SQLite format 3@  ii!%%atableTopicsTopicsCREATE TABLE Topics (Title NVARCHAR(100), Notes TEXT)Ct~ytoje`[VQLGB=83.)$ MQ0.0 INTRODUCTION{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator b`^~]|\[ZXW|VbUSROPOMLKJNIGAEC B {A @@ ? > P: 9 8 U6 5 b3 21/.,+&)-(+%$"!p  vB\@$  ) "!hZYXheet{ Normal;}{\s1 heading 1;}{\s2 heading 2;}} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\s2\sb240\sa100\qc\cf1\lang1033\b\f0\fs44 CONTENTS OF THE THIRD VOLUME.\par \trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl720\slmult0\qc PART III. (\i Continued\i0 , \cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc CHAPTER XV.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\scaps REGENERATION.\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cf0\b0\scaps page\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~1.\cell Usage of the word Regeneration\cell 3\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~2.\cell Nature of Regeneration\cell 5\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Not a Change in the Substance of the Soul. \emdash Not an Act of the Soul. -- Doctor Emmon's Doctrine. \emdash Professor Finney's Doc-trine. \emdash Doctor Nathaniel Taylor's View. \emdash Not a Change in any one Faculty. \emdash Not merely Illumination. \emdash Not a Change of the Higher Powers of the Soul exclusively. \emdash Modern Speculative Views. \emdash I':brard's Doctrine. \emdash Delitzsch's Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 25\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Doctrine of the Latin Church\cell\pard\intbl 27\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Doctrine of the Church of England\cell\pard\intbl 28\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~3.\cell The Evangelical Doctrine\cell 29\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Exposition of the Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 30\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 An Act of Divine Power\cell\pard\intbl 31\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx 7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 In the Subjective Sense of the Word not an Act\cell\pard\intbl 32\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 It is a New Principle of Life. \emdash A New Birth. \emdash A New Heart. \emdash The whole Soul the Subject of it\cell\pard\intbl 36\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpad dl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~4.\cell Objections to the Evangelical Doctrine\cell 37\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\b CHAPTER XVI.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\scaps FAITH.\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\t rpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\b0\'a7\~1.\cell Preliminary Remarks\cell 41\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~2.\cell Psychological Nature of Faith\cell 42\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\par d\intbl\fi-240\li360 Primary Idea of Faith is Trust. \emdash More limited Sense of the Word Definitions of Faith founded on its Subjective Nature, \emdash\cell\pard\intbl\f1\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 First, a Degree of Conviction less than Knowledge, but stronger than Opinion\cell\pard\intbl 46\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Second, a Conviction determined by the Will\cell\pard\intbl 49\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Definition founded on the Objects of Faith. \emdash Conviction of the Truth of Things not seen\cell\pard\intbl 53\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Definitions founded on the Kind of Evidence on which the Conviction rests, \emdash\cell\pard\intbl\f1\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 First, a Conviction founded on Feeling\cell\pard\intbl 52\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Second, a Conviction founded on Testimony\cell\pard\intbl 60\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cf2\f2 iv\cf0\f0\'a7\~3.\cell Different Kinds of Faith\cell 67\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~4.\cell Relation of Faith and Knowledge\cell 75\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~5.\cell Relation of Faith and Feeling\cell 88\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~6.\cell Relation of Faith and Love\cell 93\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~7.\cell Object of Saving Faith\cell 95\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~8.\cell Effects of Faith\cell 104\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Assurance\cell\pard\intbl 106\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Certainty of Salvation\cell\pard\intbl 110\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\b CHAPTER XVII.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\scaps JUSTIFICATION.\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\b0\'a7\~1.\cell Symbolical Statement of the Doctrine\cell 114\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~2.\cell Justification a forensic Act\cell 118\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Proof of the Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 120\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Calvin's Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 133\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~3.\cell Works not the Ground of Justification\cell 134\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Romish Doctrine. \emdash Remonstrant Doctrine. \emdash Protestant Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 137\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~4.\cell The Righteousness of Christ the Ground of Justification\cell 141\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~5.\cell Imputation of Righteousness\cell 144\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~6.\cell Proof of the Doctrine of Imputation\cell 150\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~7.\cell Consequences of the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness\cell 161\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~8.\cell Relation of Faith to Justification\cell 165\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Romish Doctrine. \emdash Remonstrant Doctrine. \emdash Protestant Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 170\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~9.\cell Objections to the Protestant Doctrine of Justification\cell 171\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~10.\cell Departures from the Protestant Doctrine\cell 179\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Osiander. \emdash Stancarus. \emdash Piscator. \emdash Arminian Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 185\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~11.\cell Modern Views on Justification\cell 195\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Rationalistic Theories. \emdash Philosophical Theories. \emdash Speculative Theologians\cell\pard\intbl 199\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\b CHAPTER XVIII.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\scaps SANCTIFICATION.\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\b0\'a7\~1.\cell Its Nature\cell 213\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Supernatural\cell\pard\intbl 213\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~2.\cell Wherein it consists\cell 220\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~3.\cell Method of\cell 226\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~4.\cell Fruits of\cell 231\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Nature of Good Works. \emdash Romish Doctrine. \emdash Works of Supererogation. \emdash Precepts and Counsels\cell\pard\intbl 235\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~5.\cell Necessity of Good Works\cell 238\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Antin omianism\cell\pard\intbl 241\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~6.\cell Relation of Good Works to Reward\cell 241\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~7.\cell Perfectionism\cell 245\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\!cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~8.\cell Theories of Perfectionism\cell 256\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Pelagian. \emdash Romish. \emdash Arminian. \emdash Oberlin\cell\pard\intbl 251\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\cf2"\b\f2 v\cf0\f0 CHAPTER XIX.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\scaps THE LAW.\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\b0\'a7\~1\cell Preliminary Principles\cell 259\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc#\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Theism the Foundation of the Moral Law. \emdash Christian Liberty in Matters of Indifference. \emdash Scriptural Use of the Word \ldblquote Law.\rdblquote \emdash Different Kinds of Laws. \emdash Perfection of the Law. \emdash The Decalogue. \emdash Rules of Interpretation\cell\pard\intbl 272\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~2.$\cell Division of the Contents of the Decalogue\cell 272\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~3.\cell The Preface to the Ten Commandments\cell 275\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~4. \i The First Commandment\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 277\%cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~5.\cell Invocation of Saints\cell 281\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Mariolatry\cell\pard\intbl 285\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clve&rtalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~6. \i The Second Commandment\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 290\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Worship of Images forbidden. \emdash Doctrine and Usage of the Romish Church\cell\pard\intbl 296\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clv'mrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Relics\cell\pard\intbl 300\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~7. \i The Third Commandment\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 305\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvert(alc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Import of the Command. \emdash Oaths. \emdash Romish Doctrine. \emdash Vows. \emdash Monastic Vows\cell\pard\intbl 319\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~8. \i The Fourth Commandment\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 321\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clv)ertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Its Design. \emdash Origin and Perpetual Obligation of the Sabbath\cell\pard\intbl 323\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 How it is to be sanctified\cell\pard\intbl 336\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmr*g\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Sunday Laws\cell\pard\intbl 340\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~9. \i The Fifth Commandment\i0 .\emdash Its Design\cell\pard\intbl 348\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clve+rtalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Filial Relation. \emdash Parental Duties. \emdash The Obedience due to Civil Magistrates\cell\pard\intbl 356\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Obedience to the Church\cell\pard\intbl 360\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmg,f\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~10. \i The Sixth Commandment\i0 . \emdash Its Design\cell\pard\intbl 362\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Capital Punishment\cell\pard\intbl 363\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\c-lvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Self-defence. \emdash War. \emdash Suicide. \emdash Duelling\cell\pard\intbl 368\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~11. \i The Seventh Commandment\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 368\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc.\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Celibacy. \emdash Marriage a Divine Institution\cell\pard\intbl 376\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 As a Civil Institution\cell\pard\intbl 377\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertal/c\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Monogamy\cell\pard\intbl 389\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Converted Polygamists\cell\pard\intbl 387\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell0\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Divorce\cell\pard\intbl 391\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Doctrine of the Church of Rome. \emdash In what Sense Marriage is a Sacrament\cell\pard\intbl 398\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\c1ell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Laws of Protestant Countries\cell\pard\intbl 401\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 The Social Evil\cell\pard\intbl 406\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Prohibited 2Marriages\cell\pard\intbl 407\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cf2\f2 vi\cf0\f0\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~12. \i The Eighth Commandment\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 421\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Foundation of the Right of Proper3ty. \emdash Community of Goods. --Communism and Socialism. \emdash International Society \emdash Violations of the Eighth Commandment\cell\pard\intbl 434\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~13. \i The Ninth Commandment\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 437\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clve4rtalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Importance of Truth. \emdash Detraction.\emdash Falsehood. \emdash Mental Reservation. \emdash Pious Frauds. \emdash False Miracles\cell\pard\intbl 452\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~14. \i The Tenth Commandment\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 463\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-355\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\b CHAPTER XX.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\scaps THE MEANS OF GRACE.\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\b0\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~1. \i The Word of God\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 4666\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Office of the Word as a Means of Grace. \emdash Lutheran Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 479\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~2. \i The Sacraments\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 485\c7ell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Their Nature. \emdash Usage of the Word. \emdash Theological Definition. \emdash Lutheran Doctrine. \emdash Romish Doctrine. \emdash Remonstrant Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 490\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\8intbl\'a7\~3.\cell Number of the Sacraments\cell 492\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~4.\cell Efficacy of the Sacraments\cell 49S\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Zwinglian and Remonstrant Doctrine. \emdash Reformed Doctrine. \emdash 9Lutheran Doctrine. \emdash Romish Doctrine. \emdash The \ldblquote\lang1142 Ex Opere Operato\lang1033\rdblquote Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 509\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~5.\cell The Necessity of the Sacraments\cell 516\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~6.\ce:ll The Validity of the Sacraments\cell 523\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~7. \i Baptism\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 526\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Its Mode. \emdash Use of the Word\cell\pard\intbl 52;6\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~8.\cell The Formula of Baptism\cell 539\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~9.\cell The Subjects of Baptism. \emdash Qualifications for Adult Baptism\cell 541\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trp entitled to Baptism?\cell 558\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Usage of the Church of Rome. \emdash Theories adopted by many Protestants. \emdash President Edwards's Doctrine. \emdash The Half-Way Covenant\cell\pard\intbl 567\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373?\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Puritan Doctrine. \emdash Usage of the Reformed Churches\cell\pard\intbl 573\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~12.\cell Efficacy of Baptism\cell 579\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\@fi-240\li360 Doctrine of the Reformed Churches. \emdash Baptismal Regeneration\cell\pard\intbl 591\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cf2\f2 vii\cf0\f0\'a7\~13.\cell Lutheran Doctrine of Baptism\cell 604\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~14.\cell Doctrine of the Church oAf Rome\cell 605\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~15. \i The Lord\rquote s Supper\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 511\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Of Perpetual Obligation\cell\pard\intbl 511\cell\row\trowd\trgBaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Elements to be Used. \emdash Sacramental Actions. \emdash Its Design. \emdash Qualifications for the Lord's Supper\cell\pard\intbl 629\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~16.\cell Doctrine of the Reformed Churches\cCell 626\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Zwinglian View. \emdash Calvin's Doctrine. \emdash The Form of Statement in which the Zwinglians and Calvinists Agree\cell\pard\intbl 631\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\iDntbl\fi-240\li360 The Sense in which Christ is Present in the Sacrament\cell\pard\intbl 637\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Manducation\cell\pard\intbl 643\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 EWhat is Received in the Lord's Supper\cell\pard\intbl 645\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 The Efficacy of the Lord's Supper\cell\pard\intbl 647\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~17.\cell Modern Views on this Sacrament\cell 650\Fcell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~18.\cell The Lutheran Doctrine\cell 661\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~19.\cell Doctrine of the Church of Rome\cell 677\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clverGtalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Transubstantiation. \emdash Withholding the Cup from the Laity\cell\pard\intbl 685\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 The Lord's Supper as a Sacrifice\cell\pard\intbl 685\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalHc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\~\cell\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\'a7\~20. \i Prayer\i0 \cell\pard\intbl 692\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 The Object of Prayer\cell\pard\intbl 700\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1I\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Requisites for Acceptable Prayer\cell\pard\intbl 701\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Different Kinds of Prayer\cell\pard\intbl 705\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-24J0\li360 Public Prayer\cell\pard\intbl 707\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Power of Prayer\cell\pard\intbl 708\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl720\slmult0\qc\b PART IV.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx782K2\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc ESCHATOLOGY.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc CHAPTER I.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\scaps STATE OF THE SOUL AFTER DEATH.\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\b0\'a7L\~1.\cell Protestant Doctrine\cell 718\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 The Old Testament Doctrine on the Future State\cell\pard\intbl 716\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Intermediate State\cell\Mpard\intbl 724\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~2.\cell Sleep of the Soul\cell 730\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~3.\cell Patristic Doctrine of the Intermediate State\cell 733\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgNf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~4.\cell Doctrine of the Church of Rome\cell 743\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Purgatory\cell\pard\intbl 749\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\b CHAPTER II.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\tOrqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\scaps RESURRECTION.\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\b0\'a7\~1.\cell Scriptural Doctrine\cell 771\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~2.\cell History of the Doctrine\cell P781\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\cf2\b\f2 viii\cf0\f0 CHAPTER III.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\scaps SECOND ADVENT.\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\b0\'a7\~1.\cell Preliminary RemarksQ\cell 790\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~2.\cell The Church Doctrine\cell 792\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~3.\cell Personal Advent of Christ\cell 792\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalRc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~4.\cell Calling of the Gentiles\cell 800\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~5.\cell Conversion of the Jews\cell 805\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Are the Jews to be Restored to their Own SLand?\cell\pard\intbl 807\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~6.\cell Antichrist\cell 812\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 The Papacy the Antichrist of St. Paul.\emdash The Antichrist of Daniel\cell\pard\intbl 823\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\Ttrleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 The Antichrist of the Apocalypse\cell\pard\intbl 825\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\f1\f0\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Roman Catholic Doctrine of Antichrist\cell\pard\intbl 831\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqUc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\b CHAPTER IV.\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\sl480\slmult0\qc\scaps CONCOMITANTS OF THE SECOND ADVENT.\scaps0\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\b0\'a7\~1.\cell The General Resurrection\cell 837\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trVleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~2.\cell The Final Judgment\cell 844\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~3.\cell The End of the World \cell 851\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbWl\'a7\~4.\cell The Kingdom of Heaven\cell 855\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~5.\cell Theory of the Premillennial Advent\cell 861\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Did the Apostles expect the Second Advent in their Day?\cell\pard\intbl 867\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trqc\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmgf\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\'a7\~6.\cell Future Punishment\cell 868\cell\row\trowd\trgaph15\trleft-35\trpaddl15\trpaddr15\trpaddfl3\trpaddfr3 \clvmrg\clvertalc\cellx672\clvertalc\cellx7373\clvertalc\cellx7822\pard\intbl\fs24\cell\pard\intbl\fi-240\li360 Duration of Future Punishment.\emdash Objections to the Scriptural Doctrine\cell\pard\intbl 878\cell\row\pard\cf3\f3\fs23\par } wwMQ0.0 INTRODUCTION{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\qc\cf1\lang1033\b\f0\fs48\par \par \par \par \par \par SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY\par \par VOLUME III\cf2\b0\fs23\par } S=y0.1 CONTENTS{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times New Roman;}{\f2\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f3\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\styles DD9 u1.15.0. CHAPTER XV REGENERATION{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red255\green192\blue128;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\stylesheet{ Normal;}{\s1 heading 1;}{\s2 heading 2;}{\s3 heading 3;}} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\s3\sb180\sa100\qc\highlight1\lang1033\b\f0\fs48\par \par \par \highlight2 REGENERATION\par \pard\cf3\highlight0\b0\f1\fs23\par } \255\blue255;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7 1. \i Usage of the Word.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\b0\scaps The\scaps0 subjective change wrought in the soul by the grace of God, is variously designated in Scripture. It is called a new birth, a resurrection, a new life, a new creature, a renewing of the mind, a dying to sin and living to righteousness, a translation from darkness to light, etc. In theologic]al language, it is called regeneration, renovation, conversion. These terms are often used interchangeably. They are also used sometimes for the whole process of spiritual renovation or restoration of the image of God, and sometimes for a particular stage of that process. Thus Calvin gives the term its widest scope: \ldblquote\lang1142 Uno verbo p\'9cnitentiam interpretor regenerationem, cujus non alius est scopus nisi ut imago Dei, qu\'e6 per Ad\'e6 transgressionem f\'9cdata et tantum non obliterata fuer^at, in nobis reformetur.\~Atque h\'e6c quidem instauratio non uno momento, vel die, vel anno impletur, sed per continuos, imo etiam lentos interdum profectus abolet Deus in electis suis carnis corruptelas.