Chapter I. Introduction.

There is an obvious crisis approaching, in the religious world, on questions of the highest moment. In past time such periods of change have been preceded by a slow and silent preparation, in which multitudes have been led into the same course of thought and feeling. Then, as the crisis approached, some efficient leader lifted the last stone which sustained the protecting dyke, and rode on the summit of the in-rushing tide to notoriety and influence. Thus it was in the day of Luther, in the day of Wesley, and at other periods of religious movement.

At the present time there are indications of a great impending change, which has been preceded by a long course of unobserved preparation. But it is believed that, in this case, it is not to be exhibited, like former ones, by leaders forming new sects and parties, amid more or less of conflict and commotion, but by the agency of the people, and by a healthful, quiet process, which, like leaven, shall gradually assimilate surrounding particles till the whole be leavened.

The matter involved is the great question of questions, to each individual for himself, and to every [pg 002] parent and educator for their children: “What must we do to be saved?”

It is the object of this volume to show that the answer to this great question has, for ages, been involved in mystery and difficulty by means of a philosophical theory to account for the “origin of evil,” which, in the fifth century, was forced on the people by popes and ecclesiastical councils, and which has been sustained by persecution ever since—that this theory is the basis of a system of religious doctrine incorporated into creeds and churches, which is so contrary to the moral sense of humanity, that theologians have failed to render it consistent and satisfactory, even to themselves—that the people are endowed with principles of common sense by which they can educe from the works of God a system of natural religion far superior, which system is briefly set forth, and also the tendencies of the two opposing systems—that both systems are so incorporated into church creeds, and into theological teachings, that they are a compound of contradictions, and all the great religious controversies have been efforts to eviscerate the false system from the true, while through the long conflict, it is theologians who have proved the noble confessors and martyrs for truth—that it is impossible to establish the claims of the Bible, or of any other writings, as revelations from the Creator, when the Augustinian theory is made a part of their teachings; so that the real question for the people, is “Bible or no Bible”—that the leading theological teachers of the chief sects in this country have virtually conceded that this theory is sustained neither by common sense nor the Bible; and, finally, that the people are about [pg 003] to cast off this dogma, which for ages has darkened the way to eternal life, and by applying the principles of common sense to the Bible, thus establish its agreement with the system of natural religion herein set forth.

In conclusion, the indications of the predicted change are set forth as they are manifested in the present position of theologians—of the parochial clergy—of the church—of educational interests—of women—of “Young America”—and of the religious and secular press.

Chapter II. The Augustine Theory of the Origin of Evil.

The theory in question was introduced into the Christian church, as an article of faith, in the fifth century, chiefly by the influence of Augustine, an African bishop.

To understand how it was brought about, it is needful to bear in mind the distinction between facts and the philosophical theories that explain the how and the why of these facts.

Christ and his Apostles taught the fact that all men are sinners, and the way to escape from sin and its penalties. As, at first, Christianity prevailed chiefly among the uneducated, it was not till some three or four hundred years after Christ, that the philosophy of these facts agitated the churches. Augustine was a man of powerful mind and great learning, and with [pg 004] other philosophers, speculated as to “the origin of evil,” or the why and the how all men came to be sinners.

By the aid of a few misinterpreted passages in the Bible, the following theory was introduced and mainly by Augustine.

Chapter III. Questions Connected with the Augustinian Theory.

In discussing the topics of this chapter it is needful to refer to certain religious sects and parties of this country in their relations to the subject.

The first class may be denominated the old school Calvinists, embracing the Old School Presbyterian churches, the Reformed Dutch and most of the Baptist denominations.

Their views are ably presented by the theologians of Princeton and their quarterly, and by the Baptist theologians of the Newton Theological Seminary and the Baptist periodicals.

The second class may be called the new school Calvinists, embracing Congregational and New School Presbyterian churches. These are ably represented in New England by the Andover and New Haven Theological Seminaries and their respective quarterlies; and out of New England, by the Theological Seminaries of Union and Lane, and their quarterly at Philadelphia.

The third class are the Arminian sects, including the Methodists and Episcopalians, whose views are ably presented in their quarterlies and other periodicals in New York and Philadelphia.

Chapter IV. The Difficulties Involved in the Augustinian Theory.

The difficulties involved in the Augustinian theory of “the origin of evil,” result from these facts. Our only idea of a benevolent being is that wherever he has the power to produce either happiness or misery, [pg 012] he prefers to make happiness. Our only idea of a malevolent being is that wherever he has this power he prefers to make misery.

Consequently, the affirmation that all the sin and misery of man is the result of a depraved nature which the Creator has power both to prevent and to remove, conveys no other idea than that God prefers to make misery when he has power to make happiness, and thus is a malevolent being.

If God would make all minds perfectly holy, as theologians claim he has power to do, all sin would cease. He chooses not to do so, but rather to perpetuate the depraved nature transmitted from Adam, which is “the origin of all evil.”

Now all classes of theologians who hold to the depravity of man's nature consequent on Adam's sin, agree that this is the cause or origin of all sin and its consequent suffering.

They all agree, also, that God has proved his power to make a perfectly holy nature in the case of angels and of Adam, and that in consequence of the first sin of Adam, every human mind begins to exist with a depraved nature, according to a constitution of things instituted by God.

They all agree that God can regenerate every human mind, and that this boon is withheld, not for want of power, but for want of will on the part of God.

The difficulty that they have to meet is this—How can the Creator, having done thus, be regarded as any other than a malevolent being, the malignant and hateful “author of sin,” and all its consequent sufferings?

The following exhibits the several modes of attempting to meet this question.

Chapter V. The Augustinian Theory in Creeds.

The preceding chapters have presented the Augustinian theory of “the origin of evil,” and certain questions connected with it which have been debated by theologians; also the difficulties involved in the theory, and the modes of meeting these difficulties.

The next aim will be to verify these statements by extracts from the creeds and theologians of the great Christian sects.

Chapter VI. Modes of Meeting Difficulties by Theologians.

Having presented the Augustinian theory, as it is set forth in both Catholic and Protestant creeds, the next object will be to verify the statements of the preceding chapters as to the modes of meeting difficulties adopted by theologians.

The first extract will show that Augustine taught that all men had a common nature in Adam, so that his choosing to eat the forbidden fruit was the act of each and all human minds which were existing in or with him at that time. And thus that it was man and not God that caused our depravity of nature.

The extract introduced to verify the above was written to St. Jerome, who taught that all minds commenced their first existence at or near the birth of each. This Augustine denied, and the passage shows not only that he taught a common nature which was ruined in Adam, but also that all unbaptized infants go to endless punishment for the sin thus committed in Adam ages before they were born.

Chapter VII. Theologians Themselves Concede the Augustinian Dogmas Indefensible.

Although each theologian claims that the mode of meeting difficulties adopted by his school is satisfactory, yet as each maintains that all other modes are unavailing, it comes to pass that a majority of theologians declare each attempt to make the Augustinian dogma consistent with the moral sense of humanity an utter failure.

It has been shown that the Catholic mode is not to attempt to defend the dogma. It is “decreed” by [pg 031] “the church,” which is the only infallible interpreter of God's Word, to be in the Bible, and it is to be received, like the doctrine of transubstantiation, as an inscrutable mystery. This is the mode also adopted by Dr. Woods and many other Protestants.

The following from the Princeton theologians presents their protest against this Catholic method. They perceive that if they allow it in this case, they have no excuse for denying the validity of the Catholic defense of transubstantiation. And so they proceed to claim that imputing to children sins that they never committed, and thus involving them in endless misery, is the true mode, while the Catholic one is vain.

Chapter VIII. The Augustinian Theory Contrary to the Moral Sense of Mankind.

Having presented evidence that both Catholics and Protestants of Europe and America unite in holding the Augustinian theory of the origin of evil, and also that theologians themselves find it indefensible, the next aim will be to present a portion of the evidence to show that this system is at war with the moral feelings and common sense of mankind.

There are remains of the writings of those who were the opposers of this theory in the time of Augustine, which show the strong emotions called forth at that remote period by the introduction of this doctrine.

The following is from one of the theologians of that day, addressed to the author of the theory:

Chapter IX. The Principles of Common Sense Defined.

The preceding extracts exhibit a portion of the evidence to prove that the Augustinian system is contrary [pg 042] to the moral sense of mankind, and that theologians have failed, by their own concessions, to render it consistent and satisfactory even to themselves.

The next attempt will be to show that the people are endowed with principles of common sense, by the aid of which they can educe from the works of the Creator, independently of any revealed Word, a system of religion far superior to the one based on the Augustinian theory.

Our first aim will be to designate what is intended by “the principles of common sense.”

It is claimed, then, that there are certain truths, the belief of which exists in every rational human mind. This belief, in some cases, as all must allow, results from the constitution of mind given by the Creator, and not from any instruction or knowledge gained by other modes. Of this class is the belief of every mind in its own existence, and also the belief in the existence of other things beside ourselves.

There are other truths universally believed by every rational mind, where there may be room for question as to whether this belief is acquired or the result of constitutional organization. But this question is waived, as of little practical consequence for the present purpose of this work.

The fact on which the name and classification of these truths rests is, that the belief in them is common to all rational minds, and is regarded as so indispensable to true rationality, that whenever any person shows by words and actions that a belief in any one of these truths does not exist, he is regarded as deranged, that is to say, his reason is said to be more or less destroyed.

This, therefore, is the test by which we are to distinguish these principles of common sense from all other knowledge. They are truths which are believed by all rational persons, so that the disbelief of any one of them, evinced in words and actions, is universally regarded as proof of a deranged mind. In such cases, a man, in common parlance, would be said to have “lost his mind,” or to have “lost his reason;” inasmuch as he is lacking in some of those peculiar features which constitute man a rational being.

In this work the question is also waived as to the number of truths which are to be included in this class. In regard to certain of them there can be no dispute. Of those involving any discussion, there probably will be no occasion to speak in this work. The writer does not claim that the common people, or that metaphysicians, when they speak of “common sense,” always refer to what is here designated by this term.

All that the writer claims is that there are certain truths, the belief of which is common to all minds, either as the result of constitutional organization or of acquired knowledge; and that these can be classified by this test, viz., that men universally talk and act as if they believed them, and when they cease to do so, are regarded as more or less insane.

Moreover, it is claimed that it is proper to call them principles of common sense, because they are that kind of sense which is common to the whole race, and also they are often referred to, both by metaphysicians and by the common people, by this term.

In the following chapters it will be shown that by the application of these principles, a system of natural religion can be gained from the works of the Creator [pg 044] by the same methods that men employ in all the ordinary concerns of life, and that thus we are as fully qualified to gain religious knowledge and peace as we are to secure temporal comfort and prosperity.

Chapter X. Common Sense Applied to Gain the Existence of God.

Having explained what is intended by the principles of common sense, the next attempt will be to apply certain of these principles to gain a system of natural religion; meaning by this term that religion which may be gained from the works of the Creator independently of any revealed Word.

In all systems of religion the first article relates to the existence and character of the Deity to be worshiped and obeyed. The first principle of common sense to guide us in this inquiry is this:

Chapter XI. The People's Mental Philosophy.

In the preceding chapter we have applied the principles of common sense to gain evidence of the existence of a Creator, or Great First Cause, whose natural attributes we can discover only by the nature of our own minds.

This being so, our next step in seeking after God is to examine the construction or nature of our own minds.

The only way to discover the nature of a thing is to examine what are its qualities, how it acts, and how it is acted upon. This also is the same as studying the philosophy of things. For when learned men set forth any branch of philosophy, they only teach the qualities of certain things, how they act, and how they are acted upon.

Whoever, therefore, gives attention to the nature of mind so as to discover its qualities, how it acts, and how it is acted upon, is studying the philosophy of mind, or mental philosophy.

The nature of mind, the philosophy of mind, and mental philosophy are terms all expressing the same thing.

Now, the only possible way in which any person can discover the nature of another mind is by a knowledge of his own. We first learn by experience the qualities of our own mind, how it acts and how it is acted upon, and then, by a process of reasoning, we learn that there are other minds around us, and that they have similar qualities.

The study of mental philosophy, then, is directing attention to the nature of our own mind, and thus discovering the nature of other minds.

It differs from all other studies in this respect, that all men have the materials of the knowledge sought in their own minds, and are required simply to direct attention to their own mental states and acts.

This being so, the common people are as fully qualified to settle all questions in regard to the nature or philosophy of their own minds as the most learned and profound metaphysicians or theologians can be. All that is requisite to success is, that they direct their attention to the subject by suitable methods.

It will be found, on examination, that the common people have secured a written system of mental philosophy as real as has ever yet been furnished by any metaphysician or theologian, while it is free from the great defects which render many works on mental science unpractical and repulsive.

This—the people's system of mental philosophy—it will be the object of what follows to set forth.

In attempting it, we shall find that mankind, in the uses of every-day life, have arranged the various acts and states of mind into classes and subdivisions, and have given names to these classes, and to the specific acts or states included in these classes. These classifications and terms are recorded by lexicographers in their dictionaries.

All words have that meaning which is attached to them by the people who use them. The business of the lexicographer is, not to settle what meaning ought to belong to words, but rather to state the meaning which men actually attach to them in writing and speaking.

In setting forth the people's system of natural philosophy as contained in lexicographies, we find that almost every word is used to express several meanings, similar in some respects and diverse in others. In consequence of this, we only can attempt thus much for mental science, as for many other subjects, viz., to describe the thing intended, and then to select the word most frequently used to express this idea, as set forth in our dictionaries.

This, then, is the course pursued in the following pages. A description is set forth of a given act or state of mind, sufficient to identify it from all others, and then the word is selected from dictionaries of our language which has most frequently been used by the common people in expressing the idea intended. Thus every person who cares enough about the matter to read and think, can decide as well as the most celebrated metaphysician, whether the description given is [pg 053] true to his own experience, and also whether, according to lexicographers, the word selected is frequently used by man to express this idea.

The writer, in her first attempts to investigate the philosophy of mind, examined the works of Stewart, Reid, Locke, Edwards, Brown, Coleridge, Cousin, Jouffroy, Coombe, Spurtzheim and several others. More recently some attention has been given to the writings of Sir William Hamilton, Hickok and others. The result has been the conviction, that most of these works contain the people's system, more or less disguised with diverse modes of classification and new technics, which tend to render the whole subject misty and perplexing. And still more unfortunately, some of them attempt the discussion of questions which are unpractical and often unintelligible.

As an example, certain metaphysicians have attempted to prove that there is nothing existing but mind, and that all which we believe to be realities without ourselves are not so, but merely ideas in the mind.

Other metaphysicians have attempted to meet their arguments, and to prove that the world around us is a reality.

Both attempts have ended in books which seem to have no sort of practical influence either way. Men can not help believing that there is an outer world, and that the men and things that affect our senses are realities, and such arguments neither lessen nor increase this belief.

Meantime, the books written to prove or disprove this truth are incomprehensible to most common minds, at least the writer of this work has in vain essayed to [pg 054] understand them, or to find any person who could communicate any clear ideas of their contents.

Chapter XII. The Nature of Mind, or Its Powers and Faculties.

We have seen, in the preceding chapters, that our only mode of gaining a knowledge of the natural attributes of God, is by the study of the nature of mind. We have seen also that the only way to discover the nature of mind is to examine what are its qualities, and how it acts and is acted upon in our own experience.

When we discover what our minds actually do, we find out what they have power to do. The faculties of mind are its powers of acting as they are exhibited in our own experience.

The following presents a brief outline of the powers and faculties of mind as they have been classified and named by the people.

Ideas is the word most frequently used to include all the operations and states of mind.

Our ideas are often referred to as divided into two classes, viz., ideas gained by the senses, and ideas that pass through the mind without the aid of the senses.

Chapter XIII. Nature of Mind.—Regulation of the Thoughts.

A system of natural religion includes not only the existence and natural attributes of the Creator, but his moral character and the duties owed to Him, to our fellow-beings and to ourselves.

To discover these by the principles of common sense, unaided by revelation, we must again turn to our own minds as our only directory. This demands a more enlarged consideration of many of the specific powers and operations of mind, as developed by experience and observation.

Chapter XIV. Nature of Mind.—The Moral Sense, or Moral Susceptibilities.

Those susceptibilities of pleasure and pain which are affected by the conduct of ourselves or others, in reference to rules of right and wrong, are called the moral sense, or the moral susceptibilities.

In order to a more clear view of this part of the subject, it is important to inquire as to the manner in which the ideas of right and wrong seem to originate.

The young child first notices that certain actions of its own are regarded with smiles and tones of love and approval, while other acts occasion frowns and tones of displeasure.

Next, it perceives that whatever gives pleasure to itself is called good and right, while whatever causes unpleasant feelings is called bad and wrong. Moreover, it notices that there is a right and wrong way to hold its spoon, to use its playthings, to put on its clothes, and to do multitudes of other things. It thus perceives, more and more, that there are rules to regulate [pg 065] the use and action of all things, both animate and inanimate, and that such rules always have reference to some plan or design.

As its faculties develop and its observation enlarges, the general impression is secured that all plans and contrivances of men are designed to promote enjoyment or to prevent discomfort, and are called good and right just so far as this is done. At the same time, all that tend to discomfort or pain are called bad and wrong.

In all the works of nature around, too, every thing that promotes enjoyment is called good and right, and the opposite is called evil and wrong.

At last there is a resulting feeling that the great design of all things is to secure good and prevent evil, and that whatever is opposed to this is wrong, and unfitted to the object for which all things exist. The question whether this impression is owing solely to observation or partly to mental constitution is waived, as of little practical consequence.

In the experience of infancy and childhood, the law of sacrifice is speedily developed. It is perceived that much of the good to be gained, if sought to excess, occasions pain, so that there must be a certain amount of self-denial practiced, which, to the young novice, sometimes involves disappointment and discomfort. It is also seen that frequently two or more enjoyments are offered which are incompatible, so that one must be relinquished to gain the other. It is perceived, also, that there is a constant calculation going on as to which will be the best—that is, which will secure the most good with the least evil. And the child is constantly instructed that it must avoid excess, and must give up what is of [pg 066] less value to secure the greater good. All this training involves sacrifices which are more or less painful, so that a young child will sometimes cry as it voluntarily gives up one kind of pleasure as the only mode of securing what is best.

It is perceived, also, that there is a constant balancing of good and evil, so that a given amount of enjoyment cancels or repays for a certain amount of evil. When a great amount of enjoyment is purchased by a small degree of labor or trouble, the compound result is deemed a good, and called right; on the contrary, when the evil involved exceeds a given amount in comparison to the good, the compound result is called evil and wrong.

Thus is generated the impression that there is a law of sacrifice instituted requiring the greatest possible good with the least possible evil, and that this is the great design of all things.

The impression is, not merely that we are to seek enjoyment and avoid pain, but that we are to seek the greatest possible good with the least possible evil, and that in doing this we are to obey the law of sacrifice, by which the greatest good is to be bought by a certain amount of evil voluntarily assumed.

Moreover, the child is thus gradually trained to understand that good and evil are to be regarded in two relations. Any thing and every thing is called good when it in any way gives enjoyment to any being.

But if the good can be secured only by sacrificing a greater good or by inflicting a greater evil, then, in this relation, the good is called evil and wrong. Thus, in one relation eating a delicious fruit is a good, because it gives enjoyment. But if such is the state of [pg 067] a child's stomach, that sickness and suffering will follow the act, then it is evil and wrong.

The early training of infancy introduces the first part of the great law of sacrifice in regard to self alone. But as the intellect develops, the existence of other minds is learned, and their happiness or suffering become subjects of attention. Here the calculations of the balance of good and evil become more and more complicated. And the two relations also become more definite and extensive. Whatever gives pleasure is always called good and right, until some evil is discovered as connected with it, not alone or chiefly to self, but to others also. Then the compound result is sought for, and if it is seen that, on the whole, what by itself would be good and right if dissevered from its connected evil, does involve more evil than good, then it is called evil and wrong. But if the balance shows so great an amount of good as pays for certain incidental evils, then the result is called good and right.

The child also very early learns that the character of those around is estimated by their reference to this mode of regarding good and evil, right and wrong. If a child simply seeks good to itself without any regard to the amount of evil involved as a consequence, he is called a bad child. On the contrary, those who make sacrifice of their wishes and plans to avoid what would bring evil on others, are called good, generous, lovely and virtuous. The youngest child soon perceives that its mother and other friends are constantly making sacrifices for its own good, and bearing inconveniences and trouble for the good of those around. And those who perform such acts of [pg 068] benevolent self-sacrifice are praised, and their conduct is called good and right.

Thus arises a conviction or belief that the design or end for which every thing exists is to make the most happiness possible, and that those who conform to this design are acting right, while those who do not are acting wrong. Eventually there is established this conviction, also, that the voluntary sacrifice of self-enjoyment to promote the best good of all, is the highest kind of right action, and that those who practice this the most are the best in character.

The first feature of our moral sense, then, is, that impression of the great design of all things which enables us to judge of the right and wrong in voluntary action. This also may be placed as one of the principles of common sense. God has so formed our minds and their circumstances, that the result is a universal belief in every rational mind that whatever secures the most happiness with the least evil is right, and whatever does not is wrong. The wanton and needless destruction of happiness also men believe to be wrong. Their only diversities of opinion are in regard to what will be best and what will not.

The second feature of our moral constitution is what is ordinarily called the sense of justice. It is that susceptibility which is excited at the view of the conduct of others as voluntary causes of good or evil.

In all cases where free agents act to promote happiness, an emotion of approval arises, together with a desire of reward to the author of the good. On the contrary, when there is a voluntary destruction of happiness, there is an emotion of disapproval, and a desire for retributive pain on the author of the wrong.

These emotions are instinctive, and not at all regulated by reason in their inception. When an evil is done, an instant desire is felt to discover the cause; and when it is found, an instant desire is felt to inflict some penalty. So irrational is this impulse, that children will exhibit anger and deal blows on inanimate objects that cause pain. Even mature minds are sometimes conscious of this impulse.

That this impulse is an implanted part of our constitution, and not the result of instruction, is seen in the delight manifested by young children in the narration of the nursery tale where the cruel uncle who murdered the Babes in the Wood receives the retributions of Heaven.

It is the office of the intellect to judge whether the deed was a voluntary one, whether the agent intended the mischief, and whether a penalty will be of any use. The impulse to punish is never preceded by any such calculations.

Another feature in this sense of justice is the proportion demanded between the evil done and the penalty inflicted. That this also is instinctive, and not the result of instruction, is seen in the nursery, where children will approve of slight penalties for slight offenses, and severe ones for great ones, but will revolt from any very great disproportion between the wrong act and its penalty. As a general rule, both in the nursery and in mature minds, the greater the wrong done, the stronger the desire for a penalty, and the more severe the punishment demanded.

Another very important point of consideration is the universal feeling of mankind that the natural penalties for wrong-doing are not sufficient, and that it is an act [pg 070] of love as well as of justice to add to these penalties. Thus the parent who forbids his child to eat green fruit will not trust to the results of the natural penalty, but will restrain by the fear of the immediate and more easily conceived penalty of chastisement.

So, in the great family of man, the natural penalties for theft are not deemed sufficient, but severe penalties for the protection of property are added.

This particular is the foundation of certain distinctions that are of great importance, which will now be pointed out.

We find the terms “reward and punishment” used in two different relations. In the first and widest sense they signify not only the penalties of human law, but those natural consequences which, by the constitution of nature, inevitably follow certain courses of conduct.

Thus an indolent man is said to receive poverty as a punishment, and it is in this sense that his children are said to be punished for the faults of their father.

The violations of natural law are punished without any reference to the question whether the evil-doer intended the wrong, or whether he sinned in ignorance, or whether this ignorance was involuntary and unavoidable. The question of the justice or injustice of such natural penalties involves the great question of the right and wrong of the system of the universe. Is it just and right for the Creator to make a system in which all free agents shall be thus led to obedience to its laws by penalties as well as rewards, by fear as well as by hope? This question will not be discussed here.

Most discussions as to just rewards and penalties ordinarily relate to the added penalties by which parents, [pg 071] teachers and magistrates enforce obedience to natural or to statute law.

In these questions reference is always had to the probable results of such rewards and penalties in securing obedience. If experience has shown that certain penalties do secure obedience to wise and good laws, either of nature or of human enactment, then they are considered just. If they do not, they are counted unwise and unjust.

So, if certain penalties are needlessly severe—that is to say, if a less penalty will secure equal obedience, then this also decides so severe a penalty to be unjust.

In deciding on the rectitude of the penalties of human enactments, it is always assumed to be unjust to punish for any lack of knowledge and obedience when the subject had no power to know and to obey. If a choice to obey will not secure the act required of a free agent, then a penalty inflicted for disobedience is always regarded as unjust. The only seeming exception to this is the case where a person, by voluntary means, has deprived himself of ability to obey. But in such cases the punishment is felt to be right, not because he does not obey when he has no power, but because he has voluntarily deprived himself of this power. And he is punished for destroying his ability to obey, and not for violating the law.

These things in human laws, then, are always demanded to make a penalty appear just to the moral sense of mankind, namely, that the subject have power to obey, and that he has opportunity to know the law, and is not ignorant by any voluntary and improper neglect.

In all questions of justice, therefore, it is important [pg 072] to discriminate between those penalties that are inherent as a part of the great system of the universe, and for which the Creator alone is responsible, and those additional penalties which result from voluntary institutions of which men are the authors.

The next feature in our moral constitution is the susceptibility which is excited by the intellectual judgment of our own feelings and conduct as either right or wrong.

In case we decide them to be right, we experience an emotion of self-approval which is very delightful; but if we decide that they are wrong, we experience an immediate penalty in a painful emotion called remorse. This emotion is always proportioned to the amount of evil done, and the consciousness that it was done knowingly and intentionally. No suffering is more keen than the highest emotions of this kind, while their pangs are often enduring and unappeasable. Sometimes there is an attending desire to inflict retribution on one's self as a mode of alleviating this distress.

This susceptibility is usually denominated conscience. Sometimes this word is used to include both the intellectual judgment of our conduct as right or wrong, and the consequent emotions of approval or remorse; sometimes it refers to the susceptibility alone. Either use is correct, as in the connection in which it is employed the distinction can ordinarily be easily made.

This analysis of our moral constitution furnishes means for a clear definition of such terms as obligated, ought, ought not, and the like.

A person is obligated or ought to do a thing when he has the intellect to perceive what is best, and thus [pg 073] right, and the moral susceptibilities just described. When he is destitute either of the intellect or of these susceptibilities, he ceases to be a moral and accountable being. He can no longer be made to feel any moral obligations.

Chapter XV. The Nature of Mind.—The Will.

The power to choose exists in other animals as well as in man, so that it is not this faculty which distinguishes our race from the brutes. It is another part of our nature which elevates us above the lower animals, which will now be described.

Chapter XVI. Constitutional Varieties of the Human Mind.

In the preceding chapters have been presented the most important mental faculties which are common to the race. There are none of the powers and attributes of the mind as yet set forth which do not belong to every mind which is regarded as rational and complete.

But, though all the race have these in common, yet we can not but observe an almost endless variety of human character, resulting from the diverse proportions and combinations of these several faculties.

These constitutional differences may be noticed, first, in regard to the intellectual powers. Some minds are naturally predisposed to exercise the reasoning powers. Others, with precisely the same kind of culture, have little relish for this, and little power of appreciating an argument.

In other cases, the imagination seems to be the predominating faculty. In other minds there seems to be an equal balance of faculties, so that no particular power predominates.

Next we see the same variety in reference to the susceptibilities. In some minds, the desire for love and admiration is the predominating principle. In others, the love of power takes the lead. Some are eminently sympathizing. Others have a strong love of rectitude, or natural conscience. In some, the principle of justice predominates. In others, benevolence is the leading impulse.

Finally, in regard to the power of volition, as has been before indicated, there are some that possess a strong will that is decisive and effective in regulating all specific volitions, while others possess various and humbler measures of this power.

According to the science of Phrenology, some of these peculiarities of mind are indicated by the size and shape of different portions of the brain, and externally indicated on the skull.

That these differences are constitutional, and not the result of education, is clear from the many facts showing that no degree of care or training will serve to efface these distinctive traits of the mind. To a certain degree they may be modified by education, and the equal balance of the faculties be promoted, but never to such a degree as to efface very marked peculiarities.

In addition to the endless diversities that result from these varied proportions and combinations, there is a manifest variety in the grades of mind. Some races are much lower in the scale of being every way than others, while the same disparity exists in individuals of the same race.

The wisdom and benevolence of this arrangement is very manifest when viewed in reference to the interests of a commonwealth. Where some must lead and others follow, it is well that some have the love of power strong, and others have it less. Where some must be rulers, to inflict penalties as well as to apportion rewards, it is well that there be some who have the sense of justice as a leading principle. And so in the developments of intellect. Some men are to follow callings where the reasoning powers are most needed. Others are to adopt pursuits in which taste [pg 087] and imagination are chiefly required; and thus the varied proportions of these faculties become serviceable.

And if it be true that the exercise of the social and moral faculties secures the highest degree of enjoyment, those disparities in mental powers which give exercise to the virtues of compassion, self-denial, fortitude and benevolence in serving the weak, and the corresponding exercises of gratitude, reverence, humility and devotion in those who are thus benefited, then we can see the wisdom and benevolence of this gradation of mental capacity.

Moreover, in a commonwealth perfectly organized, where the happiness of the whole becomes that of each part, whatever tends to the highest general good tends to the best interest of each individual member. This being so, the lowest and humblest in the scale of being, in his appropriate place, is happier than he could be by any other arrangement, and happier than he could be if all were equally endowed.

This subject is very important, because some theologians present these disparities of mental organization as indications of the depravity consequent on Adam's sin.

Chapter XVII. Nature of Mind.—Habit.

This chapter is introduced because some theologians claim that the depravity of man consists either in a habit or in something like a habit.

Habit is a facility in performing physical or mental operations, gained by the repetition of such acts. As examples of this in physical operations may be mentioned the power of walking, which is acquired only by a multitude of experiments; the power of speech, secured by a slow process of repeated acts of imitation; and the power of writing, gained in the same way. Success in every pursuit of life is attained by oft-repeated attempts, which finally induce a habit.

As examples of the formation of intellectual habits, may be mentioned the facility gained in acquiring knowledge by means of repeated efforts, and the accuracy and speed with which the process of reasoning is performed after long practice in this art.

As examples of moral habits may be mentioned those which are formed by the oft-repeated exercise of self-government, justice, veracity, obedience, and industry. The will, as has been shown, gains a facility in controlling specific volitions and in yielding obedience to the laws of right action by constant use, as really as do all the other mental powers.

The happiness of man, in the present state of existence, depends not so much upon the circumstances in which he is placed, or the capacities with which he is endowed, as upon the formation of his habits. A man might have the organ of sight, and be surrounded with all the beauties of nature, and yet, if he did not form the habit of judging of the form, distance and size of bodies, most of the pleasure and use from this sense would be wanting. The world and all its beauties would be a mere confused mass of colors.

If the habits of walking and of speech were not acquired, these faculties and the circumstances for employing [pg 089] them would not furnish the enjoyment they were designed to secure.

It is also the formation of intellectual habits by mental discipline and study, which opens vast resources for enjoyment that otherwise would be for ever closed. And it is by practicing obedience to parents that moral habits of subordination are formed, which are indispensable to our happiness as citizens, and as subjects of government. There is no enjoyment which can be pointed out, which is not, to a greater or less extent, dependent upon this principle.

The influence of habit in regard to the law of sacrifice is especially interesting. The experience of multitudes of our race shows that such tastes and habits may be formed in obeying this law, that what was once difficult and painful becomes easy and pleasant.

But this ability to secure enjoyment through habits of self-control and self-denial, induced by long practice, so far as experience shows, could never be secured by any other method.

