Part 15 (1/2)

and thefrom the harp of David? and the burdens of inspiration been treasured on the Prophet's scroll? Who could quote a word that God had ever spoken in any other language? It was the one sacred idioent corruptions, and to which, when the world's confusion is over, they es ht understand it still, it was intrinsically fitted to be universal And who could call _that_ speech provincial, at whose sound the heavens and earth arose? or esteeh the dispersion at Babel, and was present on the world before the Flood? So there ue, in the reading of Scripture, or in any intercourse between _an to converse _with one another_, to cohts, and descend froht they resort to the e of Worshi+p was but one; though the jargons of Opinion were many And so the Scribes and the Rabbis of the written Word supposed themselves to hold the only key of life

But the Holy Spirit goes into no one's keeping, and is no respecter of tongues Free as the wind to blohere it listeth, it sweeps wherever souls are genial to its breath, and will yield to it their gifts, of love, of lips, of life It seeone into the hands of the philologists, and beenbeen feeling its way in other directions, te men to pray out of the fresh heart, and never mind the words, till now at last the secret broke, that on any native tongue by which souls ether, may all pass out to God; that the home-sounds are the devoutest too; that the speech into which ed instru to the faintest touch of their affections, is the true vehicle by which ”the Spirit giveth utterance” The prayer of faith, ascending in the idioes into one in heaven And God's truth, descending to this world, breaks into all the moulds of expression native to our various race

_One Gospel in reat Pentecost lesson, construe the ht_ as well as speech,--natural differences of temperament and character,--to which the Gospel, still without prejudice to its unity, adapts itself with the same divine flexibility What private observer--still more what student of history--can doubt that we are not all made in the same mould,--that the proportions of our humanity are variously mixed,--that not only do we individually differ in moral susceptibility and spiritual depth, but fall into perroups marked by distinct and ineradicable characters, and reproducing the sae? Transpose the souls of Plato and Pascal into the right place and time, and do you suppose they would turn up as _Latitudinarian Divines_? Deal as you ith the lot of Priestley and Belsha the _Christian Mystics_? Close in the fires of Augustine's nature hat damps you may, and could you ever find him peace in a Gospel of _Good Works_? No; we touch here on differences deeper than accident, and irremovable by culture,--differences that vindicate their reality by crossing the lines of dissi in all ti wants and experiences; they set into differing shapes of faith; and on souls equally faithful they fix very differing expressions They are so many _vernacular idioht to be: no one of thee alone intelligible between man and God; and the pretension of any to supersede the rest, and reign alone, is not less vain than the con dialects, and the a waters of local literature into the huge tank of a universal language They may not be able to understand each other, or even with the key of outward comparison always bear translation into idioms other than their own But let them speak in their oay, and pray their own prayer Not only are they all clear to Him that readeth the heart; there will thus be _e as they may be, are ever deepest in their special tones; and the prayer, the hy, coes our thirst like the saters of soiven to our fathers and made sacred by a Saviour's noonday rest

On this principle,--that different types of natural genius in men cannot but throw their Christianity into different forms,--we may not only justify the divisions of Christendom, but even cease to wish that they should disappear Unity no doubt there must be: God is one; Truth is one; the Gospel is one; and a ht and affections in all dimensions at once, would reach the Divine equilibriu partial preponderates