\lang1033\rdblquote\par With the theologians of the seventeenth century conversion and regeneration were synonymous terms. In the acts of the Synod of Dort, we find such expressions as \ldblquote\lang1142 Status conversionis aut regenerationis\lang1033 ,\rdblquote and \ldblquote\lang1142 effecta ad con_versionem sive regenerationem pr\'e6via.\lang1033\rdblquote John Owen, in his work on the Holy Spirit, follows the same usage. The fifth chapter of the third book of that work is entitled \ldblquote The nature of regeneration,\rdblquote and one of the heads under this is, \ldblquote Conversion not wrought by moral suasion only.\rdblquote \ldblquote If the Holy Spirit,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote acts no otherwise on men in regeneration or conversion,\rdblquote then so and so follows. Turrettin, as `we have seen, distinguishes between what he calls \ldblquote\lang1142 conversio \cf1\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 habitualis\lang1033\rdblquote and \ldblquote\lang1142 conversio actualis\lang1033 .\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 Conversio habitualia seu passiva, fit per habituum supernaturalium infusionem a Spiritu Sancto. Actualis vero seu activa per bonorum istorum exercitium.\~Per illam homo renovatur et convertitur a Deo. Per istam homo a Deo renovatus et convertus convertit se ad Deum, et actus agit. Illa amelius regeneratio dicitur, quia se habet ad modum nov\'e6 nativitatis, qua homo reformatur ad imaginem Creatoris sui. Ista vero conversio, quia includit hominis ipsius operationem.\lang1033\rdblquote This is clear and accurate. As these two things are distinct they should be designated by different terms. Great confusion arises from this ambiguity of terms. The questions whether man is active or passive in regeneration and whether regeneration is effected by the mediate or immediate influence of the Spibrit must be answered in one way if regeneration includes conversion, and in another if it be taken in its restricted sense. In the Bible, the distinction is generally preserved; \cf2\f2\'ec\'e5\'f4\f3\u8049?\lang1032\f4\'ed\'ef\'e9\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 , repentance, change of mind, turning to God, \i i.e\i0 ., conversion, is what man is called upon to do; \cf2\f3\u7936?\lang1032\f4\'ed\'e1\'e3\lang1033\f3\u8051?\lang1032\f4\'ed\lang1033\'ed\'e7\'f3\'e9\'f2\cf0\f0 , regeneration, is the act of God. God regecnerates; the soul is regenerated. In the Romish Church justification is making subjectively just, \i i.e\i0 ., free from sin and inwardly holy. So is regeneration. So is sanctification. These terms, therefore, in the theology of that church are constantly interchanged.\par Even by the Lutherans, in the \ldblquote Apology for the Augsburg Confession,\rdblquote regeneration is made to include justification. That is, it is made to include the whole process by which the sinner is transferred from a state ofd sin and condemnation into a state of salvation. In the \ldblquote Form of Concord\rdblquote it is said, \ldblquote\lang1142 Vocabulum regenerationis interdum in eo sensu accipitur, ut simul et remissionem peccatorum (qu\'e6 duntaxat propter Christam contingit) et subsequentem renovationem complectatur, quam Spiritus Sanctus in illis, qui per fidem justificati sunt, operatur, quandoque etiam solam remissionem peceatorum, et adoptionem in filios Dei significat. Et in hoc posteriore usu s\'e6pe multumque ied vocabulam in Apologia Confessionis ponitur. Verbi gratia, cum dicitur: Justificatio est regeneratio. Quin etiam vivificationis vocabulum interdum ita accipitur, ut remissionem peccatorum notet. Cum enim homo per fidem (quam quidem solus Spiritus Sanctus operatur) justificatur, id ipsum revera est qu\'e6dam regeneratio, quia ex filio ir\'e6 fit filius Dei, et hoc modo e morte in vitam transfertur.Deinde etiam regeneratio s\'e6pe pro sanctificatione \cf1\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 et renovatione (qu\'e6 fidei fjustificationem sequitur) usurpatur. In qua significatione D. Lutherus hac voce, tum in libro de ecelesia et conciliis, tum alibi etiam, multum usus est.\lang1033\rdblquote\par As this lax use of terms was unavoidably attended with great confusion, the \ldblquote Form of Concord\rdblquote itself, and the later Lutheran theologians were more precise. They made especially a sharp distinction between justification and anything signifying a subjective change in the sinner.\par In the early Church regeneratgion often expressed, not any inward moral change, but an external change of state or relation. Among the Jews when a heathen became a proselyte to their religion, he was said to be born again. The change of his status from without to within the theocracy, was called regeneration. This usage in a measure passed over to the Christian Church. When a man became a member of the Church he was said to be born anew; and baptism, which was the rite of initiation, was called regeneration. This use of the word has not yet entirely passed away. A distinction is still sometimes made between regeneration and spiritual renovation. The one is external, the other internal. Some of the advocates of baptismal regeneration make this distinction, and interpret the language of the formulas of the Church of England in accordance with it. The regeneration effected in baptism, in their view, is not any spiritual change in the state of the soul, but simply a birth into the visible Church.\par \pard\cf3\highlight1\f5\fs23\par } "V)1.15.2. Nature of Regeneration{\rtf1\ansi\ansii#}Y1.15.1. Usage of the Word{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\froman\fprq2\fcharset161{\*\fname Times New Roman;}Times New Roman Greek;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green[jcpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f3\froman\fprq2\fcharset161{\*\fname Times New Roman;}Times New Roman Greek;}{\f4\froman\fcharset0 Gentium;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red255\green0\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~2. \i Nature of Regeneration.\i0\par \pard\fi36k0\sb180\qj\b0 By a consent almost universal the word regeneration is now used to designate, not the whole work of sanctification, nor the first stages of that work comprehended in conversion, much less justification or any mere external change of state, but the instantaneous change from spiritual death to spiritual life. Regeneration, therefore, is a spiritual resurrection; the beginning of a new life. Sometimes the word expresses the act of God. God regenerates. Sometimes it designates the subjective efflect of his act. The sinner is regenerated. He becomes a new creature. He is born again. And this is his regeneration. These two applications of the word are so allied as not to produce confusion. The nature of regeneration is not explained in the Bible further than the account therein given of its author, God, in the exercise of the exceeding greatness of his power; its subject, the whole soul; and its effects, spiritual life, and all consequent holy acts \cf1\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 and states. Its metaphymsical nature is left a mystery. It is not the province of either philosophy or theology to solve that mystery. It is, however, the duty of the theologian to examine the various theories concerning the nature of this saving change, and to reject all such as are inconsistent with the Word of God.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Not a change in the Substance of the Soul.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Regeneration does not consist in any change in the substance of the soul. The only advocate of the opposite doctnrine among Protestant theologians was Flacius Illyricus, so called from the place of his birth. He was one of the most prominent Lutheran theologians in what is called the second Reformation in Germany. He did great service in the cause of truth in resisting the synergism of Melancthon, and the concessions which that eminent but yielding reformer was disposed to make to the papists. He contributed some of the most important works of the age in which he lived to the vindication of the Protestant faith. Hiso \ldblquote Catalogus Testiam Veritatis,\rdblquote designed to prove that the doctrine of the Reformation had had their witnesses in all ages; his \ldblquote Clavis Scriptur\'e6 Sacr\'e6;\rdblquote and especially the great historical work, \ldblquote The Magdeburg Centuries\rdblquote (in thirteen volumes, folio), of which he was the originator and principal author, attest his learning, talents, and untiring industry. His fervent and uncompromising spirit involved him in many difficulties and sorrows. Hpe died worn out by suffering and labour, says his biographer; one of those men of faith of whom the world was not worthy. Always extreme in his opinions, he held that original sin was a corruption of the substance of the soul, and regeneration such a change of that substance as to restore its normal purity. All his friends who had sided with him in his controversy with the Synergists and the supporters of the Leipzig Interim, forsook him now, and he stood alone. In the \ldblquote Form of Concord,\rdblquotqe adopted to settle all the controversies of the period, these peculiar views of Flacius were condemned as a virtual revival of the Manich\'e6an heresy. It was urged that if the substance of the soul be sinful, God, by whom each individual soul is created, must be the author of sin; and that Christ who, in assuming our nature, became consubstantial with us, must be a partaker of sin. No Christian Church has assumed the responsibility of the doctrine of Flacius, or held that regeneration involves a changer of the essence of the soul.\par \pard\cf1\f1\fs16 7\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Regeneration does not consist in an Act of the Soul.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Regeneration does not consist in any act or acts of the soul. The word here, of course, is to be understood not as including conversion, much less the whole work of sanctification, but in its restricted sense for the commencement of spiritual life. The opposite view, which makes regeneration, even in its narrowest sense, an act sof the soul, has been held by very different classes of theologians. It is, of course, involved in the Pelagian doctrine which denies moral character to everything except acts of the will. If \ldblquote all sin is sinning,\rdblquote and \ldblquote all love loving,\rdblquote then every moral change in man must be a change from one form of voluntary activity to another. As the later Remonstrants held the principle in question they made regeneration to consist in the sinner\rquote s own act in turning untot God. The influence exerted on him was one which he could yield to or resist. If he yielded, it was a voluntary decision, and in that decision his regeneration, or the beginning of his religious life, consisted.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Dr. Emmons\rquote s View.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Dr. Emmons, holding that all sin and holiness consist in acts, which acts, whether sinful or holy, are immediately created by God, makes regeneration to consist in God\rquote s giving rise to the commencement of au series of holy acts. In his discourse on Regeneration, the first proposition which he undertakes to establish is, \ldblquote that the Spirit of God, in regeneration, produces nothing but love.\rdblquote This is maintained in opposition to those who say that the Spirit produces a new nature, principle, disposition, or taste. \ldblquote Those in the state of nature,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote stand in no need of having any new power, or faculty, or principle of action produced in them, in order to thevir becoming holy. They are just as capable of loving as of hating God This is true of all sinners, who are as much moral agents, and the proper subjects of moral government, before as after regeneration. Whenever, therefore, the divine Spirit renews, regenerates, or sanctifies them, He has no occasion of producing anything in their minds besides love.\rdblquote \ldblquote The love which the Spirit of God produces in regeneration is the love of benevolence, and not the love of complacence.\rdblquote \ldbwlquote Though there is no natural or necessary connection between the first exercise of love and all future exercises of grace yet there is a constituted connection, which renders future exercises \cf1\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 of grace as certain, as if they flowed from a new nature, or holy principle, as many suppose.\rdblquote His first inference from the doctrine of his sermon is, \ldblquote If the Spirit of God produces nothing but love in regeneration, then there is no ground for the distinction which xis often made between regeneration, conversion, and sanctification. They are, in nature and kind, precisely the same frdits of the Spirit. In regeneration, He produces holy exercises; in conversion, He produces holy exercises; and in sanctification, He produces holy exercises.\rdblquote Secondly, \ldblquote If the Spirit of God in regeneration produces nothing but love, then men are no more passive in regeneration than in conversion or sanctification. Those who hold that the divine Spirit in regenerationy produces something prior to love as the foundation of it, that is, a new nature, or new principle of holiness, maintain that men are passive in regeneration, but active in conversion and sanctification But if what has been said in this discourse be true, there is no new nature, or principle of action, produced in regeneration, but only love, which is activity itself.\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Professor Finney\rquote s Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Professor Finney, in his \ldblquotze Lectures on Systematic Theology, teaches: (1.) That satisfaction, happiness, blessedness, is the only absolute good; that virtue is only relatively good, \i i.e\i0 ., good as tending to produce happiness. (2.) That all virtue lies in the intention to promote the happiness of being, that is, of universal being. There is no virtue in emotion, feeling, or any state of the sensibility, for these are involuntary. Love to God even is not complacency in his excellence, but \ldblquote willing him good.\rdblquot{e (3.) All sin is selfishness, or the choice of our own happiness in preference to the good of universal being. (4.) Every moral agent is always \ldblquote as sinful or holy as with their knowledge they can be.\rdblquote (5.) \ldblquote As the moral law is the law of nature, it is absurd to suppose that entire obedience to it should not be the unalterable condition of salvation.\rdblquote (6.) Regeneration is an \ldblquote instantaneous\rdblquote change \ldblquote from entire sinfulness to entire holi|ness.\rdblquote It is a simple change of purpose.\par The system of Professor Finney is a remarkable product of relentless logic. It is valuable as a warning. It shows to what \cf1\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 extremes the human mind may be carried when abandoned to its own guidance. He begins with certain axioms, or, as he calls them, truths of the reason, and from these he draws conclusions which are indeed logical deductions, but which shock the moral sense, and prove nothing but that his premises are false}. His fundamental principle is that ability limits obligation. Free will is defined to be \ldblquote the power of choosing, or refusing to choose, in compliance with moral obligation in every instance.\rdblquote \ldblquote Consciousness of the affirmation of ability to comply with any requisition, is a necessary condition of the affirmation of obligation to comply with that requisition.\rdblquote \ldblquote To talk of inability to obey moral law, is to talk sheer nonsense.\rdblquote\par But it is ackno~wledged that man\rquote s ability is confined to acts of the will, therefore moral character can be predicated only of such acts. The acts of the will are either choices or volitions. \ldblquote By choice is intended the selection or choice of an end. By volition is intended the executive efforts of the will to secure the end intended.\rdblquote We are responsible, therefore, only for our choices in the selection of an ultimate end. \ldblquote It is generally agreed that moral obligation respects strictly only the ultimate intention or choice of an end for its own sake.\rdblquote \ldblquote I have said that moral obligation respects the ultimate intention only. I am now prepared to say, still further, that this is a first truth of reason.\rdblquote \ldblquote Right can be predicated only of good-will, and wrong only of selfishness. It is right for him [for a man] to intend the highest good of being as an end. If he honestly does this, he cannot, doing this, mistake his duty, for in doing this he really performs the whole of duty.\rdblquote \ldblquote Moral character belongs solely to the ultimate intention of the mind, or to choice, as distinguished from volition.\rdblquote\par The end to be chosen is \ldblquote the highest good of being.\rdblquote \ldblquote Good may be natural or moral. Natural good is synonymous with valuable. Moral good is synonymous with virtue.\rdblquote Moral good is only a relative good. It does meet a demand of our being, and therefore produces satisfaction. This satisfaction is the ultimate good of being.\rdblquote \ldblquote I come now to state the point upon which issue is taken, to wit: That enjoyment, blessedness, or mental satisfaction, is the only ultimate good.\rdblquote \ldblquote Of what value \cf1\f1\fs16 10\cf0\f0\fs24 is the true, the right, the just, etc., aside from the pleasure as mental satisfaction resulting from them to sentient existences.\rdblquote\par It follows from these principles that men perform their whole duty, and are perfect, if they intend the happiness of being in general. There is no morality in emotions, sentiments, or feelings. These are involuntary states of the sensibility, and are in themselves neither good nor bad. \ldblquote If any outward action or state of the feeling exists, in opposition to the intention or choice of the mind, it cannot by any possibility have moral character. Whatever is beyond the control of a moral agent, he cannot be responsible for.\rdblquote \ldblquote Love may, and often does exist, as every one knows, in the form of a mere feeling or emotion. This emotion or feeling, as we are all aware, is purely an involuntary state of mind. Because it is a phenomenon of the sensibility, and of course a passive state of mind, it has in itself no moral character.\rdblquote Gratitude, \ldblquote as a mere feeling or phenomenon of the sensibility, has no moral character.\rdblquote The same is said of benevolence, compassion, mercy, conscientiousness, etc. The doctrine is, \ldblquote No state of the sensibility,. has any moral character in itself.\rdblquote The love which has moral excellence, and which is the fulfilling of the law, is not a feeling of complacency, but \ldblquote good-will,\rdblquote willing the good or happiness of its object. Should a man, therefore, under the impulse of a benevolent feeling, or a sense of duty, perform a right act, he would sin as really as if, under the impulse of malice or cupidity, he should perform a bad act. The illustration is, that to pay a debt from a sense of justice, is as wicked as to steal a horse from acquisitiveness. A man \ldblquote may be prevented [from committing commercial injustice] by a constitutional or phrenological conscientiousness or sense of justice. But this is only a feeling of the sensibility, and if restrained only by this, he is just as absolutely selfish as if he had stolen a horse in obedience to acquisitiveness.\rdblquote \ldblquote If the selfish man were to preach the gospel, it would be only because upon the whole it was most pleasing or gratifying to himself, and not at all for the sake of the good of being as an end. If he should become a pirate, it would be exactly for the same reason. Whichever course he takes, he takes it for precisely the same reason; and with the same degree of light it must involve the same degree of guilt.\rdblquote To feed the poor from a feeling of \cf1\f1\fs16 11\cf0\f0\fs24 benevolence, and to murder a parent from a feeling of malice, involve the same degree of guilt! Such a sacrifice to logic was never made by any man before. But still more wonderful, if possible, is the declaration that a man may \ldblquote feel deeply malicious and revengeful feelings toward God. But sin does not consist in these feelings, nor necessarily imply them.\rdblquote\par Moral excellence is not an object of love. To say that we are bound to love God because He is good, is said to be \ldblquote most nonsensical. What is it to love God? Why, as is agreed, it is not to exercise a mere emotion of complacency in Him. It is to will something to Him.\rdblquote \ldblquote Should it be said that God\rquote s holiness is the foundation of our obligation to love Him, I ask in what sense it can be so? What is the nature or form of that love, which his virtue lays us under an obligation to exercise? It cannot be a mere emotion of complacency, for emotions being involuntary states of mind and mere phenomena of the sensibility, are without the pale of legislation and morality.\rdblquote \ldblquote We are under infinite obligation to love God, and to will his good with all our power, because of the intrinsic value of his well-being, whether He is holy or sinful. Upon condition that He is holy, we are under obligation to will his actual blessedness, but certainly we are under obligation to will it with no more than all our heart, and soul, and mind, and strength. But this we are required to do because of the intrinsic value of his blessedness, whatever his character might be.\rdblquote Surely such a system is a \cf3\f2\u8017?\lang1032\f3\'f0\lang1033\f2\u8057?\lang1032\f3\'e4\'e5\'e9\'e3\'ec\'e1 \'f4\lang1033\f2\u8134?\lang1032\f3\'f2 \lang1033\f2\u7936?\lang1032\f3\'f0\'e5\'e9\'e8\'e5\lang1033\f2\u8055?\lang1032\f3\'e1\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 .\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Dr. Taylor\rquote s View.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The system of Dr. Taylor of New Haven agrees with that of Professor Finney in making free agency include plenary power; in limiting responsibility and moral character to voluntary acts, in regarding happiness as the chief good; and in making regeneration to consist in a change of purpose. The two systems differ, however, essentially as to the ground of moral obligation or nature of virtue; and as to the nature of that change of purpose in which regeneration consists. Professor Finney adopts the common eud\'e6monistic theory which makes the happiness of being, \i i.e\i0 . of the universe, the chief good; and therefore makes virtue consist in the governing purpose to promote that happiness, and all sin in the purpose to seek our own happiness, instead of the happiness of being; consequently, regeneration is a change of that purpose; that is, it is a change from selfishness to benevolence. \par Dr. Taylor, on the other hand, recognized the fact that as the desire of happiness is a constituent element of our nature, or law of our being, it must be innocent, and therefore is not to be confounded with selfishness. He hence inferred that this desire of happiness is rightfully the controlling principle of action in all sentient and rational creatures. Sin consists in seeking happiness in the creature; holiness in seeking happiness in God; regeneration is the purpose or decision of a sinner to seek his happiness in God and not in the world. This change of purpose, he sometimes calls a \ldblquote change of heart,\rdblquote sometimes \ldblquote giving the heart to God,\rdblquote sometimes \ldblquote loving God.\rdblquote As regeneration is the choice of God as our chief good, it is an intelligent, voluntary act of the soul, and therefore must take place according to the established laws of mental action. It supposes the preliminary acts of consideration, appreciation, and comparison. The sinner contemplates God as a source of happiness, estimates his suitableness to the necessities of his nature, compares Him with other objects of choice, and decides to choose God as his portion. Sometimes the word regeneration is used in a comprehensive sense, including the whole process of consideration and decision; sometimes in a restricted sense, for the decision itself.\par Such being the nature of regeneration, it is of course brought about through the influence of the truth. The Bible reveals the nature of God, and his capacity and willingness to make his creatures happy; it exhibits all the motives which should determine the soul to take God for its portion. As regeneration is a rational and voluntary act, it is inconceivable that it should take place except in view of rational considerations. The Spirit\rquote s influence in this process is not denied. The fact is admitted that all the considerations which ought to determine the sinner to make choice of God, will remain without saving effect, unless the Spirit renders them effectual.\par These views are presented at length in the \ldblquote Christian Spectator\rdblquote (a quarterly review) for 1829. On the nature of the change in question, Dr. Taylor says: \ldblquote Regeneration, considered as a moral change of which man is the subject \emdash giving God the heart \emdash making a new heart \emdash loving God supremely, etc., are terms and phrases which, in popular use, denote a complex act. These words, in all ordinary speech and writing, are used to denote one act, and yet this one act includes a process of mental \cf1\f1\fs16 13\cf0\f0\fs24 acts, consisting of the perception and comparison of motives, the estimate of their relative worth, and the choice or willing of the external action.