That the highest kinds of happiness are to be purchased by more or less voluntary sacrifice and suffering to procure good for others, seems to be a part of that nature of things which we at least may suppose has existed from eternity. We can conceive of the eternal First Cause only as we imagine a mind on the same pattern as our own in constitutional capacities, but indefinitely enlarged in extent and action. Knowledge, wisdom, power, justice, benevolence and rectitude, must be the same in the Creator as in ourselves, at least so far as we can conceive; and, as the practice of self-sacrifice and suffering for the good of others is our highest conception of virtue, it is impossible to regard [pg 090] the Eternal Mind as all-perfect without involving this idea.

The formation of the habits depends chiefly upon the leading desire or governing purpose, because whatever the mind desires the most it will act the most to secure, and thus by repeated acts will form its habits. The character of every individual, therefore, as before indicated, depends upon the mode of seeking happiness selected by the will. Thus the ambitious man has selected the attainment of power and admiration as his leading purpose, and whatever modes of enjoyment interfere with this are sacrificed. The sensual man seeks his happiness from the various gratifications of sense, and sacrifices other modes of enjoyment that interfere with this. The man devoted to intellectual pursuits, and to seeking reputation and influence through this medium, sacrifices other modes of enjoyment to secure this gratification. The man who has devoted his affections and the service of his life to God and the good of his fellow-men, sacrifices all other enjoyments to secure that which results from the fulfillment of such obligations. Thus a person is an ambitious man, a sensual man, a man of literary ambition, or a man of piety and benevolence, according to the governing purpose or leading choice of his mind.

There is one fact in regard to the choice of the leading object of desire, or the governing purpose of life, which is very important. Certain modes of enjoyment, in consequence of repetition, increase the desire, but lessen the capacity of happiness from this source; while, in regard to others, gratification increases the [pg 091] desire, and at the same time increases the capacity for enjoyment.

The enjoyments through the senses are of the first kind. It will be found, as a matter of universal experience, that where this has been chosen as the main purpose of life, though the desire for such pleasures is continually increased, yet, owing to the physical effects of excessive indulgence, the capacity for enjoyment is decreased. Thus the man who so degrades his nature as to make the pleasures of eating and drinking the great pursuit of life, while his desires never abate, finds his zest for such enjoyments continually decreasing, and a perpetual need for new devices to stimulate appetite and awaken the dormant capacities. The pleasures of sense always pall from repetition—grow “stale, flat and unprofitable,” though the deluded being who has thus slavishly yielded to such appetites feels himself bound by chains of habit, which, even when enjoyment ceases, seldom are broken.

The pleasures derived from the exercise of power, when its attainment becomes the master passion, are also of this description. The statesman, the politician, the conqueror, are all seeking for this, and desire never abates while any thing of the kind remains to be attained. We do not find that enjoyment increases in proportion as power is secured. On the contrary, it seems to cloy in possession. Alexander, the conqueror of the world, when he had gained all, wept that objects of desire were extinct, and that possession could not satisfy.

But there are other sources of happiness for which the desire ever continues, and possession only increases the capacity for enjoyment. Of this class is [pg 092] the susceptibility of happiness from giving and receiving affection. Here, the more there is given and received, the more is the power of giving and receiving increased. We find that this principle outlives every other, and even the decays of nature itself. When tottering age on the borders of the grave is just ready to resign its wasted tenement, often from its dissolving ashes the never-dying spark of affection has burst forth with new and undiminished luster. This is that immortal fountain of happiness always increased by imparting, never surcharged by receiving.

Another principle, which increases both desire and capacity by exercise, is the power of enjoyment from being the cause of happiness to others. Never was an instance known of regret for devotion to the happiness of others. On the contrary, the more this holy and delightful principle is in exercise, the more the desires are increased, and the more are the susceptibilities for enjoyment from this source enlarged. While the votaries of pleasure are wearing down with the exhaustion of abused nature, and the votaries of ambition are sighing over its thorny wreath, the benevolent spirit is exulting in the success of its plans of good, and reaching forth to still purer and more perfect bliss.

This principle is especially true in regard to the practice of rectitude. The more the leading aim of the mind is devoted to right feeling and action, or to obedience to all the laws of God, the more both the desire and the capacity of enjoyment from this source are increased.

But there is another fact in regard to habit, which has an immense bearing on the well-being of our race. [pg 093] When a habit of seeking happiness in some one particular mode is once formed, the change of this habit becomes difficult just in proportion to the degree of repetition which has been practiced. A habit once formed, it is no longer an easy matter to choose between the mode of securing happiness chosen and another which the mind may be led to regard as much superior. Thus, in gratifying the appetite, a man may feel that his happiness is continually diminishing, and that, by sacrificing this passion, he may secure much greater enjoyment from another source; yet the force of habit is such, that decisions of the will perpetually yield to its power.

Thus, also, if a man has found his chief enjoyment in that admiration and applause of men so ardently desired, even after it has ceased to charm, and seems like emptiness and vanity, still, when nobler objects of pursuit are offered, the chains of habit bind him to his wonted path. Though he looks and longs for the one that his conscience and his intellect assure him is brightest and best, the conflict with bad habit ends in fatal defeat and ruin. It is true that every habit can be corrected and changed, but nothing requires greater firmness of purpose and energy of will; for it is not one resolution of mind that can conquer habit: it must be a constant series of long-continued efforts.

The influence of habit in reference to emotions deserves special attention as having a direct influence upon character and happiness. All pleasurable emotions of mind, being grateful, are indulged and cherished, and are not weakened by repetition unless they become excessive. If the pleasures of sense are indulged beyond a certain extent, the bodily system is [pg 094] exhausted, and satiety is the consequence. If the love of power and admiration is indulged to excess, so as to become the leading purpose of life, they are found to be cloying. But, within certain limits, all pleasurable emotions do not seem to lessen in power by repetition.

But in regard to painful emotions the reverse is true. The mind instinctively resists or flies from them, so that often a habit of suppressing such emotions is formed, until the susceptibility diminishes, and sometimes appears almost entirely destroyed. Thus a person often exposed to danger ceases to be troubled by fear, because he forms a habit of suppressing it. A person frequently in scenes of distress and suffering learns to suppress the emotions of painful sympathy. The surgeon is an example of the last case, where, by repeated operations, he has learned to suppress emotions until they seldom recur. A person inured to guilt gradually deadens the pangs of remorse, until the conscience becomes “seared as with a hot iron.” Thus, also, with the emotion of shame. After a person has been repeatedly exposed to contempt, and feels that he is universally despised, he grows callous to any such emotions.

The mode by which the mind succeeds in forming such a habit seems to be by that implanted principle which makes ideas that are most in consonance with the leading desire of the mind become vivid and distinct, while those that are less interesting fade away. Now no person desires to witness pain except from the hope of relieving it, unless it be that, in anger, the mind is sometimes gratified with the infliction of suffering. But, in ordinary cases, the sight of suffering [pg 095] is avoided except where relief can be administered. In such cases, the desire of administering relief becomes the leading one, so that the mind is turned off from the view of the suffering to dwell on conceptions of modes of relief. Thus the surgeon and physician gradually form such habits that the sight of pain and suffering lead the mind to the conception of modes of relief, whereas a mind not thus interested dwells on the more painful ideas.

The habits of life are all formed either from the desire to secure happiness or to avoid pain, and the fear of suffering is found to be a much more powerful principle than the desire of happiness. The soul flies from pain with all its energies, even when it will be inert at the sight of promised joy. As an illustration of this, let a person be fully convinced that the gift of two new senses would confer as great an additional amount of enjoyment as is now secured by the eye and ear, and the promise of this future good would not stimulate with half the energy that would be caused by the threat of instant and entire blindness and deafness.

If, then, the mind is stimulated to form good habits and to avoid the formation of evil ones most powerfully by painful emotions, when their legitimate object is not effected they continually decrease in vividness, and the designed benefit is lost. If a man is placed in circumstances of danger, and fear leads to habits of caution and carefulness, the object of exciting this emotion is accomplished, and the diminution of it is attended with no evil. But if fear is continually excited, and no such habits are formed, then the susceptibility is lessened, while the good to be secured by it [pg 096] is lost. So, also, with emotions of sympathy. If we witness pain and suffering, and it induces habits of active devotion to the good of those who suffer, the diminution of the susceptibility is a blessing and no evil. But if we simply indulge emotions, and do not form the habits they were intended to secure, the power of sympathy is weakened, and the designed benefit is lost. Thus, again, with shame: if this painful emotion does not lead us to form habits of honor and rectitude, it is continually weakened by repetition, and the object for which it was bestowed is not secured. And so with remorse: if this emotion is awakened without leading to habits of benevolence and virtue, it constantly decays in power, and the good it would have secured is for ever lost.

It does not appear, however, that the power of emotion in the soul is thus destroyed. This is evident from the fact that the most hardened culprits, when brought to the hour of death, where all plans of future good cease to charm the mental eye, are often overwhelmed with the most vivid emotions of sorrow, shame, remorse and fear. And often, in the course of life, there are seasons when the soul returns from its pursuit of deluding visions to commune with itself in its own secret chambers. At such seasons, shame, remorse and fear take up their abode in their long-deserted dwelling, and ply their scorpion whips till they are obeyed, and the course of honor and virtue is resumed, or till the distracted spirit again flies abroad for comfort and relief.

There is a great diversity in human character, resulting from the diverse proportions and combinations of those powers of mind which the race have in common. [pg 097] At the same time, there is a variety in the scale of being, or relative grade of each mind. While all are alike in the common faculties of the human mind, some have every faculty on a much larger scale than others, while some are of a very humble grade.

The principle of habit has very great influence in modifying and changing these varieties. Thus, by forming habits of intellectual exercise, a mind of naturally humble proportions can be elevated considerably above one more highly endowed by natural constitution. So the training of some particular intellectual faculty, which by nature is deficient, can bring it up nearer to the level of other powers less disciplined by exercise.

In like manner, the natural susceptibilities can be increased, diminished or modified by habit. Certain tastes, that had little power, can be so cultivated as to overtop all others.

So of the moral nature: it can be so exercised that a habit will be formed which will generate a strength and prominency that nature did not impart.

One of the most important results of habit is its influence on faith or belief. Those persons who practice methods of false reasoning, who turn away from evidence and follow their feelings in forming opinions, eventually lose the power of sure, confiding belief.

On the contrary, an honest, conscientious steadiness in seeking the truth and in yielding to evidence, secures the firmest and most reliable convictions, and that peace of mind which alone results from believing the truth.

The will itself is also subject to this same principle. A strong will, that is trained to yield obedience to law [pg 098] in early life, acquires an ease and facility in doing it which belongs ordinarily to weak minds, and yet can retain all its vigor. And a mind that is trained to bring subordinate volitions into strict and ready obedience to a generic purpose, acquires an ease and facility in doing this which was not a natural endowment.

Thus it appears that by the principle of habit every mind is furnished with the power of elevating itself in the scale of being, and of so modifying and perfecting the proportions and combinations of its constitutional powers, that often the result is that there is no mode of distinguishing between the effects of habit and those of natural organization.

Chapter XVIII. The Nature of Mind Our Guide to the Natural Attributes of God.

The natural attributes of any mind are the powers and faculties to be exercised, while it is the action or voluntary use of these faculties that exhibits the moral attributes.

Having gained the existence of a Great First Cause by the use of one principle of common sense, and the fact that this cause is an intelligent mind by another, it has been shown that a third of these principles leads to the belief that the natural attributes of God are like our own. We can not conceive of any other kind of minds than our own, because we have never had any past experience or knowledge of any other.

But while we thus conclude that the mind of the Creator is, so far as we can conceive, precisely like our own in constitutional organization, we are as necessarily led to perceive that the extent of these powers is far beyond our own. A mind with the power, wisdom and goodness exhibited in the very small portion of his works submitted to our inspection, who has inhabited eternity, and matured through everlasting ages—our minds are lost in attempting any conception of the extent of such infinite faculties!

Thus we are necessarily led to conceive of the Creator as possessing the intellectual powers described in previous pages. He perceives, conceives, imagines, judges and remembers just as we do.

So also all our varied susceptibilities to pleasure and pain exist in the Eternal Mind. The desire of good and the fear of evil which are the motive power in the human mind, exist also in the divine. Thus by the light of nature we settle the question that the existence of susceptibilities to pain and evil are not the results of the Creator's will, but are a part of the eternal nature of things which he did not originate or control.

All the minds we ever knew or heard of are moved to action by desire to gain happiness and escape pain, and as we can conceive of no other kind of mind than our own, we must attribute to the Creator this foundation element of mental activity.

Thus we are led to attribute to the Creator all those susceptibilities included in the moral sense, as described in previous pages. His mind, like ours, feels that whatever makes the most happiness with the least [pg 100] evil is right; that is to say, it is fitted to the eternal nature of things, of which his own mind is a part.

So also the Creator possesses that sense of justice implanted in our own minds, which involves the desire of good to those who make happiness, and of evil to those who destroy happiness; and which also demands that such retributions be proportioned to the good and evil done, and to the power of the agent.

So also we must conceive of the Creator as possessing the susceptibility of conscience, which includes in the very constitution of mind retributions for right and wrong action.

Again, we are led to conceive of God as a rational free agent, with power to choose either that which excites the strongest desire or that which is perceived to be best on the whole for all concerned, even if it does not excite the strongest desire.

Again, we are to conceive of the Creator as possessing a belief in those principles of reason which he has implanted in our minds, and made our guide in all matters, both of temporal and religious concern.

Again, our experience of the nature and history of mind, leads to the inference that no being has existed from all eternity in solitude, but that there is more than one eternal, uncreated mind, and that all their powers of enjoyment from giving and receiving happiness in social relations have been in exercise from eternal ages. This is the just and natural deduction of reason and experience, as truly as the deduction that there is at least one eternal First Cause.

Again, all our experience of mind involves the idea of the mutual relation of minds. We perceive that minds are made to match to other minds, so that there [pg 101] can be no complete action of mind, according to its manifest design, except in relation to other beings. A mind can not love till there is another mind to call forth such emotion. A mind can not bring a tithe of its power into appropriate action except in a community of minds. The conception of a solitary being, with all the social powers and sympathies of the human mind infinitely enlarged, and yet without any sympathizing mind to match and meet them, involves the highest idea of unfitness and imperfection conceivable, while it is contrary to our uniform experience of the nature and history of mind.

It has been argued that the unity of design in the works of nature proves that there is but one creating mind. This is not so, for in all our experience of the creations of finite beings no great design was ever formed without a combination of minds, both to plan and to execute. The majority of minds in all ages, both heathen and Christian, have always conceived of the Creator as in some way existing so as to involve the ideas of plurality and of the love and communion of one mind with another.

And yet the unity and harmony of all created things as parts of one and the same design, teach a degree of unity in the authorship of the universe never known in the complex action of finite minds.

Thus a unity and plurality in the Creator of all things is educed by reason and experience from the works of nature.

Chapter XIX. The Nature of Mind Our Guide to the Moral Attributes of God.

Having employed the principles of common sense to gain a knowledge of the natural attributes of God, we are next to employ the same principles to gain his moral character; or those attributes which are exhibited in willing. In other words, we are to seek the character of God as expressed in his works or deeds.

In our experience of the moral character of minds in this world, we find that some of the highest grades as to intellect and susceptibilities, are lowest as to good-willing. How is it, then, with the highest mind of all? Does he so prefer evil to good, that he deliberately plans for the production of evil when he has power to produce happiness in its place? Or does he sometimes prefer evil and sometimes good, with the variable humors of the human race? Or does he always prefer good when it costs him no trouble or sacrifice, but never when it does? Or is he one who invariably chooses what is best for all, even when it involves painful sacrifices to himself?

In seeking a reply to these momentous questions, we return once more to the principle of common sense before stated, i.e., the nature of any work or contrivance is proof of the character and design of the author.

In examining the works of the Creator, we find that the material world impresses us as wisely adjusted and good in construction, only as it is fitted to give enjoyment to sentient beings. It is the intelligent, [pg 103] feeling, acting minds that give the value to every other existence. If there were no minds, all perception of beauty, fitness and goodness would perish.

It is minds, therefore, which are the chief works of the Creator's hand, and which give value to all others.

If the nature of these minds is evil, then the author of them is proved to be evil by his works. If their nature is good and perfect, then their author is proved to be good and perfect.

Here again we are driven back to our own minds to gain the only conceptions possible to us, not only of wisdom, but of goodness or benevolence.

On examination, we shall find that we can form no idea of these qualities which does not involve a limitation of power.

Our idea of power is that which we gain when we will to move our bodies or to make any other change, and this change ensues. Our only idea of a want of power is gained when the choice or willing of a change or event does not produce it. Whenever, therefore, it shall appear that the Creator wills or wishes a thing to exist or to be changed, and that change or existence does not follow his so willing, we can not help believing that he has not the power to produce it?

Again; our idea of perfectness always has reference to power; for a thing is regarded as perfect in construction only when there is no power in God or man to make it better. When any arrangement is as good as it can be, so that neither God nor man has power to make it better, we regard it as perfect, even when there is some degree of evil involved.

We are now prepared to define what is included in [pg 104] the terms perfect wisdom and perfect benevolence, when applied to the Creator or to any other being, thus: A perfectly wise being is one who invariably wills the best possible ends and the best possible means of accomplishing those ends.

An imperfectly wise being is one who does not invariably do this.

A perfectly benevolent being is one who invariably wills the most good and the least evil in his power. An imperfectly benevolent being is one who does not invariably will thus.

The degree in which a being is ranked as wise and good is estimated by the extent to which his willing good or evil corresponds with his power.

Thus it appears that, in a system where evil exists, the very idea of perfect benevolence and wisdom involves the supposition of a limitation of power.

To return, then, to the question as proposed at the commencement of the chapter—Is the Creator a being who prefers good to evil invariably, or is he one who only sometimes prefers evil to good, and at other times prefers good to evil, with the varying humors of man; or does he invariably choose what is best for all, even in cases where it may cost personal sacrifice and suffering to himself?

It will be the object of what follows to prove that the last supposition is the true one.

In attempting this, we again take the principle of common sense, that “the nature of any contrivance proves the design and character of the author.” Then we proceed to a review of the nature, first of mind, and next of the material world, to prove that the design or chief end of the Creator is, not to make happiness [pg 105] irrespective of the amount, but to produce the greatest possible happiness with the least possible evil. In other words, we are to seek for proof that God has done all things for the best, so that he has no power to do better.

In still another form, we are to seek for evidence, in the nature of God's works, that he has ever done the best he could, so that the amount of evil that ever was or ever will exist, is not caused by his willing it, but by his want of power to prevent it; so that any change would be an increase of evil and a lessening of good to the universe as a whole.

In pursuing this attempt, it will be needful to reproduce two or three chapters of a work by the author, already before the public, entitled, The Bible and the People; or, Common Sense applied to Religion.

In this work the nature of mind is presented very much more in detail, for the same purpose as that here indicated. What will now follow is a brief review of previous chapters in that work, as a summary of the evidence there presented that the chief end of God in all his works is to produce the greatest possible happiness with the least possible evil.

Whenever we find any contrivances all combining to secure a certain good result, which, at the same time, involve some degree of inevitable evil, and then discover that there are contrivances to diminish and avoid this evil, we properly infer that the author intended to secure as much of the good with as little of the evil as possible. For example, a traveler finds a deserted mine, and all around he discovers contrivances for obtaining gold, and, at the same time, other contrivances for getting rid of the earth mixed with it. The [pg 106] inevitable inference would be that the author of these contrivances designed to secure as much gold with as little earth as possible; and should any one say that he could have had more gold and less earth if he chose to, the answer would be that there is no evidence of this assertion, but direct evidence against it.

Again: should we discover a piece of machinery in which every contrivance tended to secure a speed in movement, produced by the friction of wheels against a rough surface, and at the same time other contrivances were found for diminishing all friction that was useless, we should infer that the author designed to secure the greatest possible speed with the least possible friction.

In like manner, if we can show that mind is a contrivance that acts by the influence of fear of evil, and that pain seems as indispensable to the action of a free agent as friction is to motion; if we can show that there is no contrivance in mind or matter which is designed to secure suffering as its primary end; if we can, on the contrary, show that the direct end of all the organizations of mind and matter is to produce happiness; if we can show that it is only the wrong action of mind that involves most of the pain yet known, so that right action, in its place, would secure only happiness; if we can show contrivances for diminishing pain, and also contrivances for increasing happiness by means of the inevitable pain involved in the system of things, then the just conclusion will be gained that the Author of the system of mind and matter designed “to produce the greatest possible happiness with the least possible evil.”

In the pages which follow, we shall present evidence exhibiting all these particulars.

The only way in which we learn the nature of a thing is to observe its qualities and actions. This is true of mind as much as it is of matter. Experience and observation teach that the nature of mind is such, that the fear of suffering is indispensable to secure a large portion of the enjoyment within reach of its faculties, and that the highest modes of enjoyment can not be secured except by sacrifice, and thus by more or less suffering.

This appears to be an inevitable combination, as much so as friction is inevitable in machinery.

We have the evidence of our own consciousness that it is fear of evil to ourselves or to others that is the strongest motive power to the mind. If we should find that no pain resulted from burning up our own bodies, or from drowning, or from any other cause; if every one perceived that no care, trouble, or pain resulted from losing all kinds of enjoyment, the effort to seek it would be greatly diminished.

If we could desire good enough to exert ourselves to seek it, and yet should feel no discomfort in failing; if we could lose every thing, and feel no sense of pain or care, the stimulus to action which experience has shown to be most powerful and beneficent would be lost.

We find that abundance of ease and prosperity enervates mental power, and that mind increases in all that is grand and noble, and also in the most elevating happiness, by means of danger, care and pain. We may properly infer, then, that evil is a necessary part of the experience of a perfectly-acting mind.

So strong is the conviction that painful penalties are indispensable, that the kindest parents and the most benevolent rulers are the most sure to increase rather than diminish those that are already involved in the existing nature of things.

Again: without a revelation we have no knowledge of any kind of mind but by inference from our experience in this state of being. All we know of the Eternal First Cause is by a process of reasoning, inferring that his nature must be like the only minds of which we have any knowledge. We assume, then, that he is a free agent, regulated by desire for happiness and fear of evil.

We thus come to the conclusion that this organization of mind is a part of the fixed and eternal nature of things, and does not result from the will of the Creator. His own is the eternal pattern of an all-perfect mind, and our own are formed on this perfect model, with susceptibilities to pain as an indispensable motive power in gaining happiness.

We will now recapitulate some of the particulars in the laws and constitution of mind which tend to establish the position that its Creator's grand design is “to produce the greatest possible happiness with the least possible evil.”

Chapter XX. Additional Proof of the Moral Attributes of God.

We have presented the “nature” of mind as the chief evidence of the grand design of its Creator in forming all things, and thus also presented the proof of his perfect wisdom, benevolence, and rectitude. We now will trace the evidences of the same beneficent design in the nature of all social and material organizations.

First, then, in regard to the domestic relations. We have seen that while all happiness depends on obedience to laws, every mind comes into existence in perfect ignorance of them, and without any power to learn what is good or evil but by experience and instruction. The intention of the Creator that each new-born being should be taught these laws and trained to obey them, is clearly seen in the first and highest domestic relation. In this we see two mature minds, who have themselves been trained to understand these laws, drawn by sweet and gentle influences to each other. They go apart from all past ties of kindred; they have one home, one name, one common interest in every thing. The one who has most physical strength goes forth to provide supplies; the delicate one remains behind, by domestic ministries to render home the centre of all attractions.

Then comes the beautiful, helpless infant, of no use to any one, and demanding constant care, labor, and attention. And yet, with its profound ignorance, its tender weakness, its delicate beauty, its utter helplessness, [pg 122] its entire dependence, how does it draw forth the strongest feelings of love and tenderness, making every toil and care a delight! And thus, month after month, both parents unite to cherish and support, while, with unceasing vigilance, they train the new-born mind to understand and obey the laws of the system into which it is thus ushered. Its first lessons are to learn to take care of its own body. And when the far-off penalty of pain can not be comprehended by the novice, the parent invents new penalties to secure habits of care and obedience. During all this period the great lesson of sacrifice constantly occurs. The child must eat what is best, not what it desires. It must go to bed when it wants to sit up. It must stay in the house when it wants to go out. It must not touch multitudes of things which it wishes thus to investigate. And so the habits of self-denial, obedience, and faith in the parents are gradually secured, while the knowledge of the laws of the system around are slowly learned.

But the higher part of the law of sacrifice soon begins to make its demands. The child first learns of this law by example, in that of the mother, that most perfect illustration of self-sacrificing love. Then comes a second child, when the first-born must practice on this example. It must give up its place in the mother's bosom to another; it must share its sweets and toys with the new-comer; it must join in efforts to protect, amuse, and instruct the helpless one. And thus the family is the constant school for training ignorant, inexperienced mind in the laws of the system of which it is a part, especially in the great law of self-control, for the best good of self, and of self-sacrifice for the best good of others.

Next comes the discipline of the school and the neighborhood, when the child is placed among his peers to be taught new rules of justice, benevolence, and self-sacrifice for the general good.

Next come the relations of the body politic, for which labors are demanded and pain is to be endured according to the grand law of sacrifice, by which the individual is to subordinate his own interests and wishes to the greater general good, so that the interests of the majority shall always control those of the minority.

Lastly, the whole world is to be taken into the estimate, and the nations are to be counted as members of one great family of man, for which every portion is to make sacrifices for the greater general good.

Thus, as age, and experience, and habits of obedience to the laws of rectitude increase, the duties and obligations grow more numerous and complicated. But the same grand principle is more and more developed, that each individual is to seek the greatest possible happiness with the least possible evil, for the vast whole as well as for each subordinate part, while self is to receive only its just and proper share.

The same great design of the Creator can be detected also in specific organizations, by which minds so differ from each other as to fit them for the diverse positions and relations that the common good demands. If all were exactly alike in the amount of constitutional powers and in the proportionate combinations, it can easily be seen that the general result would be far less favorable to the happiness of the whole. But as it is, some have the love of power very large, and seek to lead and control; others have it small, and prefer to follow. Some have elevated intellect, and love to [pg 124] teach; others have humbler capacities, and prefer humbler pursuits.

These varied combinations also give scope to the virtues of pity, tenderness, patience, mercy, justice, self-denial, and many other graces that could not be called into being without all the disparities, social, domestic, intellectual, and moral, that we find existing. Meantime the principle of habit and the power of the will give abundant opportunities for modifying these natural peculiarities to accommodate to varying circumstances.

To these indications of benevolent design may be added the “nature” of the bodily system, and the “nature” of the material world without. In examining the body we inhabit, so nicely adjusted, so perfectly adapted to our necessities, so beautifully and harmoniously arranged, so “fearfully and wonderfully made,” it is almost beyond the power of numbers to express the multiplied contrivances for ease, comfort, and delight.

We daily pursue our business and our pleasure, thoughtless of the thousand operations which are going on, and the busy mechanism employed in securing the objects we desire. The warm current that is flowing from the centre to the extremities, with its life-giving energies, and then returning to be purified and again sent forth; the myriads of branching nerves that are the sensitive discerners of good or ill; the unnumbered muscles and tendons that are contracting and expanding in all parts of our frame; the nicely-adjusted joints, and bands, and ligaments, that sustain, and direct, and support; the perpetual expansion and contraction of the vital organ; the thousand hidden contrivances and [pg 125] operations of the animal frame, all are quietly and constantly performing their generous functions, and administering comfort and enjoyment to the conscious spirit that dwells within.

Nor is the outer world less busy in performing its part in promoting the great design of the Creator. The light of suns and stars is traversing the ethereal expanse in search of those for whom it was created; for them it gilds the scenes of earth, and is reflected in ten thousand forms of beauty and of skill. The trembling air is waiting to minister its aid, fanning with cool breezes, or yielding the warmth of spring, sustaining the functions of life, and bearing on its light wing the thoughts that go forth from mind to mind, and the breathings of affection that are given and returned. For this design earth is sending forth her exuberance, the waters are emptying their stores, and the clouds pouring forth their treasures. All nature is busy with its offerings of fruits and flowers, its wandering incense, its garnished beauty, and its varied songs. Within and without, above, beneath, and around, the same Almighty Beneficence is found still ministering to the wants and promoting the happiness of the minds he has formed for ever to desire and pursue this boon.

We are now prepared to meet the questions proposed, (i.e.) is the Creator a being who, with the varying humors of man, sometimes prefers evil to good, and sometimes prefers good to evil, or does he invariably choose what is best for all, even in cases where it may involve personal sacrifices and suffering to himself?

In attempting to answer this question, we have set [pg 126] forth the evidence to be found in the works of the Creator which establishes the position that his chief end or ruling purpose is to produce the greatest possible happiness with the least possible evil.

The question then reads, does the Creator destroy happiness and cause needless pain, and thus thwart his own chief desire and great end; the end for which he made all things?

The very statement of the question is its most forcible answer.

We have seen that we are obliged to conceive of God as possessing such a social and moral nature as our own. This would lead him to desire the veneration, confidence, love, and gratitude of the children he has created.

But he has formed their minds to hate selfishness and to admire and reverence self-sacrificing benevolence. Will the Creator then oppose his own chief end and grand design by conduct which would make all his creatures necessarily, by the nature he implanted, withhold their respect and love, and feel only dislike and contempt? The very question involves its own answer.

Add to this, that all those causes which our experience and observation have shown to lead to wrong choices are necessarily excluded from our conceptions of the Creator.

The Eternal Mind can not err for want of knowledge, nor for want of habits of right action, nor for want of teachers and educators, nor for want of those social influences which generate and sustain a right governing purpose; for an infinite mind, that never had a beginning, can not have these modes of [pg 127] experience which appertain to new-born and finite creatures.

Again: Such is the eternal system of the universe, as we learn it by the light of reason, that the highest possible happiness to each individual mind and to the whole commonwealth is promoted by the right action of every mind in that system. This, of necessity, is seen and felt by the All-creating and Eternal Mind, and to suppose that, with this knowledge, he would ever choose wrong, is to suppose that he would choose pure evil. It is to suppose the Creator would do what he has formed our minds to believe to be impossible in any rational mind. It is to suppose that the Creator would do that which, if done by human beings, marks them as insane.

Chapter XXI. Nature of Mind as Perfect in Construction.

The first article in every system of religion is, who is the God who controls our destinies, and what is his character?

In attempting to answer this question by the light of nature, independently of revelation, we have gained these positions. There is an Intelligent Mind who created all things, whose natural attributes are the same as ours in kind, but vast beyond our comprehension in extent. In moral character, or that which is exhibited in choice or action, he is perfect in wisdom, benevolence, and rectitude; that is to say, he is a being whose chief end or ruling purpose is to do the [pg 128] best he can to make the most possible happiness with the least possible evil.

This being discovered as the grand design for which all human minds are created, we are thus enabled to decide as to what is the right and perfect construction or “nature” of mind, and also as to its right and perfect action.

In regard to the perfect construction of mind, we must again refer to the fact that in a system of things where both natural and moral evil exist, we are obliged to suppose a limitation of power by the nature of things, so that a system is perfect, not as excluding all evil; for as evil does exist, a system without any evil is impossible. All that remains, then, to constitute the idea of perfection, (as used in reference to things as they are) is this, that whatever is created by God, is the best possible in the nature of things.

The question then must be this, is the mind of man, as a race, the best in construction, that is possible in the nature of things? Is our mind made as good as it can be, so that no change is possible that would make it better?

In replying to this question, we must regard the matter in two relations. We have noticed, in the chapter on the Constitutional Varieties of the Human Mind, that while there are powers and attributes of mind which are common to all, there is an endless variety of character resulting from the diverse proportions and combinations of these several faculties, and also that there are diverse grades of mind, each having these diverse combinations. Some races of men are much lower in the scale of being, every way, than other races, while the same disparity exists among individuals of the same race.

Now when we compare individuals with each other, or when we compare races in these respects, we regard them as more or less perfect in organization with reference to the highest grade or species known to us. In this relation some minds are to be regarded as imperfect and defective in organization. And in reference to any one individual or race in this relation, we feel that the organization could be improved.

