 
 entered it by faith : ' for we which have believed do 
 enter into rest.' To a like rest our Lord invites us, 
 plainly showing that Sabbath stands for the holiest 
 and happiest things of His church. 2 
 
 God connected with His labours in creation, and 
 with His care of this working-day world, the truth of 
 infinite repose in Himself as the result of His perfectly 
 balanced attributes, and not only entails the same to 
 all of like character, but has institutionally held it 
 forth from the beginning of time. With the loss of 
 this truth, the Sabbath itself seems to have perished. 
 Moses revived it in the wilderness with appendages 
 in the civil government over Israel which have since 
 ceased. But the institution in its primary and car- 
 dinal idea of the rest of holiness, as written in stone 
 with the nine other commandments, is equally binding 
 upon us to remember it as of unabated and undying 
 obligation. In heaven it will be more to us, no doubt, 
 than upon earth. It can no more perish than the 
 divine holiness. The change of day and outward forms 
 of observance, of which some make so much account, 
 from failing to look at the scriptural truth of the in- 
 stitution, cannot abate its force. Even without this 
 truth, and regarding it simply as a civil institution for 
 
 1 Matt. XL 29 ; John xiv. 27, zvi. 33. 
 MM), iv. 1-0. 
 
Nature and Use of the Law in Stone. 233 
 
 natural men, how beneficent its effects upon man, the 
 labouring animals, and the whole social system ! 
 
 That I do not err and am not fanciful in this view 
 of the fourth commandment, any one may see by look- 
 ing at the two words applied to the institution in 
 Hebrew, and their use in other connections. They are 
 JOP, shebah, seven ; and ria^ shabbath, rest. Seven 
 was a sacred number among the Hebrews, and is used 
 for an oath ; and the verb from which it is made ex- 
 pressed the most hallowed idea of which they had a 
 conception. 1 It was also used for completeness or ful- 
 ness in the times of worship ; 2 for the utmost extent 
 of calamity; 3 and for punishment in full measure. 4 
 Thus the idea of completeness, fulness, perfection, in- 
 heres in the term ; and, as applied to God, it refers to 
 the infinite perfection of His nature, as illustriously 
 displayed when the first Sabbath dawned upon His 
 completed work of creation : ' the morning stars sang 
 together, and the sons of God shouted for joy.' It 
 denotes, not that God ceased to energize through all 
 nature, but the eternal harmony of His attributes as 
 brought out in His works, leading heavenly beings to 
 single out this attribute before all others in their cry 
 of ' Holy, holy, holy.' This cry comprehends all God's 
 attributes, and all His works in their harmonious ad- 
 justment, as beauty all the features in their united 
 result. Neither love, justice, nor truth, in its separate, 
 capacity, can come up to an angel's conception of God, 
 more than a single feature in our idea of a beautiful 
 face. Holiness is beauty. 5 
 
 This attribute of harmony is marvellously refilled 
 
 1 Gen. xxi. 28 ; Ex. xxxvii. 23 ; Lev. iv. 16, 17. 
 
 * PS. cxix. 164. 3 Prov. xxiv. 16. 
 
 * Lev. xxvi. 18, 21. 8 Ps. ex. 3. 
 
234 Seed- Truths. 
 
 even in material nature, adding force to the saying, 
 that ' the imdevout astronomer is mad.' For millions 
 of years, so far as we know, the spheres have main- 
 tained their mystic dance without jostling or colliding. 
 "What has in it more of the sublime than the rest or 
 quietude with which the solar orbs perform their cycles 
 through the ethereal expanse, traversing infinite spaces, 
 and, in doing so, giving birth and being to innumerable 
 forms of life, all noiseless, quiet, harmonious ? "Who 
 can imagine a more glorious showing in material things 
 of the infinite harmony in which they had their origin, 
 than the Sabbath of God's completed works had to 
 offer? 
 
 Thus we have, in the first table of the law, the one 
 Jehovah as the central fact of creation and of redeem- 
 ing power; we have true ideas of His adorable cha- 
 racter enjoined ; we have His name as an inspiration 
 of truth, reverence, and sincerity in His worship ; and 
 we have the rest of holiness as the complement of the 
 first table of the law, including love to God with all 
 our heart, mind, and strength, the sum of all piety 
 and of all happiness. 
 
 ' And those who stand upon the sea of glass, 
 And those who stand upon the battlements 
 And lofty towers of New Jerusalem, 
 And those who circling stand, bowing afar, 
 Exalted on the everlasting hills, 
 Thousands of thousands, thousands infinite, 
 "With voice of boundless love, answered, Amen ; 
 And Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, 
 The one Eternal, smilcl .superior bliss ; 
 And every eye and every face in heaven, 
 Eeikcted and reflecting, beams with love.' 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 THE DIVINE INDWELLING IN OUR SOCIAL RELATIONS. 
 
 GOD, in the adytum of man's nature, on the basis 
 of law, works Himself out in all our external 
 relations, symbolized in Israel by an orderly people 
 and a fruitful land ; and doctrinally stated in the gos- 
 pel as glorifying God in body and spirit, showing forth 
 His praise, and adorning the doctrine of God our 
 Saviour in all things. 1 And it is in reference to the 
 sanctity which the character of all believers is supposed 
 to acquire from their new interior life, that they are 
 called saints, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly 
 calling ; and they are exhorted by the mercies of God, 
 thus inwardly manifested, to present their bodies a 
 living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, which 
 is their reasonable sacrifice. 2 That these terms have 
 gone into disuse in expressing discipleship, indicates a 
 falling off in sanctity ; insomuch that the circles are 
 comparatively few to which saint, holy brethren, would 
 not be felt to be a misnomer. But as we write to 
 develope seed-truths in the word itself, and not their 
 supposed germination in existing character, we are 
 compelled to keep to what is written of God's en- 
 thronement within on the basis of law, and its out- 
 working in the life. 
 
 1 1 Cor. vi. 20, x. 31. 
 
 * Heb. iii. 1 ; Rom. xii. 1 ; 1 Cor. i. 2, et al 
 
236 Seed- Truths. 
 
 No imagery is more glowing than the representative 
 outworking of enthroned divinity in the exterior life 
 of His ancient people. Sons were as olive-plants 
 around their board ; daughters as polished stones cut 
 in the similitude of a palace ; garners full of all man- 
 ner of stores ; sheep bringing forth ten thousands, and 
 oxen strong to labour ; no breaking in, going out, nor 
 complaining in the streets : thus happy is that people 
 whose God is the Lord. 1 The early and latter rain 
 causing the springing of the pastures, the fruitfulness 
 of vine and fig-tree ; barns full of wheat ; vats over- 
 flowing with wine and oil ; plenty and satisfaction on 
 every hand, betokened God's presence in the midst of 
 His people. 2 The Lord caused them to ride on the 
 high places of the earth, even in passing through the 
 deserts of Arabia Petrea, to eat the increase of the 
 fields ; to suck honey out of the rock, and oil from the 
 flinty rock ; butter of kine, and milk of sheep, with fat 
 of lambs, and rams of the breed of Bashan, and goats, 
 with the fat of the kidneys of wheat : they were fed, 
 and drank of the pure blood of the grape. 8 Such are 
 the glowing images which represented to a sensuous 
 age the outworking of divine truth and love, overspread- 
 ing the whole external scene with bloom and beauty ; 
 thus foreshadowing the blessedness of an indwelling 
 Saviour to a regenerated people. 
 
 It is often asked wherein the Mosaic law in stone is 
 superior to the institutes of other legislators ? Do not 
 even heathen and savages honour parents, condemn 
 murder, adultery, thieving, lying, and infringements 
 upon other's rights ? And the codes of Solon, Lycur- 
 gus, Numa, and others, are urged with a leer of triumph, 
 as more than offsetting the words claimed to be spoken 
 1 Ps. ciliv. 12-15. 2 ilos. ii. 21-23. * Deut. xxxii. 13, 14. 
 
Divine Indwelling in oiir Social Relations. 237 
 
 and written by Jehovah on Mount Sinai. But these 
 codes were political rather than personal, distributing 
 men into classes, and prescribing the functions of each 
 as members of the state, and not with a view of regu- 
 lating the interior life. Solon made property instead 
 of birth the basis of citizenship ; Lycurgus divided the 
 state into three orders, made a distribution of the lands, 
 provided a common table, prescribed a rigorous system 
 of gymnastics, and required the state to own and train 
 the children, chiefly with a view to power in war. 
 Numa enacted a politico-religious system, classifying 
 the people, determining the duties of pontiffs and the 
 rites of religion ; but giving no hint, not even by sym- 
 bol, of a new condition of the inner nature, fitting it 
 for consociation with a personal God, or as a dwelling- 
 place of the Infinite Spirit. Their institutes are as re- 
 mote from the animus and intent of the Sinai covenant, 
 as the tactics of the Prussian army, or the legislation 
 of Parliament or Congress. 
 
 Moses' law hinges upon a right condition of the soul 
 towards God, in obedience to the first table, regulating 
 the spiritual relations as a prerequisite to social and 
 civil life. It is fundamental to revealed religion, and 
 a basis for universal duty, in heaven as well as on 
 earth, and is as pervading and enduring as the power 
 of moral obligation. It includes all the elements of a 
 spiritual and holy life, as our Lord's interpretation and 
 illustration of it in His teaching and life, thus magni- 
 fying it and making it honourable, clearly prove. The 
 Episcopal Church is to be honoured for its weekly 
 repetition of the ten commandments ; but among other 
 denominations how rarely do we hear them, and how 
 much more rarely still do we hear expositions of their 
 several precepts, that contain anything like an exliaus- 
 
238 Seed-Truths. 
 
 tive view of their underlying spiritual truths ! God's 
 law is viewed too much as an abstraction, a transcript 
 of the divine nature, which nobody knows anything 
 about c the ethical nature of God/ the public sentiment 
 of the universe, which as a Moloch calls for blood, 
 blood, and cannot be appeased towards sinners till they 
 or their surety suffers a sanguinary death. Such is the 
 law of the pulpit a mighty antagonistic force to the 
 gospel, an enemy to be eschewed by him who would 
 seek salvation ; whereas the law of the Old Testament 
 and of the New is a unit in being fulfilled alike and 
 only by love, but weak in bringing us to love, from 
 the strength of our hatred and our sin : this object 
 being accomplished only by the blood of Christ as in- 
 flowing life from God, shed on Calvary, to convert it 
 into power for this express purpose, that the law may 
 be fulfilled in us, that is, the law of love ; and that it 
 may be put into our minds, written in our hearts, and 
 imprinted upon our inward parts. 1 So little are the ten 
 commandments understood, that I have heard earnest 
 Christian men speak of them as done away in Christ, 
 mistaking the law itself for the mode of its administra- 
 tion. The law in stone is now the law in the heart. 
 
 I do not propose an exposition of the second table 
 in detail, but chiefly as showing that each precept, like 
 a sign-post, guards a point where we are liable to go 
 wrong, and that it is alike adapted to bodied and dis- 
 embodied life. These two points, bearing directly on 
 our main purpose, will fully appear as we consider the 
 commandments of the second table seriatim. 
 
 The duty of honouring parents, and its reward, are 
 among the clearest things to natural conscience and 
 observation. 2 It is a general law of subordination in 
 
 1 Heb. viiL 10 ; Jer. xxxi. 33. * Ex. xx. 12. 
 
Divine Indwelling in our Social Relations. 259 
 
 the social state. ' Some are, and must be, greater than 
 the rest.' This subordination, which is an instinct of 
 childhood, extends to those who divide with parents 
 their prerogatives, and prescribes a like duty to rulers, 
 teachers, employers, masters, and superiors. And that 
 this obligation is a point of danger, or of temptation 
 and trial to character, all experience fully shows. 
 Are not children prone to have their own way ? Are 
 not nations restive under authority ? Are not pupils 
 often in open rebellion against their teachers, appren- 
 tices against their masters, employees, as individuals 
 or trade-unions, against their employers ? Instead of 
 rising up before the hoary head, are not the young 
 often impertinent to venerable years ? 
 
 The law is fixed as a guide-post at the corner of 
 these divergent ways, crying out for subordination, 
 promising a great ensuing good for it is the first 
 commandment with promise 1 and forewarning us, 
 that he who curses father or mother shall die the 
 death. 2 Who can imagine the train of evils to ensue 
 without subordination, or the good to accrue from duly 
 observing it in all our relations ? If the required 
 honour is rendered, and the enjoined social subordina- 
 tion maintained, order and happiness ensue ; but if 
 superiors are oppressive in their exactions, and sub- 
 ordinates are rebellious, anarchy succeeds. The reward 
 and penalty inhere in the conditions of the relation, 
 and are not created by enactment any more than the 
 duty itself. 
 
 This is the law of all social relations, in the higher 
 world as well as in this, as there are degrees in glory, 
 and both greatest and least in the kingdom of God. 3 
 
 1 Eph. vi. 2. 2 Ex. xxi. 17. 
 
 3 1 Cor. xv. 40-42 j .Matt. v. 19, xi. 11, xxv. 40. 
 
240 Seed- Truths. 
 
 Pre-eminence in that kingdom is real, and not fictitious, 
 as it often is in this, depending on the power to serve 
 or to impart to others the greatest good. 1 Differences 
 in the principle of precedence and subordination do 
 not unsettle the fact or the accruing duty ; but they 
 show the universal adjustment of the law to all social 
 relation in the universe, to ' principalities and powers 
 in the heavenly places/ as well as to those on earth. 2 
 Might and dominion are not only of this world, but of 
 that which is to come. It is a law that bears alike on 
 the parties concerned ; and parents are required not 
 to provoke their children to wrath, and rulers are to 
 exercise their functions in the fear of the Lord. 3 
 
 In the family, this is the first duty of which we are 
 cognizant, as in entering the spiritual kingdom sub- 
 mission to God is the first lesson we learn. To obey 
 is better than sacrifice. Can we wonder that a precept 
 so wide-reaching, so necessary to authority in family, 
 church, and state, so elementary to all duty, should 
 have the first place in the second table ? Honouring 
 parents includes sustaining them by moneyed contri- 
 butions in the helplessness of old age, as our Lord 
 teaches ; and a man must not think to escape this duty 
 by consecrating his wealth to religion or to charity. 4 
 
 The sixth commandment is, like the others, positive 
 as well as negative, requiring us not only not to kill, 
 but to preserve life, by sanitary laws, by caring for the 
 sick and infirm, and by promoting general health, 
 security, and contentment. 8 These duties pertain not 
 only to natural, but to spiritual life ; and it forbids us 
 to corrupt men's souls, thus exposing them to the death 
 
 1 Mark x. 42 ; Luke xxii. 25, 26. Epli. i. 21, iii. 10. 
 
 3 Kj.h. vi. \ ; 2 Siinj. xxiii. a. * Murk vii. 10-13. 
 
 6 Ex. xx. 13. 
 
Divine Indwelling in our Social Relations. 241 
 
 that never dies, as well as to refrain from whatever 
 is prejudicial to animal life. Cain was a murderer in 
 the latter sense ; but Satan was a murderer from the 
 beginning, by swerving from the truth, and seducing 
 others, thus bringing ' death into the world, and all our 
 woe.' 1 Men who rejected the gospel incurred blood- 
 guiltiness, by destroying their own souls and endan- 
 gering others ; and the reason assigned why ' he that 
 sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed/ 
 is, that ' man was made in the image of God,' as if 
 defacing that image was the head and front of a mur- 
 derer's act. 2 
 
 This law, therefore, seemingly altogether a thing of 
 the flesh, runs up into the infinite and eternal, and 
 applies with greater force to pure spirits, as embodying 
 in themselves more of existence than we do. In any 
 world where God has transferred His image to a crea- 
 ture, the law thunders its maledictions against the 
 killing, which consists in defiling and defacing that 
 image. It is the great safeguard of life, natural and 
 spiritual, and is commensurate in its claims with the 
 moral government of God. 
 
 Nor does it merely prohibit the act, but the state of 
 mind from which it took its rise ; and ' whoso hateth 
 his brother is a murderer.' 3 All settled malignity is 
 murder. To intend the crime, as did the conspirators 
 against Paul's life, 4 but fail from the impossibility of 
 executing it, is entered as murder in His account who 
 searcheth our hearts. So careful is our Father in 
 heaven of the life of His children, that He required in 
 the building of houses, that they should be surrounded 
 by a battlement, to prevent a fall from the roof ; and if 
 
 1 John viii. 44. 2 Acts xviii. 6 ; Gen. ix. 6. 
 
 8 1 John iii. 15 ; Matt. v. 21, 22. * Acts xxiii. 13-15. 
 
 Q 
 
242 Seed-Truths. 
 
 a man kept an ox known to be dangerous, and the ox 
 should kill a man, both the owner and the ox should 
 die. If a person was found slain near a city, its elders 
 should be held responsible for his death till they had 
 cleared themselves from the imputation. ' For blood 
 it defileth the land : and the land cannot be cleansed 
 of the blood that is shed therein, but by the blood of 
 him that shed it/ l 
 
 How necessary, in the present state of the world, is 
 it to reduce mines, railway management, navigation by 
 steam, and the whole range of our activity, to a sana- 
 tory police, to ensure security to limb and life ! It 
 is amazing that a precept expressed by four short 
 words should cover interests so vast, so universal, so 
 enduring. 
 
 It is one of the anomalies of human nature, that 
 there should be two ways in a case like this to create 
 temptation, and to require a guide-post to point out the 
 one in which we ought to walk. How can one enter- 
 tain a hostile intent against another's life ? Impossible 
 as it may seem, murder has its charms to growing mul- 
 titudes, even under the light of our civilisation, to pro- 
 voke from a distinguished essayist a treatise on ' Murder 
 as a fine art.' Few periods have evinced more hellish 
 skill in the practice of it than our own. To say nothing 
 of the multitude of private murders, what an amount of 
 slaughter in wars of revenge, of ambition, of conquest, 
 and from the lust of territorial extension ! Six millions 
 are said to have perished in the Bonapartean wars of a 
 past age ; and this is but an item of the sacrifices made 
 to that Moloch of the balance of power in Europe ; 
 while in America hundreds of thousands have fallen 
 in the endeavour to perpetuate the slavery of f<ur 
 
 1 Deut xxii. 8 ; Ex. xxi. 21 ; Deut. xxi. 1-9; Num. xxxv. 33. 
 
Divine Indwelling in our Social Relations. 243 
 
 millions of people. Who will say that Infinite Wisdom 
 uttered an unnecessary interdict in proclaiming, in a 
 voice of thunder, from the rugged peaks of Sinai, 
 ' Thou shalt not kill ?' 
 
 The seventh commandment, ' Thou shalt not commit 
 adultery/ 1 reflects also a spiritual as well as a natural 
 truth. As it bears extensively on the interests of this 
 life, so of our relations to a higher world, where ' the 
 bride, the Lamb's wife/ enjoys high and holy com- 
 munion with Him by whom she has been redeemed 
 and presented without spot to God. 2 
 
 Sex itself, out of which marriage takes its rise, 
 involves the radical truth of one thing complemented 
 by another, love by truth will by understanding 
 body by soul soul by spirit Christ by His church, 
 His body, the complement or fulness of Him who 
 filleth all in all. 3 As it is through the church that 
 Christ acts upon this world to restore it to God, how 
 is He complete as a Saviour without it ? On this 
 mysterious law, seen in the sunbeams, where light is 
 complemented by heat, seen in the meanest plants, 
 seen in everything, and most of all in the spiritual 
 coalescence of the soul with God, on this all-pervading 
 principle the apostle bases his doctrine of marriage. 
 This is a great mystery, that two should be one ; but 
 I am speaking of Christ and His church. 4 Marriage, 
 in our earthly views of it, never comes fully up to its 
 prototype in the spiritual universe. 
 