But froh only oneat once; the blind walls of our mental chamber shut out all the rest; and as we kneel, like Daniel, at the open light, the breeze upon our face seems sacred, because it comes from our Jerusale as truth, rounded off, self-balanced, and complete; in the mind of God,--the final seat of reality,--of course there is Nor is it a question, whether each individual reeable to fact, and adequate to his nature This also is possible But when he has attained it, on what ter parallel pretensions? Is he in his heart to identify his oith the absolute truth, sufficient for _all_ as for hiether throay their own? Or is he to confess to himself his own limitations, to suspect that hehe has ? In which direction is he to seek unity? By antipathy to all beliefs save one?--or by inviting all of them to live their life and show their place in huenius of Romanism to seek unity by _suppression_; of Protestantism, by free _development_;--of the former, to protect the consistency it has; of the latter, to press forward to one that it has not Are we taunted with our ”Protestant variations”? Why, the more they are, the richer is our field of experience, the finer our points of comparison; provided, however, that we hold fast to the noble trust in a Gospel of identity at bottoious heart of all the churches, than in the theologic wisdom of our own No man can proclaim the principle of ”_One Gospel in many dialects_,” unless he is prepared to adin the others, however hid froon, to ascribe it sooner to his own incapacity than to their insignificance When God's truth, refracted on its entrance into our nature, shall eain, not one of these tinted beams can be spared Let us for a moment arrest and examine them Let us look at the chief varieties which Christianity assu our own place, and appreciating that of others

There are three great types of natural mind on which the Spirit of Christ may fall; and each, touched and awakened by hie of its own

(1) There is the _Ethical_ ood-ordering of this life; judging all things by their tendency to this end; and is beyond it There is nothing low or unworthy in the attachment which keeps this spirit close to the present world, and watchful for its affairs It is not a selfish feeling, but often one intensely social and humane; not any mean fascination with ht, and an assertion of the sacred authority of human duties and affections A man thus tempered deals chiefly with this visible life and his comrades in it, because, as nearest to him, they are the better known

He plants his standard on the present, as on a vantage-ground, where he can survey his field, and ht Whatever his bearing towards fervors beyond his range, he has no insensibility to the claied province, and that appeal to him in the native speech of his huood faith, as to _expect theht, and hear of their violation with a flush of scorn His word is a rock, and he expects that yours will not be a quicksand If you are lax, you cannot hope for his trust; but if you are in trouble, you easily h the sufferer be no ornahtly, and disreputable, suffices perhaps to set hirace from the records of mankind

Such ravity; and whoever would coht it thus far on its way, or trace its sweep into a brighter future, must take account of their steady ht and taste on the _religion_ of its possessor is not difficult to trace It _ion altogether; its basis being siined as coher relations But, practically, this is an exceptional case A deep and reverential sense of Moral Authority passes irresistibly into Faith in a Moral Governor; and Conscience, as it rises, culion, the hearty reception of the revealed Gospel is so congenial a sequel, that Christianity has enlisted its chief body-guard--its band of Immortals--froive to the faith, they are true to the close to the hulorify this, not apt to dwell upon the Divine The second table of commandment has ion presents itself to their mind under the idea of _Law_ God in Christ teaches us his Will; publishes the punish us in it by the perfect exa us under failure by the offer of pardon on repentance Now this is a true Gospel; not a proposition of it can be gainsaid; and whoever from his heart can repeat this creed;--God is holy; uilt, secure of retribution; and Christ, our pattern for both lives,--is not far frodom of Heaven, and has a faith as much beyond the practice, as it is short of the professions, of the great mass of Christians If he has an equable, rational, and balanced nature; if he can depend on himself, and reduce his will to the discipline of rules; if he have affections teh to follow reason instead of lead it, and to love God by sense of fitness and word of co in hiood for the sake of everlasting happiness”; if no wing ever beats in his soul that takes hiuidance for the problerounds of trust,--and a path traced through every Gethsemane and Calvary of this world, to the saintly peace of another

But while this is a _true Gospel_, is it the _whole_ Gospel? Not so; unless the voice of the Saviour is to reach only a part of our humanity, and in response draw but a ”little flock” For notclay Who can deny that there abound,--and areatest names of Christian history,--