But when we regard each mind as a part of a vast system, in which the highest good of the whole will prove the highest possible good of each individual part, we are to judge of perfection in the organization of mind in another relation. If it is for the greatest happiness of the whole that there should be grades and ranks in mental powers; if disparities and varieties in organization give scope and exercise to virtues and modes of enjoyment that would be impossible were all minds exactly alike, and on the pattern of the highest in the scale of being, then the very points which are imperfections in the individual relations, become perfections in relation to the great whole. In this view, the lowest and humblest in the scale of being, when acting in his appropriate place and according to the great Creator's design, is perfect in mental construction, and is fitted to be happier in every respect than he could be if the whole system were changed by placing him among the highest in mental organization.

Just as it is with the human system—the lowly foot is perfect and complete in its place, though inferior in construction and service to the regal head and cunning hand. And should the foot be endowed with the higher gifts it would be a departure from its perfection [pg 130] in organization as related to the whole. The question, then, of the perfect nature of each human mind requires that we regard each one as a part of an infinite system demanding grades and ranks, and thus, also, relative disparities. And having proved that the chief design of the Creator is to make the best possible system, we are necessarily led to the conclusion that the lowest order of mind is as perfect in its nature, in relation to the great whole, as is the highest of all.

From the above we gain this definition:

A perfect mind, as to construction or nature, is one which is better fitted to its position in the best possible system of minds than it would be by any possible change.

In this use of the words nature and perfect it is claimed that in the preceding pages it has been proved that the mind of man is perfect in nature. Our next inquiry will relate to the perfect action of mind in respect to that which is voluntary or self-originated. In other words, we shall inquire as to the perfect moral action of the human mind, as discoverable by reason and experience, independently of revelation.

Chapter XXII. Right and Wrong—True Virtue.

Having discovered the end for which mind is made, and thus gained the idea of what is meant by perfectness, in its nature or construction, we next inquire as to what is the perfect action of mind.

Here we must again recognize the distinction between two classes of mental actions, viz., those acts which are natural as resulting necessarily from the constitution of mind, of which God is the producing cause, and those which are voluntary and of which man is the producing cause. The first are natural and involuntary, the latter are moral and voluntary.

This introduces the second part of the system of natural religion, that which relates to man's obligations or duty toward the Creator, toward his fellow beings, and toward himself. In other words, the question is, “what is right voluntary or moral action?”

In seeking the reply to this without the aid of revelation, the following particulars demand attention:

In all discussions on this question there is no mental analysis more important than the distinction between the desire, or what moves us to choose, and the act of choice.

The mind is always moved to choice by desire for some good to be gained or some evil to be avoided. The susceptibility or power of being thus led, in popular language is called a “bias,” an “inclination,” a “propensity,” a “tendency,” or a “proclivity” toward the object which causes the desire. Thus the susceptibility to desire stimulating drinks is excited by liquors, and this is called “a propensity” to strong drink.

The susceptibility to desire to amass money is called a bias, or propensity to avarice. The only thing ever meant by a bias or propensity to choose any thing is, that there are such susceptibilities that desire can be excited for that thing.

But all such propensities or biases are from evil and toward good in the widest sense of these terms. No rational mind ever desires pure evil, but always desires good of some sort. On the contrary, it is one of the implanted principles of common sense that no rational mind will choose pure evil. Any man who should do this would be regarded as insane—as having lost the distinctive feature of a rational mind.

But we find that desires are called strong, imperative, powerful, and the like, not at all with reference to the question whether what is desired would be best for all concerned. They are measured, as to strength or weakness, by the degrees of enjoyment their gratification secures, or the amount of pain that self-denial would involve. This measurement of varied degrees of pleasure and pain is a matter of consciousness to every mind, and is constantly referred to by all races and in all languages.

In this use of the term, the strongest desire often exists for that which is perceived to be the best good for all concerned. At other times the strongest desire is for that which is seen to be the lesser good. When the strongest desire is for that which is best, the choice is easy, and the mind always chooses the best good. But when the strongest desire is for that which is not best, then choice is more difficult, and there is a conscious struggle between the promptings of reason and conscience, and the importunities of strong desire for the lesser good.

At such periods there is a conscious power in every mind to choose either way, and sometimes we choose to gratify the strongest desire and give up the best good, and at other times we choose the best good and [pg 133] deny the strongest desire. Every human being has been conscious of this struggle between excited desire and the dictates of reason, and all the literature of the world refers to it as a universal fact. The terms self-denial, self-control, self-government, all are based on this experience of all minds.6

Chapter XXIII. Laws and Penalties—Sin and Holiness.

The laws of God, in regard to voluntary action, are those invariable arrangements in mind and matter by which happiness or pain are connected with certain feelings and actions.

Thus it is an invariable arrangement that pain shall be connected with touching fire, and pleasure with seeing the light. So in regard to the intellect; pleasure is invariably connected with the exercise of wit and humor, and disgust with folly and fatuity. So the moral sense is invariably pleased with truth, justice, and integrity, and pained by the opposite.

Whenever, therefore, we discover what invariably affords pleasure or pain, we discover one of the laws of God.

To discover these laws, and to believe in them, is as indispensable to the right action of mind as light is indispensable to perfect eyes in order to see.

The first lesson of every new-born spirit is to discover the laws that relate to its own enjoyment. Whenever a child chooses any thing which secures enjoyment without harm to itself or to others, it is acting as its Creator designed, and this action is therefore right. And whenever it chooses what will cause needless pain to itself or to others, it acts wrong. Most of the choices of a little child are of what is right as giving enjoyment without harm.

The grand law of God, as learned by experience, is that every mind must sacrifice the lesser for the greater [pg 146] good in gratifying its own desires. When the interests of others are not concerned, the child must always choose not what it desires the most, but what is best for itself. It is the first labor of the educator to make a child understand and obey this first part of the law of sacrifice.

But where the feelings and interests of others are involved, the law of God is, that the lesser good of the individual shall always be sacrificed to the greater good of the many. Each mind of the great commonwealth is to act, not to make self-gratification the first thing, but to make the greatest possible happiness with the least possible evil for the whole commonwealth the predominant purpose. And such is the system of the Creator that whatever is for the best good of the whole is for the best good of each individual.

Thus it appears that obedience to the laws of God, physical, intellectual, social, and moral, is to be chosen as the ruling purpose of each mind. And this is the mode by which all rational beings are to promote the end or design for which all things are made, (i.e.,) happiness-making on the greatest possible scale for the great commonwealth.

Now it is very certain that no human mind is able, by its own solitary investigations, to discover all the physical, intellectual, social, and moral laws of God.

Many of these laws we can learn by experience, but for the greater portion we are dependent on the instruction of others. Therefore truth on the part of educators, and faith on the part of the learners are as indispensable to the right action of mind as is light to the right action of the eye in seeing. Not a “dead,” [pg 147] merely intellectual belief, but a “saving faith” that controls the feelings and conduct.

We now are enabled to define the kind of inability as to obeying the laws of God, which inevitably attends every mind that commences its existence in this world. As yet there have never been perfectly true educators of young minds, while perfect faith, that is to say, “saving faith,” in the teachings that are true is as much wanting. The young child can not be made to understand, and therefore can not believe, or have faith in many of the laws of God and the penalties connected with them. This no one will deny.

Chapter XXIV. Love to God And Love to Man.

In a former chapter we have noticed the analysis of the principle of love. It is needful to refer to this [pg 152] again, as intimately connected with the question of the right moral action of finite minds.

We have seen that love is a complex exercise, its first element being agreeable emotions in view of certain qualities and actions. Combined with these emotions co-exists a desire of reciprocated regard, that is to say, a desire to be the cause of similar agreeable emotions to the one loved. These are constitutional impulses not at all consequent on any volition or choice, and as the involuntary element of love, are properly called involuntary love. Such love can not be justly demanded except where those qualities are, or can be, perceived which naturally awaken agreeable emotions. In cases where the qualities exist that would naturally awaken affection if noticed, and the want of it is owing to inattention, a proper regard to such qualities can be justly demanded. But this is the only particular in which involuntary love can be made the subject of law and penalties.

But the main element of love, as practically estimated among men, is such a desire of good to the one loved as involves the good willing or voluntary effort to please and gratify. If a friend simply is pleased with our good qualities, and wishes to please us with his naturally agreeable traits in return, it is of little value in comparison with the truer love which is shown in voluntary efforts to please and make happy. This last is the main element of true affection, and properly is called voluntary love or good willing. Theologians express this distinction by the terms the love of complacency and the love of benevolence.

Thus we have gained these definitions:

Involuntary love toward God and toward men consists [pg 153] in agreeable emotions in view of admirable qualities.

Voluntary love toward God and toward men consists in good willing, or the voluntary effort to please and make happy.

To “love our neighbor as ourselves” must refer solely to voluntary love, for we have no regard to our own agreeable qualities in the love of self. Self-love is simply the desire and will to please and gratify self. This then is the kind of love that can properly be demanded of all. Each one can justly be required to will or choose to please and gratify others the same as we do ourselves. Each can be required to estimate the happiness of every other mind as of the same value as his own, and to exercise good willing for others as we do for our own enjoyment. From this primary principle necessarily results the law demanding that the good of the commonwealth shall always take precedence of any individual concern. If we are bound to value the happiness of each mind as equal in value to our own, the inevitable result is that we are to estimate the happiness of many minds as of more value than our own, so as always to make our own enjoyment and wishes subordinate and secondary to the general good.

Still more are we to regard the feelings and wishes of our Creator and Supreme Lord. He has infinite susceptibilities of enjoyment and suffering, and thus whatever retards or promotes his wishes and plans must be of as much more value as his powers of enjoyment and suffering are greater than ours. The love of good willing then should have first reference to God as the one whose will and wishes are of more [pg 154] value than any other being in this relation alone. Still more are we bound to regard his will and wishes as first in value, because his chief end and aim is the most possible happiness to all the creatures he has made. To will to please God as the chief end of our existence is the same as to choose to make the most possible happiness, not only to him, but to all his creatures.

Involuntary love is valuable as rendering it easier and more agreeable to labor for the welfare of others. Those whose interesting traits please us; those who, as children or friends, contribute to our enjoyment, and those who in any way give us pleasure, it is far easier to will for their enjoyment than it is to do so for those who do nothing to please us, and perhaps only give us discomfort, anxiety or disgust.

This exhibits an indirect way of securing the love of good will toward those who neither please us by their agreeable qualities, nor are causes of enjoyment to us in any way. Involuntary affection may be so strongly excited toward one whose qualities or conduct cause delight to self, that the desire to please that friend may become more animating than the desire for any personal gratification. Should such a friend be deeply interested in the happiness of his children, or of any other persons, whose character and conduct may in no way please us, still the desire to gratify such a friend may lead to good willing to those whom he loves, for his sake, in order to please and gratify him.

Thus it is that love to parents tends to produce “peace and good will” among children, who, in their [pg 155] little broils, are restrained by the desire to please their parents, when love to each other fails.

Here we have a view of the importance of right conceptions of God's character, in order to secure the perfect action of finite minds, especially in the first stage of existence.

It has been shown that the rules of right action are to be gained, in many cases, only by long experience and by a course of reasoning. Often, too, general rules (such, for example, as that we are never to lie, even to save life, or for any reason,) must be obeyed when a person can see immediate evil, and no good to self or to any one by obedience. Now it is impossible for a rational mind to choose pure evil. There must be some good in an object to excite desire, or it is impossible to choose it. But pleasurable emotions toward an all-wise Creator, whose benevolence and wisdom excite love, delight, and confidence, may be such that to please him gives abundant motive to obey the rules of right he enjoins when no other good can be perceived except that obedience will please him. And the more we perceive in him that excites admiration, love, and gratitude, the more strength of motive is gained.

It has been shown that a choice or act is virtuous in all relations, when it absolutely is best for all, and when it is done in reference to a rule of rectitude, or because it is right. The motive or reason of a choice decides whether or not it is virtuous.

Now as the Creator's will and the rules of rectitude are the same, when we say that any act, in order to be virtuous, must have reference to God's will, the question comes up, is an act virtuous because it pleases God, or does it please God because it is virtuous? i.e., [pg 156] because it conforms to those rules by which his chief end in creation is secured, and which rest on the eternal nature of things.

The last is the principle here assumed. God's great end is the highest happiness of his creatures. Obedience to his laws is the mode for securing this end; his own actions are right as they conform to this end; and the actions of all his creatures are right only in the same relation.

So God's “glory” consists in the highest happiness of his creatures, which can only be secured by their obedience to his laws.

This makes it clear that choosing as our chief end to obey all the physical, social, and moral laws of God, as learned by experience, is the same as loving God with all the heart, and our neighbors as ourselves. It is also living for God's glory as the chief end; and it is being a truly righteous, virtuous, and pious man.

This distinction between voluntary and involuntary love enables us to discover certain dangers that result for want of such discrimination. Men may conceive of the Creator as desiring to be loved, admired, and glorified, just as selfish conquerors, like Alexander and Napoleon have done. In this view all their aims would be to excite agreeable emotions toward God by the contemplation of his various attributes. And thus they might be so absorbed in the indulgence of such delightful emotions as to become entirely heedless of the wants and the wishes of those around them. This kind of experience would cultivate selfishness instead of benevolence.

On the contrary, choosing to obey all God's laws for happiness-making on the largest scale, and viewing [pg 157] the lovely and glorious attributes of the Creator as means to this end, would induce the only true virtue, while it is the true mode of pleasing our Maker and increasing his enjoyment.

The preceding furnishes the mode of harmonizing a great variety of expressions that may properly be given in answer to the great question, “what must we do to be saved?” as we gain this answer independently of revelation.

The first answer is, “believe in God's teachings—or have faith in God.” This means, take the laws of God as revealed by reason and experience, and obey them, and you shall be saved. It is a practical and not a mere intellectual belief that constitutes this “saving faith.”

The next answer is, “repent,” or “repentance toward God.”

The word repent is used to signify, sometimes, simply remorse or pain for wrong-doing. In another sense it signifies that sorrow for wrong-doing which includes reformation. It is ceasing to disobey law and commencing a life of obedience. It is in this sense that men are saved by repentance.

Another answer is, “thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbor as thyself.” This has been shown to signify, thou shalt choose as the chief end of life to make happiness the right way, that is, by obeying all the physical, social, and moral laws of God. “This is the love of God, that we keep his commandments.”

Another answer is, “make it thy chief end to glorify God.” Inasmuch as God's glory consists in the exhibition of his character as a benevolent being, all [pg 158] who promote his chief aim by making happiness according to his will, are living to glorify God.

Another answer is, “live a truly virtuous life.” It has been shown that true virtue consists in obedience to the great law of sacrifice by which the lesser personal good is sacrificed to the greater good of all concerned.

Thus faith, repentance, love to God and man, making it our chief end to glorify God, living a virtuous life, all signify one and the same thing, (i.e.,) choosing to find out and to obey all the physical, social, and moral laws of God as our chief end or ruling purpose.

The righteous are those who have formed such a purpose, and who exhibit its results in their daily life.

The wicked are those who have not formed such a purpose, and do not exhibit it in their daily life.

In the common language of every-day life, when a person is intensely interested in any pursuit, it is said to be “his life.” And when a man changes from a vicious to a virtuous course he is said to “begin a new life.”

Thus it would be in agreement with the ordinary use of language to call a new-formed purpose to obey all the laws of God the commencement of a new life. And as the beginning of natural life is the commencement of a life of impulsive choices unregulated by law, the commencement of a life of obedience to law would, by a figure of speech, very naturally be called “a new birth.”

We have seen, in previous pages, that the formation of a ruling principle or governing purpose is sometimes the result of a slow process of educational influences, and sometimes it is a marked and sudden change. In [pg 159] the history of mind we find, as a general rule, that it is the slow process of educational training that secures a virtuous character in childhood, while the more sudden and marked changes are incident chiefly to more advanced life.

The term “regeneration” is used by theologians as meaning the formation of a ruling purpose to love and obey God, by man himself. By some, this change of mind is regarded as in all cases instantaneous, by others as sometimes a gradual and sometimes an instantaneous change.

The preceding still farther exhibits the fact that the whole foundation of religion and of morals rests on the answer to the question, what is true virtue or right voluntary action?

Chapter XXV. Increased Civilization Increases Moral Difficulties.

From the preceding it appears that the more our race advances in civilization, the more numerous and complicated are the laws of God which must first be discovered and then obeyed.

By advance in civilization is signified increase in the capacities of the human mind for varied enjoyments, and increase in the appropriate supply of these capacities. The early history of the race resembles the early period of individual life, when the chief enjoyments are those of the senses. The refined and varied pleasures of taste are but little attained except [pg 160] by cultivation. So also the higher pleasures of the intellect and of the moral nature are dependent on culture.

As every new avenue to enjoyment is opened, and every new capacity developed, there are inevitably resulting difficulties and temptations which, experience soon shows, must be regulated by laws and penalties. From this results the endless multitude of civil and statute laws, in addition to the various domestic and social rules enforced in the family, the school and the neighborhood.

All these laws and rules will be found to be only specific applications of the great law of sacrifice which demands that, in all cases, every mind shall choose what is best for self and best for the whole. The great democratic principle that the majority shall rule is but one mode of applying this general law of sacrifice.

In this aspect we can perceive how it is, that every attempt to develop any faculty of enjoyment in any created mind, and every effort to provide aliment for such developed capacities is right, as in agreement with the grand end designed by the Creator; provided it is done according to the great law of sacrifice disclosed by reason, viz., that individual enjoyment be made subordinate to the general good, and that no greater good be sacrificed for a less, either for self or for the commonwealth.

In this light, music, drawing, painting, sculpture, architecture, the drama, poetry, laughter, all things that impart enjoyment to any mind are right, provided no higher good is sacrificed in enjoying them. Nay, more; all these modes of imparting enjoyment may [pg 161] become positive duties, in cases where they do not interfere with some higher good.

This view of the subject still further illustrates the nature of that inability which exists in all finite minds in discovering and obeying the laws of God.

There are only two conceivable modes by which we can learn these laws; one is by the experience of finite beings; the other is by revelation from the Creator. To learn what is right and wrong by experience involves not only the certainty, but the necessity, as it respects the absolute right, of wrong-doing; for no one, however right the motive or intention may be, can discover what will cause more or less good or evil but by experiments in which the evil as well as the good is detected by experience.

To learn what is right and wrong in all the thousand and million complications of life by revelation, would involve the necessity of a direct revelation every hour of every day, to every individual of the race. But the only conceivable mode by which revelations from God are possible, is by miracles and prophecy, which are interruptions of the ordinary uniformity of nature. It is the fact that the laws of nature are uniform that alone makes miracles possible, so that incessant revelations by miracles would destroy such uniformity, and thus destroy the only conceivable mode of communication from the Creator.

This being so, the only possible method by which mankind can discover what is right and wrong in the greater portion of their actions is by an experience involving, more or less, wrong-doing as a part.

There are general rules of right and wrong which can be communicated both by God and man, but these [pg 162] rules are to be applied by men to the numberless and ever-varying circumstances of life, involving still the same necessity of experience of evil in order to detect the relative amount of good to be gained in the varied courses offered for pursuit to which these rules are to be applied.

Now the grand difficulty, as it respects both God and man, as before shown, is the positive inability of undeveloped mind to understand much of what is right and wrong. This difficulty meets the mature mind as really as it does the infant's; for while many of the general rules evolved by reason and experience are clear, and easily perceived, there are endless varieties of cases in which the application of these rules is a matter of uncertainty. For example, that men are to be honest and speak the truth, are rules universally appreciated. But then come the questions whether this and that thing is honest, or whether in this or that emergency it may not be right to say what is false. The higher men advance in civilization, and the more means and modes of enjoyment are discovered, the more complicated become the questions of right, and the more frequent the temptations to wrong.

All that can be done is to cultivate the conscience and train the reasoning powers of mankind, so that by means of the experience of life, as developed by individuals and communities, regard to the rules of right and wrong shall keep pace with the increasing civilization.

With these distinctions in the mind, we can perceive that sin, in its widest sense, including transgression of unknown law, is inevitable in a perfect system of finite minds, while in the limited sense, as transgression of known law, it is not so.

So also we can see, that without the intervention of the Creator to teach us, it is an impossibility for any human being to live without sin; so that this intervention is impossible except to a limited extent, without an entire change in the eternal nature of things to which God's own will is conformed.

Chapter XXVI. Humility and Meekness.

We have seen that we can learn what is right and wrong only by aid received from the experience of our fellow-beings around us.

But in order to this, there are certain virtues which are both difficult and indispensable. In studying the history of mind, it will be seen that the higher the grade of intellect and the greater its culture, the stronger is the love of intellectual supremacy and the more energetic the pride of opinion. It is a fact which none will dispute, that, as the general rule, having some exceptions, the class of minds most highly endowed by native talent and acquired culture, are most unwilling to take the attitude of learners toward their associates, and still more toward their inferiors in these endowments. When this pride of intellect and of opinion is combined with benevolence of disposition and with sensitiveness of conscience, there is nothing more difficult than to “become as a little child” in learning truth and duty. For the more benevolence and conscientiousness, the greater the unwillingness to be put in the wrong.

And yet, in the smallest sphere of life, between every individual and his neighbors, thousands of questions of right and wrong turn on how our words and actions will affect the happiness of those around; and there is no possibility of settling such questions but by leaving every person at liberty to communicate freely what does, or does not, give them pain or pleasure, and thus teach others how to make happiness and save from pain. In order to this, it is indispensable that every one be made to understand that our chief aim is to make happiness the best and right way, and that for this end we wish to have a perfectly free expression of wishes and opinions. For if it is perceived that irritability and alienation result from such a course, all those around us will conceal their feelings and opinions, and thus, for want of a true knowledge of circumstances, we shall “walk in darkness,” because we are not willing to be told the truths that put us in the wrong or expose our mistakes.

The same free expression of opinion and protest against all wrong, are as indispensable to the discovery of those rules of right and wrong, that are to be evolved from the general experience. Every man, woman and child in the commonwealth, should be perfectly free to set forth their opinions, experience, and reasoning, for the purpose of finding out what is best for the whole. Nor should they be withheld by the fear that such a course would place a parent, a brother, a friend, or a party in the wrong, and expose those dearest to us to blame. For the true happiness of each and all is to be secured by a knowledge of the truth, and often such knowledge can be gained only by exposing the evil results of courses that are [pg 165] pursued by the best and most conscientious persons.

In carrying out this principle, there must be discretion exercised as to time and manner of performing the duty; and there are some limitations to be recognized, which are matters of expediency. For example, a man must seek the best time to expose what is wrong, and he must seek to do it in a manner that will secure the good aimed at with the least possible evil. And if it can be done better by the agency of another, the aid of that other should be invoked.

So in regard to limitations, what is strictly personal should be confined to the party who alone is concerned. What relates solely to the family concerns should be confined to the family. Nor should any wrongs or dissensions be brought before the public except those in which the public welfare is involved.

But with these limitations it is the demand of reason and common sense, that every man, woman and child freely protest against all that they believe to be wrong in opinion or conduct.

In taking such a course, every man's success in discovering and propagating the truth will depend very much on the spirit with which it is attempted. If it is done in a self-sufficient, dictatorial, and denunciatory mode, the inevitable result will be to arouse those passions and prejudices which are most effectual in blinding the mind in discovering truth.

If, on the contrary, it is attempted with the humility, meekness and benevolence which are befitting ignorant, fallible and short-sighted beings, encompassed with such appalling difficulties and dangers, the most favorable of all influences will be exerted to secure a patient and candid attention.

Still, so sensitive are men to all implications of their motives or conduct, so unwilling are they to acknowledge themselves mistaken, that the faithful discharge of the duty of protesting against wrong, will always be attended with more or less of ill-will and bad passions.

In view of the above, if we were to predict what would be the first preliminary teaching of a messenger from the Creator imparting to us the true way of happiness-making, we should say, reasoning from the experience of life, it would read thus:

“Blessed are the poor in spirit;” that is, those who feel their poverty of mind as to the knowledge required for right action.

“Blessed are they that mourn;” that is, those who are troubled by this want.

“Blessed are the meek;” that is, those that can quietly and patiently bear reproof and fault-finding.

“Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness;” that is, those who are as earnest to find the right way of happiness-making as the hungry and thirsty are for food and drink.

“Blessed are the happiness-makers.”9

“Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake;” that is, those who are willing to suffer for the right.

Chapter XXVII. The Standard of Right and Wrong Decided by The Risks of Eternity.

It has been shown, that the more the capacities of men are cultivated, and the sources of enjoyment multiplied, the more complicated become the varying questions as to right and wrong moral action, and the more our reasoning powers and our conscience need to be cultivated in order to decide correctly.

Just as fast as men increase in the number and extent of the capacities and resources of enjoyment, will questions of right and wrong multiply, and rules be evolved, every one of which will rest on the grand law of sacrifice, which demands of every individual that he shall give up private feelings and choose what is best for all concerned.

These difficulties and complications are still more increased, if we are to take into account an immortal existence, and the influence which conduct and character in this life may have on a future eternity. What is best for each individual, and what is best for the commonwealth in such vast relations, involve questions far beyond the reach of human capacities, which only infinite wisdom can answer.

In all questions of right and wrong, for individual and for public interests, the degree of danger and risk involved, always is the ruling consideration. The greater the danger of the commonwealth, or of the individual, the greater are the demands for sacrifices [pg 168] on the part of all concerned. What would be right in circumstances of ease and safety, becomes the height of selfishness and crime in hours of peril and suffering.

To illustrate this point on a humble scale, let it be supposed that a vast and dangerous morass is filled with a multitude of travelers, of all ages and all degrees of intelligence, who can press through it to their homes only by difficult, dark, and circuitous paths. In addition to its morasses, pit-falls, swamps and fens, each path is beset with venomous reptiles, and its woods with ferocious beasts, while it is the young and tender who are the special objects of pursuit to these terrific foes. In such a community, and amid such dangers, all decisions of right and wrong, as to what was owed to others or to one's self, would be entirely diverse from what would be demanded were all in their safe homes. Sleepless nights, constant watching, painful toils, incessant vigilance, would be the imperious duty of every one, who could render any service. Amusements and sports, that in other circumstances would be wise and right, would be allowed only just so far as they tended to give relaxation or repose of mind and body to those who needed them, and only for the great end of securing a safe and speedy escape to all.

Now suppose that, in these circumstances, some of the wanderers are taught that there were no such dangers, that the paths were all safe and certain, and that every one of them would sooner or later arrive safely at home.

Others are taught that there probably is some danger and some doubt as to the amount of risks, yet as [pg 169] no one knows much about the matter, on any alternative, it is very wise to be careful and prudent.

Another class are taught that all these terrific dangers do exist; nay more, that it is certain that some are to be lost in pit-falls, some torn with wild beasts, some poisoned to death with venomous reptiles, and some for ever lost in bleak and cold morasses.

Meantime, who should be the lost and who the saved, and the number of the lost, would be entirely dependent on the care, vigilance, labors and sacrifices endured by each, not only for self, but for others.

It can easily be seen, that in these three classes there must be an entirely different standard for deciding all questions of right and wrong. What would be right and wise, in case there is little or no danger, would be folly and crime amid such terrific perils. In one case, each would have little concern or responsibility for any but self; in another case, all benevolent minds would be overwhelmed with anxiety for others as well as for themselves.

This being so, it is claimed that the deductions of reason as to the future immortality of man, and his risks and dangers beyond the grave, are indispensable to deciding multitudes of moral questions of the highest moment, while every person's standard of morality must be regulated by their decision of this question.

Chapter XXVIII. The Destiny of Man in the Future Life.

It has been shown, that the teachings of reason as to the immortality of the soul, and our risks and dangers after death, are indispensable to a true standard of morality, and to the decision of innumerable moral questions of the highest moment.

The next attempt, therefore, will be to set forth what can be learned by reason and experience, independently of revelation, in regard to the future destiny of man.

The first question relates to the existence of the soul after death, and its immortality. Here we have to guide us that great principle of common sense, which regulates mankind in all the practical business of life, viz., things are, and will continue according to past experience, until there is evidence of a change.

By the aid of this, we go forward in all practical affairs, believing that the beings and things around us are continued in existence till we have evidence that they are not. If any man were to talk and act as if every person was destroyed, and every town and village annihilated, as soon as the evidence of his senses failed, he would be deemed one who had “lost his reason.”

This same principle tends to the belief that the soul of man continues to exist after the dissolution of the body. We have no evidence that the separation of soul and body is an event that either injures or destroys [pg 171] the spiritual part. On the contrary, there are many analogies in nature that would lead to the impression that death gives new strength and powers to the disembodied spirit.

This being so, we have the same reason to believe that the soul of man exists after death as we have for believing that our friends are living when they leave us on a journey, and we have no evidence of their death. We can not see them, hear them, or feel them, and yet we believe they are living, we know not exactly where, because we have no evidence of their death. And so, after the dissolution of the body, though all evidence of sense as to the existence of their immaterial part ceases, we believe the same thinking, sentient spirits continue to exist, because we have no evidence that they have ceased to do so.

We have perfect evidence that the body ceases to exist as a body, for it moulders to dust. We have no evidence at all that the soul is either injured or destroyed. Such a thing as the destruction or annihilation of a spirit was never known or heard of from any quarter of earth or heaven.

We therefore conclude, that at the moment of death the soul is still existing with all its powers unchanged.

The same argument goes on still further, and leads to the immortality of the soul. We know of no cause or reason for the destruction of the soul at any future period. We never have known or heard that any soul ever ceased to exist. And so we infer, that the soul will keep on a perpetuated existence, by the same principle as that which leads us to believe the earth and the heavens will remain to future ages.

In regard to the character and condition of departed [pg 172] spirits, again we have the same principle to guide us. Without revelation, the past experience of mind is our sole beacon to give light as to its future destiny.

Our next inquiry, then, is, what does the past experience of mind teach us as to its condition beyond the grave? In pursuing this inquiry, we must recall, in brief forms, some of the points of mental experience set forth in previous chapters.

Some of the most important of these relate to the principle of habit by which the exercise of all our faculties becomes more and more easy by use. This is true of the intellect, by which we gain our knowledge of what will secure the most happiness; of the social nature, by which we give happiness to other minds and receive the same from them; of our moral nature, by which we are guided to justice, equity, and the rule of conscience; of our voluntary nature, by which we regulate all our other powers. Each and all are developed, strengthened, and facilitated in right action, by being exercised according to the laws of God.

The legitimate use of all our faculties induces also not only increased facility, but increased enjoyment. The more the intellect is trained, the more agreeable its exercise. The more our social nature is developed by use, the more its powers are developed and its blessed influence increased. The more our moral nature is exercised, the more vigorous becomes our sense of justice and the sensibilities of conscience, and the more pleasing their exercise. And the more the will is exercised in controlling every other faculty by the rules of rectitude, the more easy and delightful is this power of self-control.

The influence of habit in regard to the great law of sacrifice for the best good of all, is especially to be regarded. Such is its power that, in many cases, self-sacrifices that at first were annoying, or even painful, become sources of the highest and noblest enjoyment.

Another not less important influence of habit is, in regard to those modes of enjoyment which are most important to the commonwealth, and most happifying. The pursuit of these increases both desire and capacity for gratification, while those less important and more dangerous, if made the leading object of pursuit, diminish capacity while desire is increased. Thus the happiness gained in giving and receiving affection, in causing happiness to others, and in rectitude of action, all increase both the desire and the capacity for these important and elevated modes of enjoyments. Nor is there any danger of excess in forming habits in these directions. But the pleasures of the senses and the pursuit of power, honor, and other enjoyments that terminate in self, are liable to excess, and this excess diminishes the capacity for enjoyment, while the ceaseless craving of desire remains.

Thus it appears that a mind that forms habits of happiness-making according to right rules, becomes more and more strongly drawn to that course by finding more and more enjoyment in it, while a mind that pursues as a chief end the enjoyments that terminate in self, constantly loses capacity for such good, and yet the desire for it drives on to vain and cheerless efforts.