 The interdict of the seventh commandment bears 
 alike upon our mortal and immortal relations. It pro- 
 hibits idolatry ; it condemns wandering affections ; it 
 enjoins purity of heart, that thus we may see God. 
 
 1 Ex. xx. 14. 2 Rev. xix. 7, xxi. 9 ; Eph. v. 27. 
 
 Eph. i. 23. 4 Eph. v. 32. 
 
244 Seed-Truths. 
 
 Our union with God is not institutional, not the result 
 of ceremonial vows, though vows may be an expression 
 of it; but the tie of supreme devotion of heart, as 
 affection must precede marriage to render it valid. Our 
 marriages expire at death, but our union with God is 
 eternal 
 
 As we said in our last chapter, the seventh com- 
 mandment does not forbid, it sanctifies the union of 
 the sexes, by imposing the restraints which ensure the 
 happiness of the parties, the training of children, and 
 beneficent results to general society. Hence arise the 
 parental and filial affections ; thence brotherly and 
 sisterly love ; thence the endearments of home ; and 
 thence the care of the sick and aged in the bosom of 
 affection, to smooth their pathway to the grave. With 
 singular accuracy of inspired discernment, the opposite 
 of marriage in the intercourse of the sexes is spoken 
 of as a state of estrangement ; ' the stranger/ ' strange 
 woman/ or ' women,' denoting separation from family, 
 home, children, and domestic ties, those cast off from 
 the social system amid the loathing of kindred, and be- 
 coming the bane of virtue and order. 1 States derive 
 their stability from the exclusiveness of the family ties 
 one man with one woman, till death parts them, as 
 our Lord teaches ; a and they cannot long survive the 
 unsettling of this relation. Eome laid the foundation of 
 her power while her matrons were in honour ; she lost 
 it when concubinage succeeded to their place. 
 
 The seventh commandment is interpreted by our 
 Lord to prohibit the unchaste desires in which the 
 violations of it originate ; which is a further evidence 
 that the second table, like the first, is primarily an 
 
 1 Prov. ii. 16 ; 1 Kings xi 1 ; Prov. xxii. 14, xxiil 27. 
 Matt xix. 6. 
 
Divine Indwelling in our Social Relations. 245 
 
 interior force, and not a regulator of conduct imposed 
 from without. The apostle also takes a like view of 
 lasciviousness, as a power within dominating the man, 
 and precipitating him upon ' uncleanness with all greedi- 
 ness.' * That this is a point of temptation, and needing 
 such a law to warn us against the house ' where the 
 dead are, and her guests are in the depths of hell/ who 
 will doubt ? 
 
 Property rights are inseparable from personality. 
 In whatever state or world a being exists as a personal 
 entity a responsible individuality his intellect, his 
 power to give or receive happiness, to serve or be 
 served, and all within the range of his voluntary 
 agency, are his to use or refuse, as much as any mate- 
 rial possession. If another uses what is his, it must 
 be by his consent, or it is stealing. May not gifts 
 of mind be appropriated without the consent of the 
 owner, as well as of money ? Is not many a slave, 
 without money, robbed of his ingenuity by having it 
 coerced into another's service, and many a man of in- 
 tellect compelled to use his gifts to enrich others rather 
 than himself ? Locks and keys may be unknown in 
 heaven, but not so of property rights. 
 
 The eighth commandment ' Thou shalt not steal ' 2 
 is therefore equally comprehensive with the others. 
 Stealing is depriving another of his property without 
 his consent, and becomes robbery when it is done by 
 violence or fraud, when the consent is obtained on 
 false pretences. When it is the result of political 
 power, it is despotism. It is coercing subordinates 
 into subserviency, to build up privilege on their blood, 
 bones, and sinews. This is the worst of all stealing, 
 because it robs a man of himself, under various institu- 
 
 i Matt. v. 28 ; Epli. iv. 19, 29. Ex. xx. 15. 
 
246 Seed-Trut7is. 
 
 tional powers and pretexts ; by education and habits 
 conducted and formed under a social incubus, depriv- 
 ing millions of their right by taking away their sense 
 of it or power to assert it, dooming the many to a 
 poverty that wrecks their manhood, to ruin the few 
 by luxury and idleness. Alas for the founders of 
 empire, that they did their work with so little regard 
 to the voice of God speaking from Sinai ! 
 
 Cicero reasons on the morals of trade in a way 
 that might prove edifying to our times. He supposes 
 the case" of a ship from Alexandria, loaded with wheat, 
 arriving at Rhodes in a time of famine, with the know- 
 ledge that other ships would soon come in with like 
 cargoes to glut the market ; and the question is, Would 
 her crew be bound to make known this fact, or could 
 they with impunity accept famine prices for their own 
 cargo? He quotes an old Greek moralist as denying 
 their right to do it. Would we in our times deny that 
 right ? Says an old catechism : ' The eighth command- 
 ment requires the lawful procuring and furthering the 
 wealth and outward estate of ourselves and others.' 
 Another still says : ' It commandeth us to beguile no 
 man, to occupy no unlawful wares, to envy no man his 
 wealth, and to think nothing profitable that either is 
 not just, or differeth from right or honesty.' 
 
 This law is also violated, by depriving of their just 
 expectations those who are dependent upon us, through 
 idleness, prodigality, gaming, or self-indulgence. Parents 
 who thus beggar their children, husbands or wives \vli<> 
 thus abuse their power over each other, bringing ruin 
 by extravagance, are violators of God's law of pi<>] 
 A wife has no right to live beyond her husband's 
 means, nor a husband and father to dispose of his in- 
 come in disregard of the claims of his family. In all 
 
Divine Indwelling in our Social Relations. 247 
 
 these relations we have a mutual property in each 
 other ; and in the sense of God's law, it is stealing to 
 disregard each other's claims. We condemn stealing 
 in the ordinary sense, and yet we perhaps practise it 
 in subtler and more fatal methods. By idleness and 
 prodigality, how many paupers are thrown upon the 
 public charge ! How many are robbed of education 
 and position ! How many wrecked by gambling ! How 
 much fraud is committed by the falsification of weights 
 and measures, by misrepresentations in buying and 
 selling, by monopolizing the market to raise the price 
 of articles on which the masses subsist, and other 
 ways of doing by others just as we would not have 
 them do by us ! 1 
 
 This law involves the positive as well as the nega- 
 tive, binding us to promote the wealth of others, to seek 
 not our own good exclusively, but that of our neigh- 
 bour, 2 and to refrain from all occupations which do not 
 afford to society an equivalent for what we take. 
 That we need the admonition of such a precept always 
 before us, as a guide to justice, truth, and right in 
 every transaction of life, is clear from all the experi- 
 ences of the commercial world. Does not the word 
 from Sinai ' Thou shalt not steal ' meet a great ne- 
 cessity, and cover infinite and eternal interests ? 
 
 Nor is the duty of truth-speaking less pervading or 
 significant. It covers the whole extent of our powers 
 of communication, by speech, by gesture, by deeds, or 
 even of our not speaking or doing with intent to de- 
 ceive. In character, what is more beautiful than truth 
 and sincerity ? than lying, what more odious ? What 
 insult is sooner avenged than the given lie ? Men 
 most false in themselves still honour truth, as Balaam 
 1 Matt. vii. 12. 1 Cor. x. 24. 
 
248 Seed-Truths. 
 
 with criminal intent could exclaim, ' Must I not take 
 heed, and speak that which the Lord hath put in my 
 mouth?' 1 
 
 Truth is of God and heaven, and the basis of all 
 true happiness. He that came from God brought with 
 Him ' grace and truth.' 2 ' Thou shalt not bear false 
 witness against thy neighbour,' 3 is a precept which 
 aims at bringing us up to a heavenly standard, that 
 God's will may be done here as there. Every depar- 
 ture from truth is an assault upon the God of truth, 
 and upon a chief constituent of social happiness. 
 Lying is false witness to, about, or against a neighbour, 
 because it is a communication or impression for some- 
 body to receive, and from its nature is social, not 
 solitary. When it is about a neighbour, it is slander 
 the most cruel of all personal assaults. 
 
 ' Good name, in man and woman, dear my lord, 
 Is the immediate jewel of their souls. 
 
 "Who steals my purse, steals trash ; 'tis something nothing: 
 'Twos mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands ; 
 But he that niches from me my good name, 
 Robs me of that which not enriches him, 
 And makes me poor indeed.' 4 
 
 How often have the roses of health faded from the 
 cheek of a victim of scandal, when the cause was not 
 suspected ! The poison is more dangerous and deadly, 
 for the stealthy manner in which it is infused. How 
 often have nations been convulsed and deluged in 
 blood by lying diplomacy I 
 
 Detraction in its mildest form ; telling what is true 
 of another, with intent to injure him ; keeping back the 
 truth, to avoid doing him a service ; disparaging in- 
 nuendoes ; dubious hints to excite suspicion ; retailing 
 
 * Num. xxiii. 12. Johni. 17. 
 
 Ex. xx. 16. * Ollu-ilv, Act iii. Sc. 3. 
 
Divine Indwelling in our Social Relations. 249 
 
 another's scandal, under the disclaimer of not believing 
 it ; interlarding conversation with what will draw from 
 others words of detraction, and thus virtually saying, 
 'Report, and we will report it;' 1 these are some of 
 the innumerable practices in our complicated civilisa- 
 tion against which Sinai levels its thunders ' Thou 
 shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour/ 
 ' Better be a deaf man who heard not. and in whose 
 mouth are no reproofs/ than deal uncharitably with 
 another's good name. 2 
 
 Teaching false doctrines is wholesale lying, like 
 poison in the conduits that supply a city with water, 
 unsettling the faith of thousands, and perhaps corrupt- 
 ing their morals. Those who built up Paganism, Mo- 
 hammedanism, and the Papacy, may be too numerous, 
 and spread over too many ages, to be charged person- 
 ally with the wrong as a general malaria can be traced 
 to no particular source but is the bane less deadly ? 
 Is it not the sad entail of a thousand generations ? 
 Does it not take within its fell swoop thousands of 
 millions of human beings ? 
 
 A restored law, that should render truth the basis 
 of personal character and of social life, would preclude 
 infinite evils from the human family, both in this and 
 the world to come. It would establish confidence 
 between man and man, give security to trade, make 
 friendships secure and happy, and inspire the truly 
 poetical song, ' Surely His salvation is nigh them that 
 fear Him, that glory may dwell in our land. Mercy 
 and truth are met together; righteousness and peace 
 have kissed each other. Truth shall spring out of the 
 earth, and righteousness shall drop down from heaven. 
 Yea, the Lord will give that which is good, and our 
 
 1 Jer. xx. 10. 2 Ps. xxxnii. 13, 14. 
 
250 Seed-Truths. 
 
 land shall yield her increase. Righteousness shall go 
 before Him, and shall set us in the way of His steps/ l 
 When the point of temptation comes, let us look up 
 and read what God has written, and avoid all incen- 
 tives to violate the ninth commandment. 
 
 The law from Sinai is the first code to aim at dis- 
 ciplined desires. All other legislation contents itself 
 with external acts. But when the full force of the 
 current remains, what avails to dam it at one point, 
 merely to have it break out in another ? The current 
 itself must be absorbed or turned in the direction of 
 beneficence and truth, or nothing is gained, except the 
 semblance of security. Disciplined desires, content- 
 ment with what we have in hand or in prospect this 
 is the end of the last of the commandments : ' Thou 
 shalt not covet.' 2 
 
 It bears upon every other precept in the decalogue, 
 by promoting the state of mind which ensures obe- 
 dience. The others may be merely externally obeyed, 
 but this one never. It takes effect directly on the in- 
 ternal man ; and there is no obedience which does not 
 put that in a state of moderated and truthful desire. 
 It anticipates in law what is taught in the Gospel, ' Ye 
 must be born again.' 3 No man can have a subdued 
 and chastened spiritual life without God's restored 
 dominion in his soul, or Christ dwelling in him by 
 faith. 4 By this we learn, in whatever situation we are, 
 therewith to be content. 6 This new life in God is the 
 only fulfilment of the last commandment 
 
 Men may exercise over themselves a philosophical 
 restraint, may study quietude from scliish motives, 
 may stoically accept pain as coolly as pleasure, may 
 
 1 I Vs. Ixxxv. 9-13. Ex. xx. 17. 3 J.,lm iii. 8. 
 
 4 fyli. iii. 17. 6 I'liil. iv. 11 ; 2 Cor. vii. 4. 
 
Divine Indwelling in our Social Relations. 251 
 
 restrain exorbitant desires which they cannot gratify 
 because they are annoying, may repress the emotions of 
 anxiety and fear, may have a constitutional hardihood 
 that carries them through trying scenes with much 
 equanimity, and in many ways simulate the condition 
 contemplated by the tenth commandment. But the 
 soul is a fountain of desires, the jets of which gush 
 up ; and there is no way of dealing with them, but 
 to find a direction in which they may be allowed full 
 scope. This is God's way of curing covetousness, 
 changing the bent of desire towards all that is pure, 
 and good, and holy. And a soul in that state is in no 
 danger of coveting his neighbour's house, his neigh- 
 bour's wife, his neighbour's man-servant or maid-ser- 
 vant, nor his ox or ass, nor anything that is his 
 neighbour's. How should he, when his resources of 
 happiness are already complete ? 
 
 It is on the basis of this spiritual fulness that many 
 of the exhortations of the gospel are rendered possible, 
 and escape being positively ridiculous, such as, ' Eejoice 
 evermore,' ' Be careful for nothing,' ' Take no thought 
 for the morrow,' and the like, which, on any other 
 ground, would be like telling a man not to feel under 
 the surgeon's knife. 1 The idea of Eenan, that such 
 teaching is a mere reflection of the simplicity and 
 carelessness of Galilean life, is contradicted by all ex- 
 perience of shepherds and shepherdesses, or men in a 
 rural state, whose discontent is often quite equal to 
 that of men in cities or in more refined circles. It is 
 not in the outer life that the exhortation against care- 
 fulness takes effect, but in such an absorption in divine 
 love, and such a hold on heaven, as neutralizes our 
 carking worldly cares, and gives us infinite repose in 
 
 1 Phil. iv. 4-7 ; Matt, vi. 25. 
 
252 Seed- Truths. 
 
 God. It is in a faith overcoming the world, not in a 
 philosophy that silences the clamours of sense; and 
 hence it is, that the greatest delectation is sometimes 
 seen in the midst of painful disease and inevitable 
 death. 
 
 This cursory view of the commandments is suffi- 
 cient to show us how remote their proper seat is from 
 all other codes, the sanctum sanctorum of human 
 nature, thence throwing out their influence over the 
 whole life ; how central their spirit is to the gospel, as 
 their letter was to the Mosaic institutes ; how appli- 
 cable to all worlds of accountable agency; how ad- 
 monitory against all the ways of evil towards which 
 we are tempted; and how complete a summary they 
 contain of all piety and virtue. 
 
CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 THE THEOCRATIC AS A TYPE OF THE SPIRITUAL MAN. 
 
 BEFORE dismissing the subject of law, we will con- 
 sider the character of the man who outwardly 
 lived up to its requirements. He stood as an effigy of 
 what ' grace, reigning through righteousness unto eter- 
 nal life by Jesus Christ our Lord/ now accomplishes 
 upon a truly believing soul. 1 Such an one is in spirit 
 all that the theocratic man was in form. God rules in 
 his soul; the kingdom of heaven there has its seat ; 2 and 
 in him is realized the- original plan of human nature as 
 actuated by the inbreathed divinity. 3 This is redemp- 
 tion, this is seeking and saving that which was lost. 4 
 
 As the lost state consists in being ruled by fleshly 
 impulses and natural ideas to the extent of incapaci- 
 tating men for conceiving what it is to be ruled by the 
 Spirit of God, it pleased the Lord to present the idea 
 to them in the theocratic man, who stood related to 
 the spiritual reality as the mould to the implement 
 to which it gives form. The mould, though of base 
 material, and unfit for use except as a mould, is care- 
 fully polished, clear in outline, and perhaps a more per- 
 fect ideal than the implement which it shapes. So the 
 theocratic Israelite, though a mere thing of form and 
 ceremony, may furnish a more perfect type of what we 
 ought to be as spiritual men, than doctrine, or than any 
 other example except Christ Himself. Christ alone 
 1 Rom.v. 21. 2 Lukexvii. 21. 3 Gen. ii.7. 4 Matt.xviii.il. 
 
 253 
 
254 Seed- Truths. 
 
 fulfilled the law-ideal, in His perfect subordination in 
 all things to the will of the Father who sent , Him. 1 
 The theocratic man was all outline, and could easily 
 be defined ; but believers are often a rough casting, 
 though of the genuine stuff. 'Art thou a master in 
 Israel, and knowest not these things ? ' 2 said Jesus to 
 one of the best characters formed by the law ; showing 
 how totally ignorant he was of the true spirit and in- 
 tent of his own ceremonial observances. He was a 
 good model, but useless as an organ of spiritual power. 
 The Jews who were most exact in observing their law, 
 were the greatest enemies of Him who was the sole 
 exemplar of its spirit and power. 
 
 The theocratic man acknowledged God's absolute 
 property in his person and inheritance, by paying yearly 
 his half-shekel of ransom money, and a tenth of his 
 proceeds. 3 This was done with the significant formu- 
 lary, ' A. Syrian ready to perish was my father,' and 
 1 he went down into Egypt, where he endured hard bon- 
 dage ;' and ' the Lord brought us forth with a mighty 
 hand.' ' And, behold, I have brought, the first-fruits of 
 the land which Thou, Lord, hast given me.' 4 Thus 
 his Syrian forefathers and their descendants were con- 
 ceded as owing their preservation to God ; his half- 
 shekel was the ransom money of a forfeited life ; and 
 his very possessions were not his own, but the property 
 of Jehovah, to whom the annual rental was due, and 
 served as a perpetual bond for his allegiance. And the 
 captivity of Israel was ascribed to their unfaithfulness 
 to the terms on which they held their land, in not 
 allowing it the rest of its Sabbath ; and thus, by cruel 
 
 * John iv. 34, vi. 38, xvii. 4 ; Isa. zlii. 21 ; Matt. v. 17. 
 
 .Tohn iii. 10. 3 Ex. xxx. 12, 15. 
 4 Deut. xivi. 6-11, xxviL 30. 
 
The Theocratic as a Tjpc of Spiritual Man. 255 
 
 bondage for seventy years in Babylon, they were 
 brought to a sense of God's absolute right to them and 
 their inheritance. 1 This was a great literal truth to 
 that people ; .but how much greater in its spiritual 
 significance to us, who have been redeemed from hell 
 by the precious blood of Christ ! 
 
 The theocratic man abstained from all intercourse in 
 eating, drinking, or social communion with a Gentile ; 2 
 would not buy meat in a heathen market, lest it should 
 be unclean, or had been offered to an idol; and thus 
 he kept himself from all ceremonial pollution. 3 If by 
 any means he had become polluted, he instantly re- 
 sorted to the required sacrifices to set himself right with 
 his law. 4 He was a constant and earnest student of 
 the Old Testament Scriptures, and a man every way 
 actuated by his religion in the minutest affairs of life. 
 No nation on earth could know a true Jew without 
 knowing him as a Jew, because he carried with him 
 the mark of his religion wherever he went, and made 
 it conspicuous in all his active life. The Eoman his- 
 torians 5 speak of him as distinguishable in the impe- 
 rial city for his religion, as the negro for his sable 
 skin or woolly head. Is this no lesson to us to come 
 out of the world and be separate, and touch not the 
 unclean thing ? Must there not be always, in every 
 place, and among all people, a difference, obvious and 
 unmistakeable, between a man ruled by heaven and 
 those who are ruled by earth ? 6 The Jewish mode of 
 
 Lev. xxvi. 34 ; 2 Chron. xxxvi. 21. 
 