(2) _Passionate_ natures, that cannot thus work out _their own salvation_, but ever pray to be taken whither of theo? It is not that they are necessarily weak of will, deficient in self-control, and unequal to the huh all these, and yet can find no peace Duty, as men measure it, may be satisfied; but still the face of God does not lift up its light For want of that answering look, it is all as the tillage of the black desert; digging by night without a heaven above, and sowing in sands which no dew shall fertilize Intense and effectuating resolve was certainly not wanting in Luther; what his young conscience i devotion, humble charities; yet the shadow of death brooded around his irreproachable obedience Is it not that the saht by a fall of the will, arises in these e of God's _Holiness_, drawn to it, yet fluttering helplessly at immeasurable depths below it, they strain after an obedience they cannot reach, and never lose the sense of infinite failure Measured by their ai Did the law of Christ require nothing but works which the hand could do, its conditions would be finite, and h the affections of the soul; and who can _make himself love_ where he is cold? who set hiuilty intruders outside the door of his nature? Impossible! the inner life, which is the special seat of our divine concerns, evades our laboring prudence, and tortures conscience without obeying it How then do these sufferers find their e to which Christ is not given as the Teacher of Law, but set up as the personal object of pure Trust and Love God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, to entleness, to elevate the Human into holiness, and sho there is one moral perfection for both; surrendered him to humiliation and self-sacrifice; placed him in heaven; and offered to accept pure _faith and love towards hi term for the human soul,--as the substitute for an unattainable ideal of obedience Here then is the salvation of these passionate natures This simple trust, this intense affection, is precisely what they have to give They cannot direct themselves; but only fix their love, and you may lead them as a child Self-discipline is impossible; self-escape triu winds of their nature with iron bands of law, and you do but stir the sleeping storms Set in the heavens without an orb of divine attraction,--a new star in the East,--and you carry their whole ate their faith; and for the first time they will prevail over their work Let there be an appeal of Grace to their enthusiasm,--a whispered word, ”_Lovest thou me?_”--and the very burden that was too heavy to be borne loses all its weight; and the drudging mill of habit, that sees and joy There are men who so need to be thus carried out of themselves, that without it their nature runs to waste, or burns aith self-consu fires They are like one who, in a dream, should set himself to climb a far-off mountain-top; if he tries to run, he cannot even creep, and only wakes himself to find that he lies still on the bed of nature But if the thought of hispower--chariot of fire and horses of fire--lifts hih the clear space, till, without effort, his feet stand upon the visionary hills

Here then, again,--in this doctrine of Faith,--we have a true Gospel, speaking to many hearts impenetrable by the doctrine of Works But have we even yet the _whole_ Gospel? Has the Good Shepherd, in these tords, made his voice known to all that are his? Or are there other sheep still to be gathered that are not of these folds? I believe _there are_ For thus far we have looked only at the _moral_ side of Christian doctrine,--at its different answers to the problem of Sin,--at the conditions of ulti deep unworthiness Whether you say, Patiently obey, and you shall grow into perfection of faith and love; or, Fling yourself on faith and love, and you will find grace for patient obedience;--in either case you are prescribing terms of salvation; you have the _future life_ specially in mind, and are anxious to make ready the soul _there_ to meet her God But there are persons who cannot fix any particular solicitude upon that crisis, as if all before were probation, and all after were judght of a present God;--who cannot dramatically divide existence into a two-act piece, first Time, then Eternity, and wait for the Infinite Presence, till the curtain rises between the that, as Time is in Eternity, so is Man already shut up in God This is the indigenous sentiment of another natural type of mind, which may be called,--

(3) The _Spiritual_ God is a Spirit; man has a spirit; both, _Now_; both, _Here_; and shall they never e of looks? shall nothing break the seal of eternal silence? is there really love between thenition dumb? Why tell us of God's Omniscience, if it only sleeps around us like dead space, or at , like a sentinel of the universe, not free to stir? Who could ever pray to this riefs to rest on a Pity so secret and reserved? Surely if He is a Living Mind, he not ain in a Divine Future, but h the immediate hours, and awakens a thousand sanctities to-day