Another ominous fact in our mental nature is, the effect of habit in diminishing the control of the voluntary [pg 174] power. When any excessive or illegitimate mode of exercising the faculties becomes a ruling passion, the change of a habit thus formed becomes more and more difficult in exact proportion to the continuous repetition. Even when men see and feel that a habit is formed that increases their sorrow and diminishes their enjoyment, and that another course would render them every way nobler and happier, they find their purposes of change often are powerless. The control of the will continually yields to the force of habit, and so they are hopelessly driven on in their fetal pursuits.

Again, the effect of wrong action on the susceptibilities is as ominous as it is on the power of choice. We have seen that the design of painful emotions is to stimulate to the formation of good habits, and that when this legitimate object is not effected these emotions continually decrease in strength and vividness, so that the designed benefit is lost. Thus fear is designed to induce habits of caution, but if no such habits are the result, danger ceases to excite this emotion, and a man becomes at once fearless and careless. So with sympathy in the sufferings of others; if no habits of benevolent efforts to relieve are induced, that sensibility diminishes, and men become at once unsympathising, hard and cruel. So it is with shame; if it does not lead to habits of honor and duty, the susceptibility continually diminishes. And so it is with remorse; if habits of rectitude are not induced by its emotions, the conscience becomes “seared as with hot iron.”

But the most deteriorating effect of wrong action is seen in regard to that fundamental point of the mental constitution which makes it a source of happiness to [pg 175] be the cause of happiness to others. It is a universal fact that the tendency of disagreeable emotions is to lead to the infliction of pain on others. This propensity to inflict pain on whoever is the cause of pain, when regulated by the rules of rectitude, is the source of justice in the family and state, and leads only to good. But when it is indulged and unregulated, it is the most fearful feature in our mental constitution. The records of history exhibit many monsters of our race, whose mental constitution has become so disordered by habits of fatal indulgence, that all love of happiness-making for others seems destroyed, and the baleful pleasure of tormenting becomes a ruling passion.

Another feature of our mental conformation which directly bears on this subject, is the fact, that all those good qualities and benevolent acts which naturally tend to please and awaken the desire of good to others, may become sources of pain and ill-will. This is the case when the lovely and benevolent traits of other minds are contrasted with opposite traits in self. Thus it is that the selfish, cruel and malignant hate and are powerfully repelled from the generous, just and virtuous, while the good as instinctively fly from the wicked.

The natural result of these features in the nature of mind, is a continual tendency toward a separation of the good and the bad, the righteous and the wicked.

According to the teachings of experience, a mind that forms habits of selfishness and sin is constantly tending to a deterioration of its nature in all directions. And the course of obedience to the grand law of self-sacrifice for the best good of all, becomes more [pg 176] and more difficult and improbable. As the natural result the good are more and more attracted toward each other, and the bad are more and more repelled.

These tendencies, so plainly exhibited here, reasoning from experience, we infer are to continue after death, until the final result must be the entire exclusion of the evil from the good, whenever power exists to compel the separation. This power, all must feel is held and will be exercised by the Author of all minds, whose great plan, so far as reason teaches, can be carried to perfection only by such a consummation.

One point in the history of our race has a mournful pertinence to this question. We find that the improvement and the safety of the great commonwealth is always, more or less, promoted by the ruin of individuals. Multitudes are deterred from evil courses by the miserable end of those who pursue them; so that the good are often preserved by the destruction of the bad.

So, too, we find exhibitions of the fact that minds are utterly ruined, and ruined for ever, so far as we can perceive. The man who has stultified his intellect, ruined his health, seared his conscience, and blunted all his generous and benevolent sensibilities by a course of debauchery, cruelty and crime, is a wreck as total and irretrievable, so far as we can see, as a watch whose springs and pivots are crushed beneath the hammer, or a human body whose every lineament is effaced beneath the rushing locomotive train.

The common language of life expresses such mental facts in precisely the same terms as are applied to physical catastrophes. Thus, a man who is given [pg 177] up to debauchery, intemperance and crime, is said to be a “total wreck”—“entirely destroyed,”—“utterly ruined.”

Add to this the teaching of experience, that when men are bad, the increase of blessings only increases indulgence and crime. At the same time punishment does not tend to reformation. The more men suffer for their folly and guilt, the more hardened they become. The victims of licentiousness and intemperance, though they suffer such miseries, have ever been regarded as the farthest removed from the probabilities of reformation.

Add to all this, the deductions of reason as to the moral nature of the Creator and Governor of all minds. He has power to separate the good and bad; his great design, of which we here see only the tendencies, makes it indispensable to the perfect happiness of the good that they be separated from the bad—a perfectly happy commonwealth can not be attained where the bad form a part—while the sense of justice exists in God on a scale far above ours, demanding added penalties for the known and willful destruction of happiness. He, like his children on earth, feels that craving for retributive justice, which can never rest till the guilty and remorseless monster receives the just recompense for his cruelty and crimes.

These teachings of reason and experience lead to the conclusion, not only that there is to be a grand consummation in which all sin and suffering shall be ended in a perfected commonwealth, but also to the conclusion that those excluded from this community of the good are to continue their existence in sin and its natural results for ever.

That any portion, either of matter or mind, is to be annihilated, can not be inferred from any past experience. All that we can learn are the laws of perpetual succession and change. One single fact of annihilation has never yet been made known to man by any process of reasoning, or any recorded experience.

There is another question in reference to this awful subject, which is of deepest interest. Although the deductions of reason lead to the doctrine of the eventual separation of mankind into two distinct communities, the good and the evil, what are its teachings as to the immediate state of each individual soul after the event of death?

Here, as before, we have only the nature and past history of mind, from which the future is to be deduced. In this world we have found the changes in the character of individuals and of communities to proceed by slow and imperceptible movement. We have nothing in the past to lead to the belief that this slow process of discipline, culture and change may not proceed on for ages. As in this life, multitudes have the impress and direction of character given in early life, so that the first few years determine all their future history in this world, so the career of this short life may fix the future through eternal years. And yet the process of change to the full consummation of character may involve ages.

In studying the works of the Creator, we find that every thing goes forward on a system of developments. Nothing comes into being in full perfection, and unless there is an interruption of the natural tendencies of things, every thing reaches its full and perfected state before its existence ends. And the nobler, larger, [pg 179] and grander the existence, the slower it proceeds to its consummated perfection. The oak and the palm demand centuries ere they reach their perfected prime. The highest grades of animal life are slowest in gaining their full development. The horse, the elephant, and the camel, are going forward to perfection for years after the feebler tribes that started with them have perfected and perished.

Guided, then, by the analogies of experience, we should infer that mind, the noblest work of its Creator's hand—mind, that begins its career in such low and feeble development, is not to form the mournful exception to the general rule.

On the contrary, we infer from all past experience, both of matter and mind, that the soul, when it lays aside its outer covering, proceeds onward in its career of development. And if its period of progressive development is proportioned to its relative value in comparison with all other created things, the fleeting years of this life in relation to the ages previous to its prime, may be but as the first days of puling infancy to the whole career of manhood.

But this subject is imperfectly treated, if we neglect to consider the fact, that the soul, so far as we can perceive, is disembodied at death. We have perfect evidence, that the material part is destroyed, as to its organized existence. We have the same sort of evidence that the soul continues to exist, and will continue to exist, as we have that the sun exists when all evidence of sight ceases. But what is the experience of a disembodied spirit, we have no means of learning. It may be that its powers of knowledge and action are greatly increased, when freed from its earthly prison. [pg 180] If this be so, the experience of this life leads to the inference that its dangers and temptations are increased in exact proportion. Increase of civilization is only increase in sources of knowledge and enjoyment, and each addition brings new temptations, new rules, and the need of new penalties. It may be the same in the future life.

We can suppose the body a veil to hide our mind from another, and that death makes every soul “open and naked,” in all its thoughts and feelings, to every other disembodied spirit. What would be the effect of such a revelation, no one could say. But we should fear rather than hope.

If men are exasperated by words that exhibit only a portion of the scorn, contempt, and disgust felt toward the base and mean, not only by the pure and good, but by the wicked themselves, such a full revelation of all minds to all minds presents a theme for awful forebodings to the guilty. And even the purest might tremble to encounter such an ordeal. But over such terrific conjectures rest the darkness and silence of the grave.

The following, then, are the deductions of reason and experience as to the future condition of our race after death.

The soul, at the dissolution of the body, remains unchanged in its tastes, habits and character. The tendencies indicated in this life are continued indefinitely, and eventually will result in the separation of the good and the bad into two separate communities, the one, being obedient to all the laws of God, will be for ever and perfectly happy, and the other are to reap the natural results of disobedience, and whatever [pg 181] added penalties the best good of the universe may demand.

The final consummation in which this separation will be achieved, may be at the distance of ages, and in the meantime all those minds that have passed, or will pass from this life, are in the same process of culture, discipline, and upward or downward progress, which exists in this life. Whether these advantages and temptations will be greater or less in the disembodied state, we have no data for inference or conjecture.

The conduct and character formed in this life will have an abiding influence on the character and happiness of every mind through eternal ages.10

Chapter XXIX. What Must We Do To Be Saved?

We have considered the risks and dangers of the future state, as taught by reason and experience, and also as the foundation of a true standard of morality. We have seen that the true mode of escape from these dangers is the formation of a truly virtuous character, or in other words, it is making it our chief end to obey all the laws of God.

The next question is, what are the teachings of reason and experience as to the most successful modes of securing true virtue, or voluntary obedience to all the laws of God?

This brings up the inquiry as to the causes of voluntary [pg 182] action, and of the power which one mind has of securing right or wrong volitions in another.

In a previous chapter was pointed out the distinction to be recognized between the producing cause and the occasional causes of volition.

Mind itself is the only producing cause of its own volitions. Excited desires, and those objects which excite desire, are the occasional causes of choice.

The question is, in what sense can any being be the cause of virtuous actions, or virtuous character, in another mind?

Here we must recur to the fact that the Creator, as the author of all minds, and of all the things that excite desire, is the cause, in one sense, of all the volitions and of all the characters of all finite minds. It is in this sense that, in the Bible, the Jehovah of the Old Testament says, “I make peace and create evil.” No other being but the Creator can be regarded as the cause of volitions in this sense, viz., as the author of all minds and their circumstances of temptation.

There is a second sense in which the Creator is never the cause of sinful action in any mind. It is this: creating or modifying our susceptibilities, or arranging temptations with the design or intention of producing sinful action. This is established by proving, that the chief end of God is to make the most possible happiness, and that sin is the needless destruction of happiness, resulting from disobedience to the laws of God.

The only sense, then, in which God can be called the author or cause of sinful volitions in the minds of his creatures, is the fact that he is the author of all created minds and of their circumstances of temptation.

In regard to man, there are only two conceivable modes, in which he can be the cause of sinful or virtuous character in other minds.

The first mode is so to combine circumstances of temptation as to affect the most excitable and powerful sensibilities, or to remove those objects and influences that sustain moral principle, or by a long course of training, to form habits and induce principles. The combinations of motive influences that one mind can thus bring to bear on another, as temptations to right or wrong action, are almost infinite.

Another mode is by changing the constitutional susceptibilities. This can sometimes be effected to a certain degree by education, and the formation of habits. It can be still more directly effected through the physical organization. For example, a child may be trained to use coffee, tea, alcohol, or tobacco, till the nervous system is shattered, and then a placid temper becomes excitable, an active nature becomes indolent, and multitudes of other disastrous changes are the result.

When these two modes are employed with the design to induce wrong action, then men are blameable causes of sinful action and character in their fellow men. God, as above shown, never thus causes sin. When these modes are employed with the intention to induce virtuous actions and character, then both God and man are causes of right moral action in mankind.

Thus, it appears, that in the formation of virtuous character and habits, God, educators and self are the three combining causes, each being indispensable to the result, and thus each dependent on the others. God decides the nature and combinations of our susceptibilities [pg 184] and our circumstances of temptation. The educators of mind also modify the susceptibilities, and regulate the temptations. Self, as the producing cause of volition, decides the nature of our own volitions, and thus also coöperates to regulate circumstances of temptation.

The attainment of virtuous character, therefore, depends conjointly on God, man and self. It has been shown that God invariably does the best he can to secure the most perfect action possible in all minds.

The blamable causes of all failure in right and virtuous action are self and the finite educators of self. The unblamable causes are God, educators and self, so far as they are faithful in doing all they can to educate aright.

With these preliminary considerations, we proceed in the inquiry as to those modes which in past experience have been found most successful in securing virtuous character, or voluntary obedience to the laws of God.

The first cause of right moral action is a knowledge of and faith in the physical, social, intellectual and moral laws of God. It is impossible, in the nature of things, that a new-created mind should be possessed of such knowledge and faith. All that is possible, so far as we can learn by reason and experience, is that there should be a slow and gradual development not only of each individual mind, but of the whole race, as each generation, in turn, receives by instruction the experience of the one previous, and transmits it with its own experience to a succeeding generation.

The next thing that has been found efficacious in forming virtuous character is the formation of uniform habits of obedience to parental rule, in the early periods [pg 185] of existence. To secure this, invariable steadiness in government has been found indispensable. If a child finds that sometimes he is to obey and sometimes he is not, there is always a temptation to struggle against law. But if a parent's laws, rewards and penalties are as steady and sure as those of God, in due time the child submits as cheerfully to the domestic rules and commands, as he does to the laws of nature. He is no more tempted to contest parental commands than he is to attempt to stop the flow of a river or the falling of rain. In this way a habit of submission to law is generated, which makes all the future discipline and training of life comparatively easy. A child learns cheerfully to obey a heavenly Father, just in proportion as he thus obeys his earthly parents.

The next thing taught by experience is that children should be instructed as fast as possible in the reasonableness and benevolence of all the laws they are required to obey. Obedience is made easy and sure just in proportion as a child is made to perceive, that such obedience is best for himself and best for all concerned.

The next thing which experience has shown to be most effective in securing obedience to law, is love on the part of the educator, and corresponding love in return from the child. To gain the love of a child an educator must exhibit all lovable traits, and confer benefits, so as to call forth at once admiration, gratitude and affection. This renders it easy to the child to conform to the rules and wishes of one so beloved.

Sympathy with a child in all its trials and in all its enjoyments, still further increases this power of another mind in right guidance.

This sympathetic influence is greatly increased by the power of a virtuous example—especially if this example is exhibited by a beloved friend and benefactor, who would be gratified by thus guiding a dependent mind.

Another influence that tends to secure virtuous action is the bearing of pain and hardships even when it is not voluntary. Those children who are trained in a cold clime and on a hard soil, and who are early trained to hardships, find it far easier to conform to rule, and to bear sacrifices for the general good, than those whose lives have been a course of uninterrupted ease and indulgence.

To these, add the social influences of the example and sympathy of a surrounding community. Where all around are practicing virtuous conduct—where all admire and praise only what is good and right—it is far easier to secure obedience to the rules of rectitude, than where the example and sympathy of surrounding minds are opposed to virtue.

But the most powerful of all influences in securing virtuous action, is the principle of love and gratitude toward some noble benefactor, who saves from some terrible evils at the expense of great personal suffering and sacrifices, and who seeks his reward in the pleasure of redeeming those thus benefited, from the snares and ruin of sin. And the greater the evils averted, and the more severe the suffering on the part of the benefactor, the stronger the influence thus gained to secure virtuous character and action in the one thus rescued.

These are the influences which experience has [pg 187] shown to be most effective in securing virtuous character.

When the question is asked, “What must we do to be saved?” it may be answered in reference to all concerned in the matter; that is to say, “What must self do—What must our fellow-men do—What must the Creator do, to secure obedience to his laws, and thus to save from sin and its penalties?”

In view of the above teachings, each one for himself must seek, first, knowledge of the laws of God, and of their rewards and penalties as discovered by the experience of mankind. In order to do this, each must take all means to gain true teachers, and to receive their teachings in true faith, that is, that practical faith, which includes the purpose of obedience. Each must cultivate the intellect, the reason and the moral sense, in order to judge correctly in receiving and applying the rules of rectitude; each must seek to discover the reasonableness and benevolence of these laws, and form habits of steady obedience; each must seek to discover and rightly to appreciate all the good and lovable qualities of all who institute and administer laws, from the Creator to all subordinate rulers and governors in the domestic and civil state; each must seek the society of those whose sympathy and example would encourage and promote virtuous conduct; and finally, each must make obedience to all the laws of God the chief end or ruling purpose. These are briefly the reply to the great question in relation to self.

We are next to consider this question in relation to what men must do to save others.

Here we are to take into account two subjects previously [pg 188] illustrated; the first is that great law of sacrifice, by which each individual must make his own wishes and welfare subordinate to the higher interests of the great commonwealth; the second is the fact that all questions of right and wrong are dependent on the risks and dangers that threaten the commonwealth. In cases where there is little peril or evil, each individual has little responsibility for others. On the contrary, when all are exposed to terrific dangers and hazards, every individual is bound to think and care as much for the danger of each one as for his own. And just as much as the interests of all are of more value than those of one, so much more should each place the public welfare above that of self.

In a preceding chapter have been exhibited the risks and dangers of our race in reference to the future life. These are such, that without any appeal to revelation, every man of humanity and benevolence must feel that to save his fellow-beings from such dangers should become immediately his leading object of pursuit, his chief end.

In pursuing this as the main object of life, each individual is bound to follow the teachings of experience as to the most successful modes as set forth above. Each one, then, should become a teacher of the laws of God to all who are in ignorance, to the full extent of his power, and set forth all the motives to induce obedience; each should strive to exhibit all those qualities and deeds which will excite admiration, love and gratitude, in order thus to gain influence over other minds and guide them to virtuous conduct. Each should confer benefits and practice self-denying benevolence toward others and thus gain still farther [pg 189] influence. Each should strive to exhibit that example and that sympathy that are so effective in leading others aright.

In regard to those who are the educators of the young, each must strive to maintain that invariable steadiness in governments which is so effective in forming virtuous habits and in rendering obedience to the laws of God more and more easy.

Finally, it should be the aim of each to establish such a community around all who are being trained to virtue, that every social influence shall repress vice and encourage virtue.

Next, we are to consider the great question in reference to the Creator. What then must God do to save our race from sin and its miseries? What would reason and experience teach us to expect he would do to secure obedience to his laws?

In answering this question we must again refer to the causes which experience has shown to be most effective, for we can conceive of no other. We have examined the evidence that the Creator has given to each of his children such a constitution of mind and body, and such circumstances of temptation and trial as is best on the whole, as a part of an infinite system whose results are to develop through eternity. At the same time it has been shown that God is limited, by the eternal nature of things, to a course in which some evil must exist, so that all that is requisite to his character as perfectly benevolent, is that this evil should be reduced by him to its least possible amount.

To suppose that God can impart at creation of each mind all the knowledge of the millions of rules needed [pg 190] for all the myriads of new relations, of myriads of beings through all eternity, is to suppose an impossibility in the nature of things.

If it be maintained that the Creator is not thus limited by the nature of things, but, as theologians teach, could make mind perfect in all needed knowledge as in all other respects, at the first, then we have the greater contradiction involved in the fact, that a perfectly benevolent being chose for his children ignorance and sin in preference to knowledge and virtue.

To say that it may be best to create minds destitute of all needed knowledge when the want insures infinite wrong and suffering, and when there is power to create the knowledge that would insure perfect happiness, is simply a direct contradiction. It is saying that less happiness may be greater than greater happiness. For by “what is for the best” we understand “that which secures the most happiness.” And saying that making misery where there is power to make happiness in its place, is best, means nothing else but the assertion above, that less happiness is greater than greater happiness; or that less is more than most, which is a contradiction, inconceivable and absurd, so that no mind can either comprehend or believe it.

Now, every theologian of every school and of every sect maintains that “God does all things for the best.” Every one who believes in a benevolent Creator does the same. This is simply saying that God does the best possible; that is to say, there is no power that can make a better system than God has made, or administer it with more wisdom or benevolence. He has chosen the best possible and so he can not do any better.

These things being granted, the teachings of experience would lead us to suppose, still farther, that the Creator must do all that is possible to maintain invariable steadiness of government. We can see that this, which is so important in family government, must be still more so in an infinite family. For this end, the natural penalties for wrong doing, must be as invariable as the rewards for well doing.

Again, the Creator must instruct his creatures in his laws and their rewards and penalties to the full extent of his power. That is to say, he must provide well-trained educators of mind, as fast and as fully as is possible in the nature of things, having in view the results of eternal ages to guide his decisions.

Again, to secure voluntary obedience, he must add to the natural rewards and penalties of his laws, the other class of motives which experience has shown to be most effective. Thus, he must present himself to his creatures as a being possessing all those qualities which call forth the delightful emotions of admiration, reverence and love; he must show himself as a constant benefactor, and as one who “does not willingly afflict or grieve the children of men.” He must manifest his love to his creatures by word as well as by deed. He must come personally to provide for their wants and cheer them with his care. He must show his tenderness and sympathy in their trials and sorrows as well as in their joys. And if they are exposed to great dangers and evils from which they can be redeemed by self-sacrifice and suffering on his part, this highest and most effective proof of love must be exhibited.11

To this must be added, a manifestation of his chief [pg 192]desire, so that when love and gratitude ask, what can we do to please our benefactor in return, the answer shall be, obey his laws, and work and suffer for the good of all, as you see your Heavenly Parent does for you.

Finally, he must bring around each of his creatures the powerful social influence, not only of his own sympathy and example, but those also of a perfect commonwealth, where all shall be perfect as is the Father of all.

This is what we should evolve by the light of reason and experience, as what the Creator must do to save our race. Whether he has done all this, is a question that belongs to that system of religion which we can gain only by revelation from God.12

Chapter XXX. How Far Reason and Experience are Sufficient Without Revelation.

The preceding chapters present the system of natural religion, as it may be gained by experience and those principles of reason or common sense with which all men are endowed.

Whether mankind ever have, or ever would, fully evolve this system of religious belief without any aid by revelation from the Creator, is a question which we can not readily decide—inasmuch as the claim of Christianity is, that from the first, our race have been instructed by revelations from God, which have been more or less preserved in traditions and written records. [pg 193] It is certain that the elimination of this system, by unaided humanity, is dependent on the development of both the intellectual and moral powers, just as much so, as the physical discoveries of Newton, Copernicus and Columbus were dependent on the intellectual progress of the race.

In reference to the question of the necessity or importance of revelations from the Creator, it is interesting to examine how far those nations that have been most advanced in intellectual development, have secured this system of common sense, independently of the revelations contained in the Bible—revelations which also have been more or less incorporated by Mohammed into the Koran.

In a brief review of the pagan systems, that of Boodhism occupies the first place, as one which has had longest and largest control over civilized pagandom—one which has been most unimpeded by resistance, and one which now controls one half the human race.

We have seen that the common-sense system teaches an eternally self-existent Creator, perfect in knowledge, wisdom, power and benevolence, administering a perfect system by laws—his chief design being to produce the most possible happiness with the least possible evil. It teaches also, that the right voluntary action of mind, as a part of this system, consists in good willing toward the Creator, toward self, and toward our fellow-beings, according to the laws of God, so as to secure what is best for all concerned—making it imperative that self be made subordinate to the public good. It teaches also, that the most effective mode of securing this right action is, first, by imparting [pg 194] a knowledge of these laws and their sanctions, and thus influencing mind by the motives of hope and fear; next, by the motive influences of love, gratitude, sympathy and example, as mutually exercised by God, our fellow-men and self. Finally, it teaches that all questions as to what is right and wrong, are to be regulated with reference to the risks and dangers of a future life, and not with chief reference to this life alone—and that in this estimate the interests of self are to be made subordinate to those of the commonwealth.

We will now notice how far the system of Boodh corresponds with that of common sense.

This religion13 is one in which there is no intervention of any supreme God, or any self-existent being, or any Creator; on the contrary, all souls and all the universe exist from eternity. All souls from eternity have gone on transmigrating from one body to another, rising or falling in the scale of existence according to their merit or demerit. Boodh is a general name for a divinity or god. There have been innumerable Boodhs in different worlds and different ages, but in this world only four. These four are beings who have risen by merit through various transmigrations, and then became incarnate in human bodies. At last they were annihilated, none of them being now in existence—so that this world for centuries has been without any God.

The last Boodh of this world was Gaudama. He passed through innumerable transmigrations in four hundred millions of worlds, and attained immense merit. At last, he was born into this world the son of a king, about six hundred years before Christ. [pg 195] The moment he was born he exclaimed, “Now am I the noblest of men; this is the last time I shall ever be born!” He remained forty-five years as Boodh of this world—performed all sorts of meritorious deeds, promulgated excellent laws, and then was annihilated. Ever since, this world has had no God, and will have none for eight thousand years, when the next Boodh is to appear. The first three Boodhs left no laws or sayings. Those of Gaudama, the last Boodh, were reduced to writing A. D. 94, and these are the Bedegat, or Bible of the Boodhists.

These teachings of Gaudama are so obligatory, that disbelief of them is the only crime that incurs eternal punishment.

According to this system, true virtue or rewardable merit, consists in obeying the teachings of Gaudama. These teachings relate first to sins to be avoided. The five general laws are, not to kill, not to steal, not to commit adultery, not to lie, and not to drink intoxicating liquors. These are subdivided so as to include all sins of similar kinds under each head. For example, the first law includes even the killing of animals for food, also capital punishments and war.

Sins are divided into these three classes: first, those of the body, such as killing, theft, fornication, etc.; those of the tongue, as falsehood, harsh language, idle talk, etc.; and those of the mind, as pride, covetousness, envy, heretical thoughts, etc.

These writings of Gaudama strongly denounce the evils of pride, anger, covetousness, and all inordinate appetites. Men are exhorted to avoid excess in perfumes, ornaments and laughter—also strong drink, smoking, opium, night wanderings, bad company, [pg 196] idleness, anger under abuse, flattery to benefactors, annoying jests, and all that leads to strife.

For all such sins the most awful conceivable punishments are to follow in a future state, and for millions of ages.

Rewardable merit is of three kinds:

1. Obedience to all the preceding precepts and prohibitions, and the performance of all duties fairly deducible from them, such as integrity, gentleness, lenity, forbearance, condescension, veneration to parents and love to mankind in general.

2. Alms-giving and votive offerings. This includes feeding priests, building temples and accommodations for priests and for travelers, making roads, tanks and wells, planting fruit and shade trees, feeding criminals and animals, and finally, giving alms to all classes of men in need.

3. Prayers and reading the Bedegat, or religious books. Of this last kind of merit, there are three kinds: the first is the senseless repetition of prayers and reading; the second, reading intelligently; the last, is performing these exercises with strong desires and feelings. Prayers are not addressed to any God, as there is none existing now for this world. Gaudama, at his death, advised that, in addition to obeying his laws, his relics and image should be worshiped, and temples be built to his honor till the next Boodh came.

Votive offerings of fruit, rice and flowers are made to priests or placed in temples. The prayers consist of the repetition of soliloquies that express our liability to bodily evils and to mental suffering, and our inability to escape. Also of protestations of this kind, [pg 197] “I will not lie;” “I will not steal;” “I will not kill,” etc.

There are four Sabbaths or days for public worship each month, when the people go with votive offerings and prayers to the temple of Gaudama, but they have no general united worship.

The Boodhists have a hierarchy very much like the Catholic church, with varied grades and ranks. The priests are required to practice celibacy, and are mainly supported by voluntary gifts from the people.

They reside in buildings erected especially for them, and as celibacy and the avoidance of women are enjoined on all, these establishments very much resemble Catholic monasteries. Few of the priests preach, and only by special request, after which, presents are made to them. They attend funerals only when invited, and then expect presents. Part of them spend some time in teaching novitiate priests, but most of them, regarding work as unprofessional, spend their time in sheer idleness. It is the rule that each priest perambulate the streets every morning till he receives boiled rice enough for his daily wants. The higher class of priests avoid this. In Burmah the priests are at the rate of one to every thirty persons, and they are well supported by the people, and without interference from the government to enforce it.

As to the motives that sustain this religion, there being no God to the Boodhist, all motives arising from relations and regard to him are excluded. All the motives presented appeal to hope of good and fear of evil to self. Those who attain a certain measure of merit in obeying Gaudama's teachings go to some of the celestial regions, according to their attainments. [pg 198] These consist of twenty-six heavens, one above another, which offer various degrees of enjoyment according to merit obtained.

There are eight principal hells; four that torment with cold and four with heat. In the other hells are other sufferings, although not connected with heat and cold. Worms bite, bowels are torn out, limbs are racked, bodies are lacerated, they are pierced with hot spits, crucified head downward, gnawed by dogs, torn by vultures. These are described with minuteness in the Bedegat and often depicted by the native artists in drawings, reminding one of Dante's Inferno illustrated.

For killing a parent or a priest a man will suffer in one of the hells of fire for inconceivable millions of ages. Denying the doctrines of Gaudama incurs eternal suffering in fire. Insulting women, old men or priests, receiving bribes, selling intoxicating drinks and parricide, are punished in the worst hell.

Merit gained by any good conduct in these hells enables the person to rise even to the celestial regions.

The souls of all the universe have existed from eternity, transmigrating for ever, and thus rising and falling in the scale of existence according to the degrees of merit at each birth. This is decided not by any deity but by immutable fate. In passing through these changes the amount of sorrow is incalculable. The Bedegat declares that the tears shed by one soul in its various changes are so great that the ocean in comparison is but a drop. Sorrow is declared to be the inevitable attendant of all existence, and therefore “the chief end,” and the highest reward of Boodhism is, annihilation.

The system of Boodhism commenced about six hundred years before Christ, and has pervaded eastern, central and southern Asia about as long and as fully as Christianity has pervaded Europe. The Burman empire, where this account of that faith was obtained, presents the most favorable results of this system on the character and condition of its votaries.

In China, Buddhism (another name for Boodhism) is the popular religion. With it is associated Confucianism, which is a system of morals and politics instituted by Confucius, B. C. 550, which teaches nothing in regard to any God or a future state. With them co-exist the sect of Laotze, which is a kind of rationalism. Most of the temples and priests are those of Boodh or Budda, but there is no such organized priesthood as in Burmah, nor is this religion maintained by governmental power. It is also considerably modified by the more ancient system of polytheism.

In Thibet and Tartary, the religion of the Grand Lama chiefly prevails, which is one form of Boodhism.

In western India, Brahmanism is in constant warfare with Boodhism, and the two systems are perfectly antagonistic. Brahmanism teaches one eternal deity and three hundred and thirty-three millions of other gods, with hosts of idols representing them; Boodhism has no deity at all, and only one image, that of Gaudama. Brahmanism enjoins sacrifices; Boodhism forbids killing. Brahmanism requires atrocious tortures; Boodhism inculcates fewer austerities than even Popery. Brahmanism makes lying, fornication and theft sometimes commendable, and describes the gods as excelling in such crimes; Boodhism never confounds [pg 200] right and wrong, and never excuses any sin. Brahmanism makes the highest good or chief end of man to be absorption into the supreme deity; Boodhism makes annihilation the highest hope and aim of existence. These two systems, together with Mohammedanism, so prevail in Hindostan that the distinct results of each can never be compared. These are the prevailing religions in the most advanced pagan nations at the present time; and of the two, Boodhism is the best, and probably has been the most fairly tested in Burmah.

In past ages the two most highly developed heathen nations were those of Greece and Rome, and of their religion we have the fullest records. It is not probable that any one will consider their system of religion superior to this now exhibited of modern paganism.

The result is that the most highly developed heathen nations, as yet, have attained but very imperfectly the system of common sense.

No heathen religion ever taught an eternally-existing Creator, perfect in knowledge, wisdom, power and benevolence. None ever taught that the chief end of our Creator is happiness-making on the greatest possible scale. None ever taught that this also is the chief end for which man is created. None ever taught that right moral action, or true virtue, consists in good willing toward the Creator, toward self, and toward our fellow-beings, according to the laws of the Creator, so that every mind shall make the good of self subordinate to the general good. None ever taught that all questions of right and wrong, or what is for the best, are to be decided with reference to the risks and dangers of a future life. None ever presented communion with, and the care, sympathy, sacrifices, and example of a “long-suffering” [pg 201] Creator, as motives to secure virtuous self-sacrifice from his creatures. If all this is taught by revelations from God in the Bible, it is what was never taught by any other religion yet known on earth.