 ' They eat and lodge with one another only. ' Tacitus, Book v. ch. v. 
 1 Cor. x. 25-28 ; Rom. xiv. 2, 3, 15. 
 Lev. v. 1-10. 
 
 ' Whatever is held sacred by the Romans, with the Jews is pro- 
 fane.' Tacitus, Bonk v. ch. iv. 
 6 2 Cor. vi. "*7 : Rev. xviii. 4. 
 
256 Seed- Truths. 
 
 showing devotion to Jehovah was the outward mould 
 into which our spirit is to be cast, not with perishable, 
 but imperishable materials. Our heart devotion to the 
 divine love which is the fulfilling of the law must ever 
 be in the ascendant, to make our religion the ruling 
 power; and so far as we fail therein, our sacrifice of 
 repentance and our faith in atoning blood must be re- 
 sorted to, to set us right with God. That we draw our 
 life from Him, must be so clear a fact, that the world 
 shall ' take knowledge of us, that we have been with 
 Jesus.' 1 
 
 Our religious terms are chiefly derived from what 
 pertained to this theocratic man. We are ' pardoned,' 
 not simply in the sense of being exempted from punish- 
 ment, but of being restored to true holiness, as he was 
 by sacrifice to ceremonial purity. A sacrifice that did 
 not restore him thus was unavailing; as also is the 
 death of Christ, if it does not result in the setting up 
 of the kingdom of heaven in our souls. As our holi- 
 ness was the object of His death, how is it to succeed 
 so far as we live under the dominion of the flesh ? 
 There remaineth no more sacrifice for sins to those 
 who know the truth, but will not live under its ruling. 3 
 Sin and punishment being inseparable, God's pardon 
 in cancelling the one destroys the other, and never, like 
 ours, releases a man from prison to send him out a cri- 
 minal the same as at first. It removes the punishment 
 by taking away the love of sinning. Herein is seen 
 the efficacy of Christ's death, and not otherwise. Cere- 
 monial and human pardons leave the criminal as he 
 was before ; God's restores him to the obedience of 
 faith. 8 
 
 1 Jer. vi. 27 ; 1 Pet L 7-9 ; Acts iv. 18. 
 * Heb. x. 20. 3 Hum. i. 5. 
 
The Theocratic as a Type of Spiritual Man. 257 
 
 So of justification : it is to become just and right 
 with God, by faith working with love as a power to 
 make us what we are declared to be, or what we actu- 
 ally ought to be, through the imparted life from Christ. 
 God never accepts as just one who does not fulfil the 
 righteousness of the law by walking, not after the flesh, 
 but after the Spirit. No sacrifice can avail to his jus- 
 tification which does not make him a spiritual man. 
 ' The just shall live by faith! as a power doing all for 
 him that sight did for Adam in his innocency, so far 
 at least as the ruling power in his soul is concerned. 1 
 The actual dominion over us to which Christ succeeds 
 when we receive Him by faith, is the substance of which 
 all other justification is shadow. It is ' the righteous- 
 ness of God by faith,' or that we take hold of, enjoy, 
 and practise, when we truly 'believe to the saving of 
 our souls/ As the sacrifice under the law could not 
 avail to justify a delinquent Israelite, unless he brought 
 it to the priest, and was a party in offering it, no more 
 can that of Christ to one who does not accept the Holy 
 Spirit's ruling in his soul. 2 The work of making sin- 
 ners just and right with God is no abstraction of law ; 
 but a concrete and experimental fact of the life, lifting 
 the soul to all that is good, and pure, and holy. The 
 motions of sin in the members are not indeed dead, 
 nor are we beyond Satan's fiery darts ; but our security 
 is in continuing practically in Christ, ' walking not 
 after the flesh, but after the Spirit,' and then we shall 
 have ' no condemnation.' 3 Justification stands related 
 to sanctification, as the child to the man ; being com- 
 plete in all his members, but not yet grown to ' the 
 measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.' 4 
 
 1 Heb. ii. 4 ; Rom. i. 17 ; Gal. iii. 11 ; Heb. x. 38. 
 8 Horn. iii. 22 ; Heb. x. 39. 3 Rom. viii. 1. * Epli. iv. 13. 
 
 R 
 
258 Seed- Truths. 
 
 The law of Moses, as we have seen, legislates in re- 
 ference to thoughts, feelings, and motives ground im- 
 approached by any civil code but without the power 
 of doing more than convince us how wrong we are to 
 the very core of our being ; but the gospel comes to 
 realize the end and purpose of this stringent legislation. 
 It is a power to cleanse the sanctuary of the soul, 
 ' that Christ may dwell in our hearts by faith/ and 
 that we ' may be filled with all the fulness of God.' l 
 The theocracy was contrived with reference to restoring 
 this lost truth of an indwelling God, doing it at first 
 in effigy, to prepare for the substance in them that be- 
 lieve in Jesus. It was a vast polity controlling every 
 minutia of a man's life ; and yet having no head or 
 sovereign, except the Invisible God, ruling from the 
 hidden recesses of the temple. No other government 
 is like it. We have governments ruling by that ideal 
 tiling called a constitution, which, as the supreme law 
 of the land, distributes its powers among those who are 
 sworn to carry out its provisions. Thus in England, 
 from the Queen to the constable, all rule by an idea ; 
 all exercise prerogatives not personal to themselves, 
 but in virtue of the constitution or the nation. Not 
 so in Israel ; all power there centred in a personal 
 God ruling from the .mercy-seat. It was a divine 
 autocracy, and yet administered according to the cove- 
 nant entered into between God and the people. There 
 was no sharer in the throne no successor; but His 
 prerogatives were eternal : no cabinet of ministers ; no 
 counsellors of state ; all authority inhering in the per- 
 sonal God. His behests had no other reason but ' I 
 am the Lord.' 2 His moral code is grounded in His 
 
 i Eph. iii. 17-19. 
 
 * Ler. xviii. 5, xix. 2 ; Ex. xx. 2 ;-Isa. xli. 4, xlix. 7. 
 
The Theocratic as a Type of Spiritual Man. 259 
 
 right to rule us. So far as prophets, priests, or kings 
 were called into His service, it was by His appoint- 
 ment, and to exercise only such prerogatives as He 
 assigned them. 
 
 Our Christian theology derives thence its doctrine 
 of the kingdom of heaven among men, as consisting 
 in 'righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.' 1 
 Thence comes one ' citizenship of the saints and of the 
 household of God ;' the co-heirship of Jews and Gen- 
 tiles as children of Abraham by faith ; our general 
 assembly and church of the first-born which are regis- 
 tered in heaven ; our New Jerusalem coming down 
 from God to rule in the souls of men ; and, in fact, all 
 the main features of the Christian scheme are cast in 
 this theocratic mould. 2 Following Christ in all things, 
 and being ruled by Him ; going forth without the camp, 
 bearing His reproach ; being crucified with Him ; 
 reigning with Him ; regarding ourselves as not our 
 own, but bought with a price ; redeemed from the earth 
 by His blood, and all similar ideas, may be distinctly 
 traced i*> this old dispensation.* 3 
 
 Things were indeed tolerated under the theocracy 
 in themselves evil, as we wink at the foibles of chil- 
 dren, not as sanctioning them, but in accommodation to 
 the weakness of the people or ' the hardness of their 
 hearts.' On this principle polygamy was tolerated, 
 though a violation of the original marriage law. 4 The 
 right of parents to take the life of their children, 
 which prevailed at Rome many ages after Moses, was 
 
 1 Rom. xiv. 17. 
 
 2 Eph. ii. 19, iii. 9 ; Rom. ih. 30 ; Heb. xii. 22. 
 
 3 Matt. xvi. 24; Heb. xiii. 11-13^ Kom. v. 20, 21, viii. 17; Matt 
 Xix. 28 ; 1 Cor. vi. 20. 
 
 4 Matt. xix. 7-9 j Gen. ii. 22, 23. 
 
2 6o Seed- Truths. 
 
 not absolutely repealed in the Levitical law, but only 
 fenced around by restraints to render it innocuous. 
 The avenger of blood was not regarded as criminal in 
 taking life for life ; but the cities of refuge provided a 
 means of escape to the manslayer, with a view to a 
 trial of his case before impartial judges. 1 Thus the 
 theocracy, though based upon the authority of a per- 
 sonal God, was one of adjustment to human infirmity, 
 and not a Utopia of heavenly life. It assimilated into 
 itself, no doubt, customs borrowed from Egypt, from the 
 nomadic tribes of Arabia, as well as those descending 
 from the patriarchs, to fit itself to the ideas of the age 
 and the state of human progress. The tribal division 
 of the nation and the authority of heads of families 
 were recognised, though deprived of their former sacer- 
 dotal and kingly prerogatives. The priesthood was 
 confined to the tribe of Levi ; and civil authority was 
 exercised by judges and kings, whose authority was 
 limited by the priestly and prophetic offices, which 
 were always a restraint upon royal authority. The 
 king could hold office only by divine appointment, and 
 was restricted in the costliness and splendour of court 
 pageantry, .and was required to govern by law, a pro- 
 vision never departed from without entailing calamity.* 
 The kingly throne was deemed an anomaly, and conceded 
 to the demand of the people ; though Samuel recorded 
 his protest against it, and God deemed it a rejection of 
 Himself as the nation's sovereign. 8 This principle of ac- 
 commodation to human infirmity is as conspicuous under 
 the reign of grace as that of law ; and the Holy Spirit 
 bestows His gifts upon persons that come far short of 
 
 1 Deut. XXL 18-21 ; Num. xxxv. 9-34. 
 
 Deut. xvii. 14-20, xviii. 15-22; 1 Sam. xv. 10-3L 
 
 1 Sam. viii. 4-22. 
 
The Theocratic as a Type of Spiritual Man. 261 
 
 the highest standard of Christian character, and upon 
 organizations that neither in a social, civil, nor eccle- 
 siastical point of view can be accepted as the kingdom 
 of heaven among men. 
 
 Indeed, ' they that are whole need not a physician, 
 but they that are sick;' and as God's mission to men 
 is to heal and restore them, His reign is a perpetual 
 contest with individual and organic evil. 1 Where else 
 is the place of the physician, but among the sick ? The 
 theocracy was the ruling of a personal God, not over 
 angelic beings, but over a lost race, centring all power 
 in Himself, whether in tolerating evils or enjoining good, 
 and extending His requisitions over the whole life of 
 man. 2 This is the original idea : God ruling us ; the 
 spirit-world in the ascendant over the natural ; reason 
 and conscience regulating the appetites and passions ; 
 and the whole man, in his individual and social condi- 
 tion, in his inward and outward life, subject to heavenly 
 laws. If the theocratic man was not perfect, he was 
 an heir of promise, and his hope took hold upon a 
 brilliant future. 3 He derived his blood from one bom 
 out of the order of nature, and he carried in his flesh 
 the seal of his covenant with God. 4 His law was the 
 efflorescence and fruitage of the divine seeding in the 
 life of Abraham, constituting a sure basis for his great 
 anticipations. How should not the promises which had 
 rendered his past illustrious, be destined to a still greater 
 consummation in the future ? What other nation was 
 ever founded upon hope, and for four thousand years 
 
 1 Matt. ix. 12. 
 
 2 Acts xiv. 16, xvii. 30. God is here represented as acting on a like 
 policy of ' winking' at evils in dealing with all nations. 
 
 3 Gen. xii. 3 ; xviii. 18 ; Ps. Ixxii. 17 ; Acts iii. 25 ; Gal. iii 8. 
 
 4 (icii. Yviii. 9 lf>_ xvii. 10. 
 
 Gen. xviii. 9-15, xvii. 10. 
 
 USIVBESIT7J 
 * 
 
262 Seed-Triiths. 
 
 kept distinct from all others, awaiting the fulfilment ? 
 Is it not a miracle of providence ? What an exact 
 type have we here of the Christian life, which is one 
 of hope rather than realization! 'We are saved by 
 hope ;' and the Holy Spirit dwells with us as a ' Spirit 
 of promise, and the earnest of our inheritance, until the 
 redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise 
 of His glory.' 1 
 
 The theocratic man was ' cut off from his people,' if 
 lie did not ' afflict his soul ' on the great day of atone- 
 ment, if he acknowledged a strange god, if he prac- 
 tised magic, if he was guilty of blasphemy, if he 
 cursed his parents, if he profaned the Sabbath, if he 
 was guilty of adultery, the same as if he kidnapped or 
 murdered. 2 Death was the penalty in all these cases, 
 not as an example for us in our civil legislation, but to 
 set forth the terrible sin and punishment of him who 
 sacrifices his duty to God, and his life in God, to gratify 
 his selfish desires ; to conform to his natural ideas, 
 instead of those of the Spirit that dwelleth in us ; or 
 to achieve any worldly end at the expense of glory, 
 honour, and immortality. The spiritual man is taught 
 by the theocracy that God is with him and in him, 
 everywhere and at all times ; and not to eat, and drink, 
 and do everything to His glory, is treason against His 
 government. Would a subject in the very audience- 
 chamber of his sovereign dare to be thus unmindful 
 of him ? The Jew was under a government that ap- 
 pealed to him oftener, and in more ways than any 
 
 1 Rom. viii. 24 ; Eph. i 13, 14. 
 
 * Ex. xxii. 20 ; Lev. xx. 5, 6 ; Dent. xvii. 2-5 ; Ex. xxii. 18 ; 
 Deut. xviii. 9-22 ; Lev. xix. 31, xxiv. 15, 16 ; Num. xv. 32-36 ; 
 Ex. xxi. 15, 16 ; Lev. xx. 9 ; Deut. xxi 18-21 ; Ex. xxi. 12-14 ; 
 Ueut. xxii. 13-27, xxiv. 17. 
 
The Theocratic as a Type of Spiritual Man. 263 
 
 other on earth. It pressed upon him at all points like 
 the ambient air. Stamp-duties and income-taxes are 
 no such reminders of the civil authorities as were offered 
 of God's right by every foot of land from Dan to Beer- 
 sheba. The people could not go out or come in with- 
 out meeting passages of the law inscribed upon their 
 door-posts. In putting on or taking off their garments, 
 they found them fringed with reminders of God. If 
 in the house as families, or walking abroad as friends, 
 the one topic, God and His law, was the subject of 
 conversation. In eating, washing, sleeping, in labour 
 and in rest, they were still to think of God. And if 
 all else failed, the Sabbath of days, of weeks, and of 
 years, with the jubilee trumpet resounding through the 
 land to arrest the course of labour, to cancel debts, to 
 free the enslaved, and to produce a general overturning 
 of business and social relations, could not fail of bring- 
 ing home to every house and heart a sense of the 
 mighty force of law holding all alike in its grasp. 
 
 'Ye are bought with a price; therefore glorify God 
 in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's,' are 
 words enforced by two thousand years' previous history, 
 beginning with Abraham and culminating in Christ's 
 glorification and the Spirit's baptism. 1 'What manner 
 of persons ought we to be, in all holy conversation and 
 godliness,' since in us as Christians centres all this 
 legislation ! We are the chosen generation, the royal 
 priesthood, the holy nation, the peculiar people, to show 
 forth the praises of Him who hath called us out of 
 darkness into His marvellous light. 2 
 
 1 1 Cor. vi. 20. a 2 Pet. iii. 11 j 1 Pet ii. 9. 
 
9 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 GOD BORN OF MAN, THAT MAN MAY BE BORN OF GOD. 
 
 AS all divme laws centring in the theocratic man 
 failed to raise him from a fleshly to a spiritual 
 life, the question is, How is this indispensable thing to 
 be done ? How is God to enter through the closed 
 gates of the' soul, and resume His rightful dominion? 
 How is the kingdom of heaven to come among men ? 
 What must God do, and what must we do, that we 
 may be saved ? The law raised the question, but failed 
 to answer it, or to impart the required holiness, ' through 
 the weakness of the -flesh,' or because we were ' without 
 strength ' to keep its precepts. 1 The answer given by 
 infinite love and wisdom we are now to consider, 
 especially in those points of view which bear upon our 
 general subject. 
 
 Those aspects of the question which pertain to law as 
 a transcript of the Divine Mind, the ethical nature of 
 God, or the public sentiment of the moral universe, 
 that God is bound to respect in dealing with sinners, 
 we leave to those who understand them we do not. 
 Of the laws governing the Infinite and the Incompre- 
 hensible, the writer claims to know nothing. ' I ara 
 the lord' is the only reason He deigns to give of His 
 conduct. And it is as unscriptural as it is unphilo- 
 Bophical to speak of law in any other sense than as 
 
 1 Kom. v. 6, viii. 8. 
 Mi 
 
God Born of Man. 265 
 
 arising from the nature and relation of creatures. The 
 laws of the vegetable and animal kingdoms are not 
 things to be reasoned about or known in the abstract, 
 but only as acting through plants and animals. And 
 moral laws, except as seen in the nature and relations 
 of moral agents, are to us a nonentity ; and -I fully agree 
 with an able and orthodox divine in England, that to 
 speak of them as a transcript of God's nature is an 
 absurdity. As they cannot exist without God, so they 
 cannot without creatures to feel the weight of the im- 
 posed obligation. 1 What the soul needs to give it 'peace 
 with God ' is ' faith in our Lord Jesus Christ ' as the 
 restored Divinity, doing for him all and more than open 
 vision for a sinless Adam or for angels, justifying him 
 in the sense of making him just, and redeeming him by 
 sanctifying him through the truth, and giving him the 
 adoption and the spirit of a child in God's family. 2 This 
 is the direction which the whole New Testament record 
 takes in dealing with the incarnation; and we would 
 humbly follow its leading. 
 
 Can we wonder that seed-truths of inspired men 
 centre in the Divine Incarnation ? Does the universe 
 know a greater fact ? God's tally of the ages is 
 different from ours. Kingdoms, conquering armies, 
 diplomatic agencies, and material progress, elicit no 
 paeans in heaven ; but over one repentant sinner the 
 angels rejoice. 3 God marks off the cycles of time by 
 
 1 Since writing these sentiments, the following passage from Dr. 
 "Wardlaw's Christian Ethics has come to the notice of the writer : * Of 
 the abstract subsistence of principles [that is, of law] independent of all 
 "being whatever, we are incapable of forming any conception j.nay, the 
 very attempt to form it involves an immediate contradiction. There 
 can be 110 principles without mind ; and to annihilate mind is to 
 annihilate principles' (p. 240). 
 
 2 Rom. v. 1, 2, viii. 15. Luke xv. 7. 
 
266 Seed- Tru ths. 
 
 spiritual progress. The patriarchal worship had its 
 use, but failed to extend God's rule over a lost race. 
 It had no doctrine, no organization, no separation ; and 
 therefore succumbed first to lust and the flood, and 
 then to idolatry and demonism. 1 Abraham pledged his 
 race to Jehovah alone, on the principle of a rigid 
 separation from all other nations, and thus began a 
 cycle of covenant, to which the law, ' because of trans- 
 gressions,' or as a guilt-revealer, was ' added four hun- 
 dred years afterwards,' to prepare the way 'for Him 
 who came as ' the end of the law for righteousness to 
 every one that believeth.' He effects the death of the 
 natural man upon which the law took hold, and thus 
 cancels its claims as the law of marriage by the death 
 of one of the parties is cancelled that by this process 
 a resurrection-life might ensue, the divine ruling in the 
 soul, a result which the previous dispensations had 
 failed to effect. 2 
 
 Under all these ages of ceremony the world became 
 darker and darker, more and more fleshly and material ; 
 and from Malachi to the birth of John the Baptist, a 
 period of five hundred years, we have no record of 
 either miracle or inspiration. 3 Even heathenism had 
 
 > Gen. vi. 11, 12, xi. 1-9. I 
 
 2 Gal. iii. 17-20 ; Rom. vii. 6, x. 4. 
 
 8 The Old Test iment describes the Jews as ' stiff-necked ' and material 
 in their general type of thought, and the same character of them is 
 given in the New. The Roman poets, a little later, speak of them in 
 like manner. 'The Jews,' Juvenal says, 'will sell you any dreams 
 you please for the minutest coin ' (Satire vi.). 
 