\rdblquote \ldblquote When we speak of the means of regeneralion, we shall use the word regeneration in a more limited import than its ordinary popular import; and shall confine it, chiefly for the sake of convenient phraseology, to the act of the will or heart, in distinction from other mental acts connected with it; or to that act of the will or heart which consists in a preference of God to every other object; or to that disposition of the heart, or governing affection or purpose of the man, which consecrates him to the service and glory of God.\rdblquote\par \ldblquote Self-love or desire of happiness, is the primary cause or reason of all acts of preference or choice which fix supremely on any object. In every moral being who forms a moral character, there must be a first moral act of preference or choice. This must respect some one object, God or mammon, as the chief good, or as an object of supreme affection. Now whence comes such a choice or preference? Not from a previous choice or preference of the same object, for we speak of the first choice of the object. The answer which human consciousness gives, is, that the being constituted with a capacity for happiness desires to be happy; and knowing that he is capable of deriving happiness from different objects, considers from which the greatest happiness may be derived, and as in this respect he judges or estimates their relative value, so he chooses or prefers the one or the other as his chief good. While this must be the process by which a moral being forms his first moral preference, substantially the same process is indispensable to a change of this preference. The change involves the preference of a new object as the chief good; a preference which the former preference has no tendency to produce, but a direct tendency to prevent; a preference, therefore, not resulting from, or in any way occasioned by a previous preference of any given object, but resulting from those acts of considering and comparing the sources of happiness, which are dictated by the desire of happiness or self-love.\rdblquote\par Regeneration being a change of purpose, the mode in which it is produced is thus explained. \ldblquote If man without divine grace is a moral agent, then he is qualified so to consider, compare, and estimate the objects of choice as means of happiness, and capable also of such constitutional excitement in view of the good and evil set before him, as might result in his giving his heart to God, without grace. The act of giving God the heart must take place in perfect accordance with the laws of moral agency and of voluntary action. If the interposing grace violate these laws, the effect cannot be moral action; and it must violate these laws, if it dispense with the class of mental acts now under consideration. Whatever, therefore, be the influence which secures a change of heart in the sinner, the change itself is a moral change, and implies the exercise of all the powers and capacities of the moral agent, which in the nature of things are essential to a moral act.\rdblquote On a previous page it had been said, \ldblquote The Scriptures authorize us to assert, generally, that the mode of divine influence is consistent with the moral nature of this change as a voluntary act of man; and, also, that it is through the truth, and implies attention to truth on the part of man.\rdblquote \ldblquote Cannot,\rdblquote Dr. Taylor asks, \ldblquote He who formed the mind of man, reach it with an influence of his Spirit, which shall accord with all the laws of voluntary and moral action? Because motives, without a divine interposition, will not secure this moral change in sinful man, and because they have no positive efficiency in its production, must God in producing it dispense with motives altogether? Must the appropriate connections between motives and acts of will, or between the exercise of affections and the perception of their objects, be dissolved, and have no place? Must God, if by his grace He brings sinners to give Him their heart in holy love, accomplish the change in such a manner that they shall have no prior perception or view of the object of their love; and know not what or whom they love, or wherefore they love Him, rather than their former idols? Does a consistent theology thus limit the Holy One, and oblige Him to accomplish the veriest impossibilities, in transforming the moral character of sinful man?\rdblquote This may be a correct account of the process of conversion, with which this system confounds regeneration. Conversion is indeed a voluntary turning of the soul from sin to God. From the nature of the case it is produced proximately by appropriate motives, or it would be neither rational nor holy. But this proves nothing as to the nature of regeneration. The most accurate analysis of the laws of vision can throw no light on the way in which Christ opened the eyes of the blind.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Remarks.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 It is plain that these views of regeneration are mere philosophical theories. Dr. Emmons assumes that such is the dependence\cf1\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 of a creature upon the creator, that it cannot act. No creature can be a cause. There is no efficiency in second causes. Then, of course the first cause must produce all effects. God creates everything, even volitions. In the soul there are only acts or exercises. Regeneration, therefore, is an act or volition created by God; or, it is the name given to the commencement of a new series of exercises which are holy instead of sinful.\par Professor Finney assumes that plenary ability is essential to moral agency; that a man, so far as his internal life is concerned, has power only over his choices and volitions; all, therefore, for which he is responsible, all that constitutes moral character, must fall under the category of choice, the selection of an ultimate end. Assuming, moreover, that happiness is the only absolute good, all sin consists in the undue pursuit of our own happiness, and all virtue in benevolence or the purpose to seek the happiness of being. Regeneration, therefore, consists in the change of the purpose to seek our own happiness, for the purpose to seek as our ultimate end the happiness of the universe.\par Dr. Taylor, agreeing with Professor Finney on the nature of free agency, and in the doctrine that happiness is the chief good, holds with him that all sin and holiness consist in voluntary action. But assuming that self-love, as distinguished from selfishness, is the motive in all rational moral action, he makes regeneration to consist in the choice of God as the source of our own happiness. \par All these speculations are outside of the Bible. They have no authority or value which they do not derive from their inherent truth, and any man is at liberty to dispute them, if they do not commend themselves to his own reason and conscience. But besides thc purely philosophical character of these views, it would be easy to show, not only that they have no valid ground on which to rest, but also that they are inconsistent with the teachings of Scripture and with genuine Christian experience. This will be attempted when the Scriptural account of regeneration comes to be considered.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Regeneration not a change in any one Faculty of the Soul.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Regeneration does not consist in a change in any one of the faculties of the soul, whether the sensibility, or the will, or the intellect. According to some theologians, the feelings, or heart, in the restricted sense of that word, is the exclusive seat of original sin. Hereditary corruption, in other words, is made to consist \cf1\f1\fs16 16\cf0\f0\fs24 in the aversion of the heart from divine things, and a preference for the things of the world. The end to be accomplished in regeneration, therefore, is simply to correct this aversion. The understanding, it is urged, so far as moral and religious truth is concerned, apprehends aright and appreciates what is loved; and in like manner, in the same sphere, we believe what we apprehend as right and good. If, therefore, the feelings are made what they ought to be, all the other operations of the mind, or inner man, will be right. This theory is founded in part upon a mistaken view of the meaning of the word \ldblquote heart\rdblquote as used in the Scriptures. In a multitude of cases, and in all cases where regeneration is spoken of, it means the whole soul; that is, it includes the intellect, will, and the conscience as well as the affections. Hence the Bible speaks of the eyes, of the thoughts, of the purposes, of the devices, as well as of the feelings or affections of the heart. In Scriptural language, therefore, a \ldblquote new heart\rdblquote does not mean simply a new state of feeling, but a radical change in the state of the whole soul or interior man. Besides, this theory overlooks what the Bible constantly assumes: the unity of our inward life. The Scriptures do not contemplate the intellect, the will, and the affections, as independent, separable elements of a composite whole. These faculties are only different forms of activity in one and the same subsistence. No exercise of the affections can occur without an exercise of the intellect, and, if the object be moral or religious, without including a correspondent exercise of our moral nature.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Regeneration not merely Illumination.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Another and antagonistic theory equally one-sided, is that the intellect only is in fault, and that regeneration resolves itself into illumination. This view is far more plausible than the preceding. The Bible makes eternal life to consist in knowledge; sinfulness is blindness, or darkness; the transition from a state of sin to a state of holiness is a translation from darkness into light; men are said to be renewed unto knowledge. \i i.e\i0 ., knowledge is the effect of regeneration, conversion is said to be effected by the revelation of Christ; the rejection of Him as the Son of God and Saviour of men is referred to the fact that the eyes of those who believe not are blinded by the god of this world. These Scriptural representations prove much. They prove that knowledge is essential to all holy exercises; that truth as the object of knowledge, is of vital importance, and that error is always evil and often fatal; and that the effect of regeneration, so far as they reveal themselves in our consciousness, consist largely in the spiritual apprehension or discernment of divine things. These representations also prove that in the order of nature, knowledge, or spiritual discernment, is antecedent and causative relatively to all holy exercises of the feelings or affections. It is the spiritual apprehension of the truth that awakens love, faith, and delight; and not love that produces spiritual discernment. It was the vision Paul had of the divine glory of Christ that made him instantly and forever his worshipper and servant. The Scriptures, however, do not teach that regeneration consists exclusively in illumination, or that the cognitive faculties are exclusively the subject of the renewing power of the Spirit. It is the soul as such that is spiritually dead; and it is to the soul that a new principle of life controlling all its exercises, whether of the intellect, the sensibility, the conscience, or the will is imparted.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Not a Change of the Higher, as distinguished from the Lower Powers of the Soul.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 There is another view of the subject, which falls under this head of what may be called partial regeneration. it is founded on trichotomy, or the assumption of three elements in the constitution of man, namely, the body, the soul, and the spirit (the \cf3\f3\'f3\f2\u8182?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1, \'f8\'f5\'f7\lang1033\f2\u8053?\cf0\f0 , and \cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 ); the first material, the second animal, the third spiritual. To the second, \i i.e\i0 ., to the soul or \cf3\f3\'f8\'f5\'f7\f2\u8053?\cf0\f0 , are referred what man has in common with the lower animals; life, sensibility, will, and understanding; to the spirit what is peculiar to us as rational, moral, and religious beings, namely, conscience and reason. This third element, the \cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 , or reason, is often called divine; sometimes in a literal, and sometimes in a figurative sense. In either case, according to the theory under consideration, it is not the seat of sin, and is uncorrupted by the fall. It remains, although clouded and perverted by the disorder in the lower departments of our nature, the point of contact and connection between man and God. This at least is one view of the matter. According to another view, neither the body nor the soul (neither \cf3\f3\'f3\f2\u8182?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 nor \cf3\f3\'f8\'f5\'f7\f2\u8053?\cf0\f0 ), has any moral character. The seat of the moral and divine life is exclusively the \cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 or spirit. This is said to be paralyzed by the fall. It is figuratively dead insusceptible of impression from divine things. There are as many theories of the nature of regeneration among the advocates\cf1\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 of this threefold division in the constitution of man, as there are systems of anthropology. The idea common to all, or to a majority of them, is that regeneration consists in restoring the \cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 or spirit to its normal controlling influence over the whole man. According to some, this is a natural process in which an animal man, \i i.e\i0 ., a man governed by the \cf3\f3\'f8\'f5\'f7\f2\u8053?\cf0\f0 , comes to be reasonable, or pneumatic, \i i.e\i0 ., governed by the \cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 or higher powers of his nature. According to others, it is a supernatural effect due to the action of the divine (\cf3\f3\'d0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 ) Spirit upon the human \cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 or spirit. In either case, however, the \cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\'f4\'e9\'ea\lang1033\f2\u8057?\lang1032\f3\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 , or Spiritual man, is not one in whom the Holy Spirit dwells as a principle of a new, spiritual life; but one who is governed by his own \cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 or spirit. According to others again, the \cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 or reason in man is God, the God-consciousness, the Logos, and regeneration is the gradually acquired ascendency of this divine element of our nature.\par In reference to these views of regeneration it is sufficient to remark, (1.) That the threefold division of our nature on which they are founded is antiscriptural, as we have already attempted to prove. (2.) Admitting that there is a foundation for such a distinction, it is not of the kind assumed in these theories. The soul and spirit are not distinct substances or essences, one of which may be holy and the other unholy, or negative. This is inconsistent with the unity of our interior life which the Scriptures constantly assume. (3.) It subverts the Scriptural dostrine of regeneration and sanctification to make the governing principle in the renewed to be their own \cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 or spirit, and not the Holy Spirit.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Modern Speculative Views on this Subject.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The modern speculative philosophy has introduced such a radical change in the views entertained of the nature of God, of his relation to the world, of the nature of man and of his relation to God, of the person and work of Christ, and of the application of his redemption to the salvation of men, that all the old, and, it may be safely said, Scriptural forms of these doctrines have been superseded, and others introduced which are unintelligible except in the light of that philosophy, and which to a great extent reduce the truths of the Bible to the form of philosophical dogmas. We cease to hear of the Holy Ghost as the third person of the Trinity, applying to men the redemption purchased by Christ; of regeneration by his almighty power, or of his dwelling in the hearts of believers. The forms of this new theology are very diversified. They are all perhaps comprehended under three classes: first, those which are avowedly pantheistic, although claiming to be Christian; secondly, those which are Theistic but do not admit the doctrine of the Trinity; and thirdly, those which endeavour to bring theology as a philosophy into the forms of Christian doctrine. In all, however, the anthropology, christology, soteriology, and ecclesiology advocated, are so changed as to render it impossible to retain in their exhibition the terms and formulas with which the Church from the beginning has been familiar. Regeneration, justification, and sanctification are almost antiquated terms; and what remains of the truths those terms were used to express, is merged into the one idea of the development of a new divine life in the soul. As to anthropology, these modern speculative, or as they often call themselves, and are called by others, mystic, theologians teach, (1.) That there is no dualism in man between soul and body. There is but one life. The body is the soul projecting itself externally. Without a body there is no soul. (2.) That there is no real dualism between God and man. The identity between God and man is the last result of modern speculation; and it is the fundamental idea of Christianity.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Soul and Body one.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 As to the former of these points, Schleiermacher says, \ldblquote There are not a spiritual and a corporeal world, a corporeal and spiritual existence of man. Such representations lead to nothing but the dead mechanism of a pre\'ebstablished harmony. Body and spirit are actual only in and with each other, so that corporeal and spiritual action can only be relatively distinguished.\rdblquote The Late President Rauch says, \ldblquote A dualism which admits of two principles for one being, offers many difficulties, and the greatest is, that it cannot tell how the principles can be united in a third. A river may originate in two fountains, but a science cannot, and much less individual life.\rdblquote \ldblquote It would be wrong to say that man consists of two essentially different substances, of earth and the soul; but he is soul only, and cannot be anything else. This soul, however, unfolds itself externally in the life of the body, and internally in the life of the mind.\rdblquote So Olshausen teaches that the soul has no subsistence but in the body. Dr. J. W. Nevin \cf1\f1\fs16 20\cf0\f0\fs24 says, \ldblquote We have no right to think of the body in any way as a form of existence of and by itself, into which the soul as another form of such existence is thrust in a mechanical way. Both form one life. The soul to be complete, to develop itself at all as a soul, must externalize itself, throw itself out in space; and this externalization is the body.\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i God and Man one.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 As to the second point, or the oneness of God and man, as the soul externalizes itself in the body, \ldblquote dividing itself only that its unity may become thus the more free and intensely complete,\rdblquote so God externalizes Himself in the world. Schleiermacher says, it is in vain to attempt to conceive of God as existing either before or out of the world. They may be distinguished in thought, but are only \ldblquote\lang1031 zwei Werthe fur dieselbe Forderung\lang1033 , two values of the same postulate.\rdblquote According to this philosophy, it is just as true, \ldblquote No world, no God,\rdblquote as \ldblquote No body, no soul.\rdblquote \ldblquote The world, in its lower view, is not simply the outward theatre or stage on which man is to act his part as a candidate for heaven. In the midst of all its different forms of existence, it is pervaded throughout with the power of a single life, which comes ultimately to its full sense and force only in the human person.\rdblquote The world, therefore, is pervaded by \ldblquote the power of a single life;\rdblquote the highest form of that life (on earth) is man. What is that life? What is that pervading principle which reveals itself in such manifold forms of existence, and culminates in man? It is, of course, God. Man, therefore, as Schleiermacher says, is \ldblquote the existence-form\rdblquote of God on earth. Ullmann says that the German mystics in the Middle Ages taught \ldblquote the oneness of Deity and humanity.\rdblquote The results reached by the mystics under the guidance of feeling, he says, modern philosophy has reached by speculation. This doctrine of the essential oneness of God and man, the speculative theologians adopt as the fundamental idea of Christianity. To work out that idea in a manner compatible with Theism and the Gospel, is the problem which those theologians have attempted to solve. These attempts have resulted, in some cases, in avowed Christian Pantheism, as it is called; in others, \cf1\f1\fs16 21\cf0\f0\fs24 in forms of doctrine so nearly pantheistic as to be hardly distinguished from Pantheism itself; and in all, in a radical modification, not only of the theology of the Church as expressed in her received standards, but also of the Scriptural form of Christian doctrines, if not of their essence. This is seen to be true in the anthropology of this system, which destroys the essential difference between the creator and his creatures, between God and man.The christology of this modern theology has already been presented in its essential features. There is no dualism in Christ as between soul and body. The two are one life. Neither is there any dualism between divinity and humanity in Him. The divine and human in his person are one life. In being the ideal or perfect man, He is the true God. The deification which humanity reached in Christ, is not a supernatural act on the part of God; it is reached by a process of natural development in his people, \i i.e\i0 ., the Church.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Soteriology of these Philosophers.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The soteriology of this system is simple. The soul projects itself in the body. They are one life, but the body may be too much for the soul. The development of this one life in its twofold form, inward and outward, may not be symmetrical. So humanity as a generic life, a form of the life of God, as projected externally in the world from Adam onward, has not developed itself aright. If left unaided it would not reach the goal, or unfold itself as divine. A new start, therefore, must be given to it, a new commencement made. This is done by a supernatural intervention resulting in the production of the person of Christ. In Him divinity assumes the fashion of a man, \emdash the existence-form of man, \emdash God becomes man, and man is God. This renewed entrance, so to speak, of God into the world, this special form of divine-human life, is Christianity, which is constantly declared to be \ldblquote a life,\rdblquote \ldblquote the life of Christ,\rdblquote \ldblquote a new theanthropic life.\rdblquote Men become Christians by being partakers of this life. They become partakers of this life by union with the Church and reception of the sacraments. The incarnation of God is continued in the Church; and this new principle of \ldblquote divine-human life\rdblquote descends from Christ to the members of his Church, as naturally and as much by a process of organic development, as humanity, derived from Adam, unfolded itself in his descendants. Christ, therefore, saves us, not so much by what He did, as by what He is.\cf1\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 He made no satisfaction to the divine justice; no expiation for sin; no fulfilling of the law. There is, therefore, really no justification, no real pardon even, in the ordinary sense of the word. There is a healing of the soul, and with that healing the removal of the evils incident to disease. Those who become partakers of this new principle of life, which is truly human and truly divine, become one with Christ. All the merit, righteousness, excellence, and power, inherent in this \ldblquote divine-human life\rdblquote of course belong to those who partake of that life. This righteousness, excellence, etc., are our own. They are subjective in us, and form our character, just as the nature derived from Adam was ours, with all its corruptions and infirmities.\par If asked what is regeneration according to this system, the proper answer would probably be, that it is an obsolete term. There is no room for the thing usually signified by the word, and no reason for retaining the word itself. Regeneration is a work of the Holy Spirit. But this system in its integrity does not acknowledge the Holy Spirit as a distinct person or agent. And those who are constrained to make the acknowledgment of his personality, are evidently embarrassed by the admission. What the Scriptures and the Church attribute to the Spirit working with the freedom of a personal agent, when and where he sees fit, this system attributes to the \ldblquote theanthropic-life\rdblquote of Christ, working as a new force, according to the natural laws of development.