Part 1 (1/2)

Studies of Christianity

by James Martineau

INTRODUCTION

The Alish edition, ay as an Intellectual Pursuit and of Religion, as a Moral Influence” Its rare reat praise Its author was the Rev James Martineau, then a settled minister in Liverpool Since that time, his occasional publications fro a wider audience, and awakening a deeper ad track of light And now the association feel that they cannot do a greater favor to the reading public, or better aid that cause of Liberal Christianity whose servants they are, than by printing a collection of the later writings of this gifted man, whom they first introduced to Ao

The list of works prefixed to the article here entitled ”Distinctive Types of Christianity,” as it appeared in the West to them, have been accidentally o to the author's earlier years, but are inserted here equally on account of their e adaptation to the general purpose of the work; naht on the true nature of Christianity

They will also be new to most of those whom they now reach The last paper in the volume is one of the first its writer published, in his conant wisdom and moral fidelity of its catholic lessons do not secure a syainst such appeals

In selecting from Mr Martineau's numerous invaluable articles, not already published in book-form, the contents of the present work, the rule has not been so much to choose the ablest productions, as to take those best fitted toministers, students of divinity, and the cultivated laity a knowledge of the ht yet attained

We regret that the necessary limits of the volume exclude several of the author's nificent one in the National Review upon ”New as a Theologian”

We have called this volume ”Studies of Christianity,” sieneral character of its contents In justice to the author, it should be borne in mind that the separate papers were prepared to meet various occasions, without a suspicion that they would ever be brought together to form a book Of course they do not express his comentarily treat The relative order and rank of his convictions, the interpretation of Christianity from its inner side, appear much better in his ”Endeavors after the Christian Life,”--by far the richest and noblest series of sere Still, a kind of unity pervades the different pieces co this collection One Christ-like strain of senti fealty to truth presides over the standard of judgment are constantly evident The sa, and exquisite culture, everywhere appear Each article is more or less directly an illustration of Christianity, as so moral, spiritual, vital, dynamic, to be practically assimilated by the soul, in distinction fromatic, formal, forensic, once enacted and now to be etic patience of labor, the detersive intellect, the unalloyed devoutness of spirit, the telescopic range both of faculty and equipment, revealed even in these wayside products, awaken in us an unappeasable desire for a more purposed and systematic work from the same mind, now in its fullest rateful appreciation of the contributions already furnished, by giving them further circulation, assured that no truly pious and intelligent person, free fro equal ht and profit

Mr Martineau is so thoroughly acquainted with the processes and results of spiritual experience, with the sciences of nature, and with the whole realm of metaphysical philosophy, and his oealthy faculties are so tenacious in their activity and freshness, that every subject he touches receives novelty, light, and ornareater guide andthe whole do lines of analysis, clothing the severe materials of science with the colors of aesthetic art, he sheds on every theenius, and transfuses every thought with the distinctive sentiments of piety Thus is afforded that rarest of all spectacles,--and the one now ious world,--of a reatly endowed at once as philosopher, poet, and Christian, and ith simultaneous earnestness in each capacity is devoted, by the whole labors of his life, to the instruction of mankind

For these reasons, we feel it a duty to attract as much attention as possible to Mr Martineau's past and expected publications The peerless intelligence, the bracing fidelity, the essential nobleness and catholicity, the tender beauty and reverence, of his utterances, his consureat topics he handles, seehest wants of the age,--to do divine service in the conflict of scepticisainst all that is truest and purest in the religious faith and moral life of Christendom Therefore, to persons who, unacquainted with the author's previous works, may read the papers here collected, ould recommend as the best books for educated and earnest Christian thinkers, Mr Martineau's ”Rationale of Religious Inquiry,” the volu, and the two series of ”Endeavors after the Christian Life” recently republished in one volume by Messrs Munroe and Company

We shallfroenerally accessible, a few specihts which, if freely received in these tiious thinker towards the truth and peace he covets