 Now the once hallowed fountain, grove, and fane, 
 Are let to Jews, a wretched, wandei IHR train, 
 Whose wealth Is but a basket bluffed with hay.' 
 
 JUVKNAL, Satire 111. 18. 
 
 To this day they are the most material of all the races. Such was the 
 nature that Christ took upon Himself to redeem it to holino.s and 
 
God Born of Man. 267 
 
 lost much of its conservative influence, and been' suc- 
 ceeded by vice, levity, and atheism. The first chapter 
 of Komans gives a doleful picture of its condition. 1 
 Little vigour remained in anything but Eoman law, 
 magnificence and its iron-clad legions uniting the world 
 in a one-man power. That old serpent the Devil and 
 Satan exulted in the completeness and finality of his 
 dominion over man, and his imps, as ' unclean spirits,' 
 ran riot with the people. 2 . 
 
 Such was the period of the Divine Incarnation. In 
 Heaven's account this is the central fact of human his- 
 tory, and is so represented by prophets and apostles, 
 being spoken of by the one as ' the last days,' ' the 
 latter days,' and as ' the days of these kings,' alluding 
 to the Eoman rule, ' the end of sins/ in the sense of 
 cancelling its power to them that believe ; 3 and by the 
 others, that is, the apostles, it is spoken of as ' the 
 fulness of times, when God sent forth His Son/ who 
 ' was manifested in these last times,' ' now once in the 
 end of the world,' ' the ends of the world are come,' 
 ' the fulness of times,' all centring upon the incar- 
 nation and apostolic ministry. 4 Thus, both in antici- 
 pation and retrospection, among the inhabitants of 
 heaven first, and through them afterwards revealed to 
 human thought and experience, God's union to man in 
 flesh, in order to unite man to God in spirit, is the 
 central luminary, irradiating all of human history 
 deemed worthy of the notice of inspiration. The world 
 without it would be worse than a polar winter. The 
 
 heaven, as if success there must give Him success everywhere in recover- 
 ing a people to Himself out of all nations. 
 
 1 Rom. i. 18-32. 
 
 2 Matt. iv. 24 ; Mark ix. 38 ; Luke iv. 41, ix. 1. 
 
 3 Gen. xlix. 1, 10; Num. xxiv. 14-19; Dan. ii. 28, 44, ix. 24, et aL 
 
 4 Gal. iv. 4 ; 1 Pet. i. 20 ; Heb. ix. 26 ; 1 Cor. x. 11 ; Epk i. 10. 
 
268 Seed- Truths. 
 
 heading of this chapter is one of the pithy and com- 
 prehensive sayings of Augustine, that ' God was born 
 of man, that man might be born of God.' 
 
 God in human flesh leading the way in which every 
 soul must follow to reach eternal life, is another form 
 of the same thought. The oft-repeated words of Christ, 
 ' Follow me,' 1 have a deeper significance than simple 
 imitation of His virtues. What makes our modern 
 pulpit so weak is, that it is occupied by so many men 
 who are incapable of more than an outside view of 
 following Christ, or who have no idea of it as a death 
 of sinful flesh in order to a resurrection-life in spirit. 
 ' Taking up the cross to follow Christ ' does not mean, 
 as too many suppose, doing public duties or making 
 public professions from which we shrink ; but it means 
 the crucifixion of sin as our nature or as ourselves, that 
 Christ may live in us in place of self, and ' that the 
 life we live in the flesh may be by the faith of the 
 Son of God, who loved us and gave Himself for us.' 2 
 Our Lord speaks of those who had ' followed Him in 
 the regeneration,' plainly intimating that the process of 
 death to His flesh, through which He was passing to 
 reach His resurrection and glorification, was an example 
 of what all flesh, as a ruling power in the soul, must 
 pass through in order to our reaching a spiritual and 
 heavenly life. 8 'For the suffering of death He was 
 crowned with glory and honour;' and to join Him in 
 His glory, ' sitting on thrones judging the twelve tribes 
 of Israel/ we must have that sort of ' fellowship in His 
 sufferings * which only the crucifixion of the sin of our 
 flesh can give us. 4 The death of flesh as to its ruling 
 
 1 Matt. iv. 19, ix. 9 ; Mark ii. 14 ; Luke v. 27, et aL 
 
 * Mutt. xvi. 24, x. 34 ; Luke xiv. 27 ; Gal. ii. 20. 
 
 Matt. xix. 28. 4 Heb. ii. 9 ; Phil. iii. 10. 
 
God Born of Man. 269 
 
 is purification from sin ; and they who are in this sense 
 dead and buried with Christ in a spiritual baptism, are 
 freed from sin. 1 Hence following Christ in the regene- 
 ration is, in the gospel view, sharing with Him in His 
 spiritual life and resurrection glory. He calls us to 
 nothing in which He does not lead the way. 
 
 ' The Word was made flesh.' 2 The term ' Word' in 
 this passage is God, and the term ' flesh ' is man. The 
 Word, as a designation of God, is applied to Him as 
 ruling in the temple, His presence on the mercy-seat 
 in the holy of holies giving name to it as ' the Word/ 
 or ' oracle ;' 3 and the Jewish rabbis in Chaldea rendered 
 ' Jehovah ' by ' Word ' in Greek, in the passage, ' The 
 Word created the world,' and so throughout. 4 John, in 
 like manner, begins his Gospel, ' In the beginning was 
 the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word 
 was God. The same was in the beginning with God. 
 All things were made by Him ; and without Him was 
 not anything made that was made.' 5 He was the 
 source of being and of life, and the life in the incarna- 
 tion became the light of men, to illuminate their path- 
 way out of the darkness of fleshly dominion into spi- 
 ritual and heavenly light. John elsewhere speaks of 
 Him as ' the Word of life ' and ' the Word of God.' 6 
 
 The relation of the Word both to God and to man 
 is poetically set forth in Proverbs : 
 
 ' When He prepared the heavens, I was there ; 
 When He set a compass on the face of the deep : 
 When He gave the sea His decree, 
 That the waters should not pass His commandment ; 
 
 1 Rom. vi. 3-9. 2 John i. 14. 
 
 8 2 Sam. xvi. 23 ; 1 Kings vi. 16, viii. 6 ; 2 Chron. iv. 20. 
 4 Gen. i. 1. * John i. 1-3. 
 
 1 John i. 1 ; Rev. xix. 13. 
 
2 70 Seed- Truths. 
 
 When He appointed the foundations of the earth ; 
 Then I was by Him, as one brought up with Him.' 
 
 Then the passage closes with His human proclivities, 
 thus: 
 
 ' Rejoicing in the habitable parts of the earth ; 
 And my delights were with the sons of men.'* 
 
 Identity with God and affinity with man are in- 
 cluded in the name JEHOVAH; and it was He who 
 became ' the Seed of woman/ ' Great is the mystery 
 of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh.' It is 
 in view of this connection of Christ with the Jehovah 
 of the Old Testament, that the apostles so uniformly 
 refer the salvation of believers to causes beginning in 
 eternity, but revealed in time. They accepted their 
 Redeemer as one who had come to effectuate the work 
 of love on which He had been engaged from the 
 foundation of the world ; and what He was doing in 
 their own souls, and in others through their ministry, 
 was a basis of conscious connection with Him who 
 made the world, and who is the dwelling-place of His 
 people in all generations. This connection makes 
 believers the elect of God, the bride, the Lamb's 
 wife. 2 
 
 There is genuine elevation of soul in one who has 
 the spirit of Christ. He is a king and a priest unto 
 God. His name is written in heaven. Everlasting 
 purposes of love centre in him. He is honoured with 
 angelic ministrations. Who can separate him from 
 the love of Christ ? His anticipations are as great as 
 his retrospections. He looks for afar more exceeding 
 ana eiiTiiJil weight of glory. His election of God is 
 not a theory, but a faith. How should not a eliild 
 himself an heir of all his father's past and 
 
 Prov. viii. 27-31. f liev. xxi. 9. 
 
God Born of Man. 271 
 
 riches and honours ? This election is a thing of -which 
 no one can conceive without an inward gracious ex- 
 perience. 
 
 But what was the .flesh that the Word was made ? 
 What a world of reasoning has this question from first 
 to last elicited ! And yet how could language or fact 
 make it plainer than inspired pens have left it ? 
 Flesh is man as a creature of this earth, or as pro- 
 duced out of the dust of the ground. Thought, in- 
 tellect, natural conscience, sesthetical taste, the social 
 sentiments, and the power of civil organization, all 
 enter as fully into our conception of man in acting 
 among the elements of this world, as flesh, blood, or 
 bones, or as instinct in animals in fitting them for self- 
 preservation. Man became spiritual, heavenly, and 
 immortal by the inbreathed divinity, which was an act 
 separate and distinct from that which fitted him for 
 a merely earthly life. This was ruled out when he 
 came under the dominion of the flesh, and he became 
 thenceforth animal and worldly in all his proclivities, 
 except so far as his fitness for spiritual life gave place 
 to magic, idolatry, and demonism. His religion was 
 from hell rather than from heaven. 
 
 The question is often agitated, whether Christ took 
 flesh in its lapsed state, or in its primeval innocency ? 
 The Westminster Confession pertinently answers, that 
 'the Son of God did take upon Him man's nature, 
 with all the essential properties and common infirmities 
 thereof, yet without sin.' Leo, an early writer, says : 
 ' The properties of each substance being all preserved 
 and kept safe, there became by majesty, humility ; by 
 strength, infirmity ; and by eternity, mortality.' Cyril 
 says : ' Flesh is not the flesh of God, but still continues 
 flesh, although it be the flesh of God.' The apostle 
 
272 Seed-Tricths. 
 
 says, that 'in all things it behoved Him to he made 
 like unto His brethren,' and that ' He was in all points 
 tempted as we are, yet without sin.' * And our Lord 
 says to His disciples, ' Ye are they who have continued 
 with me in my temptations.' 2 The devil tempted Him 
 to a selfish exertion of His miraculous powers, in com- 
 manding the stones to become bread for His appetite ; 
 to ambition, by showing Him all the kingdoms of the 
 world as within His reach; and to presumption, by 
 casting Himself down from the pinnacle of the temple. 3 
 Each of these impulses perfectly coincides with the 
 natural feelings which Christ inherited with His flesh, 
 without which He could no more have felt the sug- 
 gestions of the tempter as a temptation than a brute 
 or a stone. The external temptation must find in the 
 tempted a coincident impulse, a nature suited to take 
 the impression, or there could be no approach to all 
 ' the points ' wherein we are tempted. 
 
 One thing is perfectly conclusive : that whatever 
 may have been the source of our Lord's temptations, 
 they left Him 'holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate 
 from sinners.' ' He offered Himself without spot to 
 God.' 'He did no evil, neither was guile found in 
 His mouth.' 4 This character of our great Sin-offering 
 was essential to all the types and prophecies of the 
 previous ages. One sin, one stain upon His holy soul, 
 would have unfitted it to be an offering for sin. 8 
 While this is fully conceded on all hands, is there no 
 danger of robbing Christ of His glory as a conqueror 
 ' travelling in the greatness of His strength,' by with- 
 drawing His nature and condition in flesh from the 
 
 > Heb. ii. 17, iv. 18. * Luke xxii. 28. 
 
 Matt. iv. 1-12. 4 Heb. vii. 26, ix. 14 ; 1 Pet. i. ID. 
 
 i*i. liii. 9, 10. 
 
God Born of Man. 273 
 
 ordinary category of humanity, to make sure that He 
 should be immaculate ? The Catholics make Him 
 angelic rather than human, representing not only that 
 His own flesh was unlike that of all other men, but 
 that His virgin-mother was equally so, and was trans- 
 ported bodily to heaven. Many Protestants sympa- 
 thize in these unscriptural views so far as to make 
 Christ's human nature like that of Adam, or at least of 
 a very different type from that of His brethren, which 
 the apostle says it was like. The apostle is very 
 explicit, first denying that He took the nature of 
 angels, and then affirming that He did take the seed of 
 Abraham, which in the Old Testament is charged with 
 greater proclivities to sin than any other race of 
 human kind. 1 
 
 Indeed, the flesh that Christ took upon Him, as 
 being that of man, over whom it had dominated from 
 the beginning of time, had come to be another name 
 for sin. Hence it is called 'the body of the sins of 
 the flesh ; ' a sinful indulgence is a ' garment spotted 
 by the flesh ; ' it is spoken of as ' lusting against the 
 spirit ; ' and our Lord, in taking such a nature, is said 
 to have been ' made sin for us.' This last passage is 
 generally amended by those who quote it, into sin- 
 offering, thus taking from the passage the very gist of 
 its meaning. The idea the apostle expresses is, that 
 as Christ was made sin for us by being born into a 
 .nature which is sin in all others, so we, by being born 
 of His Spirit, become in Him the righteousness of God. 
 This exchange of natures, by a mutual birth of Him 
 into us and we unto Him, loses all its force by making 
 
 1 Heb. ii. 16 ; Ex. xxxii. 9, xxxiii. 3-5, xxxiv. 9 ; Deut. ix. 6, 13, 
 
 xx xt 27 ; 2 Chron. xxx. 8 ; Isa. xlviii. 4. 
 
 2 Col. ii. 11 ; Jude M ; Gai. v. 17 ; 2 Cor. v. 21. 
 
 S 
 
274 Seed- Tru ths. 
 
 Him simply a sin-offering. The birth of the Word into 
 the ' likeness ' and ' fashion of man ' as a sinner, was 
 symbolized by Moses in making the brazen serpent in 
 the likeness of the reptile which had infused the bane 
 it was to heal; and our Lord was lifted up in the 
 similitude of the sinful nature which He died to 
 redeem. 1 If there is any truth in language, therefore, 
 or any reliance to be placed upon symbols, the flesh 
 which our Lord took upon Himself was like that of 
 His brethren whom He died to redeem, and not the 
 flesh of Adam in his pristine purity, any more than 
 it was the nature of angels who have never sinned. 
 ' For both He that sanctifteth and they who are sancti- 
 fied are all of one/ that is, one in blood, one in condi- 
 tion, though infinitely different in character ; one in the 
 process of glorification by means of death to flesh ; and 
 therefoie ' He is not ashamed to call them brethren/ 2 
 'And through death He delivers them who through 
 the fear of death were all their lifetime subject to 
 bondage ; ' and this He does by the crucifixion of their 
 flesh, and their resurrection life in Him, giving them 
 the inward assurance, that c whether living or dying, 
 they are the Lord's/ As the death and life of Christ 
 were not of Himself as a man, but under the ruling 
 of the Father, whom He obeyed in all things ; so the 
 believer's death of sinful flesh and his resurrection to 
 a new life are not of himself, but by the power of 
 the Holy Ghost, and in that sense they are God's. 
 This is evidently the meaning of the saying, ' Whether 
 we live, we live unto the Lord ; and whether we die, 
 we die unto the Lord : whether we live therefore, or 
 die, we are the Lord's. For to this end/ or to effect 
 this death and life in us, ' Christ both died, and rose, 
 
 1 Pkil. ii. 7, 8 ; Num. xxi. 9 ; John iii. 14. * Hcb. ii. 11. 
 
God Born of Man. 275 
 
 and revived, that He might be Lord both of the dead 
 and living/ or the presiding power both in the dying 
 and living process. 1 
 
 Now, whatever the condition of the nature which 
 our Lord inherited from the Virgin, the absolute ruling 
 of divinity over all its impulses, even to -that of its 
 voluntary sacrifice upon the cross in obedience to the 
 Father's commandment, sanctified it, and made it an 
 expiatory offering for our sins. As the Captain of our 
 salvation, He was thus ' made perfect through suffer- 
 ing ; ' and this became Him, or was necessary to Him, 
 in bringing many sons unto glory, or in leading us 
 through a like crucifixion of the flesh to spiritual and 
 heavenly life. 2 The apprehension of imputing fleshly 
 pollution to Christ, by admitting that He took human 
 nature in its effete, decayed, and materialized state 
 after four thousand years of pravity, comes from failing 
 to consider that pollution does not arise from the 
 nature, except so far as it is a ruling power. To all 
 others it was sin, because it was the dominant power 
 of their lives, and they were without strength to make 
 it anything else. But in Him it was conquered ; it was 
 ruled by the Spirit, which He had without measure ; 
 it was from first to last, in the temptations of life and 
 in the suffering of death, so absolutely dominated and 
 subdued by the divinity in Him, as to be as holy as 
 God. Hence, though He was made sin, or what was 
 so to all others, yet it was not so to Him : though He 
 had the serpent-form, He had not its venom, but, on 
 the contrary, a life-giving spiritual energy to counteract 
 and scotch the serpent, to bruise his head and destroy 
 
 1 Heb. ii. 15, Rom. xiv. 8, 9 ; with which compare John x, 18, 
 xv. 10, Acts ii. 23, 34, John iv. 34, v. 30, vi. 39, 
 
 2 Heb. ii. 10, 
 
276 Seed- Truths. 
 
 his power over believing souls ; in reference to which 
 He says exultingly, ' I beheld Satan as lightning fall 
 from heaven ; ' and again, ' Now is the judgment of this 
 world : now shall the prince of this world be cast out ; 
 and I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw 
 all men unto me.' * He had entered Satan's den of 
 fleshly pollution; He had taken the nature dominated 
 by Satan in its effete and decayed condition ; and He 
 through the Eternal Spirit had held it uncorrupt, and 
 was ready to offer it upon the cross without spot to 
 God, bruised as to His heel, but crushing the serpent's 
 head. 2 This was our Lord's victory ; in this we see 
 Him travelling in the greatness of His strength, a 
 victory and a strength of which the mistaken zeal of 
 some Christians would deprive Him, by denying that 
 His heel ever touched the serpent's head, or that He 
 conquered in the actual likeness of sinful flesh. 
 
 Man, in his very constitution, is a being of specific 
 impulses, whose guilt or innocence is determined by 
 the ruling power to which he submits himself, acting 
 in freedom ; nor was it possible for our Lord to take 
 it upon Himself without the temptations thereto in- 
 cident, any more than a civilised man, with all the 
 views and feelings of his training, can take upon him- 
 self a savage nature, and its savage and brutalized 
 associations, without a struggle between himself and 
 his assumed life, in the same proportion more intense 
 than that of savages themselves, as the resisting force 
 within him is greater. We may be allowed this com- 
 parison, though infinitely removed from the case in 
 hand. Civilisation and savagery are relative conditions, 
 of the same state of sin ; and spiritually, one may be 
 as far from the life of God as the other. If such a 
 
 1 Luke x. 13 ; JuLii xii. ol, 32. ' 2 (Jt-u. iii. 15; llcb. ix. M. 
 
God Born of Man. 277 
 
 transition might be supposed agonizing, and the civilised 
 man might feel death preferable to a life so abhorrent 
 to all his proclivities, what shall we say of One from 
 the centre and seat of infinite holiness, One from the. 
 bosom of God, One from eternity inheriting the Father's 
 full glory, One to whom all angelic praises had been 
 offered, One with the fulness of the Godhead bodily 
 dwelling in Him, what shall we say of such a One 
 in a nature four thousand years dominated by the 
 flesh, and in a state whose confirmation in sin had 
 grown with the ages, till it had reached the culminat- 
 ing point of earthliness and depravity ? The agony 
 of Messiah, under such circumstances, was beyond all 
 our powers of illustration or conception. Can we 
 wonder to hear Him say, ' My soul is troubled/ ' My 
 soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even unto death ; ' that 
 ' His sweat should be, as it were, great drops of blood 
 falling down to the ground ; ' or that He should pray 
 on the cross, ' My God, my God, why hast Thou for- 
 saken me ? ' Or can we wonder that psalmists and 
 prophets, foreseeing His great conflict here in the 
 flesh, should give words to His agony thus : ' Thou 
 hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the 
 deeps. Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and Thou hast 
 afflicted me with all Thy waves. . . . Thou hast put 
 far from me lover and friend, and mine acquaintance 
 into darkness.' ' He was oppressed, and He was 
 afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth : He is brought 
 as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her 
 shearers is dumb, so He openeth not His mouth?' 1 
 Such words, in describing a suffering Messiah, are too 
 numerous for quotation. 
 