\par The impression made upon the readers of the modern theologians of this school, is that made by any other form of philosophical disquisition. It has not, and from its nature it cannot have anything more than human authority. This system may be adopted as a matter of opinion, but it cannot be an object of faith. And therefore it cannot support the hopes of a soul conscious of guilt. In turning from such writings to the Word of God, the transition these theologians would have us believe, is from gnw/sij to pi,stij; but to the consciousness of the Christian, it is like the transition from the confusion of tongues at Babel, where no man understood his fellow, to the symphonious utterance of those \ldblquote who spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Doctrine of Ebrard.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Of the writers who belong to the general class of \ldblquote speculative\rdblquote theologians, some adhere much more nearly to the Scriptures \cf1\f1\fs16 23\cf0\f0\fs24 than others. Dr. J. H. A. Ebrard, of Erlangen, has already been repeatedly referred to as addicted to the Reformed faith; and where he consciously departs from it, he considers himself as only carrying out its legitimate principles. His \ldblquote Dogmatik\rdblquote has, in fact, a far more Scriptural character than most of the modern German systems. In Ebrard, as in others, we find a compromise attempted between the Church doctrine of regeneration, and the modern theory of the incarnation of God in the race of man. Not only is a distinction made between repentance, conversion, and regeneration; but also true repentance and genuine conversion are made to precede regeneration. The two former take place in the sphere of the consciousness. In all the states and exercises connected with repentance and conversion, the soul is active and co\'f6perative; and the only influence exercised by God or his Spirit, is mediate and moral. It is not until the sinner has obeyed the command to repent, to believe in Christ, and to return unto God, that God gives the soul that divine something which makes it a new creature, and effects its living organic union with Christ. In this latter process the soul is simply passive. God is the only agent. What is said to be communicated to the soul is Christ; the person of Christ; the life of Christ; his substance, or a new substance. A distinction, however, is made between essence and substance. Ebrard insists that the most hidden, substantial germ of our being is born again in regeneration \emdash not merely changed, but new-born. Nevertheless, he says that the \ldblquote\lang1142 essentia anim\'e6 human\'e6\lang1033\rdblquote is not changed, and assents to the statement by Bucan, \ldblquote\lang1142 Renovatio fit non quoad essentiam ut deliravit Illyricus, sed quoad qualitates inh\'e6rentes.\lang1033\rdblquote What he asserts, frequently elsewhere, is, \ldblquote That Christ, real and substantial, is born in us. But he adds that the words \ldblquote real and substantial\rdblquote are used to guard against the assumption that regeneration consists simply in some inward exercise, or transient state of the consciousness. It is, as he truly teaches, much more; something lower than the consciousness; a change in the state of the soul, which determines the acts and exercises which reveal themselves in the consciousness, and manifest themselves in the life. He finds his doctrine of regeneration, not in what Calvin and some few of the Reformed theologians taught under that head, but in what they teach of the Lord\rquote s Supper, and of the mystical union. Calvin says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Sunt qui manducare Christi carnem, et \cf1\f1\fs16 26\cf0\f0\fs24 sanguinem ejus bibere, uno verbo definiunt, nihil esse aliud, quam in Christum ipsum credere. Sed mihi expressius quiddam ac sublimius videtur voluisse docere Christus nempe vera sui participatione nos vivificari..Quemadmodum enim non aspectus sed esus panis corpori alimentum sufficit, ita vere ac penitus participem Christi animam fieri convenit, ut ipsius virtute in vitam spiritualem vegetetur.\lang1033\rdblquote \ldblquote We have here certainly,\rdblquote says Ebrard, \ldblquote the doctrine of a secret, mystical communication of Christ\rquote s substance to the substantial centre in man (the \lquote\lang1142 anima\lang1033\rquote ), which develops itself on the one hand in the physical, and on the other, in the noetic life.\rdblquote These writers are correct in denying that regeneration is a mere change in the purposes, or feelings, or conscious states of any kind in man; and also in affirming that it involves the communication of a new and abiding principle of life to the soul. But they depart from Scripture and from the faith of the Church universal in substituting \ldblquote the theanthropic nature of Christ,\rdblquote \ldblquote his divine-human life,\rdblquote \ldblquote generic humanity healed and exalted to the power of a divine life\rdblquote (\i i.e\i0 ., deified), for the Holy Ghost. This substitution is made avowedly in obedience to modern science, to the new philosophy which has discovered a true anthropology and revealed \ldblquote the real oneness of God and man.\rdblquote As already remarked, it is assumed that this communication of the \ldblquote theanthropic nature of Christ\rdblquote carried with it his merits as well as his blessedness and power. All we have of Christ, we have within us. And if we can discover little of God, and little God-like in our souls, so much the worse. It is all we have to expect, until our inner life is further developed. The Christ within (as some of the Friends also teach), is, according to this system, all the Christ we have. Ebrard, therefore, in one view identifies regeneration and justification. \ldblquote Regeneration,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote as the act of Christ, is the cause (\lquote\lang1142 causa efficiens\lang1033\rquote ) of justification; He communicates his life to us, and awakens a new life in us. This is justification, an inward subjective change, which involves merit as well as holiness. This confounding the work of the Holy Spirit in regeneration, with the judicial, objective act of justification, belongs to the system. At least it is only on the ground of this infused life that we are pronounced righteous in the sight of God. What we receive is \ldblquote the real divine-human life of Christ,\rdblquote and \ldblquote whatever there may be of merit, virtue, efficacy or moral value it any way, in the mediatorial work of Christ, it\cf1\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 is all lodged in the life, by the power of which alone this work has been accomplished, and in the presence of which only it can have either reality or stability. The imagination that the merits of Christ\rquote s life may be sundered from his life itself, and conveyed over to his people under this abstract form, on the ground of a merely outward legal constitution, is unscriptural and contrary to all reason at the same time.\rdblquote Regeneration consisting in the communicating the life of Christ, his substance, to the soul, and this divine-human life comprehending all the merit, virtue, or efficacy belonging to Christ and his work, \emdash regeneration involves justification, of which it is the ground and the cause.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Doctrine of Delitzsch.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Delitzsch devotes one division of his \ldblquote Biblical Psychology\rdblquote to the subject of regeneration. He begins the discussion with a discourse on Christ\rquote s person. \ldblquote When we wish to consider the new spiritual life of the redeemed man, we proceed from the divine human archetype, the person of the Redeemer.\rdblquote Man was, as to his spirit and soul, originally constituted in the image of God; the spirit was the image \ldblquote of His triune nature and the latter [the soul] of His sevenfold \lquote doxa.\rquote\rdblquote Man was free to conform his life to the spirit, or divine principle within him, or to allow the control of his life to be assumed by the soul. Utter ruin was the consequence of the fall. This could be corrected and man redeemed only by \ldblquote a new beginning of similar creative intensity.\rdblquote This new beginning was effected in the incarnation. The Son of God became man, not by assuming our nature, in the ordinary sense of those words, but by ceasing to be almighty, omniscient, and omnipresent, and contracting Himself to the limits of humanity. It was a human life into which He thus entered; a life including a spirit, soul, and body. There is no dualism in Christ\rquote s person, as between the corporeal and spiritual, or between the human and divine. It is the divine nature in the form of humanity, or this divine-human nature, which is purely and simply, though perfectly, human, which is communicated to the people of God in their regeneration. To this fellowship in the life of Christ, faith is indispensable, and therefore Ebrard says, infants cannot be the subjects of regeneration, while Delitzsch, a Lutheran, maintains that infants are capable of exercising faith, and\cf1\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 therefore are capable of being regenerated. What is received from Christ, or that of which his people are made partakers, is \ldblquote the Spirit, the soul, the body of Christ.\rdblquote The new man, or second Adam, was made a \ldblquote life-giving spirit,\rdblquote and gradually subdues the old man, or our Adamic nature, and brings the whole man (\cf3\f3\'f0\'ed\'e5\f2\u8166?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1,\lang1033\f4 \f3\'f8\'f5\'f7\f2\u8053?\cf0\f0 , and \cf3\f3\'f3\f2\u8182?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 ), spirit, soul, and body, up to the standard of the life of Christ, in whom the divine and human are merged into one, or rather appear in their original oneness.\par The communication of the theanthropic life to the soul is an act of the divine Spirit in which we have neither agency nor consciousness. Delitzsch infers from what our Lord said to Nicodemus, John iii. that \ldblquote The operation of the Spirit of regeneration is, therefore, (1.) A free one, withdrawn from the power of human volition, of human special agency. (2.) A mysterious one, lying beyond human consciousness, and only to be recognized by its effects.\rdblquote \ldblquote It is peculiar to all God\rquote s creative agencies, that the creature which is thereby brought into existence, or in which this or that is brought into existence, has no consciousness of what is occurring.\rdblquote\par Various as are the modifications of this doctrine as presented by different writers of this general school, regeneration is by all of them understood to be the communication of the life of Christ to the soul. By the life of Christ is meant his manhood, his human nature, which was at the same time divine, and therefore is theanthropic. It may be called human, and it may be called divine, for although being one, one life, it is truly divine by being perfectly human. We are all partakers of humanity as polluted and degraded by the apostasy of Adam. Christ, or rather, the Eternal Son of God, assumed human nature, in that He became man, and being God, humanity in Him was filled with the treasures of wisdom and knowledge and grace and power; of that humanity we must partake in order to have any part in the salvation of Christ. The communication of this life to us, which is our regeneration, is through the Church, which is his body, because animated by his human life. As we derive our deteriorated humanity by descent from Adam, we are made partakers of this renovated, divine humanity by union with the Church, in which Christ as a man, and God-man, lives and dwells. And as the \cf1\f1\fs16 27\cf0\f0\fs24 communication of humanity as it existed in fallen Adam to his descendants is by a natural process of organic development; so the communication of the renovated humanity as it exists in Christ, to his people, and through the world, is also a natural process. It supposes no special interference or intervention on the part of God, any more than any other organic development in the vegetable or animal world. The only thing supernatural about it is the starting point in Christ.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Doctrine of the Latin Church.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 In the later Latin Church the word regeneration is used as synonymous with justification, and is taken in a wide sense as including everything involved in the translation of the soul from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God\rquote s dear Son. In regeneration the sinner becomes a child of God. It is made therefore, to include, (1.) The removal of the \ldblquote\lang1142 reatus\lang1033\rdblquote or guilt of sin. (2.) The cleansing away of inherent moral corruption. (3.) The \ldblquote infusion of new habits of grace;\rdblquote and (4.) Adoption, or recognition of the renewed as sons of God. The Council of Trent says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Justificatio. non est sola peccatorum remissio, sed et sanctificatio, et renovatio interioris hominis per voluntariam susceptionem grati\'e6, et donorum, unde homo ex injusto fit justus, et ex inimico amicus, ut sit heres secundum spem vit\'e6 \'e6tern\'e6.\lang1033\rdblquote The instrumental cause of justification in this sense, is declared to be \ldblquote\lang1142 sacramentum baptismi, quod est sacramentum fidei, sine qua nulli umquam contigit justificatio.\lang1033\rdblquote As to the effect of baptism, it is taught that it takes away not only guilt, but everything of the nature of sin, and communicates a new life. \ldblquote\lang1142 Si quis per Jesu Christi Domini gratiam; qu\'e6 in baptismate confertur, reatum originalis peccati remitti negat, aut etiam asserit, non tolli totum id, quod veram, et propriam peccati rationem habet; sed illud dicit tantum radi, aut non imputari: anathema sit. In renatis enim nihil odit Deus, quia nihil est damnationis iis qui vere consepulti sunt cum Christo per baptisma in mortem: qui non secundum carnem ambulant, sed veterem hominem exuentes, et novum, qui secundum Deum creatus est, induentes, innocentes, immaculati, puri, innoxii, ac Deo dilecti effecti sunt, heredes quidem Dei, coheredes autem Christi, ita ut nihil prorsus eos ab ingressu c\'9cli remoretur.\lang1033\rdblquote\cf1\f1\fs16 28\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj Regeneration, therefore, as effected in baptism, is the removal of the guilt and pollution of sin, the infusion of new habits of grace, and introduction into the family of God. It is in baptism that all the benefits of the redemption of Christ are conveyed to the soul, and this is its regeneration or birth into the kingdom of God.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Doctrine of the Church of England.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 1. There has always been a class of theologians in the English Church who hold the theology of the Church of Rome in its leading characteristics. They accept, therefore, the definition of regeneration, or justification, as they call it, as given by the Council of Trent, and quoted above.\par 2. Others make a distinction between conversion and regeneration. The latter is that grace which attends baptism, and as that sacrament without sacrilege cannot be repeated, so regeneration can be experienced only once. Conversion is \ldblquote a change of heart and life from sin to holiness.\rdblquote \ldblquote To the heathen and infidel conversion is absolutely and always necessary to salvation.\rdblquote To the baptized Christian conversion is not always necessary. \ldblquote Some persons have confused conversion with regeneration, and have taught that all men, the baptized, and therefore in fact regenerate, must be regenerated afterwards, or they cannot be saved. Now this is in many ways false: for regeneration, which the Lord Jesus Christ himself has connected with holy baptism, cannot be repeated: moreover, not all men (though indeed most men do) fall into such sin after baptism, that conversion, or as they term it, regeneration, is necessary to their salvation; and if a regeneration were necessary to them, it could only be obtained through repetition of baptism, which were an act of sacrilege.\rdblquote \ldblquote They who object to the expression baptismal regeneration, by regeneration mean, for the most part, the first influx of irresistible and indefectible grace; grace that cannot be repelled by its subject, and which must issue in its final salvation. Now, of such grace our Church knows nothing, and of course, therefore, means not by regeneration at baptism, the first influx of such grace. That the sins, original and actual, of the faithful recipient of baptism, are washed away, she doth indeed believe; and also that grace is given to him by the immediate agency of the Holy Spirit; yet so that the conscience thus cleansed may be again defiled, and that the baptized person may, and often does, by his own fault, fall again into sin, in which if he die he shall \cf1\f1\fs16 29\cf0\f0\fs24 without doubt perish everlastingly; his condemnation not being avoided, but rather increased, by his baptismal privilege.\rdblquote\par 3. A third form of doctrine on this subject, held by some divines of this church, is that regeneration properly expresses an external change of relation, and not an internal change of the state of the soul and of its relation to God. As a proselyte was regenerated when he professed himself a Jew, so any one initiated into the visible Church is thereby regenerated. This is held to be entirely different from spiritual renovation. Regeneration, in this outward sense, is admitted to be by baptism; renovation is by the Spirit.\par 4. A large class of English theologians have ever remained faithful to the evangelical doctrine on this subject, in accordance with the views of the Reformers in their Church, who were in full sympathy both in doctrine and in ecclesiastical and Christian fellowship with other Protestant churches.\par \pard\cf4\f5\fs23\par } }{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red255\green0\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~3. \i The Evangelical Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\b0 In the Lutheran Symbols the doctrine of Regeneration, which is made to include conversion, is thus stated: \ldblquote\lang1142 Conversio hominis talis est immutatio, per operationem Spiritus Sancti, in hominis intellectu, voluntate et corde, qua homo (operatione videlicet Spiritus Sancti) potest oblatam gratiam apprehendere.\lang1033\rdblquote \par \ldblquote\lang1142 Hominis autem nondum renati intellectus et voluntas tantum sunt subjectum convertendum, sunt enim hominis spiritualiter mortui intellectus et voluntas, in quo homine Spiritus Sanctus conversionem et renovationem operatur, ad quod opus hominis convertendi voluntas nihil confert, sed patitur, ut Deus in ipsa operetur, donec regeneretur. Postea vero in aliis sequentibus bonis operibus Spiritui Sancto cooperatur, ea faciens, qu\'e6 Deo grata sunt.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \ldblquote\lang1142 Sicut igitur homo, qui corporaliter mortuus est, seipsum propriis viribus pr\'e6parare aut accommodare non potest, ut vitam externam recipiat: ita homo spiritualiter in peccatis mortuus, seipsum propriis viribus ad consequendam spiritualem et c\'9clestem justitiam et vitam pr\'e6parare, applicare, aut vertere non potest, nisi per Filium Dei a morte peccati liberetur et vivificetur.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \ldblquote\lang1142 Rejicimus errorem eorum qui fingunt, Deum in conversione et regeneratione hominis substantiam et essentiam veteris Adami, et\cf1\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 pr\'e6cipue animam rationalem penitus abolere, novamque anima essentiam ex nihilo, in illa conversione et regeneratione creare.\lang1033\rdblquote\par With these statements the doctrines taught in the Symbols and by the theologians of the Reformed churches, perfectly agree. It is sufficient to quote the standards of our own Church. The \ldblquote Westminster Confession\rdblquote says, \ldblquote Man, by his fall into a state of sin, hath wholly lost all ability of will to any spiritual good accompanying salvation; so as a natural man being altogether averse from that which is good, and dead in sin, is not able, by his own strength, to convert himself, or to prepare himself thereunto.\rdblquote \ldblquote When God converts a sinner, and translates him into the state of grace, He freeth him from his natural bondage under sin, and by his grace alone enables him freely to will and to do that which is spiritually good.\rdblquote \ldblquote All those whom God hath predestinated unto life, and those only, He is pleased, in his appointed and accepted time, effectually to call, by his Word and Spirit, out of that state of sin and death in which they are by nature, to grace and salvation by Jesus Christ; enlightening their minds, spiritually and savingly, to understand the things of God, taking away their heart of stone, and giving unto them an heart of flesh; renewing their wills, and by his Almighty power, determining them to that which is good, and effectually drawing them to Jesus Christ; yet so as they come most freely, being made willing by his grace.\rdblquote \ldblquote This effectual call is of God\rquote s free and special grace alone, not from anything at all foreseen in man, who is altogether passive therein, until being quickened and renewed by the Holy Ghost, he is thereby enabled to answer this call, and embrace the grace offered and conveyed in it.\rdblquote\par The Larger Catechism says, \ldblquote What is effectual calling? Effectual calling is the work of God\rquote s almighty power and grace, whereby (out of his free and especial love to his elect, and from nothing in them moving Him thereunto) He doth in his accepted time invite and draw them to Jesus Christ by his Word and Spirit; savingly enlightening their minds, renewing and powerfully determining their wills, so as they (although in themselves dead in sin) are hereby made willing and able, freely to answer his call, and to accept and embrace the grace offered and conveyed therein.\rdblquote\par \pard\cf1\f1\fs16 31\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Exposition of the Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 According to the common doctrine of Protestants, \i i.e\i0 ., of Lutherans and Reformed, as appears from the above quotations \emdash\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Regeneration an Act of God.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 1. Regeneration is an act of God. It is not simply referred to Him as its giver, and, in that sense, its author, as He is the giver of faith and of repentance. It is not an act which, by argument and persuasion, or by moral power, He induces the sinner to perform. But it is an act of which He is the agent. It is God who regenerates. The soul is regenerated. In this sense the soul is passive in regeneration, which (subjectively considered) is a change wrought in us, and not an act performed by us.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Regeneration an Act of God\rquote s Power.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 2. Regeneration is not only an act of God, but also an act of his almighty power. Agreeably to the express declarations of the Scriptures, it is so presented in the Symbols of the Protestant churches. If an act of omnipotence, it is certainly efficacious, for nothing can resist almighty power. The Lutherans indeed deny this. But the more orthodox of them mean simply that the sinner can keep himself aloof from the means through which, or, rather, in connection with which it pleases God to exercise his power. He can absent himself from the preaching of the Word, and the use of the sacraments. Or he may voluntarily place himself in such an inward posture of resistance as determines God not to exert his power in his regeneration. The assertion that regeneration is an act of God\rquote s omnipotence, is, and is intended to be, a denial that it is an act of moral suasion. It is an affirmation that it is \ldblquote physical\rdblquote in the old sense of that word, as opposed to moral; and that it is immediate, as opposed to mediate, or through or by the truth. When either in Scripture or in theological writings, the word regeneration is taken in a wide sense as including conversion or the voluntary turning of the soul to God, then indeed it is said to be by the Word. The restoration of sight to the blind by the command of Christ, was an act of omnipotence. It was immediate. Nothing in the way of instrumentary or secondary co\'f6perating influence intervened between the divine volition and the effect. But all exercises of the restored faculty were through and by the light. And without light sight is impossible. Raising Lazarus from the dead was an act of omnipotence. Nothing intervened between the volition and the effect. The act of quickening was the act of God. In that matter Lazarus was passive. But in all the acts of the restored vitality, he was active and free. According to the evangelical \cf1\f1\fs16 32\cf0\f0\fs24 system it is in this sense that regeneration is the act of God\rquote s almighty power. Nothing intervenes between his volition that the soul, spiritually dead, should live, and the desired effect. But in all that belongs to the consciousness; all that precedes or follows the imparting of this new life, the soul is active and is influenced by the truth acting according to the laws of our mental constitution. \par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Regeneration in the Subjective Sense of the Word not an Act.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 3. Regeneration, subjectively considered, or viewed as an effect or change wrought in the soul, is not an act. It is not a new purpose created by God (if that language be intelligible), or formed by the sinner under his influence. Nor is it any conscious exercise of any kind. It is something which lies lower than consciousness.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i Not a Change of Substance.