In the history of the heathen world, we find anxious inquiries on these subjects pressing on every thoughtful spirit. Who made this world with its profound and ceaseless sorrows? Are there contending deities, and are the malignant powers in the ascendant? If there be one supreme Creator of all, is he propitious or hostile to a race so guilty as ours? Does he feel any pity or sympathy for our profound ignorance, our infinite sorrows? Can we do any thing to gain his help in our darkness and misery? Where do we go when we die? Does our short and painful span of being end in eternal night, or are we to go on in another career of similar suffering and change? When we lay our beloved ones in the grave, shall we ever meet them again, or is “the only proper utterance of a broken heart, vale, vale, in eternum vale?”

These have been the mournful questionings of every age and every race, while the wisest sages of the wisest nations, without a revelation, have been unable to give any satisfactory reply.

Greece and Rome were the most civilized of all ancient nations, and they give us Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Cicero, as their best and wisest men, who most deeply pondered these great questions. Aristotle held to one superior deity, but taught that the stars are true and eternal deities. Cicero leads to the belief of many gods, and approves of worshiping distinguished men as gods. Socrates held to a plurality [pg 202] of deities, and also to transmigration. He held that the common sort of good men will go into the forms of bees, ants, and other animals of a mild and social kind. Plato held to two principles, God and matter, and that God was not concerned either in the creation or government of this world. He argued for the immortality of the soul on the ground of its pre-existence, and concludes some of his speculations thus:

“We can not of ourselves know what will be pleasing to God, or what worship to pay him; but it is needful that a lawgiver be sent from heaven. Such an one do I expect, and O how greatly do I desire to see him, and who he is!”

Chapter XXXI. Augustinian Creeds and Theologians Teach the Common-Sense System.

In the former portion of this work the Augustinian theory, with the system based on it, has been presented as it is taught by creeds and theologians. In contrast with it, has been presented the common-sense system of religion as evolved by reason and experience.

The evidence will now be presented, to show that those who teach the Augustinian system, at the same time teach the main points of the common-sense system; and where the two systems are contradictory, that they teach both sides of the contradiction, at once affirming and denying the same things.

A leading feature of the common-sense system is, that the nature of the human mind is our only guide to the natural attributes of God.

It will now be shown that leading theologians and metaphysicians of the Augustinian school teach the same.

The Calvinistic theologians of New England have been universally acknowledged as among the most acute and profound metaphysicians in the world. At the head of these stands President Jonathan Edwards. In reference to our modes of gaining a knowledge of God, he says:

Dr. Woods, for near half a century a leading theological teacher of New England, says:

Dr. Emmons, a distinguished New England divine, says of man:

Dr. Taylor, the New Haven divine, says:

The celebrated Scotch metaphysician, Sir W. Hamilton, says:

In proof of this from the Bible, these writers quote from the Apostle James, that “men are made after the similitude of God.”

Another leading feature of the common-sense system is the position, that we can discover the chief end or design of the Creator, by the nature of his works, and that this end is to produce the greatest possible happiness with the least possible evil.

It will now be shown that leading theologians teach the same.

President Edwards, in his Dissertation concerning the end for which God created the world, teaches that

He teaches that God is in no way dependent on his creatures for happiness, but that his enjoyment consists in outpouring his own good to his vast family.

No one can read that essay without perceiving that, though disconnected passages may make a different impression, the above is a correct statement of the doctrine of that dissertation.

It is supposed that this view has been assented to by most of those American and European theologians who most strenuously defend the Augustinian system.

The end or design of mind being ascertained, its right mode of action is thus determined. Accordingly we shall find that the great New England divines and metaphysicians, though they use different language, [pg 205] all express the same idea in defining true virtue or holiness.

Thus President Edwards taught, as his son states, that

Here let it be noted that President Edwards expressly teaches that it is not voluntary happiness-making, irrespective of the amount, that constitutes virtue; but it is “happiness in general—happiness on the largest scale.” This corresponds exactly with the common-sense system, demanding that happiness-making be on the greatest possible scale, and in order to this, it must be according to law or rules.

Dr. Dwight, whose system of theology is accepted as the most satisfactory exposition of the new school Calvinistic views, teaches that

In this case, the language of Dr. Dwight is not so discriminating and clear as that of President Edwards—for he does not show so clearly as does President Edwards that his real meaning is voluntary happiness-making on the largest scale. In this, and all the following quotations from other writers, it is a fact, as gained by their combined expressions, that the distinction [pg 206] made by President Edwards was accepted, and that by the “love of doing good,” or the “love of promoting happiness,” is intended that voluntary love or good willing which seeks not merely some good, but the best good of all.

Dr. Taylor, the distinguished successor of Dr. Dwight, teaches the same doctrine, as is so abundantly manifest in his published writings, that no quotations will be deemed needful.

The Westminster Assembly's Catechism teaches that

The glory of God can be secured only by true virtue in himself and in his creatures; and if this consists in voluntary happiness-making on the greatest possible scale, then the chief end of man, as taught in that old standard of orthodoxy, is exactly the same as is taught in the system of common sense. Man is to make happiness on the greatest possible scale, guided by the laws of God—and thus doing, he will “glorify God and enjoy him for ever.”

The same theologians also teach that the laws of God are our guide as to what is good and evil, and that true virtue, or right action, is secured only by obeying these laws. They hold, therefore, the doctrine of common sense, that all true virtue consists in voluntary obedience to the will of God as manifested in his natural and revealed laws.

The next point of agreement is in the proposition, that God always has, and always will do what is “for the best”—so that it always is and will be, out of his power [pg 207] to do better—inasmuch as to do better than best, is a contradiction and absurdity. Every theologian, in one form of words or another, maintains that God always has done, and always will do, the best he can, so that he has no power to do better. This being so, it is the same as teaching that the past, present and future existence of sin and misery, is what is inevitable in the best system which God has power to create, so that any change in God's plans, laws, and their results, would imply an act of folly and malevolence on his part.

This does not imply that the sinful conduct of man is what is desired or intended by the Creator—nor does it imply that sin was desired or intended by God as the “necessary means to the greatest good.” Instead of this, it is clear that if it had been possible—i.e., if God had the power—to create all minds with all the knowledge and all the motives that would secure perfect obedience to law from all the race of Adam, there would have been more happiness. The universal obedience of all free agents to all God's laws for making happiness on the greatest possible scale, would secure perfect happiness to all, while every act of disobedience would lessen the amount. To deny this is the same as saying that less happiness is more than the most happiness, which is absurd.

The result is, that sin is not the fault of the Creator, but is the inevitable result of the commencement of finite, ignorant, inexperienced minds, and is what neither God nor man could prevent, in a perfect system of finite, free agents.

At the same time, it is the fault of all free agents who sin when they have adequate knowledge and [pg 208] motives. And it is only sins against known law and appropriate motives which are the proper subject of penalties in addition to the natural consequences of wrong doing.

It is claimed, therefore, that when theologians teach—as all do—that “God orders all things for the best,” they really teach, in another form, the common-sense doctrine as stated above.

Having gained the teachings of leading theologians as to the nature of true virtue or right voluntary action, we also gain their definition of wrong moral action, or sin. In the words of President Edwards, “Every voluntary action which in its general tendency and ultimate consequence leads to happiness—happiness in general—happiness on the largest scale—is virtuous; and every such action which has not this tendency, and does not lead to this consequence, is vicious,” or sinful.

That is to say, every volition that tends to lessen the general happiness, is vicious or sinful, and every violation of God's physical, social and moral laws, has this tendency. Thus the Bible definition of sin is the one accepted by theologians—i.e., “sin is the transgression of law,” without reference to the question whether the law is known or not. True virtue is voluntary obedience to law, and sin is the voluntary transgression of law. These definitions then are a part of the Augustinian system as much as they are of the common-sense system.

The next point of the common-sense system taught by theologians, is that our moral power to obey God—i.e., power to choose according to law instead of impulse—is proportioned to our knowledge of law, [pg 209] and the motives of fear, hope, love and gratitude, as they are employed by God and man.

This doctrine is taught by all theologians, except those who hold that the sin of Adam so ruined the human mind, that there is no power of any kind to obey God, except as he gives new capacities. No quotations will be given to establish this point, because, it is believed, that no one will question it.

No quotations are needed to show that the Augustinian creeds and theologians agree with the common-sense system, in teaching that the soul is immortal—that our destiny in a future state depends on our conduct in this life—that there is to be an eternal separation of the righteous and the wicked, whose immortality will be happy or miserable according to their characters.

Chapter XXXII. Augustinian Creeds and Theologians Contradict the Common-Sense System, and Thus, Also, Contradict Themselves.

The preceding chapter shows the agreement of distinguished Augustinian theologians with the leading points of the common-sense system. We next are to notice the particulars in which these theologians and the Augustinian creeds contradict the common-sense system, and thus, also, contradict themselves.

The grand point, which involves these contradictions, [pg 210] is the dogma that all mankind have a depraved nature consequent on the sin of Adam, which makes it certain that every voluntary act of every human mind is “sin, and only sin,” until this depravity of nature is more or less rectified by the Spirit of God. The opposite of this is the common-sense doctrine that all men have a perfect nature, created by God, which is unchanged and not in any way depraved by the sin of Adam.

As involved in this common-sense view, true virtue consists in the right action of a perfect nature, as it now is. In opposition, Augustinianism teaches that true virtue consists in the right action of a depraved nature after it has been more or less renewed by the Spirit of God.

Common sense claims that the indispensable requisites to secure right voluntary action are, knowledge, training and motives, for which we are dependent on God, on man, and on self, conjointly. In opposition, Augustinianism claims that knowledge, training and motives are of no avail to secure true virtue, until the damage done by Adam's sin to the nature of every human mind, is more or less rectified, and that for this we are entirely dependent on the Spirit of God.

Common sense claims that man, at birth and through life, is entirely unable to obey many of the physical, social and moral laws of God, for want of adequate knowledge, training and motives; but that he is fully able to obey these laws as fast as he has the appropriate knowledge, training and motives, and that before regeneration he does perform truly virtuous acts. Augustinianism, in opposition, claims that man never obeys the laws of God acceptably until the Spirit of [pg 211] God more or less rectifies the depraved nature consequent on Adam's sin, and that previous to this influence of the Spirit, every voluntary act is “sin, and only sin.”14

Common sense teaches that the commencement of “a new life” consists, not in the change of the nature of man, but in the commencement of a ruling purpose to obey all the laws of God, which purpose may be an unconscious, gradual process by educational training, or it may be an instantaneous and conscious act. Augustinianism teaches that “regeneration” or the “new birth” consists in the re-creation or change of the nature of mind, so as, more or less, to remedy the depravity consequent on Adam's sin.

Common sense teaches that every volition of every mind, which in act and intention is conformed to the laws of rectitude, is truly virtuous in every proper use of the term, without any reference to the question either of a ruling purpose or a change of nature. Augustinianism teaches that every volition of every mind is sin, and only sin, previous to the act of regeneration accomplished by the Spirit of God.15

To illustrate the above by examples, suppose that a child is trained to deny itself, to relieve suffering, or to make others happy. In its earlier efforts this is very [pg 212] difficult, though by practice the principle of habit renders it more and more easy. Common sense teaches that the first act of self-denial for the best good of others, in which the aim or intention is to do right, is truly virtuous. For the thing done is right, and the motive or intention is right. But Augustinianism says no; such an act is “sin, and only sin,” previous to regeneration, though it is true virtue after regeneration.

Again, a young man is trained to abhor meanness and deceit and to suffer any thing rather than to violate his plighted faith. He is brought into an extremity where, by a false statement, he can escape poverty and disgrace to himself and his family. He sacrifices all rather than to violate his word and honor.

If he is not a regenerate man, Augustinianism says this act is not truly virtuous, but is “sin, and only sin.” Common sense says, it is a virtuous act in every sense of the term as used among men.

We have shown by quotations that Augustinian theologians teach that man's nature is the only guide to the nature of God, and, as his work and image, is perfect in construction. At the same time they teach that man's nature is so totally depraved that it never acts morally right, in a single instance, until it is regenerated by God, and that all sin is the natural result of this depravity of nature.

In consequence of this contradictory starting-point, they proceed to other contradictory instruction. For example, in the education of very young children most theologians, of whatever school, teach them that to speak the truth, to obey parents, to deny one's self [pg 213] for the good of others, is right, good and virtuous. They teach that when little children act thus, before regeneration, they not only act virtuously, but that God approves and loves them for it. In doing this, they use the words good, right and virtuous, in the ordinary sense in which men understand these terms.

But at the same time, the same theologians are teaching from the pulpit and the press, that every voluntary act of every child is “sin, and only sin,” previous to regeneration; that there is no good, right and virtuous act in an unregenerated mind, and that God feels no approbation or complacency in such acts or the unregenerated as the above, which are called virtuous, but are really sin.

It is manifest that the educational training of the young must be radically diverse just in proportion as one or the other of these two systems prevails.

On the Augustinian theory, there is no hope of any right moral action, or truly virtuous conduct, until the depraved nature transmitted from Adam is regenerated. On the common-sense theory, every attempt of a parent or educator, and every effort of a child to secure what is best and right with the intention thus to secure it, is truly virtuous, and every repetition is valuable as tending to secure virtuous habits and character.

On the Augustinian theory, religious instruction is only an appointed mode by which God chooses to regenerate a depraved nature. It is a process for securing a new nature from God. On the common-sense theory, religious training is a process for securing the development and right action of mind by the influences [pg 214] of knowledge, training and motives, and without any change of its nature.

It is also clear that these two systems must be very diverse in reference to the interpretations of the Creator's will as gained by reason or by revelations from God.

On the Augustinian theory, mind is so totally depraved as to be incapable of interpreting correctly, either the natural teachings of reason and experience, or the recorded revelations from God. Owing to this, authorized interpreters of God's will are indispensable. This makes the whole human race dependent on a class of men authorized by God to interpret his natural laws and revealed will.

On the contrary, the common-sense theory claims that every mind, in proportion as its powers are cultivated and developed, has the means of discovering the end for which all things are created, and of interpreting the teachings of reason and experience, and also of interpreting any revealed records of God's will.

It thus appears that theologians and creeds that adopt the Augustinian theory contradict themselves mainly in these two points:

First, they teach that man's nature is depraved and that it is not depraved.

Next, that previous to regeneration, men do not perform any truly virtuous acts, and yet that while unregenerated they do perform such acts.

The quotation from creeds and theologians, in preceding chapters, is proof that they teach that man's nature is thus depraved, and that previous to regeneration he never performs a single truly virtuous act. [pg 215] This and the preceding chapter present some of the evidence that they teach the opposite.

The following is submitted as still further evidence of such contradictions.

In the first place, it is allowed by all, that the Augustinian creeds and theologians teach that man, as a race, including every individual, has a depraved nature. The question, then, all turns on the meaning of the word nature, and whether they affirm its depravity in the same sense as they affirm that in nature man is the living image of the living God and our only guide to a knowledge of him.

It is claimed that they do use the word nature in one and the same sense when they affirm that man's nature is and is not depraved. In proof of this we must resort to our lexicographers who have collected the various senses in which mankind use the word nature. And here we must again recognize the fact that the true meaning of every word is settled simply by ascertaining what meaning men attach to it when they use it.

In examining our dictionaries, we shall find that the word nature is used sometimes to signify every thing that God has created; as when it is said, “all nature speaks its Maker's praise.” Sometimes, by a figurative use, the Author of all things is called Nature, as when it is said that “Nature paints the flowers and spreads her repasts.”

No one will claim that either of these is the sense in which the word is used in reference to the nature of the mind of man as a race.

The leading and primary signification of the word nature is that which is intended and understood when [pg 216] we say that “the nature of a design or construction is proof of the character and intention of the author.” It is in this sense that men use the word when they speak of the nature of animals, the nature of trees, and the nature of the soul.

In this use, it has but one signification, and that is, those qualities, powers and faculties which are discovered by experience and observation. Or in other words, when we discover the qualities of a thing, how it acts, and how it is acted upon, we learn its nature.

In regard to all other existences except mind, the only mode of discovering their nature is to ascertain by experience and observation how they invariably appear and act. Thus we decide that it is the nature of water to run down hill by finding that it invariably does so; and that it is the nature of smoke to rise in the atmosphere by observing that it invariably ascends.

Owing to this, mankind often use the word nature as signifying that which is according to ordinary experience. That is to say, the same word is used to express the qualities and powers of things, and also to express that invariable experience by which we learn these qualities and powers. What is according to our ordinary experience we say is according to nature, and what is contrary to ordinary experience is contrary to nature.

Thus it is according to nature for water to run down hill, and it is contrary to nature for it to run up hill.

It is mind, in distinction from matter, which has the power of willing, and this is a power which never is exercised invariably one way or another.

But theologians have practiced this fallacy on themselves [pg 217] and others. They first assume, what is contrary to fact, that mind invariably chooses one way, and that is wrong, from birth to regeneration. This being assumed without proof, they claim that the nature of the human mind is thus proved to be depraved, and totally so.

Having thus, as they imagine, established its depraved voluntary nature, they claim that, like all other things, the mind must act according to its nature, which, being wholly depraved, all its moral acts are consequently depraved.

This is what logicians call arguing in a circle; i.e., they prove that it acts invariably wrong because it is totally depraved, and it is totally depraved because it acts invariably wrong.

But common sense denies the starting assumption; i.e., the invariably wrong volitions of every mind from birth to regeneration. On the contrary, it is claimed that every choice which secures enjoyment without violating law, is right, and that whenever a mind chooses what is right, with the intention to act right, the choice is a truly virtuous act, and that all men make such choices very often before regeneration.

Whatever is according to ordinary experience in the qualities and action of mind, is said to be according to its nature. It is according to the nature of mind, then, sometimes to choose what is good, right and virtuous, and at other times to choose what is evil and wrong, according to its knowledge, temptations and habits. Such a case never was known as a mind that invariably chose wrong.

In view of the preceding, it is maintained that the word nature, as applied to mind, as settled by lexicographers, [pg 218] is always used to signify the same as its constitutional powers and faculties, and that this is the sense in which it is employed when we say “the nature of a construction or design is proof of the character and intention of the author.”

We are now prepared to show that theologians use the word nature in this same sense when they affirm that it is totally depraved, and when, at the same time, they teach that it is the image of God, and our only guide to his nature and character.

We shall first present the evidence that they use the word in this sense, when they teach that every human mind is so depraved in nature that from birth to regeneration every moral act is sin, and only sin.

The first item of evidence is the fact that all the other meanings of the word, in our dictionaries, except this, can be shown to be not the ones in which theologians use the word in reference to men as a race, so that this use is the only one remaining. They must use it in this sense, as the only one left, all others being necessarily excluded.

Again, the mode by which they attempt to prove that man has a depraved nature, shows that they use the word in this sense. For they exhibit the wrong action, or sinful feelings and conduct of the race, as the chief proof. Their argument is this: the nature of a thing is proved by its qualities, how it acts, and how it is acted upon. The human mind invariably acts depraved, therefore its nature is depraved. No one will deny that theologians always present the wicked feelings and conduct of children and of men as the proofs of a depraved nature.

It is true, that in doing this they misstate facts, and [pg 219] maintain that all the actions of men are sin, and only sin. This contradicts experience and common sense, which affirm that the human mind sometimes acts right and sometimes wrong, from the first; showing that the nature of mind is such that it naturally acts right as well as wrong. But this attempt proves that they used the word in the sense here stated.

Again: that theologians use the word in this sense, is manifest from their attempts to relieve the character of God from the charge of being “the author of sin.” They can not deny that the nature of a contrivance proves the character and intention of the author, and that, if God is the author of man's depravity by a wrong construction or nature of mind, it would be proof that he is the author of all the sin resulting from it, and thus a depraved character.

Instead of denying this use of the term, they allow it, and then try to make man himself the author of this depraved nature, either by, or in, or before Adam. That is, they allow that man's mind is wrong in construction, but claim that he himself is the author of this wrong.

Again: that theologians use the word nature in this sense, is proved by their description of the depravity intended by them. When they are urged to point out what the depraved nature of man consists in, they always state something which shows it to be wrong in construction, and which is exhibited in the wrong action of mind.

There are these following methods of describing this depravity, viz.:

1. It is called a bias, propensity, or inclination to sin.

2. It is called an unbalanced state of the faculties.

3. It is called a habit of sinning formed in a pre-existent state.

4. It is called a wrong combination, or proportion, in the mental faculties.

5. It is called a state resulting from the deprivation of God's Spirit.

It will now be shown that each and all of these equally involve the idea of that malformation or wrong construction which proves its author depraved.

The first is the most common method. On this view, it is claimed that the minds of angels and of Adam were constructed with such a bias or tendency to good as secured their perfect action for a given period. The mind of man, on the contrary, begins existence here so constructed that it has a contrary bias to evil; so that it never, in a single instance, chooses right till regenerated.

The angels and Adam had a holy nature, meaning a bias, which God created. Mankind have a contrary bias, which is a depraved nature, and of this, man is the author, either in, or by, or before Adam. And they all allow, that if God had created this depraved bias, or depraved nature, he would be “the author of sin.”

The second mode is, the claim that man's depravity consists in an unbalanced state of his faculties or propensities. The angels and Adam were created by God with the proper balance, and this is the holy nature made by God. Man is born with an unbalanced state of the faculties, and this was created by man himself, either by, or in, or before Adam. Now the balance of the faculties is as much a part of the construction of mind as any thing else, and if God created this depraved, he is proved to be depraved.

The third mode is, the claim that the depravity of man's mind consists in a habit of sinning. On this view, God created man's mind aright, in all respects, in a preëxistent state. In this normal condition of mind, every propensity was toward not only good, but to the best good, while there was sufficient knowledge of right created also, to save from all mistakes of judgment as to what is best and right. In this perfect state some minds began to sin, and thus formed a habit of sinning, and were then sent into this world to be reformed.

Here it is plain, that the depravity intended is depravity of construction. For habit, as men use the term, expresses the fact that repetition in the use of any faculty increases its power. It is a change in the constitutional construction of mind induced by use. For example, a child has little constitutional power of mind to reason or to calculate figures. By use, this deficiency of construction is modified.

Habit, then, modifies the constitutional organization of mind.

This mode of describing the depravity of mind teaches the misconstruction of constitutional organization as much as all the others, but it furnishes another mode by which it was induced, so as to make man the author in a way that is comprehensible, and not absurd.16

The fourth mode is the claim that the depravity of the human mind consists in the disparities, or varieties, of constitutional organization.

It has been shown that such disparities, as parts of a vast system in which the best good of the whole is the best good of each part, are indispensable to the perfect construction of mind in relation to that system.

But the depravity claimed is, that which is common to every mind, and is so total that not a single mind, however highly endowed, ever, even in one case, acts virtuously till regenerated. Thus the best in mental construction are as totally depraved as the worst. At the same time, it is clear that it is constitutional malformation that is taught, and nothing else.

The fifth mode of describing the depravity of mind is that it consists in the deprivation of God's Spirit.

The result of this deprivation is thus described by Dr. Hodge, of the Princeton Calvinist school of divines:

Arminius, the chief theologian of the Methodists, describes it thus:

Thus the presence of God's Spirit in Adam's mind, according to Dr. Hodge, insured a “disposition” to delight in God, which was lost by its withdrawal. According to Arminius, this withdrawal so affected the whole race, that “in respect to the true good” the will of man has no powers whatever, except such as are excited by grace—that is, by a measured return of God's Spirit, withdrawn for Adam's sin, which return was purchased by Christ's death.

It is clear, that it is the powers and faculties of mind that are meant here, in this explanation of the depravity of man's nature.

Thus it is shown that every attempt to explain what depravity consists in, by theologians, results in their teaching a constitutional malformation, which proves the author of the construction to be depraved.

We will now present the evidence, that theologians contradict themselves, and deny that they use the word nature in the sense of constitutional organization or construction, and maintain that they use it in some other sense.

In all creeds and all theological teachings, the authors expressly disclaim that they maintain any thing which makes God “the author of sin.” And they allow, that making God the creator of a depraved nature, would make him the author of sin. Therefore, to escape the difficulty, they claim that God is the author of one nature, which is perfect and in his own image, and that there is another nature which man himself made, either by, or in, or before Adam, which is depraved. Then when they are driven to identify the nature that God made and the nature that man made, they are again at fault. Man really has but one nature, and that is the nature which is discovered by his qualities and actions, as learned by experience. There is no other nature conceivable, and no other idea that men ever attach to the word when applied to the mind or soul of man. Therefore, theologians really do use it in the sense which they deny, for there is no other.

Again, theologians deny that they teach “physical depravity” and “physical regeneration,” and the only intelligible sense of this disclaimer is, that they do not teach depravity of construction and the reformation of this depravity of construction. But, as before shown, when they describe the depravity and regeneration, [pg 224] they make out what actually is physical depravity and physical regeneration, and nothing else.

Again, when they attempt to describe what they mean, one class of theologians—i.e., new school Calvinists—teach that the whole depravity consists in a want of “right willing.” And this is exactly what the common-sense system teaches—i.e., that the depravity of man is in the wrong action and not in the wrong construction of mind. And yet when they are charged with holding the Pelagian doctrine of perfect mental construction, they deny it, and say they teach depravity of nature.

As an example of this, is presented the following extract from the writings of Dr. Bennet Tyler, the president of a theological seminary established to sustain the New England theology of the President Edwards' type, in opposition to the supposed Pelagian innovations of the New Haven theologians:

In reading the above, one would suppose that there was nothing wrong at all in the construction of the human mind, and that the whole difficulty consisted in not willing aright—that is, that the depravity is not in a wrong nature, but in the wrong action of a perfect nature. And yet, at the time of this writing, the author was the leader of an effort to oppose this very [pg 225] doctrine, which was supposed to be taught by the New Haven divines.

In a recent work by the chief theological teacher of the leading Baptist Seminary,17 we find similar contradictory statements. He thus writes:

In this passage, regeneration is called “a creative act” changing the conscience, the desires, the views, the prejudices and the motives—so that “the entire spirit is readjusted,” and all its “aspirations, tendencies and relations to God are rectified.” It is not in the power of language to express a change in the faculties and constitutional elements of mind more entirely than this; and yet the very next paragraph reads thus:

But the most remarkable illustration of self-contradiction among theologians, involved in every attempt to maintain a depraved nature consequent on Adam's sin, is found in the teachings of Dr. Taylor, the leader of the New Haven school of divines.

In his Concio ad Clerum, in 1828, one aim probably was, to meet the charges against himself, of teaching the Pelagian tenet, that man's depravity consists, not in nature, but in action. In reference to this he writes thus:

Again—

In the above extract, it is as clear as language can make it, that Dr. Taylor taught, in 1828, that in men sin by nature is owing to propensities to inferior good, which are “different from Adam's,” who was created perfect, and that this is “the occasion or reason” of their sinning, and that “such is their nature, that in all appropriate circumstances of their being, they will sin, and only sin.” This must mean the construction of [pg 227] mind. He does not claim to describe, certainly, what this difference is between the nature of Adam and that of his descendants; but he maintains that while Adam's nature was not so created by God at first, the nature of all his descendants is so depraved, that, as the result, they “sin, and only sin,” till regenerated.

But, in contradiction to this, is presented the extract below, sent by Dr. Taylor to the author, in a letter in which he was attempting to show that he did not teach the depravity of man in his constitutional faculties. And he claims that what he thus writes is what he has “always taught:”

Now it is not possible to make these two extracts any thing other than exact contradictions. For in one he teaches that men are so totally depraved in nature, that “in all the appropriate circumstances of their being they will sin, and only sin.”

In the other, he says of man, “I have never supposed that he has a depraved nature, in any sense, or a corrupt nature, much less a sinful nature, to be changed; but rather that in nature he is like God.”

If it is asked, “How is it possible that a man, at [pg 228] once so honest and so acute, can thus contradict himself and not perceive it?” it may be replied, that he has done it no more than does every other theologian and every creed that teaches at once, that the nature of man is so depraved at birth that every moral act is sin, and only sin, till regeneration—and yet, that God, the Creator of all minds, is not the author of the sin resulting from such a depraved nature.

And theologians are not peculiar in self-contradictions. Every error is a contradiction to some principle of common sense. Thus it is a fact, that, as all men believe and maintain, by a necessity of nature, the principles of common sense, every false principle or error which they defend, is a flat contradiction to some of their other declarations on other occasions. Meantime, it is the great mission of all free and fair discussion to bring men to see their own inconsistencies, and to forsake all which are shown to be contrary to reason and common sense.

Chapter XXXIII. The Augustinian Theory Not In The Bible.

In the preceding chapters it is shown that theological creeds and teachings maintain the common-sense system, and at the same time the contradictory Augustinian system. In other words, it is shown that the Augustinian theologians contradict at once our common sense, our moral sense, and themselves.

It will next be shown that the Augustinian theory is not contained in the Bible, and that theologians conflict with each other in regard to this point also.

There is only one passage in the Bible which was ever claimed by any one as teaching a depraved nature consequent on Adam's sin. That passage is Romans v., from the 12th to the 19th verse:

In this passage these things are taught:

There are three modes of interpreting this passage, and the question all turns on whether the death spoken of is natural death or spiritual.

Chapter XXXIV. A Reliable Revelation From The Creator Impossible If It Contains The Augustinian Theory.

The object aimed at in this chapter demands attention to the following preliminaries.

Before we can gain a reliable revelation from our Creator, we are obliged to establish the truth that there is such a Creator. Our only mode of doing this is by the method already set forth in chapter 10, and for which we are dependent on our reason or common sense.

Having, by the aid of reason, arrived at a knowledge of the existence and character of the Creator, we next inquire as to the mode by which we can receive direct revelations from him.

Here we find that we are again wholly dependent on reason or common sense. The principle on which we alone rely for revelations from God is this:

A change in the established order of nature surpassing human power, is evidence of a supernatural agency that is sanctioned by the Author of the Laws of Nature.

The conviction of the wisdom and power of the Author of this vast and wonderful frame around us is such that, whatever changes may occur in its established order, must be felt to be by his permission.

To illustrate this, suppose a man appeared, claiming to be a teacher sent from God. In proof of this, he commands a mountain to be uptorn and thrown into the sea. Now, if this phenomenon should follow his command, it would be impossible for any who witnessed it, to refrain from believing that the Author of Nature performed this miracle to attest the authority of his messenger.

In order to insure this belief in the interference of the Creator, there must be full evidence that there can be no deception, and that the miraculous performance is entirely beyond human power and skill. Men always talk and act on the assumption that such miracles are from God, and all rational minds so regard them.

We have shown that the chief cause of a wrong action of mind, is that it commences existence in perfect ignorance, while all those causes which experience shows to be indispensable to its right action, to a greater or less degree are wanting.

The grand want of our race is perfect educators to train new-born minds, who are infallible teachers of what is right and true.

We have presented the evidence gained by reason and experience that the Creator is perfect in mental [pg 236] constitution, and that he always has acted right, and always will thus act. This being granted, we infer that he always has done the best that is possible for the highest good of his creatures in this world, and that he always will continue to do so.

We proceed to inquire in regard to what would be the best that is possible to be done for us in this state of being, so far as we can conceive.

Inasmuch as the great cause of the wrong action of mind is the ignorance and imperfection of those who are its educators in the beginning of its existence, we should infer that the best possible thing to be done for our race, would be to provide some perfect and infallible teacher to instruct those who are to educate mind. This being granted, then all would concede that the Creator himself would be our best teacher, and that, if he would come to us himself in a visible form, to instruct the educators of mind in all they need to know, for themselves and for the new-born minds committed to their care, it would be the best thing we can conceive of for the highest good of our race.

We next inquire as to the best conceivable mode by which the Creator can manifest himself so as to secure credence.