How clearly the following passage shows the true

RELATION BETWEEN NATURAL AND REVEALED RELIGION

The contempt hich it is the frequent practice of divines to treat the grounds of natural religion, betrays an ignorance both of the true office of revelation and of the true wants of the human heart It cannot be justified, except on the supposition that there is sos of creation and those of Christ, with some decided preponderance of proof in favor of the latter Even if the Gospel furnished a series of perfectly new truths, of which nature had been profoundly silent, it would be neither reasonable nor safe to fix exclusive attention on these recent and historical acquisitions, and prohibit all reference to those elder oracles of God, by which his Spirit, enshrined in the glories of his universe, taught the fathers of our race And if it be the function of Christianity not to administer truth entirely new, but to corroborate by fresh evidence, and invest with new beauty, and publish to the millions with a voice of power, a faith latent already in the hearts of h the speculations of the wise and noble few,--to erect into realities the drea the life and lot of ion of nature and that of Christ,--a relation of original and supplement,--which renders the one essential to the apprehension of the other Revelation, you say, has given us the clehich to thread the labyrinth of creation, and extricate ourselves froloom Be it so; still, _there_, in the scene thus cleared of its perplexity, must our worshi+p be paid, and the ht If the use of revelation be to explain the perplexities of Providence and life, it would be a strange use toexplained We hold the key of heaven in our hands What folly to be for ever extolling and venerating it, whilst we prohibit all approach to the teates it is destined to unlock

One would search long to find a finer illustration than is here given of the real

NATURE OF DEVOTION

In Devotion there is this great peculiarity,--that it is neither the _work_ nor the _play_ of our nature, but is soher than either,--more ideal than the one, more real than the other All hus,--either the mere ai On the one hand, we plough and soe build and navigate, that we may win the adorn and dance, we carve and paint, that we may put forth the pressure of har froraceful Art is content with siraded when it is reduced to either character It is not a labor of utility; and he who looks to it as a ratiate himself with an awful God, and bespeak an interest in a hidden Future, is an utter stranger to its essence; his habits and words may be cast in its mould, but the spark of its life is not kindled in his heart When fed by the fuel of prudence, the fire is all spent in fusing it into form; and the finished product is a cold and ion a siesture of passion; and to class it with e, to treat it as the rhyth off an irrepressible enthusias and contents, and sink it from a divine attraction to a human excitement The postures and movements and tones which sio off into space, and pass away; they direct themselves nowhither; they have no more _object_ than a convulsion; they ask only leave to be the last shape of a feeling that must have way; and be the inspiration what it may, they close and consu of aspiration, not at the evaporating end of i _hi his out his arms, it is not in blind paroxysm, but that he may embrace and be embraced; if he cries aloud, it is that he may be heard; if heinto e love of spirit to Spirit Devotion is not the play even of the highest faculties, but their deep earnest It is no doubt the cul point of reverence; but reverence is impossible without an object, and could never culminate at all, or pass into the Infinite, unless its object did so too In every case we find that the faculties and susceptibilities of a being tell true, and are the exact measure of the outer life it has to live; and just as e proportions as it has, to just so reat objects does it stand related; so that from the axis of its nature you may always draw the curve of its existence Hu God as the infant's eye to light, is itself a witness to Hie and shadow of heavenly things,” the parallel chamber in our nature with that Holy of Holies whither its incense ever ascends

In a siument to show that

DEVOTION IS NOT A MISTAKE

Be assured, all visible greatness of reater And since it is inconceivable that what isthat is not, that what isthe soul into the unreal and eift of spectral fancies, weFact,--to feel truly that the august forms of Justice and Holiness are at hoht and more perfect veneration There are those who please therow its habits of worshi+p; that the newspaper will supersede the preacher and prophet; that the apprehension of scientific laill replace the fervor ofwill then be perfectly administered when no reference to another distracts attention But, for my own part, I am persuaded, that life would soon beco in the heavens; that its deeper affections would pine away and its lights of purest thought grow pale, if it lay shrouded in no Holy Spirit, but only in the wilderness of space The acious secular voice leaves, after all, a chord untouched in the huin to sigh for the rich e hurts the eye by plying it for use and denying it beauty; and we long to be screened behind a cloud or two of lory and cool the air Never can the world be less to us, than ereply to the common assertion that

”THEOLOGY IS NOT A PROGRESSIVE SCIENCE”