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 4. It is not, however, according to the Church doctrine, any change in the substance of the soul. This is rejected universally as Manicheism, and as inconsistent with the nature of sin and holiness. It is, indeed, often assumed that there is nothing in the soul but its substance and its acts; and, therefore, if regeneration be not a change in the acts, it must be a change of the substance of the soul. This assumption, however, is not only arbitrary, but it is also opposed to the intimate convictions of all men. That is, of all men in their normal state, when not speculating or theorizing. That such is the common judgment of men has already been proved under the heads of original righteousness and original sin. Every one recognizes, in the first place, that such constitutional principles as parental love, the social affections, a sense of justice, pity, etc., are immanent states of the soul which can be resolved neither into its essence nor acts. So also acquired habits are similar permanent and immanent states which are not acts, much less modifications or changes of the essence. The same is true of dispositions, amiable and unamiable. The refinement of taste and feeling due to education and culture, is not a change in the essence of the mind. It cannot reasonably be denied that a state of mind produced by culture, may be produced by the volition of God. What is true in every other department of our inner life, is true of our moral and religious nature. Besides those acts and states which reveal themselves in the consciousness, there are abiding states, dispositions, principles, or habits, as they are indifferently called, which constitute \cf1\f1\fs16 33\cf0\f0\fs24 character and give it stability, and are the proximate determining cause why our voluntary exercises and conscious states are what they are. This is what the Bible calls the heart, which has the same relation to all our acts that the nature of a tree, as good or bad, has to the character of its fruit. A good tree is known to be good if its fruit be good. But the goodness of the fruit does not constitute or determine the goodness of the tree, but the reverse. In like manner, it is not good acts which make the man good; the goodness of the man determines the character of his acts.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i It is a New Life.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 5. While denying that regeneration is a change either in the essence or acts of the soul, evangelical Christians declare it to be, in the language of Scripture, \ldblquote a quickening,\rdblquote a \cf3\f2\'e6\'f9\'ef\'f0\'ef\'e9\'e5\f3\u8150?\lang1032\f4\'ed\cf0\lang1033\f0 , a communication of a new principle of life. It is hard, perhaps impossible, to define what life is. Yet every man is familiar with its manifestations. He sees and knows the difference between death and life, between a dead and living plant or animal. And, therefore, when the Bible tells us that in regeneration God imparts a new form of life to the soul, the language is as intelligible as human language can be in relation to such a subject. We know that when a man is dead as to the body he neither sees, feels, nor acts. The objects adapted to impress the senses of the living make no impression upon him. They awaken no corresponding feeling, and they call forth no activity. The dead are insensible and powerless. When the Scriptures declare that men are spiritually dead they do not deny to them physical, intellectual, social, or moral life. They admit that the objects of sense, the truths of reason, our social relations and moral obligations, are more or less adequately apprehended; these do not fail to awaken feeling and to excite to action. But there is a higher class of objects than these, what the Bible calls \ldblquote The things of God, \ldblquote The things of the Spirit,\rdblquote \ldblquote The things pertaining to salvation.\rdblquote These things, although intellectually apprehended as presented to our cognitive faculties, are not spiritually discerned by the unrenewed man. A beautiful object in nature or art may be duly apprehended as an object of vision by an uncultivated man, who has no perception of its \'e6sthetic excellence, and no corresponding feeling of delight in its contemplation. So it is with the unrenewed man. He may have an intellectual knowledge of the facts and doctrines of the Bible, but no spiritual discernment of their excellence, and no delight in them. The same\cf1\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 Christ, as portrayed in the Scriptures, is to one man without form or comeliness that we should desire Him; to another He is the chief among ten thousand and the one altogether lovely; \ldblquote God manifest in the flesh,\rdblquote whom it is impossible not to adore, love, and obey.\par This new life, therefore, manifests itself in new views of God, of Christ, of sin, of holiness, of the world, of the gospel, and of the life to come; in short, of all those truths which God has revealed as necessary to salvation. This spiritual illumination is so important and so necessary and such an immediate effect of regeneration, that spiritual knowledge is not only represented in the Bible as the end of regeneration (\cf4\ul Col_3:10\cf0\ulnone ; \cf4\ul 1Ti_2:4\cf0\ulnone ), but the whole of conversion (which is the effect of regeneration) is summed up in knowledge. Paul describes his conversion as consisting in Christ\rquote s being revealed to Him (\cf4\ul Gal_1:16\cf0\ulnone ); and the Scriptures make all religion, and even eternal life, to be a form of knowledge. Paul renounced everything for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ (\cf4\ul Phi_3:8\cf0\ulnone ), and our Lord says that the knowledge of Himself and of the Father is eternal life. (\cf4\ul Joh_17:8\cf0\ulnone ). The whole process of salvation is described as a translation from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. There is no wonder, therefore, that the ancients called regeneration a \cf3\f4\'f6\'f9\'f4\'e9\'f3\'ec\f3\u8057?\lang1032\f4\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 , an illumination. If a man born blind were suddenly restored to sight, such a flood of knowledge and delight would flow in upon him, through the organ of vision, that he might well think that all living consisted in seeing. So the New Testament writers represent the change consequent on regeneration, the opening the eyes on the certainty, glory, and excellence of divine things, and especially of the revelation of God in the person of his Son, as comprehending almost everything which pertains to spiritual life. Inseparably connected with this knowledge and included in it, is faith, in all the forms and exercises in which spiritual truths are its objects. Delight in the things thus revealed is the necessary consequence of spiritual illumination; and with delight come satisfaction and peace, elevation above the world, or spiritual mindedness, and such a sense of the importance of the things not seen and eternal, that all the energies of the renewed soul are (or, it is acknowledged, they should be) devoted to securing them for ourselves and others.\par This is one of the forms in which the Bible sets forth the doctrine of regeneration. It is raising the soul dead in sin to spiritual life. And this spiritual life unfolds or manifests itself just as any other form of life, in all the exercises appropriate to its nature.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i It is a New Birth.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The same doctrine on this subject is taught in other words when regeneration is declared to be a new birth. At birth the child enters upon a new state of existence. Birth is not its own act. It is born. It comes from a state of darkness, in which the objects adapted to its nature cannot act on it or awaken its activities. As soon as it comes into the world all its faculties are awakened; it sees, feels, and hears, and gradually unfolds all its faculties as a rational and moral, as well as physical being. The Scriptures teach that it is thus in regeneration. The soul enters upon a new state. It is introduced into a new world. A whole class of objects before unknown or unappreciated are revealed to it, and exercise upon it their appropriate influence. The \ldblquote things of the Spirit\rdblquote become the chief objects of desire and pursuit, and all the energies of the new-born soul are directed towards the spiritual, as distinguished from the seen and temporal. This representation is in accordance with the evangelical doctrine on this subject. It is not consistent with any of the false theories of regeneration, which regard regeneration as the sinner\rquote s own act; as a mere change of purpose; or as a gradual process of moral cultur e.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i A New Heart.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Another mode in which this doctrine is set forth is found in those passages in which God is represented as giving his people a new heart. The heart in Scripture is that which thinks, feels, wills, and acts. It is the soul; the self. A new heart is, therefore, a new self, a new man. It implies a change of the whole character. It is a new nature. Out of the heart proceed all conscious, voluntary, moral exercises. A change of heart, t herefore, is a change which precedes these exercises and determines their character. A new heart is to a man what goodness is to the tree in the parable of our Lord.\par In regeneration, therefore, there is a new life communicated to the soul; the man is the subject of a new birth; he receives a new nature or new heart, and becomes a new creature. As the change is neither in the substance nor in the mere exercises of the soul, it is in those immanent dispositions, principles, tastes, or habits which unde rlie all conscious exercises, and determine tht character of the man and of all his acts.\par \pard\cf1\f1\fs16 36\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\cf2\i The whole Soul the Subject of this change.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 6. According to the evangelical doctrine the whole soul is the subject of regeneration. It is neither the intellect to the exclusion of the feelings, nor the feelings to the exclusion of the intellect; nor is it the will alone, either in its wider or in its more limited sense,  that is the subject of the change in question. This is evident, \emdash\par (1.) Because the soul is a unit, and is so recognized in Scripture. Its faculties are not so dissociated that one can be good and another bad, one saved and another lost, one active in the sphere of morals and religion and the others inactive. In every such exercise the intelligence, the feelings, the will, and the conscience, or moral consciousness, are of necessity involved.\par (2.) In the description of this work all the fac ulties of the soul are represented as affected. The mind is illuminated, the eyes of the understanding are opened; the heart is renewed; the will is conquered, or, the man is made willing. \par (3.) When Lazarus was restored to life, it was not one member of the body, or one faculty that received the vivifying influence. It was not the heart that was set in motion, the brain and lungs being restored by its action. It was the whole man that was made alive. And it is the whole soul that is regenerated. \par (4.) This is further evident from the effects ascribed to regeneration. These effects are not confined to any one department of our nature. Regeneration secures right knowledge as well as right feeling; and right feeling is not the effect of right knowledge, nor is right knowledge the effect of right feeling. The two are the inseparable effects of a work which affects the whole soul. \par (5.) When our Lord teaches that the tree must be made good in order that the fruit should be good, it was not any one part of the tree which must be changed, but the whole tree. In like manner it is the soul, in the centre and unity of its life, that is the subject of that life-giving power of the Holy Ghost, by which it becomes a new creature. The doctrine that regeneration is a change affecting only one of the faculties of the soul has its foundation entirely outside of the Scriptures. It is simply an inference from a particular psychological theory, and has no authority in theology.\par \pard\cf5\f5\fs23\par } R1.15.3. The Evangelical Doctrine{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\froman\fprq2\fcharset161{\*\fname Times New Roman;}Times New Roman Greek;en0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~4.\i Objection.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\b0 The same objections which are urged against other doctrines of grace are pressed against the Augustinian view of the nature of regeneration. These objections are of three classes.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf1\i Denial of Supernaturalism.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 1. The first class of objections are founded on the denial of Theism; or at least on the denial of the Scriptural doctrine of the relation of God to the world. It is an assumption common to most of the forms of modern philosophy that the only agency of the Supreme Being (whether personal or impersonal) is according to law. It is ordered, uniform, and in, with, and through second causes, if such causes are admitted. Everything is natural, and nothing supernatural, either in the outward world or in the sphere of things spiritual. There can be no creation \ldblquote\lang1142 ex nihilo\lang1033 ,\rdblquote no miracles, no immediate revelation, no inspiration in the church sense of that term; no supernatural work upon the heart, and therefore no regeneration in the sense of an immediate operation of almighty power on the soul. Those who depart from their principles so far as to admit the person of Christ to be supernatural in its origin contend that the supernatural in Him becomes natural, and that from Him onward the diffusion of spiritual life is by a regular process of development, as simply natural as the development of humanity from Adam through all his posterity. \par This is purely a philosophical theory. It has no authority for Christians. As it is contrary to the express teaching of the Scriptures it cannot be adopted by those who recognize them as the infallible rule of faith and practice. As it contradicts the moral and religious convictions arising from the constitution of our nature, it must be hurtful in all its tendencies, and can be adopted by those only who sacrifice to speculation their interior life.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf1\i Resting on False Psychological Theories.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 2. A second class of objections are founded on certain psychological theories on free agency, on the nature of the soul, and on the conditions of moral obligation. No theories on these, or any other subjects, have any authority, except those which underlie and are necessarily assumed in the facts and doctrines of the Scripture. If any theory teaches that plenary ability is essential to free agency; that God cannot control with certainty the acts of free agents without destroying their liberty; or that free acts cannot be foreseen, predicted, or foreordained, then such theory must be false if the Scriptures assert facts which imply the contrary. If a theory teaches that men are responsible only for acts of the will, under their own control, that theory must be rejected if the Bible teaches that we are responsible for states of mind over which the will has no direct power. The facts involved in the evangelical doctrine of regeneration, as stated above, contradict the theories on which the arguments of the Remonstrants, Pelagians, and others against that doctrine rest, and therefore those theories must share the fate of every doctrine which contradicts established facts. This has been demonstrated over and over in different ages of the Church. The principles involved in these objections have been discussed in the preceding pages, and need not be again considered.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf1\i Objections founded on the Divine Perfection.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 3. A third class of objections are drawn from the supposed inconsistency of this doctrine with the moral perfections of God. If all men are dead in sin, destitute of the power to restore themselves to life, then not only is it unjust that they should be condemned, but it is also incompatible with the divine rectitude that God should exert his almighty power in the regeneration of some, while He leaves others to perish. Justice, it is said, demands that all should have an equal opportunity; that all should have, by nature or from grace, power to secure their own salvation. It is obvious that such objections do not bear peculiarly against the Augustinian system. They are urged by atheists against Theism. If there be a personal God of infinite power, why does He permit sin and misery to hold joint supremacy on earth; why are good and evil so unequally distributed, and why is the distribution so arbitrary?\par Deists make the same objections against the divine authority of the Bible. They cannot receive it as the Word of God because it represents the Creator and Governor of the world as placing men under circumstances which secure in some way the universality of sin, and then punishing them with inexorable severity even for their idle words.\par It is also plain that the different anti-Augustinian systems afford no real relief from these difficulties. Admitting that regeneration is the sinner\rquote s own act; admitting that every man has all the knowledge and all the ability necessary to secure his salvation, it remains true that few are saved, and that God does not interpose to prevent the great majority of adult men in the present state of the world perishing in their sins.\par Augustinians do not deny these difficulties. They only maintain that they are not peculiar to their system; and they rest content with the solution of them given in the Scriptures. That solution agrees with all the facts of consciousness and experience, so far as consciousness and experience extend. The Bible teaches that man was created holy; that by his voluntary transgression of the divine law he apostatized from God; that in consequence of this apostasy all men come into the world in a state of spiritual death, both guilty and polluted; that God exercises no influence to lead them into sin, but on the contrary, by his truth, his providence, and by his Spirit exerts all that influence over them which should induce rational beings to repent and seek his pardoning mercy and sanctifying grace; that all those who sincerely and faithfully seek reconciliation with God in the way of his appointment He actually saves; that of his sovereign grace He, in the exercise of his mighty power, renews and sanctifies a multitude which no man can number, who would otherwise have continued in their sins. With these representations of the Scriptures everything within the sphere of our knowledge agrees. Consciousness and experience testify that we are an apostate race; that all men are sinners, and, being sinners, have forfeited all claims on the favour of God; that in continuing in sin and in rejecting the overtures of mercy men act voluntarily, following the desires of their own hearts. Every man\rquote s conscience, moreover, teaches him that he has never sought the salvation of his soul with the sincerity and perseverance with which men seek the things of the world, and yet failed in his efforts. Every man who comes short of eternal life knows that the responsibility rests upon himself. On the other hand, the experience of every believer is a witness to him that it is of God and not of himself that he is in Christ (\cf2\ul 1Co_1:30\cf0\ulnone ); every believer knows that if God had left him to himself he wodd have continued in unbelief and sin. Why God intervenes to save one and not another, when all are equally undeserving; why the things of God are revealed unto babes while hidden from the wise and pr udent, can only be answered in the language of our Lord, \ldblquote Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Mat_11:26\cf0\ulnone .)\par The more popular and common objections that the Augustinian doctrine of regeneration leads to the neglect of the means of \cf3\f1\fs16 40\cf0\f0\fs24 grace, \ldblquote to waiting for God\rquote s time,\rdblquote to indifference or despair; that it is inconsistent with exhortations and commands addressed to sinners to repent and believe, and incompatible with moral responsibility, have already been repeatedly considered. It is enough to say once more that these objections are founded on the assumption that inability, even when it arises out of our own sinfulness, is incompatible with obligation. Besides, it is the natural and actual tendency of a sense of helplessness under a burden of evil, to lead to earnest and importunate application for relief to Him who is able to afford it, and by whom it is offered.\par \pard\cf4\f2\fs23\par } /]1.15.4. Objection{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\gre TqI1.16.0. CHAPTER XVI FAITH{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red255\green192\blue128;} {\stylesheet{ Normal;}{\s1 heading 1;}{\s2 heading 2;}{\s3 heading 3;}} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\s3\sb180\sa100\qc\cf1\highlight2\lang1033\b\f0\fs48\par \par \par \highlight3 FAITH\par \cf0\highlight0\fs27\par } $t0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~1. \i Preliminary Remarks.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\b0\scaps The\scaps0 first conscious exercise of the renewed soul is faith, as the first conscious act of a man born blind whose eyes have been opened, is seeing. The exercise of vision in such a man is indeed attended by so many new sensations and emotions that he cannot determine how muc%h of this new experience comes through the eye, and how much from other sources. It is so with the believer. As soon as his eyes are opened by the renewing of the Holy Ghost he is in a new world. Old things have passed away, all things are become new. The apprehension of \ldblquote the things of God\rdblquote as true lies at the foundation of all the exercises of the renewed soul. The discussions on the question, Whether faith precedes repentance, or repentance faith, can have no place if the meaning of &the words be agreed upon. Unless faith be limited to some of its special exercises there can be no question that in the order of nature it must precede repentance. Repentance is the turning of the soul from sin unto God, and unless this be produced by the believing apprehension of the truth it is not even a rational act. As so much prominence is assigned to faith in the Scriptures, as all the promises of God are addressed to believers, and as all the conscious exercises of spiritual life involve the exerc'ise of faith, without which they are impossible, the importance of this grace cannot be overestimated. To the theologian and to the practical Christian it is indispensable that clear and correct ideas should be entertained on the subject. It is one of special difficulty. This difficulty arises partly from the nature of the subject; partly from the fact that usage has assigned the word faith so many different meanings; partly from the arbitrary definitions given of it by philosophers and theologians; and p(artly from the great diversity of aspects under which it is presented in the Word of God.\par The question, What is Faith? is a very comprehensive one In one view it is a metaphysical question. What is the psychological \cf1\f1\fs16 42\cf0\f0\fs24 name of the act or state of the mind which we designate faith, or belief? In this aspect the discussion concerns the philosopher as much as the theologian. Secondly, faith may be viewed as to its exercise in the whole sphere of religion and morality. Thirdly, it may be considered as a Christian grace, the fruit of the Spirit; that is, those exercises of faith which are peculiar to the regenerated people of God. This is what is meant by saving faith. Fourthly, it may be viewed in its relation to justification, sanctification, and holy living, or, as to those special exercises of faith which are required as the necessary conditions of the sinner\rquote s acceptance with God, or as essential to holiness of heart and life.\par \pard\cf2\highlight1\f2\fs23\par } t =91.16.2. The Psychological Nature of Faith{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\froman\fprq2\fcharset177 Times New Roman;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Ari*# Q1.16.1. Preliminary Remarks{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fnil\fcharse#+al;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\froman\fprq2\fcharset161{\*\fname Times New Roman;}Times New Roman Greek;}{\f5\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f6\froman\fcharset0 Gentium;}{\f7\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red153\green51\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~2. \i The Psychological Nature of Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpa,r\fi360\sb180\qj\b0 Faith in the widest sense of the word, is assent to the truth, or the persuasion of the mind that a thing is true. In ordinary popular language we are said to believe whatever we regard as true. The primary element of faith is trust. The Hebrew word \lang1037\f1\rtlch\fs27\'e0\'c8\'ee\'c7\'ef\lang1033\f0\ltrch\fs24 means to sustain, to uphold. In the Niphal, to be firm, and, in a moral sense, to be trustworthy. In the Hiphil, to regard as firm, or trustworthy, to place trust or confid-ence in. In like manner the Greek \cf1\f2\'f0\'e9\'f3\'f4\'e5\f3\u8059?