To decide this, let each one suppose the case his own. Let a man make his appearance claiming to be the Creator. We can perceive that his mere word would never command the confidence of intelligent practical men. Thousands of impostors have appeared and made such claims, deceiving the weak and ignorant and disgusting the wise.

A person with such claims, were he ever so benevolent and intelligent, but having had no other evidence [pg 237] than his word to support them, would, by sensible persons, be regarded as the victim of some mental hallucination.

But suppose that a person claiming to be the Creator of all things, or to be a messenger from him, should attest his claim by shaking the earth, or turning back the floods of the ocean, it would be impossible for any man to witness these miracles without believing, that the Author of all things thus attested his own presence or the authority of his messenger. We have shown that the very organization of mind would necessarily force such a belief on all sane minds.

One other method would be as effective. Should this person predict events so improbable and so beyond all human intelligence, as to be equivalent to an equal interruption of experience as to the laws of mind, as time developed the fulfillment of these predictions, the same belief would be induced in the authority of the person thus supernaturally endowed.

In the case of miracles, the evidence would be immediate and most powerful in its inception. In the case of prophecy, the power of the evidence would increase with time.

Miracles and prophecy, then, are the only methods that we can conceive of, that would, as our minds are now constituted, insure belief in revelations from the Creator.

But if every human being, in order to believe, must have miracles, there would result such an incessant violation of the laws of nature as to destroy them, and thus to destroy all possibility of miracles.

The only possible way, then, to establish revelations to the race, is to have them occur at certain periods of time, and then have them adequately recorded and preserved.

The Bible is a collection of books written at different periods of the world's history. These books profess to be records of the various manifestations and teachings of the Creator to mankind. It is claimed for them, that their authority is established by miracles and prophecy, with all the evidence that is possible, so far as we can conceive, and that there are no other books in the world having any such evidence of authorized revelations from God.

No attempt will be made to set forth this evidence, which, it is claimed, is peculiar to the Bible. The point here attempted is, to show that, were the Augustinian system contained in these writings, it would destroy their claims as reliable revelations from God, even allowing that miracles and prophecy attested their authority.

All must allow that it is possible to have such things given in a revelation from God as would destroy its reliability. For example, suppose it were a fact that a revelation, supported by miracles, taught that there was no God. This would necessarily destroy its authority as a revelation from God.

Suppose again, that it taught that the Creator, who wrought the attesting miracles, was a liar, and loved to deceive his creatures; this would also destroy its reliability as a guide to truth.

Suppose again, that it taught that the Creator was a being who preferred evil to good, and chose to have his creatures ignorant and miserable, when he has power to make them wise and happy. This also would destroy the reliability of any revelation from the Creator, even were it sustained by undisputed miracles and prophecy.

This last is precisely what the Augustinian system does teach, and, as its advocates claim, it is a part of a revelation from the Creator, supported by miracles and prophecy.

In opposition to this, it is maintained that this system is not to be found in the Bible, and that were it there, all the miracles and prophecy conceivable could not prove these writings to be revelations from the Creator, which are reliable as our guide to truth and happiness. A Creator who wills ignorance and misery to his creatures, when he has power to will knowledge and happiness in their place, is not a being to be believed or trusted as our guide to truth and happiness.

It is in this light that the Augustinian theory, as a part of the Bible, brings the question fairly before the people, as “Bible or no Bible?”

Chapter XXXV. Tendencies of the Two Opposing Systems.

The preceding chapters have presented the distinctive features of two systems which, in their main points, are shown to be contradictory, while both are exhibited as incorporated into the chief creeds and theological teachings of the Christian world.

It is the object of this chapter to point out the tendencies of these antagonistic systems.

It is maintained, that the common-sense system, resting as it does on implanted principles common to all minds, is evolved and held very much in proportion [pg 240] to the development of the reasoning powers and the moral sense.

That part of this system which relates to man's duties and best interests in this life, without reference to a future state, has been more harmoniously evolved by the wise and good of all ages and nations than any other. Thus, in the teachings of Confucius, Zoroaster, Gaudama, Solon, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Seneca, and the Antonines, who are among the chief heathen sages, we can find nearly all the moral duties of man, to himself and to his fellow-man, which are to be found in the Bible. It is true that there are diversities and deficiencies in all; but a large body of pure morality could be made up from their united teachings. The account given of the system of Boodhism in a previous chapter is one illustration of this fact.

But, while it is comparatively easy for the good and wise heathen to reason out what is best for man in this life, as taught by experience, the grand failure is in motives which will secure obedience to the rules of virtue. “We see the right and yet the wrong pursue,” has been the universal lament of humanity.

The character of the Creator, as “the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, slow unto anger, of great kindness;” “who doth not willingly afflict or grieve the children of men;” who “like as a father pitieth his children;” who is “a father of the fatherless and a judge of the widow;” “a God without iniquity, just and right;” “a judge of the fatherless and the poor;” who “shall judge the world with righteousness;” “a righteous God, who trieth the heart and the reins;” who “will regard the prayer of the [pg 241] destitute;” who “knoweth the wants of the heart;” “who knoweth our down-sitting and up-rising, and is acquainted with all our ways;” who is “a righteous Lord who loveth righteousness;” “whose judgments are all right;” whose “word is right;” whose “word is truth from the beginning;” who is “plenteous in mercy and truth;” such a character as this, as it is recorded in the Jewish sacred books, was never evolved or set forth by the wisest and best sages of all the earth, unaided by these writings.

That such a Being regards our race with long-suffering compassion, and came himself to earth, by his teachings, example and self-sacrificing love, to save us from sin, this was never even imagined by any of the heathen sages of earth.

The power of motive, secured by a belief in the omnipresence, sympathy and love of such a God, never was attained by the unaided reasoning of any human being.

The fact that the soul survives the dissolution of the body, and that the good go where they are happy, and the wicked where they are punished, has been more or less clearly evolved by the heathen world. In some nations, as for example the followers of Boodhism, this doctrine is quite definite and distinct, but with most heathen nations all their notions on this subject are dim, shadowy and unpractical.

It is those nations alone, who have had access to the Bible, who have ever attained the powerful motives which are found in the system of common sense. And yet, as has been shown, these influences have been, to a great extent, nullified by a contradictory system.

It is claimed, that the system of common sense is the one on which the revelations of the Creator, contained in the Bible, are founded. This being so, those who are most developed in their reasoning powers, and who also yield the most reverence to the Bible, are those who are most powerfully protected against the pernicious tendencies of the antagonistic system of Augustine.

Thus, a system which is antagonistic to reason and common sense, has, by ecclesiastical authority and perversion, been fastened most firmly on that class of minds who bring all their cultivated powers to its defense, while at the same time the very cultivation of these powers, and their reverence for the Bible, tend to the destruction of the same system. We consequently find the strongest defenders, and the strongest antagonists of the Augustinian system, in those sects who were educated within its entrenchments.

If common sense and the Bible are to conquer this false system, it must be done by those whose common sense and reverence for the Bible are most effective and most prominent. And yet this class of persons are the ones, who would the most vigorously apply their energies in the defense of a system in which they have been trained from infancy, and which is sustained by all the power of public sentiment, and church organization. This being premised, the tendencies of the two antagonistic systems will now be set forth.

Chapter XXXVI. Tendencies of the Two Systems As They Respect the Cultivation of the Moral and Intellectual Powers.

The system of common sense rests on the assumption that there are principles of right and wrong founded on the eternal nature of things, existing independently of the will of the Creator in his own eternal mind, and by which his character and conduct may be judged.

The human mind is constructed in accordance with these principles, as the embryo image of the Eternal Creator. By the aid of these principles, we discover the design and character of God in the nature of his works, and can perceive what is right or wrong in moral action as tending to fulfill or oppose this design. Thus we are enabled to understand and to adore the rectitude, wisdom and goodness of our Creator, as manifested either in his works or in more direct revelations from him.

According to this system, all voluntary action is right which produces happiness without violating the laws of God. Thus every person who is making self or others happy in the best way, guided by the teachings of experience or by revelations from God, is fulfilling the great design of our Maker, and thus pleasing him by promoting his chief desire.

On the contrary, the Augustinian system assumes that the human mind, being totally depraved, is entirely disqualified to judge of the character and ways of [pg 244] God. Nay more, it assumes that there is no standard of right and wrong by which we can judge of the rectitude of the ways of God.

According to this theory, the fact that God wills a thing is what makes it right; so that any thing is right if God does it, and true if he says it, however contrary it may be to our moral nature and common sense.

In the teachings of moral science, founded on this theory, it is maintained that God has formed our minds to feel certain emotions of approval or disapproval in view of certain relations and actions, which are right or wrong only as agreeing or disagreeing with his will. But as the mind of man is depraved, this constitution is no certain guide, and we are dependent on direct revelations from God to teach us what is in agreement with his will. Yet here again we are at fault; for such is our depravity that we are disqualified to interpret these revelations, except as we are regenerated by God.

Accordingly, man has no means of judging of the designs or character of his Maker—nor, while unregenerate, as most of our race are and have been, has he any sure means of discovering the will of God, either by reason or revelation, saving as he may find infallible priestly interpreters.

Chapter XXXVII. Tendencies of the Two Systems in Respect to Individual Religious Experience.

The Augustinian system, assuming that true personal religion consists in the exercises of “a new nature,” tends to introverted mental efforts, in order to discover whether the signs of such a nature exist in ourselves.

As, on this theory, it is certain that man will do nothing to change his fallen nature until the Spirit of God is given to aid, the great attention and effort must be directed to those methods, which “the church” decides, or experience has proved, to be connected with the bestowal of this spiritual gift.

Not knowing clearly what the depraved nature is, which is to be changed, nor the certain signs of its existence or re-creation, nor any certain mode of securing the desired change, there is a perplexing variety of vague instructions as to “what we must do to be saved?”

In illustration of this, the following from an article by the editor of the Methodist Quarterly, shows how Wesley and his followers instruct on this subject:

This being first stated, the great question follows, what is that faith by which we are justified and sanctified? The answer is this:

That is, in order to be justified and sanctified we must have a divine evidence and conviction that God is able and willing, and actually does now give the justification and sanctification we seek. In other words, in order to gain what we seek we must believe that we have gained it. In order to get a blessing we must believe that we possess it.

Thus it is, that one of the largest sects of our country is instructed by its founder and his most intelligent and learned followers, as to the way of salvation from everlasting and inconceivable misery. It will be remembered, that this class of divines teach that the depravity of man's mind consists in the deprivation of God's Spirit, which is withheld from all the descendants of Adam on account of his sin.

The following presents the mode of instruction in which the author was educated. It is contained in a letter from Dr. Nettleton, a celebrated revival preacher, who often resided with the author's father during revivals in which they were co-laborers. This letter was written to oppose the views of the New Haven divines, who maintained that, although in consequence of Adam's sin, there is a tendency or bias to evil so powerful as to insure “sin, and only sin” till regeneration occurs, yet that the act of regeneration consists in a choice or purpose on the part of man himself.

In reference to these views of Dr. Taylor and others, Dr. Nettleton says:

He continues thus:

The great point taught by Dr. Nettleton and his associates was, that man has a depraved nature consisting in a bias or propensity to sin, consequent on Adam's sin, for which we are “awfully criminal in [pg 249] the sight of God,” and which man himself will never remedy; that regeneration consists in the change of this bias by God, and that until God does make this change man will “never give his heart to God nor make one holy choice.” And yet his sermons, as the writer heard them month after month, abounded in pungent addresses to sinners, commanding them in God's name to “give their hearts to God,” and maintaining that their inability to do so was owing to their own fault and unwillingness to do so.

At the same time, the New Haven divines, in the same pulpit, were urging their views, showing that regeneration consisted in “choosing God and his service;” that man was fully able to do this, and yet that owing to his depraved nature, he never would do it, until that nature was in some way changed by God. Meantime, on their view also, every voluntary act, previous to regeneration, was “sin, and only sin.” Nor had God pointed out any sure mode of obtaining from him the gift of regenerating grace. They, however, urged that the results of experience proved that regeneration, though not promised to unregenerate doings, is, as a matter of fact, bestowed more frequently on those who use “the means of grace,” such as prayer, reading the Bible and frequenting religious meetings, than on those who do not.

The points of difference between the New Haven theologians and their opponents, seemed to be, that the former taught that regeneration was the act of man himself in choosing God's service; while Dr. Nettleton and his associates taught that it consisted in the change of man's nature by God, and not in what was done by man himself. The New Haven [pg 250] theologians have been more definite in their attempts to explain the exact nature of regeneration than any other class. They all agree, however, that man never will, in any case, become regenerated until God in some measure rectifies the injury done to human nature by Adam's sin; that God points out no definite way to secure this aid; and that previous to regeneration every moral act of man is “sin, and only sin.”

As to the signs or evidence of regeneration, those who teach that man's depravity consists in the deprivation of God's Spirit, on account of Adam's sin, often lead to the expectation of some sudden “light and joy,” as the first evidence of regeneration. Such, also, follow Wesley's direction, and try to believe that they are justified and sanctified, in order to become so. Others point out certain emotions toward God or toward Jesus Christ as the proof of the commencement of a new nature.

Some divines lead to the impression that the new nature consists in a mysterious indwelling of God in the soul, or a union of our nature to his, so that when it takes place, there is a natural outflowing of good feelings and good works, as there was of evil before this union. But they point out no intelligible way of gaining this union.

The Catholic church teaches that regeneration is conferred by the rite of baptism, and that thus a seed or some mysterious principle is implanted, which is developed by use of the forms and rites of “the church,” and exhibited in “good works.” The Episcopal churches, more or less, retain this view in the teachings of their clergy.

“Saving faith,” or the “faith which justifies,” is described [pg 251] by religious teachers with most singular and inconsistent forms of expression. If any person will make a collection of the various diverse explanations of this indispensable requisite to eternal life, it would prove a most mournful illustration of vague teachings in reply to the great question, “What must we do to be saved?”

The following extract was prepared by a very intelligent theological student at the request of the author, in reference to the great question, “What must we do to be saved?” as set forth in a recent work, highly recommended for its clear and practical views on this great matter. This work, entitled “The Higher Christian Life,” exhibits not only the author's views of what regeneration consists in, but his views of another subject that has greatly interested many minds in the religious world, under the name of Christian Perfection:

This extract is not given as a correct exhibition of the views of this author, for it may not do him justice. It is given to show how vague and indefinite are the teachings of religious writers and preachers on this subject. Here is a book recommended for its clear views by the highest class of minds. It is read and re-read by an intelligent, well-educated young man, who is studying theology in one of our first seminaries. He then gives this author's view of regeneration, as that which he supposes to be contained in that book, and also as “the one generally entertained.”

And what is this answer to the great question, “What must we do to be saved?”—a question on which the happiness of endless ages is suspended.

It is the pardon of sin, which “is instantaneous and entire.” This is something which God does, and this, as it would seem, is regeneration.

Next it is stated that “the moment a soul believes in Christ and accepts his atonement, that moment it experiences a complete sense of pardoned sin.” Here one [pg 253] must ask, “what is signified by believing in Christ and accepting his atonement? Is this also regeneration, and if so, does it consist in the intellectual assent to the proposition that Christ as God suffered and died, and by this act secured the pardon of our sin?” There is nothing given to decide these queries.

Next, it is stated that this act of faith is followed by “a complete sense of pardoned sin.” Is this regeneration, or is it a part of it? There is nothing given to decide this question.

It is certain that the young man, totally failed in his efforts to secure any clear and definite conceptions of the author's meaning, exactly as has been the case with the writer herself, for whom the above extract was prepared.

It has been the privilege of the writer, often to listen to the preaching of Dr. Bushnell, one of the most popular of all our religious teachers. On one such occasion during the present season, the object of his sermon seemed to be to teach what was that true knowledge of God, which he urged on his hearers.

He stated that it was not merely an intellectual apprehension of his character and deeds, but something which every soul must gain in order to secure eternal life, something, as it seemed, which he deemed regeneration.

He finally enunciated this, which seemed to be his idea of this indispensable experience: “It is the return of God into the human soul.”

In enlarging on this, he described something which was so vague and indefinite as to make it useless to attempt to state the impression made. Afterward, aid was sought from one of the preacher's constant and [pg 254] most intelligent hearers. “Does Dr. Bushnell believe in a preëxistent state, when God, in the manner set forth, was in the soul of each human being? If not, what does he mean by a ‘return of God into the soul?’ ” After some discussion, this intelligent parishioner concluded that his meaning probably was, that when we desire and intend wholly to submit our wills to that of God, and to be guided wholly by him, we become in this respect one with God. And this is what is meant by God's return into the soul. At what previous time this state of union was experienced, and then lost, so that regeneration is its “return,” seemed to remain, as it respects information to be gained from parishioners, a matter of hopeless speculation.

In a family of whom eight are ministers of religion, and several are theological professors, the one who has seemed most fully to agree with the writer in explaining the nature of regeneration, is the Star contributor to the Independent.

It has been shown that Phrenology is antagonistic to the Augustinian theory of implanted evil propensities, by teaching that every faculty, when developed and regulated aright, tends to the best good of the race, so that the extinction of any faculty or propensity would not be an improvement, but rather an injury to the constitution of mind.

In regard to this brother, here referred to, the system of Phrenology was embraced by him before his theological education was commenced, and was never relinquished. In consequence, his mode of explaining the nature of regeneration has been diverse from most accepted methods of theological schools. And [pg 255] yet, when the writer, applied both to his published articles and to some of his most intelligent, regular hearers, to ascertain if the common-sense view of regeneration, as here stated, was in perfect agreement with her brother's views, it seemed difficult to decide.

In reading some of the Star Papers, the common-sense view of regeneration is clear and unmistakable; in others, there are statements as to the distinctive nature of Christian character, which seem to be both additional and diverse. The result is, an uncertainty as to the exact idea of what regeneration consists in, as taught by this brother.19

The editors of the Independent quote the following sentence from Common Sense Applied to Religion, or the Bible and the People, as a statement of “the doctrine of the new birth,” which is “not materially different” from that held by “the fathers and mothers of New England for eight successive generations:”

Let this statement, by the Independent, of what the new birth consists in, as held by the fathers and mothers of New England, be compared with the preceding account of “conversion,” given by a young theologian, born in Connecticut, and educated at Yale [pg 256] College, as the “generally entertained one,” and the case is rendered increasingly difficult and perplexing.

In the view of the author, all theologians do so far hold the common-sense theory of regeneration, that when they find a person whose will seems to be entirely subjected to the will of God, while “under the influence of love and gratitude to Him, and guided by faith in his teachings, living chiefly for the great commonwealth takes the place of living chiefly for self”—such a person is regarded by them as regenerated. At the same time, bound by the Augustine system, they give other views of the nature of regeneration, which are vague and conflicting, as has been illustrated in the preceding pages.20

From all this results endless anxiety, doubt and distress, in conscientious minds, from uncertainty whether their depraved nature has been changed, and from perplexity in view of the multifarious modes of teaching in regard to the nature and signs of regeneration.

From this, too, results false confidence and indifference to right and wrong conduct, in those who imagine they discover in themselves the signs of a [pg 257] regenerated nature, which will, as they are led to believe, secure heaven without reference to the amount of good or evil deeds.

This same incertitude as to what regeneration is, has also tended to induce the fanaticism, extravagance and absurdities often connected with religious excitements.

The idea that there is to be some mysterious change in the soul by the gift of God's Spirit; that this is to be gained by prayer; that the evidence of this change is to be found in sudden and great mental agitation; together with the belief that an eternity of misery or bliss is depending on such a change; and that death is the end of all hope—all this tends to great extremes of distress and excitement.

Chapter XXXVIII. Tendencies of the Two Systems in Reference to the Character of God.

It has been shown (chapter 24) that emotive love, in view of noble and interesting traits of character, affords a most powerful motive in securing voluntary love or good willing according to the laws of God. This is the grand reason why it is so important that all his creatures should regard their Creator, whose laws they must obey, as perfect in every noble and lovable quality. This would render it easy and delightful to obey his will.

The principle of gratitude is the strongest in our nature, in calling forth desires to please another. This [pg 260] renders it so important that we should regard our Maker, not only as noble and lovely, but as the dispenser of innumerable and constant favors to ourselves and to those whom we love.

The highest emotions of love and gratitude are evoked when a noble and lovely benefactor condescends to humiliation, suffering, and even to death to rescue from great calamity. And the greater the danger and suffering from which this goodness rescues, the stronger the gratitude and the desire to please the benefactor.

In this view we can conceive of no way in which our Creator could so powerfully influence his creatures to virtuous self-sacrifice for the general good in obedience to his laws, as by such an exhibition on his part.

It has been shown [Chapter 28] that by the light of reason and experience alone, we infer that our race are exposed to dreadful risk and danger of evils, which to some will prove interminable. If, then, it can be made to appear that our Creator has submitted to great humiliation and suffering to rescue us, and that his chief desire is that his creatures should obey his beneficent laws, the strongest conceivable motives would be secured to lead to glad obedience to the rules of virtue. And having shown that the chief end of our Creator is to do all in his power to make the most possible happiness, we should infer that he had made or would make such a manifestation of his character to his creatures. And were this revealed to us as done, such a revelation would properly be called “glad tidings,” as that which was best fitted to save men from sin and suffering.

According to the system of common sense, our Creator is presented as the Almighty Father, who forms each finite mind an embryo image of his own all perfect mind, with the great design of making all the happiness possible. Although the highest happiness of each and of all, depends on the perfect action of every mind, such action is not possible in the nature of things except as a knowledge of his laws and of the motives to secure obedience are made known by finite educators, who must first be trained themselves by a long and slow process. Thus every mind is dependent for its final success in attaining perfect obedience to law, and for perfected happiness, on God, on finite educators and on self.

In carrying forward the development and education of our race, the Creator always has done and always will do the best that is possible for the good of all. And yet, so far as reason and experience teach, some will be ruined for ever. The deteriorating process begun in this life, and its baleful results, will continue for ever.

The great consummation, when those that are hopelessly ruined will be separated from the good, is at an indefinite period ahead, and may be many ages, while the same process of labor and training are proceeding in the unseen world, and yet so that the conduct and character formed in this life have a decided influence on the whole course of existence that follows.

Thus when the good man dies we may hope that his upward career is eternally secure. But when the wicked die there must be “a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation.”

The Creator does, has done, and will do all that is [pg 262]possible to save all that can be saved from this doom, and as the highest possible motives we can conceive to secure this end, would be the appearance of our Creator in human form as a teacher of his laws, an example of virtue and a self-sacrificing Saviour, we infer that he has done or will do this, at the time and in the manner which is best fitted to the great end in view.

The Augustinian system presents a view of the character and conduct of the Creator in mournful contrast to this.

Our only idea of a perfectly benevolent being is that of one who prefers happiness to suffering, and who does all in his power to promote one and prevent the other. Our only idea of a malevolent being is, that he wills misery when he has full power to make happiness in its stead. Our only evidence of the moral character of a being (or that exhibited in willing) is the nature of his works. On the Augustinian theory, all the chief works of the Creator's hand, the immortal minds, which alone give value to any other existences, are depraved so totally that there is no really good act done by any one of them till created anew.

In other words, the Creator, having full power to make every mind perfect in nature, and who still has power to re-create all with perfect natures, has instituted a system by which the sin of one man entails a depraved nature on a whole race, while the evil as yet has been remedied only in the case of a small, “elect” number. All the rest are doomed to eternal misery for conduct which is the certain consequence of this misformed nature.

To save men from the punishment of the sins consequent [pg 263] on their depraved nature, Christ, the most perfect and only unsinning being that ever visited earth, undergoes deep humiliation and excruciating sufferings.

To call such conduct as this just, or kind, or merciful, is a violation of all our ideas of the meaning of such terms. What kindness is there in giving existence to any being on such terms? What blessings are all the comforts and enjoyments of this life, so soon to be snatched away, thus making the contrast of future misery so much the more horrible? What mercy is there in any mode of rectifying a wrong so needlessly inflicted? What mercy, or what justice is there in adding to all the miseries of our race the sufferings of so noble and lovely a being as Jesus Christ, when all, and more than all, effected by his agonies, could be so much more justly and reasonably secured by regenerating all the minds thus needlessly ruined in their nature? This strange and mysterious transaction only adds to the terror and gloom that shroud such a Creator, whose character can be learned only by the nature of his works.

To call all this a mystery is a misuse of terms, for there is no mystery about it. More direct, clear, and open injustice, folly and malevolence, can not possibly be expressed in human language than that here set forth and ascribed to God.

Every mind instinctively asks, why did not the Creator give us a perfect nature when he has the power to do so? Why does he not stop all the sin and misery resulting from the depraved nature of man by regenerating all, when he has power to do so? How can we either respect or love a being who [pg 264] has done such awful and endless wrong to our race, and for no conceivable good made known to us? What cause of gratitude for the sufferings and death of Christ to save the few of us who alone are to escape from such needless and intolerable evils?

Meantime, the various theories invented to relieve the baleful impression thus made as to the character of our Creator, only add new difficulties.

To say that this perpetuated mode of bringing ruined minds into existence, is a penalty for a single sin of the first pair, thousands of years ago, what a violation of all our ideas of justice! To say that this transaction is just because Adam was “regarded” by God as “the federal head” of our race, and that he “imputes” the sin of the father to all his descendants, what is this, to our conceptions, but puerile folly added to the baldest cruelty and injustice?

To say that we all “sinned in Adam,” thousands of years before we were born, and are punished by a ruined nature, so far as we can conceive of such an absurd proposition, what is this penalty better than inflicting endless tortures on myriads of new-born infants for their first ignorant and unconscious sin?

To say that man, or Adam is the author of all this ineffable wrong, because it is done by “a constitutional transmission” from parent to child, of which God is the author, when he had full power to make each child perfect in nature, what is this but adding to cruelty and injustice a mean subterfuge in order to cast the blame on Adam and his race?

The mind turns from a God so represented, with horror and dismay, and it is only by concealing this [pg 265] system, by representations that are perfectly contradictory, that the baleful impression is lessened.

The view of God's character thus presented by the Augustinian theory, not only lessens the power of motive which the common-sense view of the Creator's character affords, but brings a powerful positive influence to turn the human mind from that love and obedience toward God which is so indispensable to peace and happiness.

Chapter XXXIX. Tendencies of the Two Systems as to Church Organizations.

It has been shown that the common-sense theory teaches that all mankind must, in order to eternal happiness, be trained by human agencies to choose what is best, guided by the laws of God, as learned by experience or by revelation.

Under the guidance of this general principle, associated bodies would result, whose aim would be discussion and instruction to discover and perpetuate a knowledge of the rules of rectitude, and to secure all those motives which experience has proved to be most effective in securing obedience to these rules. In other words, the chief end of such associations would be to find out what is best and thus right, and also the best modes of securing right action.

The experience of mankind has shown that the most effective way to extend and perpetuate any religion is to have a body of men supported who shall [pg 266] give their chief energies and time to this object. Social gatherings at regular periods have also been found effective to this end. In short, were a system of religion established, founded exclusively and consistently on experience and common sense, it would include sabbaths of interrupted worldly affairs, social gatherings to promote worshipful obedience to the Creator and a body of men educated and sustained for the express purpose of discovering, instructing in and perpetuating the intellectual, social, moral and religious interests of humanity. Such a ministry would be not dogmatic teachers, but leaders in discussions and investigations.

The great aim of all these arrangements would be to discover by inquiry and discussion what is best in all human interests and affairs, in view of the immortality of man, and the risks and dangers of eternity, and also to devise the best modes of influencing all to right action.

Were this life the end of our being, and were all questions of right and wrong to be settled in reference to the well-being of our race in this short span, no such separate class of religious leaders and organized instrumentalities would be needful. But if men are to be trained to act with reference to the invisible state as the chief concern, then organized instrumentalities to resist the overruling tide of worldliness become indispensable.

The full tendencies of such organizations, based exclusively on the principles of common sense, must be a matter of speculation merely, for the world has had no experience of this kind. As yet we have only the experience of mankind as to systems in which the [pg 267] teachings of common sense have been combined with contradictory influences of false dogmas, which have been sustained by the strongest organizations, civil and ecclesiastical.

We will now trace some of the tendencies of the Augustinian system as they have been exhibited in the history of church organizations.

It has been shown that the Augustinian theory of a depraved nature is the foundation doctrine alike of the Catholic and the Protestant churches. All agree that man by nature is so miserably misformed that the gift of the Holy Spirit purchased by Christ to re-create is his sole hope of escape from everlasting perdition, while there is little or no ability to understand or obey God's revealed will until this gift is imparted. From this originated a priesthood as the medium through which this renewing gift is to be obtained, and who are the only authorized interpreters of God's revealed will. The transmission of this power through the rite of ordination, preserved in direct succession from the apostles, is the leading point in the Episcopal organization. Still more is this carried out to extreme results in the Catholic church.

Both organizations assume that “the church” which has this power, does not include the people, but is the priesthood alone. It is the ecclesiastics of these churches who are to interpret the Bible for the people, and the people are to receive these decisions as from God. This is the theory, while common sense and the Bible have more or less modified its practical adoption, especially in the Episcopal churches.

The Puritans of England were the first among the Protestants who organized churches as consisting solely [pg 268] of those who “profess” to be “regenerated” on the theory of the renewal of the depraved nature derived from Adam. To this profession in most cases must be added an examination by persons who are regenerated in order to ascertain whether the true signs of a new nature, according to their pattern, really exist. Such churches are a close corporation, having a minister to preach and administer baptism and the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and deacons, elders, or committees to decide who shall be received as regenerate or turned out as unregenerate.

Among the Puritans and their descendants originated another practice which has become prevalent, by which the churches thus organized as regenerated persons, also claim the right of infallible interpreters of the Bible, so far as to exclude all from their communion who do not profess to agree with their interpretations. That is to say, all persons, in order to be admitted to their corporation and to the Lord's table, must not only profess to be regenerate in the nature transmitted from Adam, but must confess that they interpret the Bible according to the notions of the church they seek to join.

It will now be shown that most of our large denominations in this country are so founded on the Augustinian dogma that were the people all to give up this theory the whole basis of sectarianism would be destroyed.

The Congregational and Baptist denominations are severed simply in reference to the rite of baptism as the mode of admission to their regenerated churches. The Congregationalists hold that baptism should be administered by sprinkling, and to the infants of [pg 269] church members as well as to adults joining the church. The Baptists hold that baptism should be administered by immersion, and only to adults who join the church. This is all that divides the two sects.

Of course, if all the people ceased to hold that churches are to consist of persons whose nature received from Adam is re-created, all churches associated on the theory would be ended, and so these disputes about modes of admission would be ended.

Again, the Presbyterians and Congregationalists separate on the question of the appointment and duties of the officers of their churches. The Congregationalists manage by church committees. Each church is the sole tribunal in its own affairs, thus being strictly democratic. The Presbyterian churches manage the business of each church by sessions or elders appointed by the church, and when they fail to give satisfaction, an appeal is made to a Presbytery consisting of ministers and elders of several churches.

Thus again, if churches organized on the Augustine theory of the regeneration of a depraved nature should cease, this dispute in regard to church officers would end, and the Presbyterians, Congregationalists, and Baptists would find all ground for separation gone.

Again, the old and new school Presbyterian churches separate on questions relating to man's ability to regenerate himself and in regard to what is the nature of regeneration.

This all depends on the fact of a depraved nature transmitted from Adam to be regenerated. If this dogma is relinquished by the people then these two sects will have no ground for division.

Again, the Methodists differ from the other Augustinian [pg 270] sects chiefly in regard to the officers and management of churches organized on the theory of a depraved nature received from Adam, which is to be regenerated. And if such organizations were ended the ground of separation between the Methodists and the preceding sects would be removed.

Again, the Episcopalian sect is founded on the idea of a succession of ordained priests through whose agency the gift of God's Spirit to renew our depraved nature and to impart the true interpretation of his revelations is to be obtained.

If, then, the people discard the dogma of a depraved nature consequent on Adam's sin, and assume that they have perfect natures, and are authorized to interpret the Bible for themselves, the chief ground for the existence of this as a separate sect will be removed. The Catholic church also would soon be ended as a distinct sect were all the people of that church to discard these and all opinions and practices immediately or remotely based on the Augustinian dogma.