Urged by such questionings as these, men of meditative piety have thirsted for conscious communion with the All-holy;--co line of light from eye to eye; a quiet ith God, where all the dust of life turns, at his approach, into the greenwaters They have retired _within_ to meet him; have believed that all is not ours that it is ours to feel; that there is Grace of hisin, across the constant warp of our personality, flying tints of deeper beauty, and hints of a pattern reed, that, in order to reach this Holy Spirit, and through its vivifying touch be born again, the one thing needful is a stripping off of self, an abandonment of personal desire and will, a return to si to the whispers spontaneous fro up of self; all return to holiness and peace a sinking down fro, possesses nothing, that relaxes every rigid strain, and is pliant to go whither the highest Will oes astray in her quest of divine things; wandering away in flights of laboring Reason to find her God; panting with over-plied resolve to do her work; sche her individuals into a Church Reverse all this, and fall back on the centre of the Spirit, instead of pressing out in all radii of your own Let Intellect droop her a, and come home; there, in the inmost room of conscience, God seeks you all the while Lash your wearied strength noreadiness hitherward or thitherward, and you shall be taken through your ith a sevenfold strength that has no effort in it Leave yourself awhile in utter solitude, shut out all thoughts of other h it be the thinnest film, between your soul and God; and in this absolute loneliness, the germ of a holy society will of itself appear, a teentle, suffuses itself through the whole irt for any errand of service that love may find So then, if there were twenty or a thousand in this case, their wills would flow together of their own accord, and find themselves in brotherhood without a plan at all

So speaks this doctrine of the Spirit It ic for God, who in Christ was the Word, is in us the Coether a false Gospel It rescues the conception of direct communion between the human spirit and the Divine,--a conception essential to the Christian life,--which an Ethical Gospel does not adequately secure: for communion must be between like and like, while obedience may be from slave to lord, nay, in so to take the scales from our eyes that hide from us the sanctities of our _immediate_ life; to abolish the postponement of eternity; and, wayfarers as we are, make us feel, as we rise from our stony pillow and pass on, that here is the abode of God, and here does the angel-ladder touch the ground! Yet this too is not the _whole_ Gospel It absorbs too much in God It scarcely saves human personality and responsibility It does no justice to nature, which it regards as the negative of God It melts away Law in Love, and hides the rocky structure of this moral world in a sunny haze that confuses earth and air

What, then, shall we say of these three types of Christian faith? Do you doubt their reality? It is demonstrated within the century which we close this day For while our forefathers were dedicating this house of prayer to the first, the Gospel of Christian Duty, Wesley had already become the prophet of the last,--the new birth of the Spirit; and erelong Evangelicism started up, and proclaimed the second,--the Salvation by Faith Do you doubt their durability and perhteen centuries' experience, for the New Testaroup of sacred books themselves, do they all lie; the Jewish Gospels represent the first; the Gentile Apostle's letters, the second; the writings of the beloved disciple, the third Matthew, as every reader must remark, is for the Law; Paul, for Faith; and John, for the Spirit And, in every age, the great mass of Christian tendencies break themselves into these three forian, Augustinian, and Mystic; Jesuit, Jansenist, and Quietist; Arminian, Lutheran, and Quaker; all proclaim the perseverance of the sahts upon the various heart of man

Is Christ then divided? Is he not equal to the _whole_ of our humanity? Rather let us say, that we are small and weak for the measure of his heavenly wisdom Doubtless, if we take e can hold, and put it to faithful application, we have grace enough for every personal exigency But there is, surely, an evil inseparable froion, which only satisfy the is of the mind, and leave parts of our nature--asleep perhaps at the rowths_ run out their resources and exhaust theenerations At first, they answer to soenial e that ends their wanderings But the sentiht into a contented state, ceases to be iives opportunity for other feelings to vindicate their existence

When the wound is bound up and has lost its srow up other than the fathers, perhaps quite as li into just the vacant places of an earlier age Meanwhile, the iinal basis has provoked reactions equally of narrow scope,--equally incapable of per the capacities of the Christian ht be still worked on as they thin away, that the sects should degenerate into poor theological egotisms, and wear themselves insensibly out It cannot be denied that all the three religious movements of the last century--represented by Taylor, by Wesley, by Cowper--exhibit the syain the part they have played before