\lang1032\f4\'f9\cf0\lang1033\f0 (from \cf1\f4\'f0\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'f4\'e9\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 , and that from \cf1\f4\'f0\'e5\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'e8\'f9\cf0\lang1033\f0 , to persuade), means to trust, \i i.e\i0 ., to be persuaded that a person or thing is trustworthy. Hence the epithet \cf1\f4\'f0\'e9\'f3\'f4\f3\u8057?\lang1032\f4\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 is applied to any one who is, and who shows himself to be, worthy of t.rust. In Latin \lang1142\i credere\lang1033\i0 (whence our word credit) has the same meaning. In mercantile matters it means to lend, to trust to; and then in general, to exercise trust in. \ldblquote\lang1142 Crede mihi\lang1033 ,\rdblquote trust me, rely on my word. \lang1142\i Fides\lang1033\i0 (from \lang1142\i fido\lang1033\i0 , and that from \cf1\f4\'f0\'e5\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'e8\'f9\cf0\lang1033\f0 ), is also trust, confidence exercised in regard to any person or thing; then the disposition, /or virtue which excites confidence; then the promise, declaration, or pledge which is the outward ground of confidence. In the cognate words, \lang1142\i fidens, fidelis, fiducia\lang1033\i0 , the same idea is prominent. The German word \ldblquote\lang1031 Glaube\lang1033\rdblquote has the same general meaning. It is defined by Heinsius (\lang1031 W\'f6rterbuch\lang1033 ): \ldblquote\lang1031 der Zustand des Gem\'fcthes, da man eine Sache f\'fcr wahr h\'e4lt und sich darauf verl\'e4sst\lang1033 ,\rdblquo0te \i i.e\i0 ., \ldblquote that state of mind in which a man receives and relies upon a thing as true.\rdblquote The English word \ldblquote faith\rdblquote is said to be from the Anglo-Saxon \ldblquote f\'e6gan\rdblquote to covenant. It is that state ef mind which a covenant requires or supposes; that is, it is confidence in a person or thing as trustworthy. \ldblquote To believe,\rdblquote is defined by the Latin \ldblquote\lang1142 credere, fidem dare sive habere.\lang1033\rdblquote \ldblquote Th1e\cf2\f5\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 etymologists,\rdblquote says Richardson, \ldblquote do not attempt to account for this important word: it is undoubtedly formed on the Dut. \i Leven\i0 ; Ger. \lang1031\i Leben\lang1033\i0 ; A.-S. \i Lif-ian\i0 , \i Be-lif-ian\i0 ; Goth. \i Liban\i0 , \lang1142 vivere\lang1033 , to live, or be-live, to dwell. \i Live\i0 or \i leve\i0 , \i be-\i0 or \i bi-live\i0 or \i leve\i0 , are used indifferently by old writers, whether to denote \lang1142\i vivere\lang1033\i0 or \lang21142\i credere\lang1033\i0\~. To \i believe\i0 , then, is to live by or according to, to abide by; to guide, conduct, regulate, govern, or direct the \i life\i0 by; to take, accept, assume or adopt as a \i rule of life\i0 ; and, consequently, to think, deem, or judge right; to be firmly persuaded of, to give credit to; to trust, or think trustworthy; to have or give faith or confidence; to confide, to think or deem faithful.\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i The Primary Idea of Faith is Trust.\i30\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 From all this it appears that the primary idea of faith is trust. The primary idea of truth is that which is trustworthy; that which sustains our expectations, which does not disappoint, because it really is what it is assumed or declared to be. It is opposed to the deceitful, the false, the unreal, the empty, and the worthless. To regard a thing as true, is to regard it as worthy of trust, as being what it purports to be. Faith, in the comprehensive and legitimate m4eaning of the word, therefore, is trust.\par In accordance with this general idea of faith, Augustine says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Credere, nihil aliud est, quam cum assensione cogitare.\lang1033\rdblquote Thus, also, Reid says, \ldblquote Belief admits of all degrees, from the slightest suspicion to the fullest assurance. There are many operations of the mind in which we find belief to be an essential ingredient Belief is an ingredient in consciousness, in perception, and in remembrance\~. We give the na5me of evidence to whatever is a ground of belief. What this evidence is, is more easily felt than described\~. The common occasions of life lead us to distinguish evidence into different kinds,. such as the evidence of sense, the evidence of memory, the evidence of consciousness, the evidence of testimony, the evidence of axioms, the evidence of reasoning\~. They seem to me to agree only in this, that they are all fitted by nature to produce belief in the human mind.\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\cf2\f5\fs166 44\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i The more limited Sense of the Word.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 There is, however, in most cases a great difference between the general signification of a word and its special and characteristic meaning. Although, therefore, there is an element cf belief in all our cognitions, there is an important difference between what is strictly and properly called faith, and those states or acts of the mind which we designate as sight or perception, int7uition, opinions, conclusions, or apodictic judgments. What that characteristic difference is, is the point to be determined. There are modes of statement on this subject current among a certain class of philosophers and theologians, which can hardly be regarded as definitions of faith. They take the word out of its ordinary and established meaning, or arbitrarily limit it to a special sphere of our mental operations. Thus Morell says, \ldblquote Faith is the intuition of eternal verities.\rdblquote But 8eternal verities are not the only objects of faith; nor is intuition the only mode of apprehending truth which is of the nature of belief. The same objections bear against the assertion that \ldblquote Faith is the organ for the supernatural and divine; \ldblquote or, as Eschenmayer expresses it, \ldblquote\lang1031 Ein vom Denken, F\'fchlen und Wollen verschiedenes, eigenth\'fcmliches Organ f\'fcr das Ewige und Heilige\lang1033 ; a special organ for the eternal and the holy.\rdblquote The supernatural a9nd divine, however, are not the exclusive objects even of religious faith. It is by faith we know that the worlds were made by the word of God; it was by faith Noah prepared the ark, and Abraham, being called of God, went out not knowing whither he went. The objects of faith in these cases are not what is meant by \ldblquote eternal verities.\rdblquote It is, moreover, an arbitrary assumption that faith is \ldblquote a special organ,\rdblquote even when things supernatural and divine are its object. Our: nature is adapted to the reception of all kinds of truth of which we can have any idea. But it is not necessary to assume a special organ for historical truths, a special organ for scientific truths, and another for the general truths of revelation, and still another for \ldblquote the eternal and the holy.\rdblquote God has constituted us capable of belief, and the complex state of mind involved in the act of faith is of course different according to the nature of the truth believed, and the nature of ;the evidence on which our faith is founded. But this does not necessitate the assumption of a distinct organ for each kind of truth.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf2\f5\fs16 45\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Faith not to be regarded as simply a Christian Grace.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 No less unsatisfactory are those descriptions of faith which regard it only in its character as a Christian and saving grace. Delitzsch, for example, describes faith as the most central act of our being;< the return to God, the going out of our inner life to Him. \ldblquote This longing after God s free, merciful love, as his own Word declares it, a longing, reaching forth, and grasping it; this naked, unselfish craving, feeling itself satisfied with nothing else than God\rquote s promised grace; this eagerness, absorbing every ray of light that proceeds from God\rquote s reconciled love; this convinced and safety-craving appropriation and clinging to the word of grace; this is faith. According to its nat=ure, it is the pure receptive correlative of the word of promise; a means of approaching again to God, which, as the word itself, is appointed through the distance of God in consequence of sin; for faith has to confide in the word, in spite of all want of comprehension, want of sight, want of experience. No experimental \lang1142\i actus reflexi\lang1033\i0 belong to the nature of faith. It is, according to its nature, \lang1142\i actia directa\lang1033\i0 , to wit, \lang1142\i fiducia supplex\lang1033\i>0 .\rdblquote All this is doubtless true of the believer. He does thus long after God, and appropriate the assurance of his love, and cling to his promises of grace; but faith has a wider range than this. There are exercises of faith not included in this description, recorded in Scripture, and especially in the eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews.\par Erdmann says that religious faith, the faith on which the Scriptures lay so much stress, is, \ldblquote\lang1031 Bewusstseyn der Vers\'f6hnung ?mit Gott\lang1033 , consciousness of reconciliation with God.\rdblquote He insists that faith cannot be separated from its contents. It is not the man who holds this or that to be true, who is a believer; but the man who is convinced of a specific truth, namely, that he is reconciled with God. Calling faith a consciousness is not a definition of its nature. And limiting it to a consciousness of reconciliation with God is contrary to the usage of Scripture and of theology.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i@ Definitions of Faith founded on its Subjective Nature.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The more common and generally received definitions of faith, may perhaps be reduced to three classes, all of which include the general idea of persuasion of the truth. But some seek the distinguishing \cf2\f5\fs16 46\cf0\f0\fs24 character of faith in its subjective nature, others, in the nature of its object; others, in the nature of the evidence, or ground on which it rests.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i FaAith as distinguished from Opinion and Knowledge.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 To the first of these classes belong the following definitions: Faith or belief is said to be a persuasion of the truth stronger than opinion, and weaker than knowledge. Metaphysicians divide the objects of our cognitions into the possible, the real, and the necessary. With regard to the merely possible we can form only conjectures, or opinions, more or less plausible or probable. With regard to things which the mind Bwith greater or less confidence views as certain, although it cannot justify that confidence to itself or others, \i i.e\i0 ., cannot demonstrate the certainty of the object, it is said to believe. What it is perfectly assured of, and can demonstrate to be true so as to coerce conviction, it is said to know. Thus Locke defines faith to be the assent of the mind to propositions which are probably, but not certainly true. Bailey says, \ldblquote I propose to confine it [belief or faith] first, to the effectC on the mind of the premises in what is termed probable reasoning, or what I have named contingent reasoning \emdash in a word the premises in all reasoning, but that which is demonstrative; and secondly, to the state of holding true when that state, far from being the effect of any premises discerned by the mind, is dissociated from all evidence.\rdblquote To believe is to admit a thing as true, according to Kant, on grounds sufficient subjectively, insufficient objectively. Or, as more fully stated, \Dldblquote Holding for true, or the subjective validity of a judgment in relation to conviction (which is, at the same time, objectively valid) has the three following degrees: opinion, belief, and knowledge. Opinion is a consciously insufficient judgment, subjectively as well as objectively. Belief is subjectively sufficient, but is recognized as being objectively insufficient. Knowledge is both subjectively and objectively sufficient. Subjective sufficiency is termed conviction (for myself); objective suEfficiency is termed certainty (for all).\rdblquote Erdmann says, \ldblquote\lang1031 Man versteht unter Glauben eine jede Gewissheit, die geringer ist als das Wissen, und etwa st\'e4rker ist als ein blesses Meinen oder F\'fcrm\'f6glichhalten (z. B. ich glaube, dass es\cf2\f5\fs16 7\cf0\f0\fs24 heute regnen wird\lang1033 ).\rdblquote \ldblquote By faith is understood any persuasion which is weaker than knowledge, but somewhat stronger than a mere deeming possible or probable, as, \i e.g\i0 ., I believe iFt will rain to-day.\rdblquote This he gives as the commonly accepted meaning of the word, although he utterly repudiates it as a definition of religious faith.\par It is urged in support of this definition of faith that with regard to everything of which we are not absolutely sure, and yet are persuaded or convinced of its truth, we say we believe. Thus with respect to things remembered; if the recollection is indistinct and uncertain, we say we think, \i e.g\i0 ., we think we saw a certain person at a Ggiven time and place; we are not sure, but such is our impression. If our persuasion of the fact be stronger, we say we believe it. If we have, and can have, no doubt about it, we say we know it. In like manner the testimony of our senses may be so weak as to produce only a probability that the thing is as it appears; if clearer, it produces a belief more or less decided; if so clear as to preclude all doubt, the effect is knowledge. If we see a person at a distance, and we are entirely uncertain who it iHs, we can only say we think it is some one whom we know. If that persuasion becomes stronger, we say, we believe it is he. If perfectly sure, we say, we know it. In all these cases the only difference between opinion, belief, and knowledge, is their relative strength. The objects are the same, their relation to the mind is the same, and the ground or evidence on which they severally rest is of the same kind. It is said that it would be incorrect to say, \ldblquote We believe that we slept in our house lasIt night;\rdblquote if perfectly sure of the fact. If a witness in a court of justice simply says, \ldblquote I believe I was at a certain place at a given time,\rdblquote his testimony would be of no value. He must be able to say that he is sure of the fact \emdash that he knows it.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Objections to this Definition.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qc Of this definition of faith, it may be remarked, \emdash\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 1. That the meaning which it Jassigns to the word is certainly legitimate, sustained by established usage. The states of mind expressed by the words, I think a thing to be true; I believe it; I know it, are distinguished from each other simply by the different degrees of certainty which enter into them respectively. The probable ground of this use of the word to believe, is, that there is more of the element of trust (or a voluntarily giving to evidence a greater influence on the mind than of necessity belongs\cf2\f5\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs2K4 to it), manifest in our consciousness, than is expressed by saying we think, or, we know. However this may be, it cannot be denied that the word belief often expresses a degree of conviction greater than opinion and less than knowledge.\par 2. But this is not the distinguishing characteristic of faith, or its \lang1142\i differentia\lang1033\i0 . There are exercises of faith into which this uncertainty does not enter. Some of the strongest convictions of which the mind is capable are beliefs. Even our Lassurance of the veracity of consciousness, the foundation of all other convictions, is of the nature of faith. So the primary truths which are, and must be assumed in all our researches and arguments, are beliefs. They are taken on trust. They cannot be proved. If any man denies them, there is nothing more to be said. He cannot be convinced. Sir William Hamilton says, \ldblquote St. Austin accurately says, \lquote We know what rests upon reason; we believe what rests upon authority.\rquote But reason itMself must at last rest upon authority; for the original data of reason do not rest on reason, but are necessarily accepted by reason on the authority of what is beyond itself. These data are, therefore, in rigid propriety, beliefs or trusts. Thus it is that, in the last resort, we must, perforce, philosophically admit, that belief is the primary condition of reason, and not reason the ultimate ground of belief. We are compelled to surrender the proud \lang1142\i Intellige ut credas\lang1033\i0 of AbelardN, to content ourselves with the humble \lang1142\i Crede ut intelligas\lang1033\i0 of Anselm.\rdblquote\par The same is true in other spheres. The effect on the mind produced by human testimony is universally recognized as faith. If that testimony is inadequate it does not preclude doubt; but it may be so strong as to make all doubt impossible. No sane man ean doubt the existence of such cities as London and Paris. But to most men that existence is not a matter of knowledge either intuitive or discursivOe. It is something taken on trust, on the authority of others; which taking on trust is admitted by philosophers, theologians, and the mass of men, to be a form of faith. Again, in some moral states of mind a man\rquote s conviction of the reality of a future state of reward and punishment is as strong as his belief in his own existence, and much stronger than his confidence in the testimony of his senses. And yet a future state of existence is not a matter of knowledge. It is an object of faith, or a thiPng believed. We accordingly find that the Scriptures teach that there is a full assurance of faith; a faith which precludes \cf2\f5\fs16 49\cf0\f0\fs24 the possibility of doubt. Paul says, \ldblquote I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.\rdblquote (\cf4\ul 2Ti_1:12\cf0\ulnone .) As Job had said ages before, \ldblquote I know that my Redeemer liveth.\rdblquote The Apostle declares, \cf4\ul Heb_11:1\cf0\ulnone , faith tQo be an \cf1\f3\u8017?\lang1032\f4\'f0\lang1033\f3\u8057?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'f4\'e1\'f3\'e9\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 and \cf1\f3\u7952?\lang1032\f4\'eb\'e5\'e3\'f7\'ef\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 , than which no stronger terms could be selected to express assured conviction. The power, also, which the Bible attributes to faith as the controlling principle of life, as overcoming the world, subduing kingdoms, stopping the mouths of lions, quenching the violence of fire, turning to flight the armies of the aliens, is prooRf enough that it is no weak persuasion of the truth. That definition, therefore, which makes the characteristic of faith to be a measure of confidence greater than opinion, but less than knowledge, cannot be deemed satisfactory.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Faith not a Voluntary Conviction.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 A second definition of faith, founded on its nature, is that which makes it \ldblquote a voluntary conviction or persuasion of the truth.\rdblquote This is a very old view oSf the matter. According to Theodoret,\cf1\f4\'f0\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'f4\'e9\'f2 \lang1033\f3\u7952?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'f4\lang1033\f3\u8054?\lang1032\f4\'ed \lang1033\f3\u7953?\lang1032\f4\'ea\'ef\lang1033\f3\u8059?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'e9\'ef\'f2 \'f4\lang1033\f3\u8134?\lang1032\f4\'f2 \'f8\'f5\'f7\lang1033\f3\u8134?\lang1032\f4\'f2 \'f3\'f5\'e3\'ea\'e1\'f4\lang1033\f3\u8049?\lang1032\f4\'e8\'e5\'e9\'f4\'e9\'f2\cf0\lang1033\i\f0 , i.e\i0 ., \ldblquote a voluntary assent of the mind.\rdblquote And ThomaTs Aquinas says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Credere est actus intellectus assentientis veritati divin\'e6 ex imperio voluntatis a Deo mot\'e6 per gratiam.\lang1033\rdblquote He distinguishes between knowledge and faith by representing the former as the conviction produced by the object itself seen intuitively or discursively (\ldblquote\lang1142 sicut patet in principiis primis,\~. vel .sicut patet de conclusionibus\lang1033\rdblquote ) to be true; whereas in the latter the mind is not sufficiently moved to asseUnt \ldblquote\lang1142 ab objecto proprio, sed per quandam electionem, voluntarie declinans in unam partem magis quam in alteram. Et siquidem h\'e6c sit cum dubitatione et formidine alterius partis, erit opinio. Si autem sit cum certitudine absque tali formidine, erit fides.\lang1033\rdblquote\par This definition admits of different explanations. The word \ldblquote voluntary,\rdblquote if its meaning be determined by the wide sense of the word \ldblquote will,\rdblquote includes every operation of theV mind not purely intellectual. And therefore to say that faith is a voluntary assent is to say that faith is not merely a speculative assent, an act of the judgment pronouncing a thing to be true, but includes feeling. Nitsch, therefore, defines faith to be a \ldblquote\lang1031 gef\'fchlsmassiges Erkennen\lang1033 .\rdblquote\cf2\f5\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24\ldblquote\lang1031 Die Einheit des Gef\'fchls und der Erkenntniss\lang1033 ; a knowledge or persuasion of truth combined with feeling, \emdash the unity oWf feeling and knowledge.\rdblquote But if the word \ldblquote will\rdblquote be taken in the sense of the power of self-determination, then nothing is voluntary which does not involve the exercise of that power. If in this sense faith be voluntary, then we must have the power to believe or disbelieve at pleasure. If we believe the truth, it is because we choose or determine ourselves to receive it; if we reject it, it is because we will to disbelieve it. The decision is determined neither by the nature Xof the object nor by the nature or degree of the evidence. Sometimes both of these meanings of the word voluntary seem to be combined by those who define faith to be a voluntary assent of the mind, or an assent of the intellect determined by the will. This appears from what Aquinas, for example, says when he discusses the question whether faith is a virtue. He argues that if faith be a virtue, which he admits it to be, it must include love, because love is the form or principle of all the virtues; and it Ymust be self-determined because there could be no virtue in faith if it were the inevitable effect of the evidence or testimony. If a virtue, it must include an act of self-determination; we must decide to do what we have the power not to do.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Remarks on this Definition of Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 This definition of faith contains many elements of truth. In the first place: it is true that faith and feeling are often inseparable. They together constituZte that state of mind to which the name faith is given. The perception of beauty is of necessity connected with the feeling of delight. Assent to moral truth involves the feeling of moral approbation. In like manner spiritual discernment (faith when the fruit of the Spirit) includes delight in the things of the Spirit, not only as true, but as beautiful and good. This is the difference between a living and dead faith. This is the portion of truth involved in the Romish doctrine of a formed and unformed fa[ith. Faith (assent to the truth) connected with love is the \lang1142\i fides formata\lang1033\i0 ; faith without love is \lang1142\i fides informis\lang1033\i0 . While, however, it is true that faith is often necessarily connected with feeling, and, therefore, in one sense of the term, is a voluntary assent, yet this is not always the csse. Whether feeling attends and enters into the exercise of faith, depends upon its object (or the thing believed) and the evidence on which it is founded. When the objec\t of faith is\cf2\f5\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 speculative truth, or some historical event past or future; or when the evidence or testimony on which faith is founded is addressed only to the understanding and not to the conscience or to our emotional or religious nature, then faith does not involve feeling. We believe the great mass of historical facts to which we assent as true, simply on historical testimony, and without any feeling entering into, or necessarily connected with it. The same is true with regard] to a large part of the contents of the Bible. They, to a great extent, are historical, or the predictions of historical events. When we believe what the Scriptures record concerning the creation, the deluge, the calling of Abraham, the overthrow of the cities of the plain, the history of Joseph, and the like, our faith does not include feeling. It is not an exercise of the will in either sense of that word. It is simply a rational conviction founded on sufficient evidence. It may be said, as Aquinas does^ say, that it is love or reverence towards God which inclines the will to believe such facts on the authority of his Word. But wicked men believe them, and cannot help believing them. A man can hardly be found who does not believe that the Israelites dwelt in Egypt, escaped from bondage, and took possession of the land of Canaan.\par In the second place, it is true not only that faith is in many cases inseparable from feeling, but also that feeling has much influence in determining our faith. This is esp_ecially true when moral and religious truths are the objects of faith. Want of congeniality with the truth produces insensibility to the evidence by which it is supported. Our Lord said to the Jews, \ldblquote Ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep.\rdblquote (\cf4\ul Joh_10:26\cf0\ulnone .) And in another place, \ldblquote If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God.