 1 John xii. 27 ; Matt. xxvi. 38 ; Luke xxii. 44 ; Ps. xxii. 1 ; Matt, 
 xxvii. 46 ; Ps. Ixxxviii. 6-18 ; Isa. liii. 7. 
 
278 Seed- Truths. 
 
 By excluding the divine nature of Christ from all 
 participation in His sufferings, and making them 
 merely human, do we not misrepresent the Gospels, 
 and reduce His sacrifice infinitely below the place 
 assigned it in the law and the prophets ? We start 
 with the postulate that God cannot suffer ; that our 
 Lord's agony was merely that of a man no greater 
 than many a martyr has endured ; and to make up 
 the deficiency of it as a substitute for our punishment 
 in hell for ever, we add the dignity of His character. 
 This is the philosophical view to formulate the subject 
 to our reason. But, ' without controversy, great is the 
 mystery of godliness : God was manifest in the flesh, 
 justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto 
 the Gentiles, believed on in the world, and received 
 up into glory ; ' nor can our reason lift the veil of this 
 mystery. 1 I do not know a passage in the Bible to 
 justify this theory ; but, on the contrary, He is affirmed 
 to have given HIMSELF for us, and made His SOUL an 
 offering, terms which can include nothing short of His 
 whole personality. 2 
 
 The nature of Christ was a unit, though of a dupli- 
 cate parentage the one divine, the other human ; the 
 result of which is an individual consciousness ; and 
 what is of both parents is as completely one in that 
 consciousness as if they had been of the same race. 
 ' His two natures have knit themselves the one to the 
 other/ says Cyril, ' and are in that nearness as incap- 
 able of confusion or distinction.' All that Christ felt 
 and thought, whether arising from His oneness with 
 Hi I)ivin' F;illi<T nr with His human mother, was as 
 much a unit in His conscious selfhood as that which 
 comes from our bodily or from our spiritual lelations 
 
 1 1 Tim. iii. 1G. ' Tit. ii. 14 ; Jsa. liii. 10, 12. 
 
God Born of Man. 279 
 
 is a unit in us. This qualified Him to suffer as God 
 as well as man, and is the uncontroverted mystery of 
 the incarnation of which the apostle speaks. He had 
 not only infinite powers of thought and action, but of 
 endurance in suffering; and was as truly God in the 
 one as in the others. How much more can a man 
 endure than a beast ! ' The spirit of a man will 
 sustain his infirmity; but a wounded spirit who can 
 bear ? ' ] He has not only greater wounds than a 
 beast, but greater power to sustain them. If this is 
 so with us in comparison with inferior creatures, how 
 much more with the infinite Son of God as Compared 
 with us ! 
 
 True, Jesus had no remorse ; but still ' the iniquity 
 of us all was laid upon Him/ and ' He suffered the 
 just for the unjust, that He might bring us nigh to 
 God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by 
 the Spirit.' 2 And if He suffered His death-struggles, 
 beginning with the manger and ending only with the 
 cross, in leading us forth to a spiritual and heavenly 
 life, then He suffered not as a man merely, but' 
 infinitely more as God. No case of sweating blood 
 from purely mental agony, in a constitution untouched 
 by disease and uninjured by excess in any form, has 
 ever been authenticated, except in Him who in Geth- 
 semane bore up under a burden of woe which no 
 human power could support, and to which an angel 
 lent a helping hand. 3 Everywhere in Scripture the 
 sufferings of the Messiah are represented- as equal to 
 the infinitude of His character ; and so they were 
 regarded by Christians, till a pretentious philosophy 
 stepped in to remove from them the veil of mystery, 
 by dividing His powers of endurance, and assigning His 
 
 1 Prov. xviii. 14. 2 Isa. liii. 6 ; 1 Pet. ii. 24. 3 Luke xxii. 43. 
 
2 So Seed- Truths. 
 
 sufferings only to the human part of His nature. But 
 the Holy Spirit, in making His blood a power to salva- 
 tion, works upon those who are too much absorbed by 
 a sense of their sins to think of dividing their Saviour's 
 character; and the cross is to them the organ of an 
 infinite woe endured for their redemption. 
 
 ' Alas ! and did my Saviour bleed ? 
 
 And did my Sovereign die ? 
 Would He devote that sacred head 
 For such a worm as I ? ' 
 
 The universality of these words, in spiritual worship, 
 shows their fitness to every converted man's experience. 
 All this He endured, not for the sake of any remote 
 principle or abstract element of the moral government 
 of God, but ' that we, being dead to sins, should live 
 unto righteousness, by whose stripes we are healed.' 1 
 His travail of soul in flesh was with a view to its 
 glorification in Himself, that by a like travail in His 
 elect they may attain to a spiritual and heavenly life. 
 How this latter result is achieved will be considered 
 in what follows. 
 
 1 1 Pet. ii. 24. 
 
CHAPTER XXIII. 
 DYING TO LIVE. 
 
 WHAT most of all confirms our view of inspired 
 teaching as to the nature, condition, and neces- 
 sities of our race, and what shows, at the same time, 
 how extraordinary is the work of its restoration to vir- 
 tue and happiness, is the change contemplated in it, 
 and the means of effecting that change. Owing to an 
 objective or philosophical treatment of the subject, in- 
 stead of one purely biblical, a treatment dating back 
 to the early centuries, when atoning efficacy, from being 
 a subjective experience, as with the apostles, became a 
 matter of reasoning and speculation after the manner 
 of Platonists and Gnostics, and which is continued to 
 this day, owing to these causes, I say, the real nature 
 of what the gospel proposes to do for our souls is 
 ignored, or held more as a theory than as a present 
 power working death to flesh, that the spirit may live. 
 The crucifixion which Paul speaks of as wrought on 
 him, that Christ might live in him, 1 is not now deemed 
 integral to the atoning process, but merely a conse- 
 quence of its prior existence. The atonement, in this 
 view, spent its force on some great principle of the 
 divine government, quite apart from any direct effect 
 upon those for whom it was made, as if the congrega- 
 tion of Israel had been atoned for without any partici- 
 
 1 Gal. ii. 20. 
 
282 Seed- Truths. 
 
 pation of their own. They had brought no sacrifice ; 
 had not assembled at the door of the sanctuary ; had 
 not afflicted their souls, nor abstained from labour, nor 
 shown any interest in the matter ; and yet their high 
 priest had effected for them a perfect reconciliation to 
 God on the mercy-seat. 1 Under like circumstances of 
 abstraction of us from Christ, and Christ from us, it is 
 supposed our reconciliation was complete, though it 
 remained to bring it home to us by effectual vocation. 
 Thus, by disjoining things that the apostles unite in 
 one, many are encouraged to hope for salvation who 
 give no signs of effectual vocation, and who have only 
 an atoning process in which they have never partici- 
 pated to rest upon. I fear the greater portion of those 
 who expect heaven at last have.no better basis than 
 this ; not having approached the vestibule of that spi- 
 ritual sanctuary in which now God on the mercy-seat 
 awaits the approach of a people showing the effect 
 upon their souls of what the blood of His Son repre- 
 sents. They are, to all intents and purposes, merely 
 natural men, and know nothing of being crucified and 
 raised with Christ; but conceive of His atonement 
 as a makeweight thrown into the scale to supply the 
 defects of their carnal lives. They have no thought 
 of blood as a spiritual purification, lifting their souls to 
 the holiness of heaven. Power to assert themselves 
 sons of God, living or dying, which is the essential 
 thing in one to whom Christ's blood is effective, is 
 utterly beyond their experience. ' They are poor sin- 
 ners, but have a great Saviour/ is the confession of 
 ininiy who have no faith to stretch out their withered 
 members to Christ for instant healing. Never can 
 Christianity enter upon its final triumph till such theo- 
 
 1 Lev. xxiii. 20-32. 
 
Dyi ng to L ive. 283 
 
 logy and such ways of living give place to the faith 
 which is our victory over sin through the blood of the 
 Lamb I 1 
 
 It is remarkable that this professed reliance upon 
 the atonement to make up deficiencies should be con- 
 nected with the legal spirit of doing to live, rather than 
 living to do. How many pass their lives in the vain 
 endeavour to amend to-day what they did yesterday, 
 to pacify their uneasy consciences, and render them- 
 selves acceptable to God, instead of walking by faith ! 
 In this they know and confess their failures ; but Christ 
 died for them, and that fact produces a fictitious quie- 
 tude in reference to their final prospects. They are 
 neither cold nor hot, not indifferent ; and yet not be- 
 lieving to the present saving of their souls. No, they 
 have the notion of a grace to cancel their defects when 
 they die ; but not to reign in them while they live, as 
 their power to walk with God. That power they con- 
 ceive of as in themselves ; and thus practically they 
 are under the law, and not under grace, in spite of all 
 they say of depending upon the atonement for. salva- 
 tion. In fact, their view of the atonement is one of 
 the great errors of their life ; because they accept it as 
 the offset to a fleshly ruling, and not as introducing 
 the reign of heaven into their souls. Death with Christ 
 as to the natural 'man, that Christ may live in them as 
 a controlling power which the apostles everywhere 
 make essential to atoning efficacy is no part either 
 of their experience or their acceptation of Christianity. 
 Such a faith in the atonement, however it may con- 
 duce to a life of legal struggles and failures, does not 
 reflect the gospel view, nor give peace with God through 
 our Lord Jesus Christ. Its throes and contortions are 
 
 1 John i. 12 ; 1 John v. 4 ; Rev. xii. 11. 
 
284 Seed-Truths. 
 
 of the natural man, growing out of fear, a regard to 
 character, nervous disease, or a sensibility of conscience 
 disproportioned .to their power of obeying its dictates. 
 It is not apostolic Christianity. 
 
 This state of things among Christians may perhaps, 
 in many cases, be set to the account of the resisting 
 force of the natural man in those with whom God has 
 begun a good work ; as among the Corinthians car- 
 nality rendered them babes when they ought to have 
 been men. 1 But more usually, I fear, it arises from de- 
 fective theological teaching in the pulpits, in creeds, in 
 books, in tracts, in newspapers, Sunday schools, prayer- 
 meetings, and through all the channels for shaping 
 public and private religious conviction. Another stan- 
 dard than that of Christ actually living and reigning 
 in the soul to trample under foot its enemies of flesh 
 and devil is adopted, a standard which accepts the 
 makeweight view of the atonement to cover the de- 
 fects of those whose names are enrolled in the church ; 
 who pay to support its institutions ; who are not im- 
 moral ; who admit that they are poor sinners, and wish 
 they were better, although not one sign of race ap- 
 pears in them, and they are even more worldly and 
 selfish than their unbelieving neighbours. The policy 
 of building up sects, and increasing their wealth and 
 power by admitting into them such materials, prevails 
 on all hands to a sufficient extent to account for the 
 limited victories of our present Israel. Hence it is 
 that so many earnest men, as Wickliffe, Huss, Luther, 
 Calvin, Knox, Wesley, and Whitfield, felt themselves 
 compelled to act a revolutionary part in the organiza- 
 tions which gave them their training, as our Lord did 
 in reference to Judaism. 
 
 1 1 Cor. iii. 1-3. 
 
Dying to Live. 285 
 
 Who ever heard of such a party leader as Jesus of 
 Nazareth ? When the amiable young man who had 
 great possessions kneeled to Him, though Jesus loved 
 and might desire him as 'an associate and helper in 
 His incipient cause, still He made the terms of dis- 
 cipleship so rigorous as to drive him away for ev^er. 1 
 One predominant worldly passion as the love of. 
 money, for instance any uncrucified lust, would make 
 the richest and most powerful convert in the world a 
 source of weakness rather than of strength in such a 
 cause. Jesus did not come among men to build up a 
 party, but to hunt out the prodigals and restore them, 
 by a death to what they once were, and a new life to 
 what they were henceforth to be. His was an errand 
 of salvation from carnal ruling to the kingdom of 
 heaven in the soul ; and He had no party that could 
 be benefited by those who would not submit to this 
 radical process. His was a kingdom that suffered vio- 
 lence, and that only the violent in dealing with all the 
 obstructions of their fleshly nature could enter. 2 He had 
 no atonement to offer for sin that did not crucify the 
 sinning nature, and establish in its place a spiritual life. 
 This doctrine must be revived from the rubbish of fifteen 
 hundred years of objective and philosophical reasoning 
 on the subject of atoning efficacy, before the sacramental 
 host can be led to victory and the millennium. 
 
 Under the former dispensations, this idea of death 
 on the one hand, in order to life on the other, a fleshly 
 crucifixion and a spiritual resurrection, was kept before 
 the world by the blood of sacrificial animals. From 
 the predicted bruising of Christ's heel in crushing the 
 serpent's head, to this day, blood is the great expedient 
 in redemption ; four thousand years of this time being 
 
 1 Mark x. 17-21. a Matt. xi. 12. 
 
286 Seed-Truths. 
 
 used as a symbol, and more than eighteen hundred as 
 spiritual power. 'Redeemed by the precious blood of 
 Christ : a this is the doctrine of doctrines, the only sun 
 among ten thousand luminaries ; and it behoves every 
 one to see to it that he does not darken its beams by 
 perverted views, nor rob his soul of its efficacy by look- 
 ing elsewhere for its fruits than in the death of flesh 
 and life in spirit. May the Holy Spirit help us faith- 
 fully to represent and truly to use so great a doctrine ! 
 This doctrine of salvation by blood is without pre- 
 cedent in profane history, or in other religions. 'Hero- 
 dotus does indeed mention blood as a pacificator be- 
 tween the contending tribes of Western Asia; the 
 chiefs wounding their arms and absorbing each other's 
 blood, in sealing their compacts of amity. 2 And blood 
 in religious ceremonies is not unknown among the 
 heathen. In these cases, however, nothing is found 
 approaching the Christian doctrine of atonement. And 
 those philosophical Christians of our age who make 
 blood the representative of a martyr influence ; or of 
 the potency accruing from an example of self-sacrifice ; 
 or a sympathetic expedient to move men to virtue, as 
 a mother uses her tears with refractory children ; or of 
 arguments to convince the reason of moral truth ; or 
 of an appeal to natural conscience to give it an impulse 
 towards reform : whoever, I say, resorts to such means 
 of explaining the position assigned to blood in the Bible 
 as an expedient for reclaiming a lost race, is as false to 
 the sacred text as to the facts and necessities of the 
 human condition. Is it to be supposed that inspired 
 men would make so much account of so small a mat- 
 ter ? Or is reform among men so easy a thing as these 
 reasoners would represent ? As to the Catholic view 
 
 1 1 Put. i. 19. Viotory, Book i. sec. 75. 
 
Dying to Live. 287 
 
 of material blood, as having an inherent efficacy to 
 take away sin, or that the loaf blessed by a priest or 
 the wine from sacerdotal hands becomes the veritable 
 flesh and blood of Christ, it is too absurd to be dealt 
 with by truth or argument. 
 
 It is simply as the representative of spiritual efficacy 
 to take away sin, that blood is used in Scripture. As 
 we said in our first chapter, spiritual truths must have 
 a seeding in words and symbols, in order to be appre- 
 hended by men ; and there are obvious reasons, as we 
 shall see, why Infinite Wisdom should assign to blood 
 the mission of representing to us the power that cancels 
 sin. Blood, as the life- current, represents life ; as it is 
 said, ' The life of the flesh is in the blood ; and I have 
 given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for 
 your soul : for it is the blood that maketh atonement. 
 No soul of you shall eat blood, neither shall any stranger 
 that sojourneth among you eat blood.' 1 It was death to 
 transgress this law. Not only is blood the life, but it is 
 a term also for death, and blood-guiltiness was murder. 2 
 Life and death, or death and life, is the stem-thought or 
 germinal idea in this symbol It represents the process 
 by which the Son of God wrought out redemption, 
 ' dying for our sins, and being raised for our justifica- 
 tion ;' ' delivered by the eternal counsel and foreknow- 
 ledge of God to be crucified and slain ;' ' whom God 
 raised up, having loosed the pains of death/ With 
 such an expedient in view from the beginning of time, 
 can we wonder that blood was used to represent it ? 3 
 
 But the death and resurrection of Christ derive their 
 potency in human history from being a representative 
 
 1 Lev. xvii. 11, 12. 
 
 8 Gen. xxxvii. 26 ; Lev. xvii. 4 ; Ps. 11 14. 
 
 3 Horn. iv. 25 ; Acts ii. 23, 24. 
 
288 Seed-Truths. 
 
 and forerunner to a like process in all that believe, of 
 dying to live. If there had been no Holy Spirit to 
 reproduce the death and resurrection of Christ in the 
 experience of men, and they had stood as isolated facts 
 of history, would they have occupied the place they 
 do ? Does not redemption give them their value to 
 us ? Even the precious blood that fell in Gethsemane, 
 and trickled down the rugged wood of the cross, had 
 only a representative force. It is not in clotted cor- 
 ruption nor among dead men's bones that we are to 
 look for atoning efficacy. ' He is not here, for He has 
 risen,' is the direction of the angel where to look for 
 the living power in redemption. 1 Our atoning High 
 Priest has passed into the heavens, there to appear on 
 the right hand of God for us ; and thence alone 'pro- 
 ceeds the saving power represented by blood. 2 
 
 Dying to live was the maxim which ruled through- 
 out our Lord's earthly experience. It began in the 
 stable at Bethlehem ; was carried on in His retired life 
 at Nazareth, in a state so unlike the heavenly choirs 
 from which He came ; was exemplified in His forty 
 days' conflict in the wilderness ; in His subsequent 
 career of labour and poverty, not having where to lay 
 His head ; in bearing our sicknesses and infirmities ; 
 in nightly vigils and prayers; in the calumny of His 
 enemies, over whom He wept bitter tears ; in the agonies 
 of the garden ; in the taunts and insults of the closing 
 scene, and finally in His death upon the cross. What 
 was this, from beginning to end, but a process of cruci- 
 fixion to all His feelings as a man ? As human nature 
 was the same in Him as in us, it could not have been 
 otherwise. No worldly good accrued to Himself or 
 family from His extraordinary powers, which to them 
 
 1 Matt xxviii 6. a Col. iii. 1 ; Heb. ix. 14, 15. 
 
Dying to Live. 289 
 
 was a cause of complaint ; and they demanded that 
 He 'should show Himself to the world' as a wonder- 
 worker, and thus raise Himself and them to worldly 
 pre-eminence. 1 The impulse ruling Him from above 
 admitted no such display, but urged Him to the per- 
 fection that suffering only could give. The Eternal 
 Spirit energizing in Him bore Him forward in this 
 career of woe, till His manhood succumbed, not to sin, 
 but to pain and death, His heel bruised in bruising the 
 serpent's head, and He fell a victim to that world for 
 which He came to die. Thus it was that He provided 
 to conduct us to spiritual life by crucifying in us the 
 body of the sins of the flesh, achieving the only victory 
 and glory which He sought or could receive the vic- 
 tory and glory of infinite love. 
 