The preceding will serve to illustrate the position that the tendency of the common-sense system is to unite all men in efforts to discover and to obey all the laws of God for making happiness the best way for time and eternity.

On the contrary, the Augustinian system tends to organize mankind into sects contending, not for truth and happiness, but for certain outward rites and forms of organization.

Chapter XL. Tendencies of the Two Systems in Regard to Humility, Meekness and a Teachable Spirit.

The result of receiving church interpretations as infallible, whether of priests or regenerated laity, is the assumption of a similar infallibility by each person who thus accepts them.

This is accomplished by a very singular fallacy, thus:

The regularly ordained priests, or the regenerated priests and laity of the true church, are claimed to be the only persons qualified to understand and interpret the meaning of God's revelations. The question then is, which is the true church? The Catholic says, “Mine, and no other.” The Episcopalian says, “Mine, and no other;” and so says the Presbyterian. The result is, each man decides that the true church is the one that agrees with his views of what the Bible teaches.

Having thus decided that the church that agrees with himself is the true church, the man proceeds, not only to receive reverently the decisions of his church, but assumes that every other man is bound to do the same.

The Catholic receives one set of interpretations from the church that he himself has infallibly decided to be the true church. The Protestant receives the creeds and confessions of the church he has infallibly decided to be the true church, whose regenerated ministers and members are qualified to understand the Bible, as no unregenerated man can do.

Being thus sustained by his own claims as a regenerated [pg 272] person, and also by the claims of the church he adopts as the true one, there is little foundation for poverty of spirit, humility and meekness. How can a man feel “poor in spirit,” as destitute of the knowledge requisite for right action, when he has his own regenerated mind and the guidance of the regenerated true church? How can a man be meek when others strive to enlighten him by showing that he is in the wrong, especially when such efforts are those of the unregenerated, or those shut out of his true church?

How can a man become very humble and lowly in his own conceit, when, in contrast with most of the world, he alone can feel and act virtuously or understand truly God's revelations?

The natural tendency to pride, self-sufficiency and dogmatism is still further increased by the assumption that humility consists mainly in a low opinion of “the nature” with which we are endowed. Thus, while assuming infallibility in one aspect, they still can claim to be humble and lowly, because they abhor and despise their depraved nature and its results in themselves.

At the same time, the most remarkable self-deception is practiced in regard to their own Christian graces. These all being supposed to spring from a regenerated nature imparted by God, they disclaim all honor or merit, and give all the glory to God, who has wrought these graces from their dead and sinful nature. By this method they imagine they attain a true humility and lowliness of spirit.

But every man of great genius, and every woman of uncommon beauty, understand as truly as the professedly regenerated person, that their gifts are from [pg 273] God, and are willing to give all the glory to him for thus distinguishing them from their fellow-creatures. And the ascription of all the power and glory to God does not save the professedly regenerated person from self-complacency and pride any more than it does the genius or the beauty.

And yet we find religious writings abounding in such disclaimers and ascriptions, which are evidently regarded as proofs of humility and lowliness of spirit. It is true that such expressions do often flow from the hearts of the really humble and contrite; but the fact that a person regards and acknowledges God as the author of his own extraordinary gifts, that raise him above his fellows, is no proof of humility, while it is often so regarded.

In contrast to this tendency of the Augustinian system, the common-sense view teaches that while our nature is noble and perfect in construction—the embryo image of its Maker—it is destitute of that knowledge, experience and training, for which it is equally dependent on God and on man. And as the requisite knowledge can be gained only by the aid of those minds around, whose happiness is affected by our conduct, it is clear that a willingness to learn from any quarter and to be told our mistakes by any person, is the natural result of an earnest desire to find out and obey the truth. And a consciousness of our own liabilities to mistakes, and a certainty that there is no one “that liveth and sinneth not,” tends to induce compassionate sympathy for the failings of others, and an indisposition to force opinions on them by any other mode than calm statement and argument.

At the same time, an earnest desire for inquiry and [pg 274] discussion is generated, which naturally leads to patient investigation, courteous demeanor towards opponents, and to all the graces that wait on a gentle, humble and truth-loving spirit.

Chapter XLI. Tendencies of the Two Systems in Regard to Dogmatism, Persecution and Ecclesiastical Tyranny.

It has been shown that the Augustinian system, teaching as it does man's depraved nature and destitution of any principles of right guidance in his own mind, makes him wholly dependent not only on revelations from his Creator, but on infallible interpreters.

Thus we find that wherever this system became dominant there has coëxisted the claim that the people are not to decide, each one for himself, what are the teachings of reason, experience and revelation as to truth and duty. Instead of this, first it was popes and councils, in which the laity had no voice; next, as among the Puritans, it was the church, including both the clergy and the regenerated portion of their flocks.

From this resulted religious persecutions, in this manner: Men are to obey God as their first duty. The church is God's mouth-piece to interpret his commands to mankind. If men refuse to obey God, speaking through his church, they must be forced to do so by pains and penalties. And as in view of eternal happiness and eternal misery, all earthly interests [pg 275] are as nothing, every temporal consideration must be put out of account. Moreover, whoever leads men to disobey the church and thus to disobey God, and so to peril not only their own eternal welfare, but that of others, commits a greater crime than is done by violating any human ordinances. Therefore, the heaviest penalties should be employed to enforce obedience to the church, and the church must take precedence of the civil government.

Thus it came to pass that the more sincere, conscientious and benevolent a person was, while holding these views, the more surely would he become a persecutor.

The pages of history give many mournful illustrations of this truth. One of the most striking will be here introduced.

Isabella of Spain, by whose generosity this western world was discovered, was one of the most gentle, conscientious, benevolent and lovely characters that ever adorned a throne.

She was trained to believe the church to be the representative of God on earth, and her father confessor, Torquemada, the originator of the Inquisition, was the guide of her conscience. By his commands the Inquisition reared its horrid dungeons. By his counsel the industrious, cultivated and chivalrous Moors, the most useful of all her subjects, were driven from their native soil. By his commands the Jews were brought to the cruel alternative of giving up their religion or relinquishing all that made life dear. And thus the historian narrates this dreadful tale of religious persecution:

This mournful narrative exhibits one of the most sublime examples of religious faith and conscientious self-sacrifice to what was deemed truth and duty in the persecuted. At the same time, when the avaricious Ferdinand relinquished thirty thousand ducats, and the tender and benevolent Isabella turned a deaf ear to such prayers and sufferings from her people, there can be no doubt that conscience ruled the persecutors also. Even Torquemada himself may have been acting from the most conscientious and benevolent motives in all the disastrous influences he brought to bear on his royal mistress.

This passage of history also teaches that honesty, and sincerity, and conscientiousness will not avail without a knowledge of the truth. Nay, more; had these persecutors been less conscientious, the natural instincts of humanity or personal interests would have mitigated or withheld the cruel doom.

It is in this light that we are enabled, in spite of their mistakes in opinions, to look upon theologians as among the noblest sufferers and confessors for what they believed to be truth. From the time of Augustine and Pelagius to the present day nothing can be more clear than that the combatants on both sides were actuated by a sincere love to God and to man, each believing, as sincerely as did Saul of Tarsus, that in these conflicts they were verily doing God service, and that all they were called to suffer was for the true church of God and the salvation of their fellow-men.

But the main purpose for which this record of history [pg 281] now appears is to illustrate the natural tendency of the Augustine theory in leading to dogmatism, persecution and ecclesiastical tyranny.

The tendency of the common-sense system can not be illustrated by history, for unfortunately Christendom has never yet had an opportunity to test by a fair experiment its true tendencies. We can only imagine what would be the results were all ecclesiastical restraints and teachings based on the Augustine theory removed from our pulpit ministries, our hymns and prayers, our religious literature, and, most of all, from long established habits of thought and feeling.

Then all our religious organizations would have for their leading aim, not to maintain some outward rite or modes of organization, but to promote free discussion for the discovery of truth and harmonious coöperation to promote happiness according to the laws of God.

Then the ministry of the Word would be committed to men distinguished not only by natural endowments, acquired knowledge and skill in debate, but also ensamples to their flocks in the virtues of humility, meekness, and a gentle and teachable spirit. Then the points that would divide men into parties would be chiefly practical questions, so that where no agreement in opinion could be secured, each would peaceably try a fair experiment and eventually bring the results forward for the general good.

Then every individual would be free to protest against all that he believes to be injurious and wrong, in regard to individuals, to the family, to the church and to the state, and be met in his efforts as a benefactor rather than an opposer or an enemy.

Chapter XLII. Tendencies of the Two Systems as Shown in Controversy and Sects.

It is the aim of this chapter to show that the chief controversies and chief sects of Christendom have resulted from the Angustinian system, and from attempts to eliminate it from the system of common sense with which it has been combined.

The dogma of a depraved nature consequent on Adam's sin, was a philosophical theory introduced to account for the prevailing sinfulness of the human race. The attempt of Pelagius and his associates to oppose this dogma, was met by civil and ecclesiastical power and persecution. “And thus,” says the historian, “the Gauls, Britons and Africans by their councils, and the emperors by their edicts, demolished this sect in its infancy and suppressed it entirely.”

For long ages after this, no attempt was made to oppose the system based on this theory in any of its branches. The doctrine that man, being so depraved in nature as to be incapable of knowing or judging aright, and having no standard of right and wrong but express revelations from God, resulted in the unresisted claim of popes and church councils as the only authorized interpreters of the Bible.

Then began the powerful influence of education. Every child was trained to believe the doctrine of a depraved nature as a part of the word of God, to be received with unquestioning submission. Thus the [pg 283] most powerful influences were enlisted to enchain the feeble and plastic mind of childhood at the starting-point of thought and reason. It was also taught by theologians to all the young ecclesiastics as a system, thus adding a new force to early educational training by the authority of the church, with all its solemn and awful sanctions.

The idea that every man is to receive the teachings of Christ, uncontrolled by church authority, as he understands them, and that he is a Christian just so far as he understands aright and obeys them, found no advocates for long centuries. Meantime the ecclesiastics, as the only infallible interpreters of God's word, and the only source by which to gain regenerating influences, abused the influence thus acquired, to build up the awful prelatic power that ruled Christendom for ages. At last, with many other abominations, the regular sale of indulgences to commit all manner of crimes at fixed prices, brought intolerable follies and crimes to a crisis.

Then Luther and his compeers arose and waged war, not against the root of these evils, but against those inevitable branches, the infallibility of church interpretations and the substitution of outward creeds, rites and forms for the spiritual principle of love to God and man exhibited by obedience to the Creator's laws.

Luther claimed that he and all men were bound to interpret the Bible for themselves, and not to submit their judgment to any pope, council or ecclesiastical power. And he claimed that the Bible teaches that man is to be saved [justified], not by outward forms, but by faith in Jesus Christ. But retaining the doctrine [pg 284] of man's ruined and helpless nature, his ideas of faith and of the mode of attaining it, were vague and conflicting. Thus originated the long conflict between Catholic and Protestant Christianity, involving some of the most bloody and cruel wars and persecutions that ever afflicted humanity.

Next came Arminius and his associates, who, still clinging to the fatal root of a totally depraved nature, labored to devise some way in which, in spite of this ruin, man could do something to secure regeneration from God. For, as shown in the early chapters, Calvinism maintained that man was utterly helpless, and that all the doings of the unregenerate were sin and only sin, and therefore utterly unavailing in gaining regenerating aid from God. Hence originated the long conflict between Calvinism and Arminianism, which has been continued to this day.

Both these schools of divinity rested on the dogma of an entirely depraved nature, but their tendencies were diverse.

Calvinism, maintaining the utter helplessness of man, tended to despairing inefficiency. If man really could do nothing, why should he attempt any thing to secure salvation?

On the other hand, Arminianism, promising help through certain forms, rites and influences conveyed by ecclesiastics, tended to a reliance on rites and forms. If man is to be saved by these instrumentalities and can do nothing himself except through them, then, these being secured, the natural tendency must be to rest in them.

These two diverse tendencies finally resulted in an equal torpor and indifference to religion in both parties, [pg 285] which was interrupted on the Arminian side by Wesley and Whitfield, and on the Calvinistic side by Jonathan Edwards.

Wesley and his co-laborers taught anew the Protestant doctrine of man's independence of ecclesiastical interpretations and church forms, and the necessity of an immediate and higher spiritual life. From his efforts and those of Whitfield originated the great Methodist denomination in Great Britain and America.

In this sect is carried out the theory of regeneration, not as a slow process of educational training, but as an instantaneous change, manifested in excited sensibilities. As the depravity consequent on Adam's sin consists in the “deprivation” of God's Spirit, and regeneration is the return of this gift, to be secured by prayer and other “means of grace,” we find their prayers, hymns and preaching all conformed to this theory. They gain grace when the Spirit comes, and when it departs they “fall from grace.”

While Wesley and Whitfield, in Great Britain, appealed directly to the people in combatting the Arminian tendency to forms and laxness, Jonathan Edwards addressed the leaders of metaphysical thought in his profound and acute writings. He attempted to meet the universal paralysis consequent on the Calvinistic doctrine of man's inability, amounting almost to the loss of a consciousness of personal freedom.

His aim was to restore to man a sense of ability and responsibility. Thus originated his theory of natural ability and moral inability, which amounts simply to this: that man has natural power to obey all that God requires, but that he so lacks moral ability, on [pg 286] account of his depraved nature, that it is certain that he never will make a truly virtuous choice till he is regenerated, and regeneration is not to be secured by any unregenerated doings.

From this resulted the division into the old and new-school Calvinistic parties in the Congregational and Presbyterian churches.

Lastly, the New Haven divines, while in some of their writings they held exactly the views of President Edwards, and claimed to have made no innovation, in others they came exactly to the Pelagian ground, maintaining that man “has not a depraved nature in any sense, nor a corrupt nature, much less a sinful nature,” “but rather that in nature he is like God.”

This is the same doctrine as was held by Pelagius, and if it were only carried out consistently and not contradicted, would be the entire elimination, root and branch, of the Augustinian system.

From this resulted a theological controversy that has agitated the Presbyterian and Congregational churches for the last thirty years.

There are two denominations which all the Augustinian sects agree in excluding from their fellowship as not entitled to the name of Christian sects, which have had great influence in undermining the hold of the Augustinian theory. These are the Universalists and the Unitarians.

The former do not formally deny the Augustinian theory of a depraved nature consequent on Adam's sin, but leaving it undisputed, gain great influence by it. They allow that God has power to restore man to his original perfectness, and then maintain that the [pg 287] very idea of a benevolent being, who is the loving parent of all his creatures, makes it certain that he will do so. For, as shown before, our only idea of a benevolent being is, that he wills to do all in his power to secure that which will make the most happiness with the least evil. As, therefore, all the Augustinian sects concede that God has power to make all minds perfect at the first, and to regenerate all minds that are ruined through the sin of Adam, Universalists maintain that the very idea of the Creator as a benevolent being necessarily involves the certainty that he will in the end, bring all the creatures he has made to a state of perfectness, both in mental construction and mental action. This argument is unanswerable, and the people very extensively are led to so regard it, and to adopt this view of the future state of our race.

The question, with this sect, all turns on whether it is possible in the nature of things for God to construct mind on a more perfect pattern than that of the human mind; and whether it is possible, in the nature of things, to make the best possible system of minds that are free agents, and yet save all of them from perpetuated disobedience to the laws of that system and the consequent suffering of the natural penalties.

It has been shown that the common-sense system teaches that it is not possible, so that it must be by revelation only, that man could gain such a doctrine as the eventual perfect holiness and happiness of the whole human race.

While the Universalists gain great power by not contesting the Augustinian dogma, the Unitarians have taken the ground of a full recognition of the [pg 288] Pelagian doctrine of the perfect construction of the nature of man. At the same time they have, as a sect, almost universally adopted the Universalist doctrine of the eventual salvation of the whole of our race.

Both these sects have embraced men of great popular talents, who have widely influenced the public mind, in their attempts to lessen confidence in the doctrines and sects based on the Augustinian theory.

Meantime, in the scientific world, mental philosophy has made great progress in clear analysis and accurate definitions. The Scotch school of metaphysicians, headed by Reid and Stewart, have clearly developed and established in a popular form, the principles of reason and common sense; though as professors in a Calvinistic university and community, they never ventured to apply these principles to the investigation of religious theories as to the “depraved nature” of the human mind. They passed over the whole question in utter silence.

Still more recently has been developed the system of Phrenology, which is based on the constitutional diversities in mental faculties. This system has effectively warred on the theological theory of implanted evil propensities, by teaching that every faculty, when developed and regulated aright, tends to the best good of the race, so that the extinction of any faculty or propensity would not be an improvement, but rather an injury to the constitution of mind.

At the same time, by the influence of our schools, our colleges, our pulpits, our popular lectures and our wide-spread periodicals, both religious and secular, the mind of all classes has been rising to a larger development, [pg 289] and to clearer and more discriminating views of mental and moral science in every department. Thus the people are gradually throwing off the chains of ecclesiastical authority and assuming that liberty of thought and action, which their Almighty Father designed as the chief birth-right of all his intelligent offspring.

Chapter XLIII. Practical Tendencies of the Two Systems.

In the preceding pages it has been shown that the common-sense system presents an intelligible, practical and consistent standard of right and wrong, by which we can judge clearly of the character and conduct, both of the Creator and of his creatures.

The mind of the Creator existing from all eternity, independently of his own will, is the pattern of perfectness in the construction of mind. He has formed and sustains a system fitted to his own perfections. The chief end of this system is happiness-making on the greatest possible scale. In order to this, his laws, by which the most possible good with the least possible evil will be secured, must be discovered and obeyed.

Accordingly, all that tends to secure happiness without evil is right, and all that needlessly lessens or destroys happiness is wrong. Every effort to discover the laws of God and to obey them is right and [pg 290] pleasing to him as promoting his chief desire and great end. This view furnishes a foundation for clear conceptions in every practical question of right and wrong. What is for the best as discovered by reason and experience? This is the great question, when we have no direct revelation from God. And even when revelation intervenes, it must be only in regard to general rules, leaving it still a matter of experience and discussion in applying these rules to the multitudes of varying cases in human experience. Thus, for example, a command to be honest toward all, leaves innumerable questions to be settled as to what is honest and fair in the multiplied cases arising between man and man.

But we always have the great principle of common sense to guide us, that whatever is for the best is right, leaving it for reason and experience to settle what is and what is not for the best.

But in contrast the Augustinian system, in many ways, tends to becloud the mind in regard to practical questions of right and wrong.

Thus the assumption that there are no principles in the human mind that enable us to judge of the character and conduct of God; that we have no means of learning what is the object or end for which all things are made; that man is so depraved as to be disqualified to know what is right and wrong, except as taught by revelations from God; and at the same time disqualified to interpret such revelations until regenerated, or by the help of a priesthood; all this tends to create the feeling of incertitude as to any question of right and wrong, while the abuses of priestly interpretations have so often set the Bible in [pg 291] opposition to our moral sense and common sense as greatly to increase the evil.

Add to this, the assumption that there is no true virtue in any acts of the unregenerate, but that all their moral deeds are sin, and only sin, and the perplexity is increased as to what is right and what is wrong moral action.

Again, the fact that salvation from eternal misery is possible only to those who have gained a new “nature,” while it is often seen that some of those received into churches as having this new nature, are not so charitable, amiable, just or honest, as many who are not thus admitted, and the mind is still more beclouded as to the real nature of right and wrong in practical conduct.

Again, the manner in which this new nature is recognized by those appointed to decide who are regenerated and who are not, in order to admit to or exclude from churches, still farther increases the difficulty. The questions often propounded on such occasions relate mainly to certain states of feeling toward God or Christ, or to certain doctrines involved in the Augustinian theory. If replies to these are satisfactory, the candidate is pronounced regenerated and received to the church.

Meantime, ever since the days of Luther, the doctrine of “justification by faith,” in opposition to “salvation by works,” has been assumed to be the foundation principle, both of Protestantism and of true piety, while there has been great indistinctness of conception as to the true meaning of these terms. At the time of the great conflict between Romanism and the Reformers, the grand evil to be combated was a reliance [pg 292] for salvation on the prescribed outward rites and forms of the church without any reference to an internal spiritual principle. The attempt of the Reformers was to substitute for these outward forms that spiritual principle which consists in a ruling purpose to discover and to obey the will of God according to the teachings of Christ, whom they regarded as “God manifest in the flesh.” They recognized the fact that no man ever did or ever could live without some violations of the laws of God, so that no man could be saved on the ground of perfect obedience to law. Instead of this they assumed that man could gain eternal life by “becoming a new creature in Christ Jesus,” meaning by this that “new life” which consists in ceasing to live to please self, and living to please God in Christ as the chief end of life, by earnest conformity to his will as learned either by reason and experience or by the Bible.

This is what they intended by faith in Jesus Christ. And the opposite doctrine of “salvation by works” was that which the Romish church was urging, viz., conformity to her outward rites and forms.

But in process of time, and for want of clear conceptions and clear teaching, it came about that the real good works, commanded by Christ, as a part of the love of God required, were confounded with the rites and forms, and outward deeds commanded by the church, and which may be performed without the principle of love to Christ, which is exhibited in obedience to his teachings. The result has been that the teachings and writings of many Protestants often make the impression that the good works of a pure morality are of no avail and often very [pg 293] much in the way of a man's final salvation. Thus has arisen the distinction often made between good moral men and good religious men. This classification rests entirely on the Augustinian dogma, that until the depraved nature received from Adam is regenerated, all the moral acts of men, however virtuous and excellent, are “sin, and sin only.”

The true meaning of “justification by faith and not by works,” is that men are not to be saved by actually finding out in all possible cases what is for the best and then doing it, which no man ever did or ever can do without mistake; but rather by a ruling purpose to discover and to obey all the laws of the Creator. This last is the spiritual principle in opposition to mere outward acts. It is practical faith in God which is to save the soul of man. All, therefore, who believe Christ to be God are “justified” by faith in Christ. That is, they are regarded and treated as just and righteous, when they have this internal principle of obedience to Christ, even though they are never free from actual transgression of law, either known or unknown. Thus the ancient patriarchs were saved by faith in Christ, he being the God of the old dispensation as much as of the new.

That this is the sense in which the Reformers used the words “justification, or salvation by faith,” in opposition to “salvation by works,” may easily be proved. At the same time, it is as easy to show that they used this term in another sense also. But at this time no reference will be made to any other use than the one under consideration. Their other use of this term in reference to the atonement of Jesus Christ will be referred to hereafter.

The preceding exhibits the several ways in which the Angustinian theory tends to becloud the mind in regard to practical questions of right and wrong. These tendencies have been more or less counteracted by the implanted principles of reason. Still more have they been rectified by the steady and clear teachings of the Bible, which never, when truly interpreted, contradict either the moral sense or common sense of man, but rather strengthen them and guide them aright.

Chapter XLIV. Tendencies of the Two Systems in the Training of Children.

It has been shown that the common-sense system results from the implanted principles of mind, so that no person can be entirely free from its influence.

The Augustinian system has also been shown in its Calvinistic and Arminian tendencies.

The Calvinistic form, making it certain that, owing to the depravity of nature consequent on Adam's sin, every moral act is sin and only sin, while there is no revealed mode of securing regeneration, leads to hopeless inefficiency and neglect of religious advantages. The Arminian form, maintaining the efficacy of certain rites and ceremonies in securing regeneration, tends to a disastrous dependence on outward observances.

Those parents who are trained in the Calvinistic school, usually begin education more or less on the [pg 295] common-sense theory that children can and do please God when they are obedient, gentle, kind, self-denying and conscientious. Prayers and hymns are also taught to the little ones that make this impression.

But when advancing years bring the pulpit and other Calvinistic influences to bear, these impressions, more or less, fade away, and are followed by the depressing feeling that nothing that a child does is either good or pleasing to the heavenly Father till the “wicked heart” is changed by God, and that there is no definite, practical mode of securing this change. The consequence, in many cases, is, that all prayer and all attention to religious instruction ceases, and a desperate course of worldliness and departure from all recognition of God ensues. In other cases, the natural result of this Augustinian theory is more or less counteracted by conscience, common sense and the Bible.

On the other hand, the Arminian view of the efficacy of rites and means of grace sanctioned by God as the mode of securing regeneration, has led to great stress on the use of those rites and forms. The Catholic and a portion of the Episcopal church, have taught that the rite of baptism was the appointed mode of remedying the depravity engendered from Adam. And so indispensable was it deemed to the salvation of infants, that not only laymen, but women were allowed to administer this rite at the approach of death, when no priest could be obtained, lest the infant soul should go to endless perdition with the taint of Adam's sin unremoved.

There have been great dissensions in the Episcopal [pg 296] church as to the efficacy of baptism. Some have taught that regeneration was imparted by this rite. Others have taught that this rite secured the implanting of “a seed,” or some new mysterious principle, which if cherished and cultivated by the church, would result in Christian character. Those who hold this view, rely chiefly on the training of children in the church as the appointed mode of securing their salvation.

That branch of the Arminian school which left the Episcopal church under Wesley and his associates, were driven off by the laxity and want of spiritual life consequent on these tendencies to reliance on rites and forms. In place of this, they urged the doctrine of instantaneous regeneration, to be gained by certain means of grace. According to these teachers, regeneration consists in the return of God's Spirit to the soul, which is withheld in consequence of Adam's sin. The tendency of this view was to lessen reliance on educational training and to exalt the importance of other means of grace by which regeneration seemed to be secured, and to which the Bible, as was claimed, promised success.

Thus, in the Arminian sects, where the efficacy of rites and forms by a regularly ordained and authoritative priesthood has been relinquished, educational training has conformed more to the Calvinistic view. As eternal salvation depends on securing regeneration, every thing is made secondary to those methods by which regeneration is to be gained.

The Episcopal Arminians, therefore, depend more on educating the young aright, and have little dependence on revivals, while the Methodist Arminians look [pg 297] less to education and more to revivals and other modes of securing religious excitement.

But the foundation difficulty alike of the Calvinists, the Episcopal Arminians and the Methodist Arminians, is the assumption that regeneration of a ruined nature is the thing to be sought, both by children and by adults, as the indispensable prerequisite to salvation, and that “the means of grace” are not for the training and development of a perfect nature, but to gain from God the cure of a ruined and helpless one.

In contrast to this, the common-sense system recognizes all that is practical in any of the three methods. It teaches that man's nature is perfect, and yet that he is utterly helpless without the knowledge, training and motives, for which he is dependent alike on God and on man. It teaches that this nature can be trained to “a new life” by educational instrumentalities and by a slow and gradual process. At the same time it teaches, that when men have lived a worldly life there may be a sudden change of character by voluntarily commencing a life of love and obedience to God, in place of a life of unregulated self-indulgence.

Since the days of Pelagius and Augustine, there has never been any large body of Christians who have trained children on the common-sense system dissevered from the Augustinian theory. This experiment is yet to be tried before its full and proper tendency can be truly developed.

The Unitarian sect, who reject the Augustinian dogma, also reject some of the fundamental principles of the common-sense system, especially that on which the whole system of moral and religious duty and motive [pg 298] rests, the dangers of the race in the invisible world, and the power of motive secured by “God manifest in the flesh” as the long-suffering and self-denying Creator, coming to aid his creatures by his teaching, sympathy, example, and abounding love.

Chapter XLV. The People Rejecting the Augustinian System.—Position of Theologians.

It is the object of what follows to present the evidence that the people are rejecting the Augustinian system, while they are retaining the system of common sense, as that alone which is taught in the Bible.

Preliminary to this, a brief statement of the prominent points of these systems, where their antagonism is most practical and apparent, will be allowed.

The Augustinian system teaches that on account of Adam's sin, man is born with a nature so totally depraved, that he never performs any truly virtuous acts till this nature is regenerated; that the true church of God on earth consists only of those who are thus regenerated; and that a visible church consists of an organization of persons who profess to possess a nature that has been re-created, so that they perform truly virtuous acts, as the unregenerated never do.

In opposition to this, the common-sense system teaches that man is born with a perfect nature, so that he can and does act virtuously without any change in this nature; also that the true church of God on earth [pg 299] consists of all those whose chief end and earnest purpose is to discover and to obey all his laws; and a visible church consists of any who associate by some outward organization to aid each other in attempts to discover and to obey the laws of God.

The evidence that the people are rejecting the former, and assuming the latter view as that which is taught in the Bible, will now be presented under these heads:

The present position of theologians;

The state of the church;

The position of the pastors of churches;

The state of popular education;

The position of woman;

The position of Young America;

The position of the religious and secular press.

Chapter XLVI. Present Position of the Church.

The word “church,” as used in this article, refers chiefly to those close corporations which claim to be regenerated persons, whose depraved nature, transmitted from Adam, has been so far rectified by re-creation, that they are, more or less, in the practice of true virtue, of which the unregenerate world are supposed to be totally destitute.

In this sense they claim to be “the saints,” “the righteous,” “the elect,” “the children of God,” “the salt of the earth,” “the light of the world,” “a holy nation,” “a peculiar people.”

While the members of these churches do not claim that all who do not come into their organizations are [pg 315] of the opposite class, they do, by their profession and admission to such churches, claim to be of the regenerated class, to whom the above terms of the Bible are to be applied, while the great majority of mankind, not in these organizations, are called by them “the world,” “the unregenerate,” “sinners,” “the wicked,” and by other similar terms.

So long as the great body of the people were guided chiefly by ecclesiastics, and were thus trained to believe that heaven was to be gained by some unintelligible “change of nature,” imparted by priestly agency, or by some supernatural intervention of God's Spirit, these claims were regarded with mystified fear and doubt.

But the more intelligence and discussion have spread among the people, the more such claims have been questioned and distrusted.

Many things have combined to increase such distrust. Among these may be mentioned the discussions already noticed, conducted by theologians themselves, by which the absurdities and inconsistencies maintained by each, were exposed by all the others.

Another cause of distrust has been the great variety of tests and signs of regeneration. One class of religious teachers claim a certain kind of experience as indispensable to admission to the church. A second class reprobate this sign and set up another. A third class depreciate both and insist upon still another. And thus it is made apparent, that theologians do not agree among themselves what the “depraved nature” of man consists in, nor what are the true signs or evidence of its “saving change.”

Another cause of distrust has arisen from attempts [pg 316] to carry out a system of church discipline. Some churches expel persons for interpreting the Bible in a different mode from themselves or their creed. Others expel their members for vending alcoholic drinks, or for dancing, or for holding slaves, or for marrying the sister of a deceased wife. Meantime, the sins of pride, anger, covetousness, avarice, worldliness, evil temper, unfairness in business, hard dealings with the poor, and many other developments of selfishness, often are made no bar to full and honorable communion.

Again, in churches and sects that are most strenuous in attempting to maintain by church discipline a uniformity of interpretation of the Bible conformed to their own, it has come to pass that orthodoxy of interpretation is sometimes practically placed before morality of conduct. Thus, if a member of a church or a minister is suspected of denying the supreme divinity of Christ, or the depravity and need of regeneration of nature in man, a great agitation is produced, and attempts are made, by church discipline, to rectify the evil as very dangerous. In the meantime, a slanderous tongue, or dishonest dealings, or selfish worldliness, excite less concern, and arouse to less effort. The inevitable result is an impression that churches and ministers place conformity of interpretation to their own creeds or opinions before morality, and consequently the feeling is engendered, that church organizations, founded on the Augustinian theory, tend to immorality.

This impression as to the immoral tendency of such church organizations, has been increased by the fact that in times of special religious excitement, that class of men in many cases, become most prominent as leaders [pg 317] in prayer meetings and other public ministries whose character for consistency in private life, or in business matters, is low. It is perceived that this fact does not prevent these men from being regarded as religious men, and as superior to others, who, living exemplary lives, are unable or unwilling to take any conspicuous place in religious movements. And when the period of excitement is passed, it is found that these leaders in revival seasons are no better in their private life and business dealings than before.