\rdblquote (\cf4\ul Joh_7:17\cf0\ulnone .) And the Apostle says of those that are lost, \ldbl`quote The god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.\rdblquote (\cf4\ul 2Co_4:4\cf0\ulnone .) The truth was present, attended by appropriate and abundant evidence, but there was no susceptibility. The defect was in the organ of vision, not in the want of light. The Scriptures uniformly refer the unbelief of those who reject the gospel to the state of their hearts. There can be no douabt that all the true children of God received Christ as their God and Saviour on the evidence which He gave of him divine character and mission, and that He was rejected only by the unrenewed and the wicked, and because of their wickedness. Hence unbelief is so great a sin. Men are condemned because they believe not on the only begotten Son of God. (\cf4\ul Joh_3:18\cf0\ulnone .) All this is true. It is true of saving faith. But it is not true of all kinds of even religious faith; that is, of faith which bhas religious truth for its object. And, therefore, it cannot furnish the \lang1142\i differentia\lang1033\i0 or criterion to distinguish faith from other forms of assent to truth. There are states of mind not only popularly, but correctly called belief, of which it is not true that love, or congeniality, is an element. There is such a thing as dead faith, or orthodoxy. There is such a thing as speculative faith. Simon Magus believed. Even the devils believe. And if we turn to other than religious truthsc it is still more apparent that faith is not necessarily a voluntary assent of the mind. A man may hear of something most repugnant to his feelings, as, for example, of the triumph of a rival. He may at first refuse to believe it; but the testimony may become so strong as to force conviction. This conviction is, by common consent, faith or belief. It is not sight; it is not intuition; it is not a deduction; it is belief; a conviction founded on testimony. This subject, \i i.e\i0 ., the connection between dfaith and feeling, will come up again in considering other definitions.\par In the third place, if we take the word voluntary in the sense which implies volition or self-determination, it is still more evident that faith cannot be defined as voluntary assent. It is, indeed, a proverb that a man convinced, against his will remains unconvinced. But this is only a popular way of expressing the truth just conceded, namely, that the feelings have, in many cases, great influence in determining our faith. But, eas just remarked, a man may be constrained to believe against his will. He may struggle against conviction; he may determine he will not believe, and yet conviction may be forced upon him. Napoleon, at the battle of Waterloo, hears that Grouchy is approaching. He gladly believes it. Soon the report reaches him that the advancing columns are Prussians. This he will not believe. Soon, however, as courier after courier confirms the unwelcome fact, he is forced to believe it. It is not true, therefore, that ifn faith as faith there is always, as Aquinas says, an election \ldblquote\lang1142\i voluntarie declinans in unam partem magis quam in alteram.\lang1033\i0\rdblquote There is another frequent experience. We often hear men say they would give the world if they could believe. The dying Grotius said he would give all his learning for the simple faith of his unlettered servant. To tell a man he can believe if he will is to contradict \cf2\f5\fs16 53\cf0\f0\fs24 his consciousness. He tries to believe. He earngestly prays for faith; but he cannot exercise it. It is true, as concerns the sinner in relation to the gospel, that this inability to believe arises from the state of his mind. But this state of the mind lies below the will. It cannot be determined or changed by the exercise of any voluntary power. On these grounds the definition of faith, whether as generic or religious, as a voluntary assent to truth, must be considered unsatisfactory.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Definitions founded on the Object hof Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The preceding definitions are all founded on the assumed subjective nature of faith. The next definition is of a different kind. It is founded on the nature of its object. Faith is said to be the persuasion of the truth of things not seen. This is a very old and familiar definition. \ldblquote\lang1142 Quid est fides\lang1033 ,\rdblquote asks Augustine, \ldblquote\lang1142 nisi credere quod non vides.\lang1033\rdblquote And Lombard says, \ldblquote\lang1i142 Fides est virtus qua creduntur qu\'e6 non videntur.\lang1033\rdblquote Hence faith is said to be swallowed up in vision; and the one is contrasted with the other; as when the Apostle says, \ldblquote We walk by faith, not by sight.\rdblquote And in Hebrews, eleventh chapter, all the objects of faith under the aspect in which it is considered in that chapter, are included under the categories of \cf1\f4\'f4\f3\u8048?\lang1032\f4 \lang1033\f3\u7952?\lang1032\f4\'eb\'f0\'e9\'e6\lang1033\f3\u8057?\langj1032\f4\'ec\'e5\'ed\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 and \cf1\f4\'f4\f3\u8048?\lang1032\f4 \'ef\lang1033\f3\u8016?\lang1032\f4 \'e2\'eb\'e5\'f0\lang1033\f3\u8057?\lang1032\f4\'ec\'e5\'ed\'e1\cf0\lang1033\f0 , \ldblquote things hoped for, and things not seen.\rdblquote The latter includes the former. \ldblquote We hope,\rdblquote says the Apostle, \ldblquote for that we see not.\rdblquote (\cf4\ul Rom_8:25\cf0\ulnone .) The word sight, in this connection, may be taken in three senses. First, in its literal sense.k We are not said to believe what we see with our eyes. What we see we know to be true. We believe that the planet Saturn is surrounded by a belt, and that Jupiter has four satellites, on the unanimous testimony of astronomers. But if we look through a telescope and see the belt of the one and the satellites of the other, our faith passes into knowledge. We believe there is such a city as Rome, and that it contains the Colosseum, Trajan\rquote s Arch, and other monuments of antiquity. If we visit that cityl and see these things for ourselves, our faith becomes knowledge. The conviction is no stronger in the one case than in the other. We are just as sure there is such a city before having seen it, as though we had been there a hundred times. But the conviction is of a different kind. Secondly, the mind is said to see when it perceives an object of \cf2\f5\fs16 54\cf0\f0\fs24 thought to be true in its own light, or by its own radiance. This mental vision may be either immediate or mediate \emdash either intmuitive or through a process of proof. A child may believe that the angles of a triangle are together equal to two right angles, on the authority of his teacher. When he understands the demonstration of that proposition, his faith becomes knowledge. He sees it to be true. The objects of sense-perception, the objects of intuition, and what we recognize as true on a process of proof, are not, according to this definition of the term, objects of faith. We know what we see to be true; we believe when we recognnize as true what we do not see. It is true that the same thing may be an object of faith and an object of knowledge, but not at the same time. We may recognize as true the being of God, or the immortality of the soul, because the propositions, \ldblquote God is,\rdblquote \ldblquote the soul is immortal,\rdblquote are susceptible of proof. The arguments in support of those propositions may completely satisfy our minds. But they are truths of revelation to be believed on the authority of God. These stateos of mind which we call knowledge and faith, are not identical, neither are they strictly coexisting. The effect produced by the demonstration is one thing. The effect produced by the testimony of God\rquote s word, is another thing. Both include a persuasion of the truth. But that persuasion is in its nature different in the one case from what it is in the other, as it rests on different grounds. When the arguments are before the mind, the conviction which they produce is knowledge. When the testimony ofp God is before the mind, the conviction which it produces is faith. On this subject Thomas Aquinas says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Necessarium est homini accipere per modum fidei non solum ea, qu\'e6 sunt supra rationem: sed etiam ea, qu\'e6 per rationem cognosci possunt. Et hoc propter tria, Primo quidem, ut citius homo ad veritatis divin\'e6 cognitionem perveniat. Secundo, ut cognitio Dei sit communior. Multi enim in studio scienti\'e6 proficere non possunt. Tertio modo proptor certitudinem. Ratio enim humanaq in rebus divinis est multum deficiens.\lang1033\rdblquote\par Thirdly, under the \ldblquote things not seen,\rdblquote some would include all things not present to the mind. A distinction is made between presentative and representative knowledge. In the former the object is present at the time; we perceive it, we are conscious of it. In representative knowledge there is an object now present, representing an absent object. Thus we have the conception of a person or thing. That conception is present, burt the thing\cf2\f5\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 represented is absent. It is not before the mind. It belongs to the category of things not seen. The conception which is present is the object of knowledge; the thing represented is an object of faith. That is, we know we have the conception; we believe that the thing which it represents, does or did exist. If we visit a particular place while present to our senses we know that it exists; when we come away and form an idea or conception of it, that is, when we recall sit by an effort of memory, then we believe in its existence. \ldblquote Whenever we have passed beyond presentative knowledge, and are assured of the reality of an absent object, there faith has entered as an element.\rdblquote\par Sir William Hamilton says, \ldblquote Properly speaking, we know only the actual and the present, and all real knowledge is an immediate knowledge. What is said to be mediately known, is, in truth, not known to be, but only believed to be.\rdblquote This, it may be remarked tin passing, would apply to all the propositions of Euclid. For they are \ldblquote mediately known,\rdblquote \i i.e\i0 ., seen to be true by means of a process of proof. Speaking of memory, Hamilton says, \ldblquote It is not a knowledge of the past at all; but a knowledge of the present and a belief of the past.\rdblquote \ldblquote We are said,\rdblquote according to Dr. McCosh, \ldblquote to know ourselves, and the objects presented to the senses and the representations (always however as presentatuions) in the mind; but to believe in objects which we have seen in time past, but which are not now present, and in objects which we have never seen, and very specially in objects which we can never fully know, such as an Infinite God.\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Objections to this Definition.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 According to this view, we know what is present to the mind, and believe what is absent. The first objection to this representation is the ambiguity of the wordvs present and absent as thus used. When is an object present? and when is it absent? It is easy to answer this question when the object is something material or an external event. Such objects are present (\ldblquote\lang1142 pr\'e6sensibus\lang1033\rdblquote ) when they affect the senses; and absent when they do not. A city or building is present when we actually see it; absent, when we leave the place where it is, and recall the image of it. But how is it with propositions? The Bible says all men are siwnners. The truth thus announced is present to the mind. We do not know it. We cannot prove it. But we believe it upon the authority of God. The Scriptures teach that Christ died as a ransom for many. Here, not only the historical fact that He died is announced, but the purpose for which He died. Here again, we have a truth present to the mind, which is an object of faith.\par The second objection is involved in the first. The terms present and absent are not only ambiguous in this connection, but it is nxot true, as just stated, that an object must be absent in order to be an object of faith. The \lang1142\i differentia\lang1033\i0 , in other words, between knowledge and faith, is not found in the presence or absence of their objects. We can know what is absent, and we can believe what is present.\par The third objection is, that the conviction we have of the reality or truth of what we distinctly remember is knowledge, and not distinctively faith, unless we choose to establish a new and arbitrary definiytion of the word knowledge. We know what is perceived by the senses; we know what the mind sees, either intuitively or discursively, is and must be true; and we know what we distinctly remember. The conviction is in all these cases of the same nature. In all it resolves itself into confidence in the veracity of consciousness. We are conscious that we perceive sensible objects. We are conscious that we cognize certain truths. We are conscious that we remember certain events. In all these cases this consciozusness involves the conviction of the reality or truth of what is seen, mentally apprehended or remembered. This conviction is, or may be, as strong in any one of these cases as in either of the others; and it rests in all ultimately on the same ground. There is, therefore, no reason for calling one knowledge and the other belief. Memory is as much a knowledge of the past, as other forms of consciousness are a knowledge of the present.\par The fourth objection is that to deny that memory gives us the kno{wledge of the past, is contrary to established usage. It is true we are said to believe that we remember such and such events, when we are uncertain about it. But this is because in one of the established meanings of the word, belief expresses a less degree of certainty than knowledge. But men never speak of believing past events in their experience concerning which they are absolutely certain. We know that we were alive yesterday. No man says he believes he has seen his father or mother or any intimate f|riend, whom he had known for years. Things distinctly remembered are known, and not merely believed.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf2\f5\fs16 57\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj The definition which makes faith to be the persuasion of the truth of things not seen, is, however, correct, if by \ldblquote things not seen\rdblquote are meant things which are neither objects of the senses, nor of intuition, nor of demonstrative proof. But it does not seem to be correct to include among the \ldblquote thing}s not seen,\rdblquote which are the special objects of faith, things remembered and not now present to mind. This definition of faith, while correct in limiting it as to its objects to things not seen, in the sense above stated, is nevertheless defective in not assigning the ground of our conviction of their truth. Why do we believe things to be true, which we have never seen and which we cannot prove? Different answers are given to that question; and, therefore, the definition which gives no answer to i~t, must be considered defective.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Definitions founded on the Nature of the Evidence on which Faith rests.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Some of the definitions of faith, as we have seen, are founded on its subjective nature; others on its objects. Besides these there are others which seek its distinguishing characteristic in the ground on which the conviction which it includes, rests. The first of these is that which makes faith to be a conviction or persuasion of truth founded on feeling. This is by many regarded as the one most generally received. Hase says, \ldblquote Every cultivated language has a word for that form of conviction which, in opposition to the self-evident and demonstrable, rests on moral and emotional grounds.\rdblquote That word in Greek is \cf1\f4\'f0\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'f4\'e9\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 ; in English \ldblquote faith.\rdblquote In his \ldblquote Hutterus Redivivus,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote The common idea of faith is: \lang1031 unmittelbar F\'fcrwahrhalten, ohne Vermittelung eines Schlussbeweises, durch Neigung und Bed\'fcrfniss,\lang1033\rdblquote \i i.e\i0 ., \ldblquote A persuasion of the truth, without the intervention of argument, determined by inclination and inward necessity.\rdblquote He quotes the definition of faith by Twesten, as \ldblquote a persuasion or conviction of truth produced by feeling;\rdblquote and that of Nitzsch, given above, \ldblquote the unity of knowledge and feeling.\rdblquote Strauss says, \ldblquote The way in which a man appropriates the contents of a revelation, the inward ascent which he yields to the contents of the Scriptures and the doctrine of the Church, not because of critical or philosophical research, but often in opposition to them \cf2\f5\fs16 58\cf0\f0\fs24 overpowered by a feeling which the Evangelical Church calls the testimony of the Spirit, but which in fact is only the perception of the identity of his own religious life with that portrayed in the Scripture and prevailing in the Church, \emdash this assent determined by feeling \emdash in ecclesiastical language, is called Faith.\rdblquote Again, he says, \ldblquote The pious man receives religious truth because he feels its reality, and because it satisfies his religious wants,\rdblquote and, therefore, he adds, \ldblquote No religion was ever propagated by means of arguments addressed to the understanding, or of historical or philosophical proofs, and this is undeniably true of Christianity.\rdblquote Every preacher of a new religion assumes in those to whom he presents it, an unsatisfied religious necessity, and all he has to do is to make them feel that such necessity is met by the religion which he proposes. Celsus, he tells us, made it a ground of reproach against the Christians that they believed blindly, that they could not justify the doctrines which they held at the bar of reason. To this Origen answered, that this was true only of the people; that with the educated, faith was elevated into knowledge, and Christianity transformed into a philosophy. The Church was divided between believers and knowers. The relation between faith and knowledge, between religion and philosophy, has been the subject of controversy from that day to this. Some took the ground of Origen and of the Alexandrian school generally, that it is incumbent on educated Christians to justify their doctrines at the bar of reason, and prove them to be true of philosophical grounds. Others held that the truths of revelation were, at least in many cases, of a kind which did not admit of philosophical demonstration, although they were not on that account to be regarded as contrary to reason, but only as beyond its sphere. Others, again, taught that there is a direct conflict between faith and knowledge; that what the believing Christian holds to be true, can be shown by the philosopher to be false. This is Strauss\rquote s own doctrine, and, therefore, he concludes his long discussion of this point by saying, \ldblquote The believer should let the knower go his own way in peace, just as the knower does the believer. We leave them their faith, let them leave us our philosophy There have been enough of false irenical attempts. Henceforth only separation of opposing principles can lead to any good.\rdblquote On the same page he admits the great truth, \ldblquote That human nature has one excellent characteristic: what any man feels is for him a spiritual necessity, he allows no man to take from him.\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\cf2\f5\fs16 59\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Remarks on this Definition.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 With regard to the definition of faith which makes it a conviction founded on feeling, it may be remarked, \emdash\par First, That there are forms of faith of which this is not true. As remarked above, when treating of the cognate definition of faith as a voluntary assent of the mind, it is not true of faith in general. We often believe unwillingly, and what is utterly repugnant to our feelings.\par Secondly, It is not true even of religious faith, or faith which has religious truth for its object. For there may be faith without love, \i i.e\i0 ., a speculative, or dead faith.\par Thirdly, It is not true of many of the exercises of faith in good men. Isaac believed that Jacob would be preferred to Esau, sorely against his will. Jacob believed that his descendants would be slaves in Egypt. The prophets believed in the seventy years captivity of their countrymen. The Apostles believed that a great apostasy in the Church was to occur between their age and the second coming of the Lord. The answer of Thomas Aquinas to this, is, that a man is constrained by his will (\i i.e\i0 ., his feelings) to believe in the Scriptures, and then he believes all the Scriptures contain. So that his faith, even in the class of truths just referred to, rests ultimately on feeling. But this answer is unsatisfactory. For if the question is asked, Why did the prophets believe in the captivity, and the Apostles in the apostasy? the answer would be, not from the effect of these truths upon their feelings, but on the authority of God. And if it be further asked, Why did they believe the testimony of God? the answer may be because God\rquote s testimony carries conviction. He can make his voice heard even by the deaf or the dead. Or, the answer may be, because they were good men. But in either case, the question carries us beyond the ground of their faith. They believe because God had revealed the facts referred to. Their goodness may have rendered them susceptible to the evidence afforded, but it did not constitute that evidence.\par Fourthly, It is admitted that the exercise of saving faith, \i i.e\i0 ., of that faith which is the fruit of the Spirit and product of regeneration, is attended by feeling appropriate to its object. But this is to be referred to the nature of the object. If we believe a good report, the effect is joy; if an evil report, the effect is sorrow. The perception of beauty produces delight; of moral excellence, a glow of approbation, of spiritual things, in many cases. a joy that is unspeakable and full of glory.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf2\f5\fs16 60\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj Fifthly, It is also true that all these truths, if not all truth, have a sell-evidencing light, which cannot be apprehended without a conviction that it really is what it is apprehended as being. It may also be admitted, that so far as the consciousness of true believers is concerned, the evidence of truth is the truth itself; in other words, that the ground of their faith is, in one sense, subjective. They see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, and therefore believe that He is God manifested in the flesh. They see that the representations made by the Scriptures of the sinfulness, guilt, and helplessness of fallen man, correspond with their own inward experience, and they are therefore constrained to receive these representations as true. They see that the plan of salvation proposed in the Bible suits their necessities, their moral judgments and religious aspirations, they therefore embrace it. All this is true, but it does not prove faith to be a conviction founded on feeling; for there are many forms of faith which confessedly are not founded on feeling; and even in the case of true believers, their feelings are not the ultimate ground of faith. They always fall back on the authority of God, who is regarded as the author of these feelings, through which the testimony of the Spirit is revealed to the consciousness. \ldblquote We may be moved and induced,\rdblquote says the \ldblquote Westminster Confession,\rdblquote \ldblquote by the testimony of the Church to an high and reverend esteem of the Holy Scripture; and the heavenliness of the matter, the efficacy of the doctrine, the majesty of the style, the consent of all the parts, the scope of the whole (which is to give all glory to God), the full discovery it makes of the only way of man\rquote s salvation, the many other incomparable excellences, and the entire perfection thereof, are arguments whereby it doth abundantly evidence itself to be the word of God; yet, notwithstanding, our full persuasion and assurance of the infallible truth and divine authority thereof is from the inward work of the Holy Spirit, bearing witness by and with the word in our hearts.\rdblquote The ultimate ground of faith, therefore, is the witness of the Spirit.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Faith a Conviction of the Truth founded on Testimony.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The only other definition of faith to be considered, is that which makes it, a conviction of truth founded on testimony. We have already seen that Augustine says, \ldblquote We know what rests upon reason; we believe what rests upon authority.\rdblquote A definition to which Sir William Hamilton gives his adhesion. In the \cf2\f5\fs16 61\cf0\f0\fs24 Alexandrian School also, the Christian \cf1\f4\'f0\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'f4\'e9\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 , was \lang1031 Auctorit\'e4ts-Glaube\lang1033 , a faith founded on authority, opposed, on the one hand, to the heathen \cf1\f3\u7952?\lang1032\f4\'f0\'e9\'f3\'f4\lang1033\f3\u8053?\lang1032\f4\'ec\'e7\cf0\lang1033\f0 , and on the other to the Christian \cf1\f4\'e3\'ed\f3\u8182?