Yet every one of their Gospels is _true at heart_; and the tree that holds that pith is a tree of life, which the Eternal husbandman hath planted; and if he prune it, it is only that it may bear more fruit

The weakness of these faiths is in their isolation; and if their sap could but le, if no element were lost which they can draw fro frondescent life would show itself again

Those who think that the future can only repeat the past, will deeh least of all should it appear so to _us_ who profess ourselves ”_Christians and only Christians_,” pledged to nothing but to lie open to all God's truth For e a joyful hope that the next century of Christendoreat Faiths which have struggled separately into the light of the one, will flow together on the broader and less broken surface of the other If, however, this is to be, it will arise from no mere _intellectual_ scrutiny, whose function will ever be to _distinguish_, and not to _unite_, and, in proportion as it doency When the problem of Christendom is, to deliver the individualsocial power, then it is seasonable to insist on the principle of free inquiry; because then you have a dead e its way

But when you have won this victory, and when individualism ceases to be devout and tends to party self-will, the hour comes to proclaim the converse lesson, and break up the vain reliance on ht Depend upon it, Unity lies in profounder strata of our nature than any tillage of the mere intellect can reach Sink deeply into the inround of _all_ Did we do nothing with our religion except live by it; did we forget the presence of doubt and contradiction; did it cease to be a creed about God and becoe self-assertion before men for self-surrender to him;--we should find ourselves side by side with unexpected friends, should be astonished at our petulant divisions, and replace the poor charity of mutual forbearance by the free consciousness of inward sympathy For _us_ especially, who feel the temptations of an exceptional position, is it the pri in the divine sanctities that hold us, in that which we have _not_ been obliged to throay; elsefrom the root of the vine, but a dead residuuinal_, all the more must it be _actual_, and the deeper should its shadow lie upon the Conscience, and touch us with theman with God, there is no _vicarious_ sacrifice possible, so much the more remains over for _self-sacrifice_, as the only path of communion and peace If you will have it that Christ is only _human_, so much the more Divine is your humanity to be; you cannot assu that its essence lies, and its glory is found, not in the natural man, but in the spiritual man; and by this very confession, you renounce the low aims of the worldly mind, and take on yourself the vows of the saintly Let believers only be true to the grace they have, and ated sanctuary of the Christian life, they will tend ever inwards to the same centre, anda reverent eye fixed on the person and spirit of Christ, they cannot but find their partial apprehensions corrected and enlarged; for his divine ie is complete in its revelation, and rebukes every narrower Gospel Moral perfectness, divine couishable eleust and holy presence, our divisions sink abashed, and hear, as of old, the word of recall, ”Ye know not what spirit ye are of” Or if, through our infir in theourselves and are perplexed and sad, do not suffice to open our eyes and make us less slow of heart to one another and to hiher world, whither our forerunners are gone, his living look will perfect the couests of his bounty will find that, though at separate tables, they have all been fed by the same bread of life, and touched their lips with the same wine of remembrance: there, the voices of the wise, often discordant here,--of Taylor and Wesley, of Enfield and Cowper, of Heber and Channing,--will blend in hare will not be the least in that hteen centuries, and, converging to their is the solemn strain, ”Great and hty! Just and true are all thy ways, thou King of Saints!”

ST PAUL AND HIS MODERN STUDENTS

_The Life and Epistles of St Paul_ By the Rev W J CONYBEARE, MA, late Fellow of Trinity College, Cae; and the Rev J

S HOWSON, MA, Principal of the Collegiate Institution, Liverpool 2 vols 4to Longmans 1852

_The Epistles of St Paul to the Corinthians: with Critical Notes and Dissertations_ By ARTHUR PENRHYN STANLEY, MA, Canon of Canterbury, late Fellow and Tutor of University College, Oxford, &c 2 vols 8vo Murray 1855

_The Epistles of St Paul to the Thessalonians, Galatians, Romans: with Critical Notes and Dissertations_ By BENJAMIN JOWETT, MA, Fellow and Tutor of Balliol College, Oxford 2 vols 8vo Murray