 There is nothing in the New Testament answering 
 to the universal use of blood in the ceremonies of the 
 Old, but this process of dying to live, first in Christ 
 and then in us ; and no other possible exhibition could 
 reduce in human nature the dominant flesh to the sub- 
 ordination necessary to the coming of the kingdom of 
 heaven. The words IXdo-fcofiai, fXaoyz-o?, and iXaarjj- 
 PLOV hilaskomai, hilasmos, and hilasterion rendered 
 in our common version, to reconcile, propitiation, and 
 mercy-seat, are but a few times used by the apostles, 
 and cannot be designed to fill the place of Jcapporeth, 
 atonement, which, with the verb from which it is de- 
 rived, is a hundred and forty times repeated in the 
 Old Testament. 2 The root of the word Jcapporeth 
 means literally to cover, probably to express the idea 
 that though sin may be hid from view, and no longer 
 operate to our condemnation, the fact of its exist- 
 
 1 John vii. 4. 
 
 Heb. ii. 17; Rom. iii. 25 ; Feb.. ix. 5; 1 John ii. 2, iv. 10. 
 T 
 
Seed- Truths. 
 
 ence can never be annihilated. The idea of hiding 
 sin, casting it behind the back, and remembering it 
 no more, is no doubt derived from this primary mean- 
 ing of the word used for atonement or expiation. 1 
 The stem-thought of kapporetli is that of removing from 
 persons and things whatever renders them unfit for the 
 service of God. 
 
 As the New Testament has no synonym for atone- 
 ment in Hebrew, the idea is expressed by facts rather 
 than by particular epithets. We are at enmity with 
 God, and alienated from Him by wicked works. God is 
 angry with the wicked every day; 2 and the atonement 
 is that which reconciles the parties. Our enmity may 
 be chronic rather than acute, and only a serious effort 
 to detach us from our idols of concupiscence or from 
 our worldly ideas could perhaps fully bring it to light. 
 So God's anger may be simply the settled antagonism 
 of His holiness to our unholiness, His spiritual law to 
 our fleshly nature. But whatever His anger or our 
 enmity, an irreconcilable difference exists between the 
 parties ; and how are they to be reconciled ? One or 
 the other of them must recede from his ground, or both 
 must undergo a change and meet half-way; and which 
 is it God or we, or both ? ' God in Christ, reconciling 
 the world to Himself,' 3 is the way the apostle states the 
 case, and not Himself to the world. He has nothing to 
 recede from, being infinitely right in all things, and the 
 change must be wholly in us. We have everything to 
 give up, because we are wholly wrong ; and our only 
 inability to be at peace with God is, that we are in the 
 
 1 Ps. li. 9, ciii. 12, xxv. 7, Ixxix. 8; Isa. xxxviiL 17. The scapt- 
 goat expressed a like idea. See Lev. xvi. 10, 26. 
 
 Koin. viii. 7 ; Eph. iv. 18; Ps. vii. 1L 
 
 2 Cor. v. 19. 
 
Dying to Live. 291 
 
 flesh and under its ruling, and we cannot please God. 1 
 Imputation of another's righteousness to cover our de- 
 fects is unworthy of God ; and besides, it would effect 
 nothing till the body of our sins was destroyed, that we 
 should not serve sin. A mind under the ruling of the 
 flesh cannot be made happy by imputation, nor by 
 any expedient short of a fleshly crucifixion in order to 
 a spiritual resurrection with Christ. This, therefore, is 
 the substance of which the blood of beasts under the 
 law was a shadow. It is only in this view that we 
 can enter into apostolic teaching on this subject. If 
 sin were anything but the rule of a nature in opposi- 
 tion to God, or divine anger anything but the anta- 
 gonism of infinite holiness to such a nature, then we 
 might talk of expedients to pacify that anger, or of 
 taking away sin by something short of a crucifixion of 
 the opposing nature ; but as the case stands, and as it 
 is represented from Genesis to Eevelation, we have only 
 to look into the facts to see how utterly unavailing is 
 any atonement which is not a dying to live. This is 
 the way that Christ leads, and we must follow. This 
 is the cross to be taken up, and not that of doing public 
 duties to which we are reluctant, as many suppose. The 
 atonement is a history, not a theory; it is a concrete 
 fact of our inward and outward relations to God, and 
 not an abstraction of justice, of law, or of government. 
 The Holy Spirit is the positive energy in conduct- 
 ing the process in all that believe. ' He takes of the 
 things of Christ, and shows them to us,' and ' does not 
 speak of Himself.' 2 Much more is meant by this 
 passage than suggesting to us Christ's words, or open- 
 ing to us the doctrines which He taught. His words 
 and doctrines, great as they are, do not equal His 
 
 1 Kom. viii. 8. 8 John xvi. 13, 15. 
 
292 Seed- Truths. 
 
 deeds. ' Laying down His life, and taking it again,' * 
 by His own voluntary act, and in obedience to His 
 Father's commandment, or through the Eternal Spirit, 
 by whom He offered Himself to God, in order to lead 
 the way for a like experience in us, is the greatest of 
 all His achievements. He thus acted what had been 
 taught from the beginning of time : that spirit is 
 greater than nature ; that nature must perish before 
 spirit can reach its full development ; that the forces 
 entitled to rule us are not the fleshly ideas and feel- 
 ings by which we are so insanely impelled, but those 
 which come from the unseen and the eternal ; and that 
 we need not fear to trust to the wreck of all our 
 earthly fortunes, if only everlasting life is an abiding 
 energy in our souls. These are the truths that Christ 
 enacted, and that must by the Eternal Spirit be re- 
 enacted in us, or the first step towards reconciliation 
 has not yet been taken. Christ went through the 
 process as a man, and in sympathy with humanity, 
 for whose infirmities He is ' touched ' with tender 
 compassion ; 2 but He did it not for Himself, but ' for 
 us/ or to commute His own power into a permanent 
 energy for the reproduction of a like process in all 
 that believe. This energy is the Holy Ghost, who has 
 nothing of His own to offer, but only this great record 
 in Him whom He represents. Dying to live was the 
 culminating point of types and prophecies, and it was 
 that which the apostles determined only to know in 
 preaching nothing but Christ and Him crucified. 8 
 
 In things the unfitness for God's service which 
 atoning blood removed, was not inherent, but represen- 
 tative. It arose from the corrupt use to which every- 
 thing pertaining to man's life had been devoted, and 
 1 John x. 18. f Heb. iv. 15. 1 Cor. ii. 2. 
 
Dying to Live. 293 
 
 the consequent vicious associations with which it had 
 been connected in his mind. To reclaim a voluptuary, 
 his vicious haunts must be broken up or forsaken ; 
 and he must be surrounded only by things fitted to 
 inspire him with pure and honourable sentiments. 
 So our language, our literature, our institutions, our 
 usages, our associations, our possessions, and our whole 
 outward life, must feel the atoning influence operating 
 in ourselves, to give them a new aspect and direction, 
 and altogether higher and more beneficent uses. * It' 
 any man be in Christ, he is a new creation ; old things 
 are passed away ; behold, all things are become new/ 
 That the apostle refers this change to the atoning 
 process, is evident from the words immediately follow- 
 ing : ' And all things are of God, who hath reconciled,' 
 or atoned, ' us to Himself by Jesus Christ/ l 
 
 This new attitude towards all that concerned us in 
 our former state could only come of our dying to what 
 we once were, and being raised with Christ to a 
 new and heavenly life. Our Lord alludes to the same 
 when He says, ' He that hateth his life in this world, 
 shall keep it unto life eternal/ And this hatred He 
 extends, in another place, to father, mother, wife, 
 children, brethren, sisters, yea, and his own life, as 
 necessary to discipleship : that is, hate and crucify our 
 whole outward condition, so far as it interferes between 
 our souls and God. This is having the world crucified 
 unto us, and we unto the world. 2 Can we wonder 
 that, in shadowing forth such an idea, blood should be 
 required to make priest, people, altar, tabernacle, and 
 all its implements of divine service, acceptable to God ? 
 1 2 Cor. v. 17, 18. a John xii. 25 ; Luke xiv. 26 ; Gal. vi. 14. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV. 
 THE KINGDOM OF GOD WITH POWER. 
 
 OUR subject, it will be seen, is a historical rather 
 than a theoretic view of human nature. It 
 pertains to redemption in its present working among 
 the elenients of the world, and not in its millennial or 
 heavenly consummation. True, it is never complete 
 in the present life, but always in conflict with insur- 
 rectionary foes in the new man himself which must be 
 kept in subjection, 1 and with assailing powers from 
 without. Still it is the kingdom of heaven of which 
 all the regenerated are subjects ; and it is with power, 
 because under the reign of the Holy Spirit, which our 
 Lord speaks of as power from on high. 2 Power 
 supposes resistance to be overcome ; and the idea is 
 nowhere associated, I believe, with God's rule of holy 
 beings. No force coerced the angels to render their 
 homage to the Infant of Bethlehem, inferior as He 
 seemed to themselves ; but gladly they obeyed the 
 call to worship Him. 3 Only in this process of cruci- 
 fixion to the dominant flesh and resurrection to a new 
 life in God do we see ' the exceeding greatness of that 
 power which wrought first in Christ in raising Him 
 from the dead/ and then in rendering llic pivnrlimg of 
 the cross the power of God to our salvation. 4 Ihu 
 
 1 1 Cor. ix. 27. * Luke xxiv. 49. 
 
 1 Ileb. L 6 ; Luke ii. 9-14. Kpli. i. 19 ; 1 Cor. i. 18. 
 
 294 
 
The Kingdom of God with Power. 295 
 
 cross, as representative of our Lord's regeneration of 
 blood, becomes, in the hands of the Holy Spirit, the 
 efficiency to a like regeneration in all that believe. 
 This is the kingdom of God with power. 
 
 Owing to partial views of the subject, we are prone 
 to underestimate the greatness of this achievement. 
 Many who think themselves Christians are conscious 
 of no such wonderful transition in themselves, and 
 they doubt its existence in others. Perhaps they are 
 right in estimating their own condition ; for the natural 
 man is liable to various changes of thought and pur- 
 pose, changes, too, that seem improving to moral 
 character, and are mistaken for the spiritual life, 
 though remote as possible from dying to live. Others, 
 in whom the good work has really been wrought, are 
 so overwhelmed with a sense of the evils in themselves 
 yet to be overcome, as to underestimate the work done 
 in their hearts. They are so far from ' apprehending 
 that for which they have been apprehended of Christ 
 Jesus,' 1 that they seem to themselves almost without a 
 standing as spiritual men. But with all these abate- 
 ments and misgivings in estimating what the Spirit 
 has really done for us, is it not true that war has 
 been inaugurated against the dominant flesh-and-devil 
 power ? Is there not a powerful phalanx prosecuting 
 this war under the leadership of the Holy Spirit ? 
 Did not our Lord exult in the fact that such a war 
 had begun when He sent out the seventy disciples ? 2 
 The spiritual David stood face to face with the giant 
 foe, defying him in the name of Jehovah of Israel. 3 
 The inauguration of such a war, in the person of Jesus 
 and in every believer, is contesting the right of the 
 flesh to rule, and embodies elements of certain victory. 
 1 Phil. iii. 12. 3 Luke x. 18-22 ; Matt. xi. 27. 3 1 Sam. xvii. 45. 
 
2 9 6 Seed- Truths. 
 
 'Resist the devil, and he will flee from you; draw 
 nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you.' 1 
 
 This failure of dying to live, on the part of so many 
 Christians so called, and this weakness of faith in so 
 many others, have had the injurious effect in our theo- 
 logies of magnifying Christ's death towards God and 
 His government, to make up for the apparent defi- 
 ciency of its influence among men. Though nobody 
 were really saved, still Christ would be a great Saviour, 
 because He has offered to divine law and justice an 
 equivalent for the salvation of many. And if they 
 are not saved under the ruling of the Holy Ghost in 
 the present life, if elected they will be, under death's 
 dominion dissolving their mortal bodies ; so that 
 however selfish, however carnal, however worldly, 
 however miserly and malignant up to the last pul- 
 sation of their congealed blood, they will step into 
 eternity quavering with their attuned voices the song 
 of Moses and the Lamb. With this vast background 
 of law appeased and justice satisfied, can we not 
 sufficiently magnify atoning efficacy, and set it off 
 gloriously, even with the failure of a veritable death 
 of the sin of flesh, in order to a spiritual resurrection 
 with Christ ? 
 
 This process of lowering down the requirements of 
 God's kingdom on earth by magnifying them in heaven 
 began early to work as a ' mystery of iniquity/ 2 or as 
 a deep stratagem of the adversary to content Christians 
 with an atonement infinite and glorious in everything 
 but that for which it was designed a power in them 
 to kill their sin, and make them victorious in faith and 
 holiness. What does the great deceiver care for the 
 greatness of the atonement, if he can only use it to 
 
 iv. 7. 2 Thess. ii. 7 ; 1 Jolm ii. 18. 
 
The Kingdom of God with Power. 297 
 
 fasten our fleshly chains ? This mystery of iniquity 
 began to wax strong when Christianity, from being a 
 spiritual life, with all its glowing sympathies, became 
 a science of the schools side by side with speculative 
 philosophy. Among the first questions, it was asked, 
 To whom did Christ pay the price of our redemption ? 
 Origen, of the third century, thought He paid it to 
 the devil, to whom the redeemed had before belonged. 
 Others disputed the position ; and after a few ages of 
 debating, by pen, pulpit, and council, the question was 
 resolved into our present theory, that Christ's death 
 was a sacrifice to law and justice. It was, as others 
 express it, to appease the indignant ethical nature of 
 God in letting the guilty go free. Divine anger and 
 the outraged moral sentiment of the universe demanded 
 a victim for man's sin, and that victim must be the 
 sinner himself, or his substitute ; and as the Son of 
 God consented to take the sinner's place, the Father 
 poured on Him the full vials of His wrath. 
 
 It comes therefore to this, as stated by an advocate 
 of the theory, that God was angry with Himself, 
 punished Himself, and became a self-immolated victim 
 in the person of His Son, to pave the way to pardoning 
 the guilty. What simple-minded person under con- 
 viction for sin could take in such a concatenation of 
 ideas as the basis of his hope ? It is the feeling that 
 Christ died for him, and he must relinquish his sins 
 for such a Saviour, and lead a holy life by His grace, 
 that gives him hope. And yet this death to sin and 
 life to righteousness is deemed by many no adequate 
 exposition of atoning efficacy. The exacting flesh 
 demands something less taxing to self, under the idea 
 of doing greater honour to Christ. Some become Anti- 
 noniians under the subtle influence \ others spend their 
 
2 98 Seed- Truths. 
 
 days in a doubtful position between nature and grace ; 
 and not a few die in hope, because their life has been 
 one of torture, not of triumph, and they think Christ's 
 blood will make up for their deficiencies. There are 
 many honourable exceptions to this painful picture ; 
 but not enough to restore professing Christians as a 
 body to the energy of a faith that it is a real dying to 
 live, or of a piety that can conceive of no atonement 
 or reconciliation with God on any principle but that of 
 a baptism and regeneration of blood. No wonder that 
 a piety so killing to flesh and so quickening to spirit 
 should be a power when it is really exercised. 
 
 Look at what ensued to Christ's followers fifty days 
 after His death. They were a simple-hearted unchival- 
 rous company ; from the most virtuous circles of their 
 age, no doubt ; but from stations and callings quite out of 
 the line of heroic achievement. Their life, after leaving 
 their cottage homes, had been a wandering one, and 
 without motive, except to hear the words and witness 
 the deeds of the young man whose person and influence 
 had such a charm to their feelings. A mysterious 
 attraction drew them after Him, leading them to call 
 Him Master and Lord even in His poverty. Why they 
 did so admitted of scarcely a logical conclusion ; and to a 
 mind severe in its worldly calculations, they would have 
 been deemed vagabondish and unavailing. Those who 
 had an eye to the loaves and fishes were better under- 
 stood, and soon fell off as from uncongenial affinities, 
 neither wanting nor being wanted, neither helping nor 
 helped in their main purposes. They found themselves 
 with a Master who had no leisure but for prayer, no 
 powers or resources that brought a worldly requital, no 
 position or intellectual culture, and who practised none 
 oi the arts of kingly command' among men ; and those 
 
The Kingdom of God with Power. 299 
 
 who were looking out for the main chance soon found 
 that they had nothing to hope from such a leader. 
 Still a mysterious influence invested Him, winning har- 
 lots to purity, and publicans to justice and liberality. 
 All felt the magic of it, stirring them to love or 
 malignity. 1 
 
 While He lived, there was no transfer to others of 
 His power, excepting the healing of diseases and cast- 
 ing out devils in His name. 2 Not a man of His fol- 
 lowers rose above a worldly estimate of things ; and 
 hence the question, in the very hour of His ascension, 
 'Wilt Thou now restore the kingdom unto Israel?' 8 
 He could not speak fully of the end of His mission, 
 because they could not ' bear ' it, nor comprehend its 
 import. 4 They had glimpses of a higher life ; but, like 
 their successors in after ages, they were looking to a 
 temporal kingdom, or to some mysterious effect upon the 
 government of God, or to vast and unknown changes in 
 somebody or something besides themselves. How little 
 do we realize that things are great in their simplicity ; 
 and that to set on foot a power to make the carnal 
 spiritual, the earthly heavenly, the selfish benevolent, 
 the sinful holy, is an enterprise that needs no adven- 
 titious aids to make it great and glorious ! The touch 
 of the surgeon's lancet, simple as it is, becomes great 
 to him whose life is saved by its means. Can we 
 wonder that the patriarchal and Mosaic ages accom- 
 plished so little, when these disciples were so slow in 
 learning what they really needed, and under such a 
 Teacher too, and when so few retain the significance 
 of what Pentecost taught them ? ' Fellowship with 
 Christ in His sufferings,' or actual communion with 
 
 1 Matt. xxi. 32 ; Luke iv. 22, v. 27, xix. 2 ; John vii. 46. 
 Luke ix. 1, x. 17. 3 Acts i. 6. 4 John xvi. 12. 
 
300 Seed-Truths. 
 
 Him in them, in order to conformity to His death ; 
 alas, how few have acquired such an experience in 
 them as to attain to His resurrection I 1 
 
 Aware of the ruling of natural ideas in His dis- 
 ciples, our Lord directed them to tarry at Jerusalem 
 till they should be endued with power from on high. 
 And they did wait in prayer and supplication for ten 
 days after His ascension, Mary His mother being of 
 the company, who is not afterwards mentioned, because, 
 when her Divine Son ceased to be known after the 
 flesh, and was known only in His glorified state, His 
 earthly relations were lost sight of. 2 The tabernacle 
 was now completed, and only awaited its occupant ; the 
 victim was upon the altar, and needed only fire from 
 heaven to exhale it into heavenly odours. Intense were 
 the longings of these simple-hearted men for a good 
 hoped for, but dimly outlined, when the accordant note 
 of faith and prayer was at length reached, as when the 
 priests of the temple made one voice to be heard on 
 high, and ' there came a sound from heaven, as of a 
 rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where 
 they were sitting/ investing them with a heavenly 
 element, and filling them with the Holy Ghost. 8 ' Arise, 
 Lord God, unto Thy resting-place, Thou and the ark 
 of Thy strength ; let Thy priests, Lord God, be clothed 
 with salvation, and let Thy saints rejoice in Thy good- 
 ness/* Thus the death of earthly hopes and ideas, and 
 the concentration of hope and prayer upon heavenly 
 things, proved the birth to a new life, new powers, and 
 the realization of the original conception of manhood, 
 as uniting in itself the power of two worlds. 
 