It is also sometimes the case that men of high character and position, can not be reached by church discipline as are the humbler members, and thus sin is made respectable by its association at once with talents, influence, wealth and church membership.

In addition to this, the fact that so many ministers and churches have taken such an antagonistic course in the public movements to remove intemperance and slavery from our land, has led to open attacks on ministers and churches in the newspapers, in public lectures and in many other ways, in which their inconsistencies have been held up to public ridicule as well as to more serious denunciation.

So long as the “change of nature,” which fits man for heaven, was regarded as a supernatural mystery which no one could understand or explain, while the approved signs of regeneration were submitted only to ministers, deacons, elders and church committees, the matter was exclusively in their keeping.

But as soon as the nature of regeneration began to be explained intelligibly, and men adopted the common-sense view, that the true church consists of persons who not only believe in Christ intellectually, but [pg 318] believe practically, i.e., that they are those who obey Christ, the case bore a different aspect. “These are the persons,” they say, “who organize on the assumption that they are regenerated because they obey Christ's teachings, while so many virtuous persons are shut out as totally and entirely disobedient,—as never feeling or acting truly virtuously in the sight of God in a single instance!”

The more this questionable assumption has become apparent, the more has been the disturbing influence on both the church and the world.

Multitudes of serious, virtuous and conscientious persons, who are really living Christian lives and making it their chief concern to obey the great Master, have refused to join associations that make such dubious claims.

Still more has been the revulsion from those churches which demand as terms to admission professed belief in certain modes of interpreting the Bible contained in a creed. They, holding the Protestant doctrine that every man is to interpret the Bible for himself, responsible to no man or body of men, can not thus resign their religious liberty.

Meantime, the Christian profession has ceased to be a cross in any way, and has rather become honorable. Those who have been taught that a purpose or determination to obey Christ was regeneration, have in many cases formed such a purpose, confessed belief in the needful creeds and joined the church in great numbers, before they had time to ascertain whether they had moral strength to carry out this purpose. They find on trial that they have not, and then discover that though there is an open door to enter the church [pg 319] there is none for exit that is not discreditable, and so they remain.

Others come into the church for worse motives, to secure the confidence, respect and trust that is accorded to that profession. Thus it has come to pass that the class, denominated “the world,” has been growing in Christian character and practical virtue, while, as a body, “the church” has been deteriorating.

The writer, in her very extensive travels and intercourse with the religious world, has had unusual opportunities to notice how surely and how extensively the conviction of this fact has been pressed on the minds of the best class of Christian ministers and laymen. More than twenty years ago, one of the most laborious Episcopal bishops of the western States, in reply to inquiries as to the state of religion in his large diocese replied, “the world is growing better and the church is growing worse.”

More than ten years ago, a distinguished lawyer, who had extensive financial business to transact, himself an honored and exemplary member of the church, stated to the writer that he was decided in the conviction that the better class of worldly men were more honorable and reliable in business matters than the majority of church members. When asked to account for this, the reply was that religious men were chiefly interested to get to heaven, which in their view was to be secured “by faith and not by works,” and so good works became a secondary concern. But the chief concern of worldly men is to succeed in this life, and they have learned that honesty is the best policy in attaining their chief end.

This statement was repeated to another exemplary [pg 320] church member, who, as a bank officer and lawyer of distinguished integrity, was said to transact more business than any other man in the north-western States. He remarked that the above was exactly his own opinion, and, moreover, he stated that a friend of his, also a church member, who, he said, did more business than any other man in Central New York, had expressed to him the same opinion.

These statements were repeated not long ago to a business man, an exemplary member of an orthodox church in Boston, and he expressed the same opinion. In repeated other instances that need not be enumerated, in various sections of the country, the same opinion has been expressed by intelligent and consistent members of the church, whose prejudices would naturally lead them to the most favorable view of the case.

Such impressions have not been decreased by the recent multiplied defalcations, forgeries, and other business dishonesties that have occurred in the last three years among church members and officers of religious charities in high places of trust.

To all this add the fact, that a large class of men of exemplary private life, who are spending their time, money and influence for the relief of human woes and the redress of social and political wrongs, are at the same time openly attacking the church as the chief bulwark of these wrongs, while all the delinquencies of ministers and churches are freely discussed and denounced by them before the people.

The result is, that a large portion of the most exemplary and intelligent part of the church feel themselves to be in a dubious and false position, and are [pg 321] daily querying whether professing to be a peculiar people is not doing more harm than good; and whether it would not be better that the influence of good men should rest on their unassociated individual character, and not on organizations making such high profession where the light of goodness is obscured by associated darkness.

Great doubt and skepticism, both in the church and out of it, have thus arisen also as to what real religion consists in, and as to what are the true claims of the church and its ministry.

Multitudes who would enter the church if it was regarded simply as an association of persons to support the ordinances appointed by Jesus Christ, and to aid each other in obeying his Word, turn from its present position and claims with distrust or disgust. At the same time ministers and church members, feeling these difficulties, have more and more relinquished the Augustinian theory as the basis of their organization, and are advancing to an open avowal of the common-sense ground, i.e., that the real invisible church of Christ embraces all those who acknowledge him as their Lord and Master, and make it their chief aim to understand and to obey his teachings, and that a visible church is any association of persons who organize to aid each other in this object, by sustaining a ministry and worship as they understand to be most in agreement with the teachings of Christ.

The Episcopal church, both in Great Britain and in this country, although as strictly Augustinian in its articles as any other, has taken the lead of all others in practically renouncing that system. Any man can more readily secure all the privileges of membership [pg 322] in that church without any confession of faith or public profession of a “change of nature,” than in any of the other Augustinian denominations, and this is probably one great reason of its prosperity in this country.

Any sensible man of good moral character, who should state in a respectful and candid spirit, that he could not conscientiously submit to acknowledging in any form, the rights of any man or body of men to decide for him in regard to the interpretation of the Bible; that according to his understanding of its teachings, he was bound to acknowledge Jesus Christ as his Lord and Master in all matters of faith and practice, and to associate himself with other avowed followers of Christ by some form of open acknowledgment; that as he understands the New Testament, the rites of baptism and the Lord's Supper were instituted as forms of such acknowledgment and communion, and that he wished thus to connect himself with the Episcopal church without any creed, confession or acknowledgment; it is believed, that in such a case, there are few ministers and still fewer laymen who would not think it right to gratify such a desire. It is believed that there are many, also, of the highest standing for intellect, piety and position in the Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist and Congregational churches, who have so far thrown aside the system of Augustine, that they also would receive such a man to their communion on these terms.

In this state of feeling among laymen the developments of sectarianism, which, as has been shown, all relate to matters of rites and forms, resulting from the Augustinian theory, have become more and more suspicious and offensive. Especially is this the case [pg 323] in the newer States, where union and harmony among good men are most needed.

In the volume, of Common Sense Applied to Religion, page 342, statistics are introduced from the reports of three of the largest sects of this country, the Old and New school Presbyterian and the Congregational churches, showing that, owing to their sectarian divisions, nearly one third of their churches are without ministers, and nearly one half of these churches have not over fifty members, the majority of these being women, while the relative amount of ministers to churches is constantly decreasing. Not only in the large, but the smaller towns, the struggle to build churches and support ministers among the various sects, that differ only as to rites and forms, is most mournful, making a taxation both on the East and West for their support which is incredible.

Each denomination is trained to regard itself as “the church of God” and to labor for its increase as a service to God's cause, while the extension of other sects is not so regarded. Although few intelligent Protestants now believe that any forms or rites are indispensable to salvation, each sect regards its own peculiarity as of very great importance. And as all the large sects are divided only on modes of baptism or of church organization there is a constant tendency to magnify these points of difference. Were it not for this, in small places and in new settlements, all would unite in one large, harmonious church, that could not only support its own ordinances, but send of its surplus to supply the destitute. Instead of this, the feuds, envies, jealousies and bickerings between small and struggling churches, of from four to twenty diverse [pg 324] sects, are an occasion of reproach and contempt to the world, and of mortification to all honorable and pious minds.

So in regard to education, each sect is now acting as a sect, in starting new colleges and seminaries, or in endowing those already started, and this often with little reference to the supply provided by other sects. For example, in Ohio there are twenty-six endowed colleges, in Indiana there are eleven, and thus at the same rate in other new States.

Besides endowments to support professors, vast sums have been spent in buildings, many of them unused for want of pupils. After each sect has thus gained its colleges, it must struggle to find pupils, and thus multitudes of young boys are pressed into a Latin and Greek course, not at all demanded in their future pursuits, and often forsaken before the college is ever reached. The waste of educational benefactions in these ways is enormous.

These expenditures are all to be met by the laity, and the more the nature of these sectarian divisions is understood, the more distrustful are the people in regard to these profuse expenditures to keep up such divisions. Multitudes of intelligent laymen contribute simply because their clergymen urge it, and entirely without intelligent approval of these things. To their own view, Christianity, as exhibited by contending sects, is a source of more evil feeling, contention and needless expense than of compensating benefits, and distrust and misgiving increase and abound.

In such a position of the organized church, one of the most remarkable indications to be noted is the occurrence of a “revival” among all sects, in which the [pg 325]people take the lead, and theologians and pastors willingly resign their wonted place. All badges of sect are dropped, and the dogmas of Augustine, from which they originated, are thrown aside. The system of common sense is recognized, and its intelligent and harmonizing influence secures, for the first time, the respectful attention of worldly men toward religious developments, which in all past time have been regarded by them with suspicion or scorn.

Chapter XLVII. State of the Pastors of Churches.

That portion of the clerical world who, as pastors, are most nearly in connection with the people, are necessarily affected with the influences that touch theologians, and also with the condition of their people.

They find that what they have been trained to regard as a fundamental doctrine of the Bible, has ceased to be defended by those who have been their teachers in theology, and who are the leaders of their sect.

They find their own minds very greatly in doubt as to many points taught them in their theological training. They find intelligent laymen refusing to enter the church, whom they feel to be as really followers of Christ in heart and life as any in their churches, while they see many professors of religion as selfish, worldly and unprincipled as most of the world around, and yet they can not exclude them.

They find intelligent young men coming to them expressing a desire to obey Christ and to unite with [pg 326] his followers in efforts to “be good and to do good,” but unable to subscribe to the creed of the church in regard to a depraved nature and associated tenets, while by one expedient or another these pastors waive the difficulty and receive them into their churches. They find intelligent mothers and Sunday-school teachers throwing aside the Augustinian dogma, and training their little ones to believe that they can love and serve their Saviour with their present nature and faculties, and that every attempt to conform to the rules of duty is well-pleasing to God, and a step forward in the path to heaven.

They find intelligent Christian mothers wishing to bring their children to the communion with no other profession than that they desire and intend to obey their Saviour in all things.

In this state of things, some of the most successful and intelligent pastors have decided, in such cases, to cut loose from their creeds and confessions, and to receive to the communion any young children whom their parents believe and feel to be thus prepared for it.

The position assumed by the parochial clergy in the great revival of the past year, has been a remarkable index.

The people of all sects and creeds came together to express their wish and intention to serve the Lord Christ by obedience to his word in heart and life, and their pastors sat with them as equals in all respects before the common Father. They related their experience; they exhorted each other to persevere; they united in prayers for help and guidance, and their pastors ceased to urge attention to those “doctrines” [pg 327] founded on the Augustinian theory, which in former revivals were made so prominent.

There are incidents that have come under the personal observation of the writer the past year in regard to the parochial clergy which are very ominous on account of the character of the persons involved, who not only are among the first in intelligence and influence, but may properly be denominated, in reference to the leading class of pastors, “representative men.”

In one case, a young man of great intelligence and moral worth, who might properly be regarded as a “representative man” of the better portion of “Young America,” informed the writer that he and his wife had accepted the general invitation of their pastor to receive the communion. Inasmuch as the doctrines of the creed of that church were not accepted by him, the inquiry was made whether this step was taken with the approval of his pastor, and the reply was in the affirmative.

The inquiry was then made, on what ground he united in this ordinance. The reply was, substantially, that he wished to be good and to do good, guided by the teachings of Christ; that he wished to be united in feeling and action with good men, who cherish the same aims, and also to make it manifest that he was associated with that class; that he regarded this sacramental ordinance as instituted for this very purpose, while his minister, as a consistent Protestant, did not insist that he should interpret the Bible according to his creed or be shut out from this privilege.

In another case, an intelligent mother who had trained her children exclusively on the common-sense [pg 328] theory, informed the writer that she had taken them to the Lord's Table with the consent of one of the most distinguished pastors of the land, without any examination or admission to the church. She simply narrated to him her own opinion that her children from early years had learned to love the Saviour and to be conscientious in daily efforts to obey his teachings; that they and she felt that they were commanded by their Saviour openly to acknowledge themselves as his followers, “even to the death,” if need be, in order to fulfill all righteousness, and that they did not and could not believe the creed of that church, nor in the right of any man, or body of men, to exact such belief under penalty of exclusion from the table of their Lord.

The pastor welcomed these lambs of the fold with their mother, and felt that had he driven them away it would have been in defiance to their Saviour's word, “Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not.”

In still another case, one of the most honored Congregational pastors of New England openly declared to friends of the writer that it was in vain to try to preach this Augustinian system any longer; that the people would not hear it, and that he should have to preach to bare walls if he attempted it any more.

Many other similar incidents that have come to the knowledge of the writer in different quarters of the country, might be added, but the above will suffice as illustrative indications of the present position of pastors.

Chapter XLVIII. The Position of Popular Education.

It is a significant fact in regard to the religious training of the young in this country, that the most influential leaders of popular education, especially in its earlier stages of improvement, have been laymen, and laymen who reject the Augustinian dogma, and all organizations founded on it. And yet they are men who believe in, and have exhibited by their example, the great duty of love to God and love to man, in a life of obedience to the physical, social and moral laws of God.

Meantime, the laws of the land which forbid any exclusive favor to any religious sect, do, in fact, forbid any religious training in common schools that conflicts with the common-sense system. It has been shown (chapter 39) that the larger Christian sects are all founded, in their distinctive features, on the Augustinian dogma. This being so, the law that excludes distinctive sectarian teaching excludes the Augustinian system.

In regard to smaller sects, not Augustinian, the distinctive doctrine of the Unitarian creed is such a unity in regard to the Creator as forbids the idea of more than one divine person who has all the attributes of God. This, it has been shown in chapter 18, is contrary to the common-sense system.

The distinctive doctrine of the Universalist creed forbids the idea of the perpetuated existence of sinful and miserable beings; this, also, is contrary to the common-sense system, as shown in chapter 28. Thus [pg 330] the chief sects that are not counted as Augustinian or Evangelical, are also excluded from introducing their distinctive tenets into the common schools of the people.

Moreover, while the people, in the schools under their control, thus forbid by law any religious training which conflicts with the common-sense system, they permit prayers to God and the use of the Bible, provided the privilege is not used, in opposition to the spirit of the above law, to introduce distinctive sectarian tenets.

It is also very noticable that in Great Britain the most influential patrons of popular education, and writers on the training of the young, have, though members of the established church, vigorously opposed the Augustinian system. Archbishop Whateley has written a most powerful argument, and one which none have attempted to answer, in favor of the common-sense view of church organization. He also has given all his influence to the establishment of schools for the people, in which every parent and child shall, as far as possible, be free in regard to religious matters.

The beloved and honored name of Arnold, dear to every liberal educator of every sect and name, has set the example of a religious training that is based entirely on the common-sense system. And probably there is not a man living or dead whose influence has been so extensive in guiding public opinion on this subject. Without openly denying the articles, or forsaking the established church, Whateley, Arnold and their associates have warred on the Augustinian theory and its offsets more energetically and effectively than any two men that can be named.

Thus, it appears, that the people themselves, and [pg 331] the chief leaders in popular education, have decided that no teaching that conflicts with the system of common-sense shall be introduced into the common schools.

Chapter XLIX. The Position of Woman as Chief Educator of Mind.

One of the most important indices of religious change is the advance in the character of female education during the last thirty years.

Fifty years ago, to read, write and cipher, and a few accomplishments, were all that were attempted in the school education of women. A little history and one or two other branches were added in some of the higher schools.

It being assumed that the equal culture of all the faculties, so as to insure a well-balanced mind, is the chief aim of all education, it is probable that the mental culture of women in this country for the last thirty years has approached nearer to the true standard than was ever known in the experience of any other nation.

The training to the handicraft of the needle, even if only for ornament, the measure of domestic duty that most young girls learn to perform, the culture of the musical taste and the art of drawing, the combination in female schools of mathematics, languages and general knowledge, and the immense variety of culture from lectures and general reading, all have [pg 332] tended to develop the female mind on a scale of advancement and equable culture never before known.

The result is a generation of women well trained for high and independent thought and action. At the same time, it is probable that there never before was so large a proportion of the best educated women who were so decidedly conscientious and religious.

It is granted by all, that it is to woman more than to man, that is committed the chief business of training the human mind at its most important stage of development. It is granted, also, that in order to success in culture, both physical and mental, it is the first step to understand the nature of that which is to be trained and developed. The first question, then, to every woman, in reference to her first duty is, what is the nature of the minds given us to train?

In this light, it is as if a gardener were to receive some rare and delicate plant with directions from his lord to train it with the utmost care; his first inquiry would be, What is its nature? Does it require sun or shade? Does it need a moist or a sandy soil? Is it a climber, or a shrub, or a tree? Or, it is as if a young machinist should receive from his master a collection of wheels and springs, and a great variety of delicate machinery, with the direction to put them together and adjust them for right action. His first inquiry would be, what is the nature of the thing to be thus arranged? For what end or purpose is it constructed? What is the mode of working it which will best accomplish the end designed?

In like manner woman receives from her Lord the delicate physical form and immortal spirit of her child to train aright for an existence never to end. She [pg 333] asks of those who are her Lord's messengers for this very end, what is the nature of this wonderful and delicate organization? What is the end or purpose for which it is made? What is the mode of training which will best accomplish the end designed?

The preceding pages exhibit the kind of replies that for ages have met these heart-wrenching queries of womanhood. From most, it is shown, she hears that the ruined nature of her offspring is such that she can do absolutely nothing to secure any right development. Others tell her that no one knows what was the end or purpose for which the mind of her child was made. Others tell her that no one knows what are right means in regard to the training and action of mind. Others tell her that the mind of her child is constructed wrong, and that nothing can be done to secure its right training and development, but in some way to induce its Maker to re-create it.

Meantime, also, her teachers are in conflict as to what is the difficulty with the nature of her child, and what would be its right action, and what is to be done to secure its right development. At the same time, the greater portion of the teachings on this great matter are so enveloped in abstruse theological and metaphysical technics as to baffle the wisest in their attempts to gain clear and definite ideas from them.

In this state of the case many sensible mothers and teachers, all over the land, have adopted a course dictated by their own common sense and their experience of the nature of mind, as discovered in their attempts to train it. In pursuing such a course, many of them have taught simply the system of common sense, leaving out entirely the Augustinian contradictions. They [pg 334] have in various forms of language taught their little ones after this fashion: “Your heavenly Father made you to be happy and to make others happy. In order to this, he wishes that you should always have what you like best, except when it would injure you or others. But when what you like best and want the most, is not best for you or best for others, you must always choose what is for the best, and in so doing you act virtuously and please and obey God. And just so far as you do all that is best for yourself and for others, guided by the teachings of Christ, and with the desire and purpose to obey him, you become a virtuous, pious and holy child, and a true Christian.”

In taking such a course as this, many mothers and teachers find themselves in antagonism with the teachings of the pulpit, the Sunday School and the great body of religious books, and yet they persevere. And sometimes they take their children from the Sunday School because the home training is there so directly assailed. And they would, in some cases, keep them from the church also, were not the theological technics so effective in protecting childhood from all comprehension of a large portion of pulpit teachings.

It is such intelligent, cultivated and pious mothers and teachers that go to their pastors with their perplexities and troubles, and not unfrequently find that tender sympathy which those only can give who have suffered the same kind of distress.

Chapter L. Present Position of Young America.

By the term “Young America,” as it is used at this day, seems to be intended that class of youthful minds who are striving to free themselves from all past ecclesiastical and conventional restraints, and who are aiming to think and act with entire freedom on all subjects.

The most active and efficient of this class are those who by general reading and study have both strengthened their reasoning powers and been most affected by the causes before described, which have tended to lessen respect for the church founded on the Augustinian theory of such a depraved nature transmitted from Adam, that all unregenerate doings are “sin, and only sin.”

These young minds find the power of the pulpit, the church, the religious press, and the religious training of the family, the school and the college all combined to enforce this doctrine. They feel galled and indignant at the chains which they find around them; and trained to interpret the Bible as teaching this doctrine and the system based on it, they secretly revolt from the authority of that book. They feel that the ministers and churches which sustain this doctrine are the grand impediments to freedom of thought and opinion, and the chief fortress of a system which to them is hateful in theory, and, in their view, destructive alike to a true manhood and a pure morality.

But if they speak out their feelings they will be denounced [pg 336] as infidels and avoided as dangerous persons. What is more trying still, the mother they love so much will be distressed, their father will be equally grieved and perhaps offended with their self-conceit, and all their Christian friends will be disturbed and displeased.

Under these conflicting influences there exists a constant conflict between their honest convictions and desire for truth and independent action, and their gentle and generous impulses. This is the condition of multitudes of young minds, who to please a mother, a father, a sister or a friend, attend church and listen in silence to much that they do not believe and to some things which they abhor. Others quietly withdraw from all religious ministries, on the plea that Sunday is more profitably spent by them in quiet strolls or reading at home, while the real trouble, secretly burning in their hearts, is scarcely breathed aloud.

Of this class of minds not a few are found in our theological seminaries. And here they encounter new difficulties. As the system of Augustinianism is developed as the basis of their professional training, they attempt to meet it with some discussion. In this they find little or no encouragement. Free discussion seems to be deemed inadmissible, and those who urge it find themselves in an uncomfortable minority, who are regarded rather as agitators than as manly and independent seekers after truth.

But the most powerful influence on the most influential class of “Young America,” as highest in intellectual and moral development, has been the practical working of two false principles.

The first of these is, that organizations to promote [pg 337] truth and righteousness are of more consequence than truth and righteousness. Thus, to a Catholic, the reputation and interests of the church—that is, the clergy—are to be regarded first, so that its pope and priesthood are to be shielded from the public exposure of whatever crimes they may commit, lest the influence of the church should suffer. Thus, in Protestant ecclesiastical organizations, the sins of their chief leaders are sometimes covered and palliated, lest their church and order be discredited. Thus the college faculty are sometimes sustained by parents or the public in unjust proceedings, lest the respect and confidence of the pupils or the public toward them should be impaired. Thus, also, the officers of benevolent associations are tolerated and shielded from odium for conduct that should receive universal disapprobation. In such cases, the end is made secondary to the means—the instrumentalities to promote virtue receive more regard than virtue itself. This, among “fishers of men,” is making taking the fish secondary to the care of the net.

The other false principle is, that men are to be restrained from protesting against wrong, in cases where it would make great trouble and difficulty to individuals or to communities involved in it.

That men are to use discretion and consult expediency as to the time and manner of exposing and denouncing wrong, is one of the teachings of common sense. But that men are to protest against wrong only when it makes little or no trouble to any one, and be silent when contention and trouble would result from such protesting, is a principle that would have inhibited the spread of Christianity by the apostles, [pg 338] of the Reformation by Luther, and of every other great reform.

The extent to which wise and good men have adopted and acted on these false principles has probably done more to undermine faith in the Bible and the church than all other causes united.

The tendency has been to generate the feeling that the great organizations based on the Bible and aiming to extend its authority, are really little better than associations to sustain the power and the influence of a certain privileged class, at the sacrifice of not only truth and righteousness, but of manly freedom of thought and speech.

The extent of real infidelity, not only in our colleges, but among the young mechanics of our shops and manufactories, the young farmers in our fields, the clerks in our offices and stores, and Young America all over the nation, is little imagined by those, who, on the field of conservatism, are striving to repress free discussion. There are seething and glowing fires gathering for vent, which such attempts are as vain to restrain as are bands of cobwebs to confine an outbursting volcano.

In speaking thus confidently of the present position of woman and of “Young America,” it seems proper to notice the opportunities that have been furnished to attain some knowledge in this direction.

During twelve years of service as principal of institutions at the East and West, in which nearly a thousand young girls from the most influential classes and from nearly every State in the Union have been under her training, the writer gained no little insight into the varied experiences of the young. Later in life, ill health and other causes led to frequent reunions with [pg 339] former pupils all over the land, who as mothers, wives and sisters sought sympathy and counsel. Thus was gained the private history and the personal acquaintance of their husbands, brothers and sons, in many professions and in various colleges.

In many cases the sons would disclose to a candid and sympathizing friend mental experiences and histories of themselves and their companions, which, from motives of tenderness, were hidden even from the most kind and judicious parents. The affiliated societies that bring the most influential young men of different colleges together, their meetings for anniversary and club reunions, have generated a common pulse, as it were, through the great body of the most highly educated and most influential young men in the land; so that learning what affects a small portion teaches also what affects the whole.

These intimations indicate but a small portion of the opportunities which have led to the opinions expressed in this and the preceding chapter.

Chapter LI. Present Position of the Religious Press.

To any one who examines the religious press of the different sects of the present time, it is clear that there never was a period in which the ecclesiasticism founded on the Augustinian theory was more a leading object of effort. At the time that the Bible Society and other benevolent religious associations originated, the tendency [pg 340] of the different sects was to a harmonious union for the great end of sending the gospel to the destitute. At that time, questions in relation to the modes of ordination and baptism, and as to church officers, seemed to vanish as matters of small concern to all whose chief aim was to save the lost. But now the reverse tendency is manifest. Every sect is engaged in magnifying the importance of its own distinctive peculiarity, in getting up publishing houses to disseminate its own peculiar modes of religious teaching, in raising funds to build churches, and in building up its own distinctive schools and colleges. And this is done not so much, as it would seem, because the salvation of ignorant and guilty men depends on these sectarian peculiarities, as because the extent, respectability and influence of a sect will be thus promoted. Every editor of every religious paper, therefore, is a chief leader in an effort to build up a sect, which as before shown, originates from the Augustinian dogma.

It is an established maxim in law and all administration of justice, that where a man's property, character, and professional success are involved, he is barred from testimony as an incompetent witness. And it is deemed no disparagement to the most honorable and high-minded men in the community to be dealt with on the assumption that such personal interests so bias men's judgment that they can not be trusted.

Now it will not be denied by any one, that our religious periodicals are all supported by the differing sects with the express understanding that each shall advocate the views of the sect that especially patronizes it. And should any editor become convinced that [pg 341] the opinions he was appointed to advocate are false, he could not honorably retain his office without declaring his change of opinion, and this declaration would inevitably result in the loss of his professional character and income among his friends and supporters.

For example, if the editor of the Independent were to become convinced that churches organized on the Congregational mode were unscriptural, and should attempt to defend such a view, he would either resign his post or be removed from it. The same would be true in regard to the editors of the Presbyterian, Episcopal, Baptist and Methodist religious magazines and newspapers.

So in regard to the professors of our theological schools, who are the chief supporters of theological magazines. They must all teach the Augustinian dogma of a depraved nature transmitted from Adam to all his descendants, or resign their professional reputation, their office and its income.

These being facts, it may properly be affirmed that the religious press in this country is barred from the full and free discussion of the great question of eternal life, “What must we do to be saved?”

One of the most remarkable indications of this fact is the course pursued by the leading religious periodicals of each sect in noticing the work before referred to, Common Sense applied to Religion, or the Bible and the People. In that work, and in an article in the Independent, as well as by private letters, an appeal was made to their editors, who, many of them, are personal friends of the writer, to instruct her and to instruct the public wherein there was any failure in that work, either in setting forth truly the principles of common [pg 342] sense and the rules of interpretation, or in deducing by these principles the system of common sense, or in proving that the Augustinian dogma and the system founded on it were contrary to the common sense and the moral sense of mankind, and unsupported by the Bible.

As these editors are not only honorable and Christian gentlemen, but among the most acute and profound metaphysicians in the world, it would be the height of ill manners to assume that, discerning any failures, they refused to specify them, either in private or in public, except for the reasons intimated. No editor whose periodical is supported by a sect for the express purpose of maintaining its distinctive peculiarities, could indorse that work as correct in its statements and arguments without giving up the basis on which the existence of that sect depends which supports his periodical.

In these circumstances the editors of the Independent fairly and openly avowed that they could not open their columns to “a psychological and theological discussion” of this sort. And every editor of every other religious periodical tacitly made the same declaration by entire silence on the main subject of the volume—the very principles, involving the existence of the sect for whose defense they were appointed.

So manifest was this position of these leaders of the theological world, that the most intelligent and best informed publishers came to the conclusion that whatever else theologians differed about, they were all united in the determination that such a discussion of these points as was sought by the author should not be permitted. And even the editors of the [pg 343] secular press were urged not to allow their columns to be used for such purposes.

Chapter LII. The Present Position of the Secular Press.

The most decided index of the coming agency of the people, in throwing off the Augustinian system, is the present position of the secular press.

It has been shown how much the religious press is restrained in liberty of opinion and expression, so that it is probable that there is not a professedly religious paper in the nation that could controvert the distinctive doctrines of the sect that patronizes it without losing its character and income.

But the secular press is far less encumbered with such difficulties. The progress of this great power toward the discussion of such subjects has been very striking. At first there began to be seen simple reports of the religious anniversaries in some secular papers. This proving popular, next there came notices of missionary and benevolent operations. Then notices of the sermons of distinguished clergymen were given, and then whole columns of daily papers were occupied with sermons from ministers, without regard to denomination. Finally, the great “revival” became a topic of the secular press. Reports of religious meetings, the number who were counted as converts, and all the details connected with this great popular movement were chronicled in the secular almost as fully as in the religious press.

The comments of editors, also, on this subject, were [pg 344] usually respectful, candid, and in many cases very able and discriminating. The result has been, that inasmuch as the religious press circulates chiefly among “the church” and the secular press among “the world,” the gospel has been preached to sinners far more by secular than by religious editors. And it may be assumed as a fact, that the secular editors of this nation have far more power and influence in guiding the religious opinions and moral conduct of “the world” than either the clergy or the religious press, and probably more than both combined.

In this state of the case, all the interests of the religious press are opposed to free investigation and discussion, and all the interests of the secular press are as powerfully interested to promote it.

In appealing, therefore, from the theological world to “the people,” it is the editors of the secular press—the true “Tribunes of the people”—who will render the verdict, and this verdict is awaited with very little doubt or apprehension in regard to its nature.

The questions submitted for decision are not so comprehensive as those of the volume referred to in which theologians chiefly were invoked, and which they have as yet declined to answer. The questions submitted to the people are briefly these: Does common sense, or does the Bible teach that every human being possesses such a depraved nature as never to perform any truly virtuous act until this nature is re-created by God? and are the churches organized on the assumption that its members are diverse from the world, in that they, as regenerated persons, perform virtuous acts as no unregenerated person ever does, sanctioned by common sense or by the Bible?

Chapter LIII. What The People Will Do?

It has been shown that the Augustinian dogma of a depraved nature is the foundation of all the large sectarian organizations in this country, and of the contentions, evil passions and waste of property resulting from such divisions among Christians.

It has been shown that the leading theologians have ceased to defend this dogma, that the pastors of churches are practically evading it, that the educators of the young are throwing it aside, and that the people in all directions are rejecting it.

This process of eliminating the Augustinian system from the system of common sense and the Bible, with which, for ages, it has been entwined, thus far has gone on as the result chiefly of the development of the intellectual and moral nature of all classes, but especially of the common people. A period has now arrived in which the question has become so far an intelligible and a practical one, that the two great principles of society indicated by the words conservatism and progress are arranging and accumulating antagonistic forces for an open and decided manifestation on this great question. What will be the precise nature of this manifestation no human mind can predict. But the distinctive principles of the two parties furnish some data for anticipating some future results, as they may occur in the several classes referred to in preceding chapters under the following heads:

Note.

Notes.