 This was the coming of God's kingdom in power. 
 
 1 Phi', iii. 0-11. .Vts i. 1?, 14. 
 
 Acu ii. i l , - < hi on. v. 13, 14. * 2 ( LAM. v". 41. 
 
The Kingdom of God with Power. 30 1 
 
 The Divinity now absorbed in Himself the ideas and 
 energies of human nature, and reigned within, single 
 and alone. The tongues of flame, denoting a propa- 
 gating power, made it a kingdom for all of every nation 
 who render the obedience of faith. It demanded ex- 
 pansion, and could not be restrained by a thick-ribbed 
 Judaism. Who can estimate the efficiency which speech 
 thus acquired for man's regeneration ? Where shall we 
 find a full record of the results of a spiritual power 
 thus obtained ? Church history is, like painting, a mere 
 surface-view of Christianity. Its soul is unlimned and 
 unseen. Eeasoning on the subject, as upon worldly 
 connections of cause and effect, to reduce it to the level 
 of our natural plain of thought, is far more absurd than 
 to attempt an explanation of the mysteries of gravita- 
 tion or of central forces. The results of speaking the 
 word in demonstration of the Spirit have more than 
 realized the sword of flame at the gate of Eden, and 
 the tongues of fire on the day of Pentecost. 
 
 ' When one who holds communion with the skies 
 Has tilled his urn where these pure waters rise, 
 And once more mingles with us meaner things, 
 'Tis e'en as if an angel shook his wings : 
 Immortal fragrance fills the circuit wide, 
 And tells us whence their treasures are supplied.' 
 
 The first sermon delivered under the new impulse is 
 remarkable for its pointed charge of guilt ' in killing 
 the Prince of life, whom God hath raised from the 
 dead/ and in identifying the person of Jesus with the 
 Jehovah of Abraham and of Moses, whom David always 
 saw before his face, and thus in concentrating all previ- 
 ous type and prediction upon a church crucified with 
 Christ, and raised by the Spirit's baptism. The fishermen 
 and their associates no longer lived their natural lives. 
 
3 o 2 Seed- Truths. 
 
 The Holy Spirit was the ruling power within them, to 
 realize the primeval inbreathing of man's creation. It 
 commuted their weakness into strength, their folly into 
 wisdom, their timidity into courage, their low, confined 
 ideas into thoughts high as heaven, vast as eternity, 
 and their death into life. It opened to them visions 
 of the glorified, to cancel their fear of mobs and mar- 
 tyrdoms. And like effects appeared in their converts, 
 who ' daily attended with one accord in the temple, 
 and breaking bread from house to house, partook their 
 food with gladness of heart, praising God, and having 
 favour with all the people.' 1 
 
 It will be seen that we take our example of God's 
 restored kingdom with power, from what may be 
 thought an extreme case, and nowise answering to 
 the general examples of Christianity which we see 
 around us. But, which is our rule of judging in the 
 case, What God has done, or what man has done ? 
 Besides, in all cases where the power for a holy life 
 really exists, is there not an approximation to apostolic 
 experience ? Was it not so with Luther and many 
 of his associate reformers ? Was it not so with Whit- 
 field and Wesley ? Was it not so with Edwards and 
 Brainerd ? And has it not been so in all our great 
 revivals of religion ? Millions of Christians realize 
 in themselves a death and resurrection with Christ, 
 whose sex, whose circumstances, whose poverty, sick- 
 ness, and necessary seclusion, compel them to an unde- 
 monstrative life, so far as this world is concerned, but 
 who have that infinitely greater cause of joy than the 
 power of casting out devils, that their names are written 
 in heaven.* 
 
 But how about miracles ? Were they not an in- 
 1 Acta ii. 46. * Luke x. 20. 
 
The Kingdom of God with Power. 303 
 
 tegral part of the apostolic kingdom of God ? Yes ; 
 and so was that of having their property in common, 
 a state of things not now possible, but towards which 
 people always converge the more they are ruled by the 
 Holy Spirit. Whenever there is a large amount of 
 spiritual influence among the churches, untold amounts 
 of wealth become a fund for charity, for missions, for 
 education, and for all the purposes of doing good, 
 although a like necessity for living from a common 
 treasury nowhere exists as with the first church in 
 Jerusalem. That was a church, to a large extent, of 
 strangers on a religious mission to the Holy City 1 
 ' devout men, out of every nation under heaven ;' and 
 how could they subsist except on the common-stock 
 principle ? As to miracles, though they convert no 
 man, they were a necessity to an age whose mate- 
 rialism was proof against all the ordinary modes of 
 appeal, and whose attention to the new visitation could 
 not be otherwise arrested. But is there not in all 
 cases of remarkable spiritual manifestations much that 
 borders on miracle ? What will be said of the extra- 
 ordinary things in the lives of such men as Bunyan, 
 Wesley, and of even Muller of Bristol, in our own 
 times ? Do they not record events and experiences 
 quite out of the ordinary connection of cause and 
 effect ? 
 
 Besides, the power of God in regeneration is super- 
 natural, if not miraculous. As Augustine quaintly 
 sets it forth, 'more easily did my body obey the 
 weakest willing of my soul, in moving its limbs at its 
 nod, than the soul obeyed itself to accomplish in the 
 will alone this its momentous will. Whence this 
 monstrousness, and to what end ? Let Thy mercy 
 
 1 Acts ii. 5-11. 
 
304 Seed- Truths. 
 
 gleam, that I may ask ; if so be that the secret 
 penalties of men, and those darkest pangs of the 
 sons of Adam, may perhaps answer me. Whence 
 is this monstrousness ? and to what end ? The mind 
 commands the body, and it obeys instantly ; the mind 
 commands itself, and is resisted. The mind commands 
 the hand to be moved ; and such readiness is there, that 
 .command is not distinct from obedience. Yet the 
 mind is mind, the hand is body. The mind commands 
 the mind its own soul to will, and yet it doth not. 
 Whence this monstrousness ? and to what end ? It 
 commands itself, I say, to will, and would not com- 
 mand unless it willed ; and what it commands is not 
 done. Bid it willeth not entirely. For so far forth it 
 commandeth as it willeth ; and so far forth the com- 
 manded thing is not done, as it willeth not. For the 
 will commandeth that there be a will, not another, 
 but itself. But doth not command entirely ; there- 
 fore what it commanded is not. For, were the will 
 entire, it would not even command it to be, because it 
 would already be. It is therefore no monstrousness 
 partly to will, and partly not to will ; but a disease of 
 the mind, that it doth not wholly rise, being by truth 
 upborne, by custom down-borne.' 1 
 
 Out of this dilemma no power but that of the cross 
 can raise a man. It is a miracle of grace to concen- 
 trate our wills upon being and doing what is utterly 
 repugnant to all our currents of desire. 'To will is 
 present with me ; but how to perform that which is 
 good I find not.' 2 When deliverance comes, it is 
 always with a burst of gratitude that it comes 'through 
 Jesus Christ our Lord ;' and that we are relieved from 
 condemnation by being 'in Christ/ in the sense of 
 1 Memoirs, pp. l.ir,, 157, 153. * Rom. viL 18. 
 
The Kingdom of God with Power. 305 
 
 "being crucified and raised with Him. Hence every 
 such transition is by a power above nature, and is 
 really more effective for building up the kingdom of 
 God than any number of material miracles. 1 When- 
 ever it is genuine, or a real death of the body of sin 
 and a real resurrection to a new life, it becomes the 
 starting-point of a new series of psychological facts, 
 called ' the fruit of the Spirit, love, joy, peace, long- 
 suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temper- 
 ance,' 2 graces existing in a form and with modifica- 
 tions utterly unattainable to the natural man. ' Against 
 such there is no law/ because the new life is accepted 
 as a fulfilment of the design and purpose of all legal 
 requisitions. The law is fulfilled in those who walk 
 after the Spirit ; and thus the atoning process is 
 complete. 
 
 In the use of the word rendered atonement in the 
 Old Testament, it is applied to the going forth from 
 the offending party of what is accepted by the of- 
 fended party as a token of reconciliation. It was so 
 applied, first to the offering of beasts by which Jacob 
 conciliated his brother Esau. 3 It is next applied to 
 the half shekel required of each Israelite that was 
 numbered after the exode, it being called atonement 
 money. It was not applied to the paschal lamb. The 
 blood of that sprinkled on the door-post was a token 
 to the destroying angel that he should pass on and 
 destroy Egypt, who held the people in bondage, but 
 leave unharmed the inmates of all the blood-stained 
 houses. As a sign of redemption, it denoted the 
 relaxing of the power of sin holding the soul in 
 bondage, and of life and freedom to the escaping 
 emancipated spirit, death to flesh, and life, in God. 
 
 1 Rom. vii. 25, viii 1. 8 Gal. v. 22, 23. 3 Gen. xxxiu 21. 
 U 
 
306 Seed- Truths. 
 
 But the money to which the term atonement or cover- 
 ing of sin is applied paid for the flour, incense, wine, 
 oil, fuel, salt, priests' garments, and whatever was 
 used in the daily service of Jehovah. It furnished 
 the fuel of the consecrated flame ascending from the 
 altar, burning there night and day, and from age to 
 age, as a symbol of those prayers, praises, and devout 
 'affections which believers unceasingly offer to God. 
 It comes up before God as a new psychological de- 
 velopment in humanity produced by His Holy Spirit, 
 and as such is a ' memorial for our souls/ or a reminder 
 that we are subjects of His restored kingdom among 
 men. 1 These affections in us which are symbolized by 
 the daily offerings in the tabernacle are spoken of as 
 ' the sacrifices of praise continually, that is, the fruit 
 of our lips, giving thanks to His name/ 2 and are the 
 living evidence that the blood of the cross is more to 
 us than an abstraction of law ; that it is indeed a 
 positive force, killing our Egypt of sin and giving life 
 and freedom to our souls, of which our holy aspira- 
 tions and praises are a standing memorial. They are 
 the life-blood of Christ our Paschal Lamb, as seen on 
 ' the two side-posts and upper door-posts/ to indicate 
 that the soul within is to go free. 3 
 
 If we would have our sins covered and cancelled, 
 therefore, we must be sure of a reigning Christ within 
 us by His viceregal Spirit, clothing us in a robe of 
 such beautiful graces, virtues, and gifts, that we ' may 
 be presented to Him a glorious church, not having 
 spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing ; but that we 
 
 * Compare Ex. xii. with Ex. xxx. 11-16. 
 
 Heb. xiii. 15, 16 ; Rom. xii. 1 ; Ps. li. 17, 1. 13-15 ; Hos. vi. 6 ; 
 Mic. vi. 7, 8. 
 
 Ex. xil 7. 
 
The Kingdom of God with Power. 307 
 
 should be holy and without blemish.' * But let us not 
 delude ourselves with a covering of satisfied legal 
 penalties in which we have no participation. Let us 
 not think to appear in a robe of righteousness which 
 somebody else wore, but which we show no signs of 
 having put on. Let us not trust our hopes of heaven 
 on the death and resurrection of Christ's body, as 
 absorbing in itself all the vengeance due to us, when 
 we show no signs of fellowship in His sufferings, or of 
 conformity either to His death or resurrection. Alas 
 for the piety of millions ! Whatever covering for sin 
 it trusts to, it is certainly not that of being influenced 
 by the mercies of God in giving His Son to die for us, 
 which shows itself in ' presenting the body a living 
 sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, as a most reason- 
 able, as a most righteous service.' 2 
 
 It is in a state of endeavour that God meets with 
 us as a resurrection power. And is not the true 
 doctrine of the cross full of inspiration to a higher and 
 still higher spiritual life ? Did Christ die and rise 
 again that we may die and rise with Him, and shall 
 we spend our days in this sepulchre of fleshliness and 
 partial sanctification ? Oh that there were one uni- 
 versal movement among Christians to realize in them 
 selves the full effects of atoning blood ! All discovery, 
 all advance even in natural things, comes to us in an 
 attitude of endeavouring it ; and can we hope for it 
 otherwise in the divine life ? This chilling unbelief as 
 to the possibilities of our holy vocation represses endea- 
 vour, and renders thousands children when they ought 
 to be men. They are not even * feeling after God, if 
 haply they may find Him/ and how can they hope that 
 the kingdom will come with power to their souls ? 
 1 Eph. v. 27. 8 Rom. xii. 1. 
 
CHAPTEE XXY. 
 
 SUFFERING AS THE INITIATIVE OF POWER. 
 
 rflHE use of suffering in redemption, as seen first in 
 JL our Lord's passion, and then in the experience 
 of His followers, is a subject that requires careful con- 
 sideration. Who does not shrink from passing under 
 the rod ? Yet it is God's chosen means of disciplining 
 and saving us. True, suffering in itself is no cure 
 of sin, tending rather to exasperate the guilty one into 
 hatred and malignity against God and His govern- 
 ment. We read of those who ' gnawed their tongues 
 for pain, and blasphemed the God of heaven, because 
 of their pains, and because of their sores, and repented 
 not of their deeds.' 1 This is the uniform effect of 
 suffering, in itself considered. It is the prison to the 
 thief, the gallows to the assassin, an object of detesta- 
 tion and a cause of exasperation against the govern- 
 ment that inflicts it. 
 
 But suffering as a throe of agony in casting off sin, 
 out ot regard to the holiness of God, becomes a point 
 of coincidence between the soul and the grace that 
 eaves it; an initial moment in passing from fleshly 
 to spiritual and heavenly ruling. This is what the 
 apostle calls icara Oebv \v7rrj, sorrow out of regard to 
 God, as distinguished from rov /cocr^ov XvTrrj, sorrow of 
 ilw world; the one working repentance to salvation, 
 > Rev. xvi. 10, 11. 
 
Suffering as the Initiative of Power. 309 
 
 the other the death of increased guilt and misery. 1 
 The one is a sense of sin, and an effort to throw it off' ; 
 the other unsatisfied desire, disappointed hope, and 
 intensified malignity. Sorrow for the sin of nature, 
 out of a regard to God, is the soul's moulting period, 
 so to speak, wherein it is reduced to the last point of 
 weakness in a struggle to disburden itself of guilt of 
 the past, and take on a renewed and infantile life. 
 This is being converted and becoming little children. 2 
 
 Our Lord reached this extreme point of weakness, 
 in disrobing Himself of mortality, and assuming His 
 crown of glory, when He cried, 'My God, my God, 
 why hast Thou forsaken me ?'* This cry was at the 
 moment which always comes in such cases when 
 the cup of agony is exhausted to its dregs, when the 
 baptism of blood, at its point of lowest submergence, 
 exhausts the last resource of earthly life. Our Lord's 
 human nature wrought in Him as powerfully as in us, 
 when He felt Himself thus dropped, as it were, into a 
 bottomless sea of agony, detaching Him from all He 
 held most dear on earth ; and no exclamation can be 
 conceived more fitting to the occasion. It was truth 
 and nature putting into words as much of an infinite 
 woe as could be expressed. 
 
 In the garden His body was spared, except as it 
 sympathized with His agonized mind ; and besides, an 
 angel lent a helping hand. But now body and soul 
 accepted the destiny which both He and His Divine 
 Father had chosen for Him ; and no angelic interme- 
 diation could longer delay the crisis of suffering, in 
 commuting mortal into immortality, or in converting 
 himself, His WHOLE SELF, into spiritual power working 
 
 1 2 Cor. vii. 10. 2 Mark x. 15; Luke xviii 17 
 
 * Matt, xxvii. 46. 
 
3 1 o Seed- Truths. 
 
 in human nature as leaven in meal, that 'He might 
 redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a 
 peculiar people, zealous of good works.' * How could 
 the Father, how could angels, how could the Son 
 Himself, stave off the crisis, when all were a unit in 
 ' the predetermined counsel and foreknowledge/ that He 
 must thus ' by wicked hands be crucified and slain/ 
 and that the ruling flesh in man could not otherwise 
 be subdued to the kingdom of God? 2 And yet, because 
 neither the Father, nor angels, nor the Son Himself 
 could afford relief, consistently with the Scriptures or 
 with the demands of the occasion, was pain therefore 
 the less painful to the sufferer Himself, or the break- 
 ing up of one mode of existence in order to enter 
 upon another less dreadful to every sensibility ? These 
 were the throes of His human birth to a higher life, and 
 ' the twelve legions of angels ' that He might have com- 
 manded to His deliverance would only have defeated the 
 purpose of His mission; and of course the Father's inter- 
 ference was equally impossible. Suffering has a mission 
 in redemption ; and well said our Lord, ' How am I 
 straitened till it be accomplished ! ' This cry of agony, 
 ' My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me ? ' has 
 infinite appropriateness to the occasion and the Sufferer. 
 Is it not strange that so plain a case should *be 
 put into the unnatural shape of an indignant Father 
 pouring His wrath upon His Son ; that outraged law 
 should wreak its vengeance on His holy soul ; or that 
 the public conscience of the universe, demanding a 
 spectacular scene of blood, should have made His death 
 an equivalent for hell-torments ? Alas for theory and 
 philosophy ! How remote the apostolic account from 
 any tiling of tin-, kind !^-every where representing Christ 
 1 Til. ii 14. '* Actsii. 
 
Suffering as the Initiative of Power. 3 1 1 
 
 as 'the Well -beloved,' 'the only begotten Son/ 'in 
 the bosom of the Father/ always an object of His 
 ' delight/ and never more so than in this tragic act of 
 His life. 1 ' Therefore doth my Father love me, because 
 I lay down my life.' 'For the suffering of death, He 
 was crowned with glory .and honour.' 2 And Jesus in 
 the next breath, to His complaint of being forsaken, 
 says, ' Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit.' 
 Does this look like one labouring under a sense of 
 divine anger ? With such a feeling of delight in each 
 other at bottom, can we imagine the pantomime of an 
 acted scene of wrath ? 
 
 Still, our Lord's sufferings were consequent upon 
 sin, as the pain inflicted by the surgeon's knife is a 
 consequence of the disease of which it is the cure. 
 He owed His sufferings to His human relationship, or 
 the lost condition of the nature which He had as- 
 sumed, a nature in which He had done no sin ; and 
 therefore His immortality was ensured without dying, 
 much more than was that of Enoch and Elijah by 
 anything they had done. He died, therefore, as He 
 Himself says, that His death might become a power of 
 regeneration to others. 'I tell you the truth: it is 
 expedient that I depart [die] ; for if I depart not, the 
 Comforter will not come to you ; but if I go [die], I 
 will send Him to you.' 3 His death did not detach 
 Him from humanity; so far otherwise, it w T as COD 
 verting Himself into a permanent and all-pervadin- 
 power, acting upon and in them that believe, to raise 
 them from a carnal to a spiritual, from an earthly to a 
 
 i Matt. iii. 17 ; John xii. 28 ; Ps. ii. 7 ; Isa. xlii. 1 ; Matt. xii. 18, 
 xvii. 5 ; Mark i. 11 ; Luke ix. 35 ; Eph. i. 6 ; Col. i. 13 ; 2 Pet. i. 17 ; 
 John i. 18. 
 
 8 John x. 17 ; Heb. ii 9. - 3 John xiv 2, 3, xvi. 7, 8. 
 
312 Seed-Truths. 
 
 heavenly life. In this sense, on Him was 'laid the 
 iniquity of us all ; ' in this sense, ' He was wounded 
 for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniqui- 
 ties : the chastisement -of our peace was upon Him; 
 and with His stripes we are healed.' l 
 
 It is in the light of this initial process to a like ex- 
 perience in us, of suffering as a means of freedom from 
 sin, that the subject has so great an interest to a lost 
 race. The apostle so uses the event when he says : 
 ' Forasmuch, then, as Christ has suffered for us in the 
 flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind : for 
 lie that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from 
 sin; that he should no longer live the rest of the 
 time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of 
 God/ 2 Let us therefore consider a few of the cases 
 in which persons have been 'armed with the same 
 mind.' or in whom suffering has conduced to a like 
 result; and note also the intellectual validity of such 
 experiences in evincing the cross to be, not merely a 
 symbol, but a living power among men. 
 
 Paul's account of this process in himself includes his 
 Pharisaical life ; his malignity as a persecutor of the 
 church; his journey to Damascus, and the mid-day 
 splendour shining upon him, eclipsing the sun; the 
 voice calling to him from heaven, and assigning his 
 mission ; the blindness, the fasting, the baptism, the 
 renewed Paul in place of a dead Saul the legalist ; 
 and, we may add, his subsequent career in * filling up 
 that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in his 
 flesh, for His body's sake, which is the church.' 8 Paul 
 on many occasions adduces the evidence of such an 
 experience in confirmation of the gospel he preached, 
 
 1 Isa. HiL 6, 6. 1 Pet. iv. 1, 2. 
 
 Acts UL 1-23, xxii 1-21, xxvi. 4-23; 1 Tim. L 18. 
 
Suffering as the Initiative of Power. 3 1 3 
 
 or to show its power in his own case. Before mobs 
 and kingly courts he stood forth as an example of 
 resurrection power, and of the efficacy of atoning blood. 
 His heart glowed with his theme, and evinced the power 
 of experimental preaching above all other modes of 
 address. 
 
 Examples of like character, though less signal, dot 
 the ages from Paul to this day ; and it is hard to select 
 where so much is offered to our choice. Bunyan was 
 a tinker, an ignorant, brutal sort of man ; but the new 
 life has made his name a household word to the civi- 
 lised world. After a death-struggle of some continu- 
 ance, 'he came up with the cross, when his burden 
 loosed from his shoulders, and fell from his back, and 
 began to tumble, and so continued to do, till it came to 
 the mouth of the sepulchre, where it fell in, and I saw 
 it no more. Then was he glad and lightsome, and said 
 with a merry heart, " He hath given me rest by His 
 sorrow, and life by His death." Then he stood still 
 awhile to look and wonder, for it was very surprising 
 to him that the sight of the cross should thus ease him 
 of his burden/ Here the cross and sepulchre are cause 
 operating to the believing soul in producing death to 
 sin and life to righteousness : Christ's experience is 
 cause, the soul's experience is effect ; the two corre- 
 sponding to each o'ther as light to the eye in producing 
 seeing. Andrew Fuller, not as the great theologian, 
 but as an untaught farmer boy, says of his experience, 
 then and there : ' I was like a man drowning, looking 
 every way for help, or rather catching for something 
 by which he might save his life.' It is hard for flesh to 
 give up to die. After floundering among false doctrines 
 about a Christ only for the elect, he adds : ' I felt some- 
 thing attractive in the Saviour. I must I will yes, 
 
314 Seed-Truths. 
 
 I will trust my sinful soul in His hands. And as the 
 eye of the mind was more and more fixed upon Him, 
 my guilt and fears were gradually but insensibly re- 
 moved. I now found rest for my soul ; and I reckon 
 that I should have found it sooner, if I had not enter- 
 tained the notion of having no warrant to come to 
 Christ without some previous qualification.' The in- 
 carnation annihilates the distance between us and God ; 
 and the blood of the cross is a positive efficiency to 
 bring the consenting, believing soul nigh, however far 
 off he may have been before. The atoning efficacy and 
 the will to trust are both parts of the same perfect 
 whole. 
 
 The general character of this class of inward experi- 
 ences is thus beautifully expressed by Cowper: 
 
 *I was a stricken deer that left the herd 
 Long since. With many an arrow deep infix'd 
 My panting side was charged, when I withdrew 
 To seek a tranquil death in distant shades. 
 There was I found by one who had Himself 
 Been hurt by the archers. In His side he bore^ 
 And in His hands and feet, the cruel scars. 
 "With gentle force soliciting the darts, 
 He drew them forth, and healed, and bade me live.* 
 
 It must be obvious to an impartial observer, that 
 such psychological facts, of which the record is illimit- 
 able, do not occur except in connection with the cross ; 
 showing that Jesus, in consenting to die, is not dis- 
 appointed in His purpose of commuting His life into 
 a permanent spiritual power, acting as leaven in meal 
 among our human elements. The Holy Spirit is this 
 power proceeding from Him ; and by working in us 
 mightily, He exerts over the whole area of our earthly 
 affairs a directing and a sanctifying influence. Our 
 bodies thus become a living sacrifice, holy arid accept- 
 
Suffering as the Initiative of Power. 315 
 
 able, being quickened to something better than a merely 
 carnal life by His indwelling Spirit ; and our eating, 
 and drinking, and lowest activities, reflect the divine 
 glory shining in and through us. 1 That Christ's death 
 has thus proved the emanating source of a power work- 
 ing outwardly as well as inwardly, shaping the currents 
 of human thought, moulding institutions, directing the 
 outlay of enterprise and wealth, supplying material for 
 art, science, and literature, and producing an extensive 
 impression upon human affairs, who can deny ? And 
 who can deny that it has done this by means that in 
 their inception were, humanly speaking, wholly inade- 
 quate to such results ? The words, ' I am Jesus, whom 
 tliou persecutest,' thrilling upon the soul of Paul, and 
 ' the just shall live by faith/ vibrating upon every chord 
 of thought and feeling in Luther, laid a foundation, the 
 first for changing the religion of Rome from Paganism 
 to Christianity, and the other for detaching a third 
 part of the nations from a dominant apostasy, arousing 
 thought and enterprise in all departments, and lead- 
 ing on to a train of consequences infinite and eternal. 
 What a potency in single seed-truths falling from the 
 tree of life as represented by the cross ! 
 
 It is no abstraction of penal law, no intellectual 
 conviction, no spectacular scene of punishment to 
 pacify a universal conscience demanding a victim as 
 an offset to hell-torments ; no, it is power as really as 
 gravitation is power, though, as pertaining to God, the 
 soul, and eternity, it is of infinitely greater significance. 
 The divinity becomes identified with humanity in a 
 far higher sense than the inbreathing into man at his 
 creation, giving him power to become a redeemed son 
 of God. There is nothing in a peasant's daughter to 
 1 Rom. viii. 11, xii. 1; 1 Cor. x. 31. 
 
3 1 6 Seed- Truths. 
 
 suggest the impossible hope that she may be married 
 to a prince; but if she were to see the prince 'coming 
 down from his throne and his palace to woo her, sacri- 
 ficing his royalty for her menial condition, exchanging 
 his robes for her rags, and his dainties for her crumbs, 
 then a new-born hope within her might aspire to being 
 his wife. And when married to him in his rags, she 
 might then aspire to a throne and a diadem, as he should 
 resume these prerogatives of his birth. Such is the 
 incarnation and the cross in human history. ' If so be 
 that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified 
 together/ Having followed Him in His regeneration 
 of blood, and in His spiritual baptism, how can we 
 doubt that we shall reign with Him I 1 
 
 In all cases wherein such a hope takes its rise, it is 
 from a like crisis of abandonment to pain and woe 
 with that which extorted the cry, ' My God, my God, 
 why hast Thou forsaken me ?' The baritone song of a 
 dying flesh has in this cry its keynote. In the three 
 thousand pentecostal converts it was, ' Men and bre- 
 thren, what shall we do ?' In the Pliilippian jailor, 
 ' Sirs, what must I do to be saved ?' In Saul of Tarsus, 
 ' wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from 
 the body of this death ? ' It is the cry of a sense of 
 total abandonment to pain and woe, in Christ working 
 out salvation for us ; but of sinking to hell in us, as 
 we feel we richly deserve. It is like the throes of the 
 convict ending in the stillness of death under the exe- 
 cutioner's axe : with this difference, that the blow is 
 stayed, as Abraham's was in beheading his son ; and we 
 fall into the arms of infinite love, ' forgiving all our 
 iniquities, healing all our diseases, redeeming our life 
 from destruction, crowning us with loving-kindness and 
 
 1 Rom. viii. 17. 
 
Suffering as the Initiative of Power. 3 1 7 
 
 tender mercies, satisfying our mouth with good things, 
 so that our youth is renewed like the eagle's.' Thus 
 Christ, our forerunner, sunk into death and the grave, 
 but was caught in the arms of a resurrection and glori- 
 fication power, to be henceforth the cause of a like 
 transition in us. His experience is reflected in ours, 
 as the central figure of a grand saloon repeats itself in 
 the mirrors by which it is surrounded. 
 
 This law of suffering as cause may be traced to 
 everything of value among men. Is not our very 
 earthly being itself a product of suffering ? Did not 
 that quiet man Newton work out his problems of the 
 universe by many a throe of agony ? Was not the 
 steamboat set adrift, and the locomotive launched upon 
 its iron track, by a generation or two of agonized 
 endeavour ? This is the law in everything. Who 
 looks for offshoots of beneficence from dilettante, plea- 
 sure-loving minds ? Suffering in the inauguration of 
 spiritual power is no isolated fact of human experience. 
 
 But the question is, What value is to be attached to 
 Christian experience, so called, as evidence of anything 
 divine or extraordinary in the doctrine of the cross ? 
 What is it worth, as tried by the ordinary tests of 
 evidence and of truth ? I am aware that there is much 
 talk of fanaticism, mental disease, and of dreamy fancies, 
 as accounting for all this class of psychological develop- 
 ment. Even the religion of Sir Isaac Newton was 
 sneered at by Voltaire as the offshoot of a diseased 
 mind. But there are certain principles on this subject 
 that cannot be well disputed. 
 
 First, the agreement of such an experience with our 
 moral nature is worthy to be thought of. If a man had 
 been confined all his life from the approach of light, and 
 should suddenly be introduced to the opening expanse 
 
3i3 Seed-Truths. 
 
 of the dawning morning, could he doubt the validity of 
 his sensations and experiences in becoming familiarized 
 to the new element ? Its agreement with his eyes 
 leaves not a doubt in his mind of their being made for 
 each other. No evidence beyond his own sensations 
 would be needed to complete the demonstration, nor 
 would the sneers of the blind at his fanaticism unsettle 
 his convictions. He knows that, whereas he was once 
 blind, now he sees. 1 
 
 So we are, by reason of sin, in the darkness of a 
 natural material sort of life, and the truths and beati- 
 tudes of our relation to God and a spirit-realm are hid 
 from us. Still our instinctive longings after immor- 
 tality, our undefined and unsatisfied feeling of connec- 
 tion with something higher than this earthly world, 
 remain, like the tendency to seeing in eyes excluded 
 from light, or like the craving of infant appetite for 
 untasted food. Conscience spurs us up to a virtue to 
 which we have not yet attained, and after which wo 
 grasp, without being able to reach it. Like men in 
 total darkness, we feel that we are made for something 
 better, and are burdened and heavy laden from a sense 
 of incapacity to assume our proper position. This con- 
 dition of human nature is the necessary result of being 
 cut off from its higher relations ; just as plants without 
 sunlight have only a feeble, diseased, and unproductive 
 life. Did the old heathen symbolize this state by the 
 vultures gnawing at the vitals of Prometheus ?. 
 
 IJut in a genuine Christian experience the needed 
 light is admitted ; the inward torture is relaxed ; the 
 Licking power of reaching one conscience-ideal is sup- 
 plied in the righteousness of the law fulfilled in us ; 
 and an undefined sense of satisfaction diffuses itself, 
 i John ix. 25. 
 
Suffering as the Initiative of Power. 319 
 
 like a gentle heat or a sweet soft radiance, through out 
 whole being. We feel that all is right with us, and 
 we are as sure that our hearts do not deceive us, as the 
 blind of the verity of their sensations on first seeing. 
 Peace and joy reign within, and, if withdrawn, duty 
 remains ; God remains ; love remains in its practical 
 working, if not in its sensational delights ; and our 
 energies are taxed in a perpetual race of glory to God 
 in the highest, and good-will to men, and in the un- 
 ceasing battle of overcoming evil with good. Nothing 
 short of this comes up to the Bible ideal of a new man 
 in Christ. 
 
 Second, Christian experience, so far as it is genuine 
 and effective, leads to right living. It makes the con- 
 tentious peaceable, the intemperate temperate, the pro- 
 fane devout, the dishonest honest, the licentious chaste, 
 and the riotous useful and orderly citizens. Such is 
 its tendency, however counteracted, or however defec- 
 tive in the spurious examples of it sometimes brought. 
 to our notice. Peter's love of his Master, though 
 undying, had its intermissions, costing him tears and 
 poignant regrets. As animal life is still life, though in 
 conflict with disease and its causes, so the restored 
 divinity of our souls is beleaguered, and victory may 
 sometimes waver all along the line of battle. To esti- 
 mate what grace actually achieves, we must take into 
 account what its subjects would have been without its 
 restraining influence. Is it nothing that the soul, even 
 in its failures, is held to a divine, a superhuman ideal 
 of moral excellence ? 
 
 The general as well as the specific results must also 
 be considered in estimating Christian experience. Think 
 of its martyr-subjects, whose blood is the seeding of 
 Christianity in the earth. Think of the Puritan stock; 
 
3 2 o Seed- Truths. 
 
 hardy, resolute, freedom-loving, unwisely mixing piety 
 and politics, ready always for a tilt with the enemies of 
 God, and quite unlovely in many of their features ; but 
 still baptized in 
 
 ' Siloa's "brook, that flowed 
 Fast by the oracle of God, ' 
 
 and wielding spiritual truths and the temporal sword 
 in a way beneficent to British institutions and to 
 general liberty. We do not claim to estimate the good 
 or ill of Puritanism in Europe ; but we are certain that 
 the Pilgrim Fathers, despite their faults, have done a 
 great work in America. It was their new life in God 
 that embarked them in the enterprise of planting their 
 religion amid nature's wilds and among savage men ; 
 that founded their churches and free schools, now the 
 pride and glory of forty million people ; and laid the 
 foundation of an empire so far in advance of the older 
 Catholic colonies of Mexico and South America. They 
 had to do with the infinite and the eternal directly 
 and in their own persons, and not through priestly 
 intermediation ; and this of itself was a power fitting 
 them to distance their more servile neighbours. This 
 Puritan seeding in the New World is, what the Eoman 
 stock was among the tribes of ancient Italy, the assimi- 
 lating force which is melting the country so largely 
 into its own type of politics and religion, and impart- 
 ing its own energy into all the departments of business. 
 The use of the word Yankee, once applied as a term of 
 reproach to a limited section, but now as a designation 
 for two-thirds of the nation, shows clearly the progres- 
 sive character of the stock to whom it properly belongs. 
 That religion as a heart-work was the leading idea with 
 the Puritans is conceded ; and whatever may be thought 
 of their influence as a whole, no one can look at English. 
 
Suffering as the Initiative of Power. 321 
 
 history, or witness their achievements in America, with- 
 out confessing that they have been a power in the earth. 
 With far less advantages for action and demonstration 
 than other classes of religionists, they have really 
 achieved more than any of them. 
 
 How can we doubt the validity of the new life in 
 God, to which at least much of this history is owing ? 
 A restored Bible ; a revived literature ; imiversal edu- 
 cation; communion with God, as the privilege of our 
 daily conscious life ; the power of prayer ; a state with- 
 out a king, and a church without a bishop ; the laws 
 supreme over palace and cottage ; these are some of 
 the doings and designings of this Puritan contact of 
 earth with heaven. Even in the Papal Church, the 
 Pascals, the Fenelons, the Bossuets, the Bourdaloues, 
 and men most in sympathy with piety as an inner life, 
 have shed around them the most genial influence, and 
 have done most to bless the world. If a tree is to be 
 judged by its fruit, what better one can be found than 
 this ? Call it a dream, a vision, fanaticism, bigotry, or 
 by any other hard name ; still neither the power nor 
 the beneficence of Christian experience can thus be 
 scorned out of existence. 
 
 Third, another fact to be considered in evidence of 
 the genuineness of Christian experience, is the power 
 it gives over the conscience. Men may be deceived 
 in their reasoning, but they are not likely to be as to 
 what is adapted to move their instinctive feelings. 
 Does not a mother know what is suited to move her 
 maternal sympathies ? Does not stage acting assume 
 that the passions have their appropriate language and 
 gestures, and that when these are used they are sure 
 of a response from a listening audience ? The picture 
 of a Fioman daughter who for six weeks sustained the 
 
 X 
 
322 Seed- Truths. 
 
 life of her father, condemned to die of starvation, by 
 stealing into his prison and feeding him with the food 
 that nature provided for her infant, will make its im- 
 pression even upon disobedient children, so sure is an 
 action of the kind to meet a response from the inner 
 chords of our being. 
 
 But what has proved a greater power, as before 
 hinted, than experimental preaching ? When an 
 apostle's life hung upon his speech, as before the 
 mob at Jerusalem and the court of Agrippa at Caesarea, 
 he did not trust to the elaborations of his intellect, but 
 to the simple rehearsal of what God had done for his 
 soul. And Gibbon concedes the mighty influence 
 which the Christian pulpit had upon the destinies of 
 the Roman world. Fervid men giving utterance in 
 ten thousand pulpits, once, twice, or thrice a week, of 
 their own vital experiences on subjects most momen- 
 tous, could not fail to affect the currents of thought 
 and feeling in a great empire. How prodigious the 
 effect of Whitfield's ministrations on a London mob, 
 and upon all classes, not from the strength of his 
 reasoning, in which he never excelled, but from the 
 tide of genuine feeling which he poured over his 
 audiences ! Speech in such cases gives vent to infinite 
 and eternal realities, swaying minds as the tempest 
 the reeds that grow in its track. An argumentative, 
 unsentimental discourse has no such effect, because it 
 appeals to very different principles of human nature. 
 The one is an assault upon the reason, the other upon 
 the conscience. 
 
 Is there not genuine nature and reality, therefore, in 
 an influence which has proved itself such a power to 
 conscience for so many ages, and to men so diversified 
 in condition and culture ? The brutalized savages of 
 
Suffering as the Initiative of Power. 323 
 
 an American forest felt the burning words of Brainerd, 
 and were quite as demonstrative under his appeals 
 as Peter's audience on Pentecost, as Whitfield's in 
 London or Bristol, or as Massillon's and Bourdaloue's 
 among the dite of Paris. A soul kindled at God's 
 altars has always been, and always will be, a power in 
 the earth. The chords of the harp give no surer re- 
 sponse to the touch, than the soul of man to the divine 
 word spoken in power by one who comes to testify 
 what he has seen with his eyes, what he has heard, 
 what he has looked upon, and what his hands have 
 handled of the Word of Life. 1 No sham can succeed 
 in such a work, no mimicry of another's acting, no 
 intonations assumed for the sake of effect, no attitu- 
 dinizing to impress the senses : nothing but genuine 
 Christian experience, not of a former date or as a past 
 memory, but as a living, glowing reality, to modulate 
 the voice and infuse sincerity into every gesture at the 
 moment of speaking, can ever meet the demands of 
 the ministerial calling. Where this is, silence is power, 
 and a look eloquence. ' It is not ye that speak, but 
 the Spirit of my Father that speaketh in you,' 8 
 lJoimil. "Matt. x. 20. 
 
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