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'e9\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 , or philosophical explanation and proof of the truths believed. Among the school-men also, this was the prevalent idea. When they defined faith to be the persuasion of things not seen, they meant things which we receive as true on authority, and not because we either know or can prove them. Hence it was constantly said, faith is human when it rests on the testimony of men; divine when it rests on the testimony of God. Thomas Aquinas says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Non fides, de qua loquimur, assentit alicui, nisi quia est a Deo revelatum.\lang1033\rdblquote \ldblquote Faith, of which we speak, assents to nothing except because it is revealed by God.\rdblquote We believe on the authority of God, and not because we see, know, or feel a thing to be true. This is the purport of the teaching of the great body of the scholastic divines. Such also was the doctrine of the Reformers, and of the theologians of the subsequent age, both Lutheran and Reformed. Speaking of assent, which he regards as the second act or element of faith, Aquinas says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Hic actus fidei non rerum evidentia aut causarum et proprietatum notitia, sed Dei dicentis infallibili auctoritate.\lang1033\rdblquote Turrettin says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Non qu\'e6ritur, An fides sit scientia, qu\'e6 habeat evidentiam: Sic enim distinguitur a scientia, qu\'e6 habet assensum certum et evidentem, qui nititur ratione clara et certa, et ab opinione, qu\'e6 nititur ratione tantum probabili; ubi fides notat assensum certum quidem, sed inevidentem, qui non ratione, sed testimonio divino nititur.\lang1033\rdblquote De Moor says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Fides subjectiva est persuasio de veritate rei, alterius testimonio nixa, quomodo fides illa generatim descripta, scienti\'e6 et conjectur\'e6 opponitur Dividitur. in fidem divinam, qu\'e6 nititur testimonio divino, et humanam, qu\'e6 fundata est in testimonio humano fide accepto.\lang1033\rdblquote Owen, \ldblquote All faith is an assent upon testimony; and divine faith is an assent upon a divine testimony.\rdblquote John Howe asks, \ldblquote Why do I believe Jesus to be the Christ? Because the eternal God hath given his testimony concerning Him that so He is.\rdblquote \ldblquote A man\rquote s believing comes all to nothing without this, that there is a divine testimony.\rdblquote Again, \ldblquote I believe such a thing, as God reveals it, because it is reported to me upon the authority of God.\rdblquote Bishop Pearson says, \ldblquote When anything propounded to us is neither apparent to our sense, nor evident to our understanding, in and of itself, neither certainly to be collected from any clear and necessary connection with the cause from which it proceedeth, or the effects which it naturally produceth, nor is taken up upon any real arguments or reference to other acknowledged truths, and yet notwithstanding appeareth to us true, not by a manifestation, but attestation of the truth, and so moveth us to assent not of itself, but by virtue of the testimony given to it; this is said properly to be credible; and an assent unto this, upon such credibility, is in the proper notion faith or belief.\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i This View almost universally Held.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 This view of the nature of faith is all but universally received, not by theologians only, but by philosophers, and the mass of Christian people. The great question has ever been, whether we are to receive truth on authority, or only upon rational evidence. Leibnitz begins his \ldblquote Discours de la Conformit\'e9 de la Foi avec la Raison,\rdblquote by saying, \ldblquote\lang1036 Je suppose, que deux v\'e9rit\'e9s ne sauroient se contredire; que l\rquote objet de la foi est la v\'e9rit\'e9 que Dieu a r\'e9v\'e9l\'e9e d\rquote une mani\'e8re extraordinaire, et que la raison est l\rquote enchainment des v\'e9rit\'e9s, mais particuli\'e8rement (lorsqu\rquote elle est compar\'e9s avec la foi) de celles o\'f9 l\rquote esprit humain peut atteindre naturellement, sans \'eatre aid\'e9 des lumi\'e8res de la foi.\lang1033\rdblquote\par It has already been admitted that the essential element of faith is trust; and, therefore, in the general sense of the word to believe, is to trust. Faith is the reliance of the mind on anything as true and worthy of confidence. In this wide sense of the word, it matters not what may be the objects, or what the grounds of this trust. The word, however, is commonly used in reference to truths which we receive on trust without being able to prove them. Thus we are said to believe in our own existence, the reality of the external world, and all the primary truths of the reason. These by common consent are called beliefs. Reason begins with believing, \i i.e\i0 ., with taking on trust what it neither comprehends nor proves. Again, it has been admitted that the word belief is often and legitimately used to express a degree of certainty less than knowledge and stronger than probability; as when we say, we are not sure, but we believe that a certain thing happened.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf2\f5\fs16 63\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i The Strict Sense of the Word \ldblquote Faith.\rdblquote\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 But in the strict and special sense of the word, as discriminated from knowledge or opinion, faith means the belief of things not seen, on the ground of testimony. By testimony, however, is not meant merely the affirmation of an intelligent witness. There are other methods by which testimony may be given than affirmation. A seal is a form of testimony; so is a sign. So is everything which pledges the authority of the attester to the truth to be established. When Elijah declared that Jehovah was God, and Baal a lie, he said, \ldblquote The God that answereth by fire, let him be God.\rdblquote The descent of the fire was the testimony of God to the truth of the prophet\rquote s declaration. So in the New Testament God is said to have borne witness to the truth of the Gospel by signs, and wonders, and divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost (\cf4\ul Heb_2:4\cf0\ulnone ); and the Spirit of God is said to witness with our spirits that we are the children of God (\cf4\ul Rom_8:16\cf0\ulnone ). The word in these cases is marture,w, to testify. This is not a lax or improper use of the word testimony; for an affirmation is testimony only because it pledges the authority of him who makes it to the truth. And therefore whatever pledges that authority, is as truly of the nature of testimony, as an affirmation. When, therefore, it is said that faith is founded on testimony, it is meant that it is not founded on sense, reason, or feeling, but on the authority of him by whom it is authenticated.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Proof from the General Use of the Word.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 That such is the foundation and the distinctive characteristic of faith, may be argued, \emdash 1. From the general use of the word We are said to know what we see or can prove; and to believe what we regard as true on the authority of others. This is admitted to be true of what is called historical faith. This includes a great deal; all that is recorded of the past; all that is true of present actualities, which does not fall within the sphere of our personal observation; all the facts of science as received by the masses; and almost all the contents of the Bible, whether of the Old or of the New Testament. The Scriptures are a record of the history of the creation, of the fall, and of redemption. The Old Testament is the history of the preparatory steps of this redemption. The New Testament is a history of the fulfilment of the promises and types of the Old in the incarnation, life, sufferings,\cf2\f5\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 death, and resurrection of the Son of God. Whoever believes this record has set to his seal that God is true, and is a child of God.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Proof from Consciousness.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 2. In the second place, consciousness teaches us that such is the nature of faith not only when historical facts are its objects, but when propositions are the things believed. The two indeed are often inseparable. That God is the creator of the world, is both a fact and a doctrine. It is as the Apostle says, a matter of faith. We believe on the authority of the Scriptures, which declare that \ldblquote In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.\rdblquote That God set forth his Son to be a propitiation for our sins, is a doctrine. It rests solely on the authority of God. We receive it upon his testimony. So with all the great doctrines of grace; of regeneration, of justification, of sanctification, and of a future life. How do we know that God will accept all who believe in Christ? Who can know the things of God, save the Spirit of God, and he to whom the Spirit shall reveal them (\cf4\ul 1Co_2:10-11\cf0\ulnone )? From the nature of the case, \ldblquote the things of the Spirit,\rdblquote the thoughts and purposes of God, can be known only by revelation, and they can be received only on the authority of God. They are objects neither of sense nor of reason.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\i Proof from Scripture.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 3. It is the uniform teaching of the Bible that faith is founded on the testimony or authority of God.\par The first proof of this is the fact that the Scriptures come to us under the form of a revelation of things we could not otherwise know. The prophets of the Old Testament were messengers, the mouth of God, to declare what the people were to believe and what they were to do. The New Testament is called \ldblquote The testimony of Jesus.\rdblquote Christ came, not as a philosopher, but as a witness. He said to Nicodemus, \ldblquote We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness.\rdblquote (\cf4\ul Joh_3:11\cf0\ulnone ). \ldblquote He that cometh from above is above all. And what he hath seen and heard, that he testifieth; and no man receiveth his testimony. He that hath received his testimony hath set to his seal that God is true (\cf4\ul Joh_3:31-33\cf0\ulnone ). In like manner the Apostles were witnesses. As such they were ordained (\cf4\ul Luk_24:48\cf0\ulnone ). After his resurrection, and immediately before his ascension, our Lord said to them, \ldblquote Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. (\cf4\ul Act_1:8\cf0\ulnone ). When they declared the death and resurrection of Christ, as facts to be believed, they said, \ldblquote Whereof we are witnesses\rdblquote (\cf4\ul Act_2:32\cf0\ulnone , \cf4\ul Act_3:15\cf0\ulnone , \cf4\ul Act_5:32\cf0\ulnone ). In this last passage the Apostles say they were witnesses not only of the fact of Christ\rquote s resurrection but that God had \ldblquote exalted\rdblquote Him \ldblquote with his right hand to be a prince and a saviour, for to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins.\rdblquote See \cf4\ul Act_10:39-43\cf0\ulnone , where it is said, \ldblquote He commanded us to preach unto the people, and to testify that it is he which was ordained of God to be the judge of quick and dead. To him give all the prophets witness, that through his name whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins.\rdblquote\par The great complaint against the Apostles, especially in the Grecian cities, was that they did not present their doctrines as propositions to be proved; they did not even state the philosophical grounds on which they rested, or attempt to sustain them at the bar of reason. The answer given to this objection by St. Paul is twofold: First, that philosophy, the wisdom of men, had proved itself utterly incompetent to solve the great problems of God and the universe, of sin and redemption. It was in fact neither more nor less than foolishness, so far as all its speculations as to the things of God were concerned. Secondly, that the doctrines which He taught were not the truths of reason, but matters of revelation; to be received not on rational or philosophical grounds, but upon the authority of God; that they, the Apostles, were not philosophers, but witnesses; that they did not argue using the words of man\rquote s wisdom, but that they simply declared the counsels of God, and that faith in their doctrines was to rest not on the wisdom of men, but on the powerful testimony of God.\par The second proof, that the Scriptures teach that faith is the reception of truth on the ground of testimony or on the authority of God, is, that the thing which we are commanded to do, is to receive the record which God has given of his Son. This is faith; receiving as true what God has testified, and because He has testified it. \ldblquote He that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son.\rdblquote The Greek here is, \cf1\f4\'ef\f3\u8017?\lang1032\f4 \'f0\'e5\'f0\lang1033\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'f4\'e5\'f5\'ea\'e5\'ed \'e5\lang1033\f3\u7984?\lang1032\f4\'f2 \'f4\lang1033\f3\u8052?\lang1032\f4\'ed\lang1033\f6 \f4\'ec\'e1\'f1\'f4\'f5\'f1\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'e1\'ed \lang1033\f3\u7971?\lang1032\f4\'ed \'ec\'e5\'ec\'e1\'f1\'f4\lang1033\f3\u8059?\lang1032\f4\'f1\'e7\'ea\'e5\'ed \lang1033\f3\u8001?\f6 \f4\'c8\'e5\f3\u8056?\lang1032\f4\'f2 \'f0\'e5\'f1\lang1033\f3\u8054?\lang1032\f4 \'f4\'ef\lang1033\f3\u8166?\lang1032\f4 \'f5\lang1033\f3\u7985?\lang1032\f4\'ef\lang1033\f3\u8166?\lang1032\f4 \'e1\lang1033\f3\u8017?\lang1032\f4\'f4\'ef\lang1033\f3\u8166?\cf0\f0 , \ldblquote believeth not the testimony which God testified concerning his Son.\rdblquote \ldblquote And this is the testimony, (\cf1\f3\u7969?\lang1032\f4 \'ec\'e1\'f1\'f4\'f5\'f1\lang1033\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'e1\'ed\cf0\lang1033\f0 ) that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life ii in his Son\rdblquote (\cf4\ul 1Jo_5:10-11\cf0\ulnone ). There could hardly be a more distinct statement of the Scriptural doctrine as to the nature of faith. Its object is what God has revealed. Its ground is the testimony of God. To receive that testimony, is to set to our seal that God is true. To reject it, is to make God a liar. \ldblquote If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater: for this is the witness of God which he hath testified of his son.\rdblquote\par Such is the constant teaching of Scripture. The ground on which we are authorized and commanded to believe is, not the conformity of the truth revealed to our reason, nor its effect upon our feelings, nor its meeting the necessities of our nature and condition, but simply, \ldblquote Thus saith the Lord.\rdblquote The truths of revelation do commend themselves to the reason; they do powerfully and rightfully affect our feelings; they do meet all the necessities of our nature as creatures and as sinners; and these considerations may incline us to believe, may strengthen our faith, lead us to cherish it, and render it joyful and effective; but they are not its ground. We believe on the testimony or authority of God.\par It is objected to this view that we believe the Bible to be the Word of God on other ground than testimony. The fulfilment of prophecies, the miracles of its authors, its contents, and the effects which it produces, are rational grounds for believing it to be from God. To this objection two answers may be made: First, that supernatural occurrences, such as prophecies and miracles, are some of the forms in which the divine testimony is given. Paul says that God bears \ldblquote witness both with signs and wonders\rdblquote (\cf4\ul Heb_2:4\cf0\ulnone ). And, secondly, that the proximate end of these manifestations of supernatural foresight and power was to authenticate the divine mission of the messengers of God. This being established, the people were called upon to receive their message and to believe on the authority of God, by whom they were sent.\par The third proof, that the Scriptures teach that faith is a reception of truth on the ground of testimony, is found in the examples and illustrations of faith given in the Scriptures. Immediately after the fall the promise was made to our first parents that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent\rquote s head. On what possible ground could faith in this promise rest except on the authority of God. When Noah was warned of God of the coming deluge, and commanded to prepare the ark, he believed, not because he saw the signs of the approaching flood, not because his moral judgment assured him that a just God would in \cf2\f5\fs16 67\cf0\f0\fs24 that way avenge his violated law; but simply on the testimony of God. Thus when God promised to Abraham the possession of the land of Canaan, that he, a childless old man, should become the father of many nations, that through his seed all the nations of the earth should be blessed, his faith could have no other foundation than the authority of God. So of every illustration of faith given by the Apostle in the eleventh chapter of his epistle to the Hebrews. The same is true of the whole Bible. We have no foundation for our faith in a spiritual world, in the heaven and hell described in Scripture, in the doctrines of redemption, in the security and ultimate triumph of the Church other than the testimony of God. If faith does not rest on testimony it has nothing on which to rest. Paul tells us that the whole Gospel rests on the fact of Christ\rquote s resurrection from the dead. If Christ be not risen our faith is vain, and we are yet in our sins. But our assurance that Christ rose on the third day rests solely upon the testimony which God in various ways has given to that fact.\par This is a point of great practical importance. If faith, or only persuasion of the truths of the Bible, rests on philosophical grounds, then the door is opened for rationalism; if it rests on feeling, then it is open to mysticism. The only sure, and the only satisfying foundation is the testimony of God, who cannot err, and who will not deceive.\par Faith may, therefore, be defined to be the persuasion of the truth founded on testimony. The faith of the Christian is the persuasion of the truth of the facts and doctrines recorded in the Scriptures on the testimony of God.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf5\f7\fs23\par } 0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~3.\i Different Kinds of Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\b0 Though the definition above given be accepted, it is to be admitted that there are different kinds of faith. In other words, the state of mind which the word designates is very different in one case from what it is in others. This difference arises partly from the nature of its objects, and partly from the nature or form of the testimony on which it is founded. Faith in a historical fact or speculative truth is one thing; faith in \'e6sthetic truth another thing; faith in moral truth another thing; faith in spiritual truth, and especially faith in the promise of salvation made to ourselves another thing. That is, the state of mind denominated faith is very different in any one of these cases from what it is in the others. Again, the testimony which God bears to the truth is of different kinds. In one form it is directed especially\cf1\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 to the understanding; in another to the conscience; in another to our regenerated nature. This is the cause of the difference between speculative, temporary, and saving faith.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf2\i Speculative or Dead Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 There are many men who believe the Bible to be the Word of God; who receive all that it teaches; and who are perfectly orthodox in their doctrinal belief. If asked why they believe, they may be at a loss for an answer. Reflection might enable them to say they believe because others believe. They receive their faith by inheritance. They were taught from their earliest years thus to believe. The Church to which they belong inculcates this faith, and it is enjoined upon them as true and necessary. Others of greater culture may say that the evidence of the divine origin of the Bible, both external and internal, satisfies their minds, and produces a rational conviction that the Scriptures are a revelation from God, and they receive its contents on his authority. Such a faith as this, experience teaches, is perfectly compatible with a worldly or wicked life. This is what the Bible calls a dead faith.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf2\i Temporary Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Again, nothing is more common than for the Gospel to produce a temporary impression, more or less deep and lasting. Those thus impressed believe. But, having no root in themselves, sooner or later they fall away. It is also a common experience that men utterly indifferent or even skeptical, in times of danger, or on the near approach of death, are deeply convinced of the certainty of those religious truths previously known, but hitherto disregarded or rejected. This temporary faith is due to common grace; that is, to those influences of the Spirit common in a measure greater or less to all men, which operate on the soul without renewing it, and which reveal the truth to the conscience and cause it to produce conviction.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf2\i Saving Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 That faith which secures eternal life; which unites us to Christ as living members of his body; which makes us the sons of God; which interests us in all the benefits of redemption; which works by love, and is fruitful in good works; is founded, not on the external or the moral evidence of the truth, but on the testimony of the Spirit with and by the truth to the renewed soul.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf1\f1\fs16 69\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf2\i What is meant by the Testimony of the Spirit\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 It is necessary, before going further, to determine what is meant by the testimony of the Spirit, which is said to be the ground of saving faith.\par God, or the Spirit of God, testifies to the truth of the Scriptures and of the doctrines which they contain. This testimony, as has been seen, is partly external, consisting in prophecies and miracles, partly in the nature of the truths themselves as related to the intellectual and moral elements of the soul, and partly special and supernatural. Unrenewed men may feel the power of the two former kinds of testimony, and believe with a faith either merely intellectual and speculative, or with what may be called from its ground, a moral faith, which is only temporary. The spiritual form of testimony is confined to the regenerated. It is, of course, inscrutable. The operations of the Spirit do not reveal themselves in the consciousness otherwise than by their effects. We know that men are born of the Spirit, that the Spirit dwells in the people of God and continually influences their thoughts, feelings, and actions. But we know this only from the teaching of the Bible, not because we are conscious of his operations. \ldblquote The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Joh_3:8\cf0\ulnone .)\par This witness of the Spirit is not an affirmation that the Bible is the Word of God. Neither is it the production of a blind, unintelligent conviction of that fact. It is not, as is the case with human testimony, addressed from without to the mind, but it is within the mind itself. It is an influence designed to produce faith. It is called a witness or testimony because it is so called in Scripture; and because it has the essential nature of testimony, inasmuch as it is the pledge of the authority of God in support of the truth.\par The effects of this inward testimony are, (1.) What the Scriptures call \ldblquote spiritual discernment.\rdblquote This means two things: A discernment due to the influence of the Spirit; and a discernment not only of the truth, but also of the holiness, excellence, and glory of the things discerned. The word spiritual, in this sense, means conformed to the nature of the Spirit. Hence the law is said to be spiritual, \i i.e\i0 ., holy, just, and good. (2.) A second effect flowing necessarily from the one just mentioned is delight \cf1\f1\fs16 70\cf0\f0\fs24 and complacency, or love. (3.) The apprehension of the suitableness of the truths revealed, to our nature and necessities. (4.) The firm conviction that these things are not only true, but divine. (5.) The fruits of this conviction, \i i.e\i0 ., of the faith thus produced, good works, \emdash holiness of heart and life.\par When, therefore, a Christian is asked, Why he believes the Scriptures and the doctrines therein contained, his simple answer is, On the testimony or authority of God. How else could he know that the worlds were created by God, that our race apostatized from God, that He sent his Son for our redemption, that faith in Him will secure salvation. Faith in such truths can have no other foundation than the testimony of God. If asked, How God testifies to the truth of the Bible? If an educated man whose attention has been called to the subject, he will answer, In every conceivable way: by signs, wonders, and miracles; by the exhibition which the Bible makes of divine knowledge, excellence, authority, and power. If an uneducated man, he may simply say, \ldblquote Whereas I was blind, now I see.\rdblquote Such a man, and indeed every true Christian, passes from a state of unbelief to one of saving faith, not by any process of research or argument, but of inward experience. The change may, and often does, take place in a moment. The faith of a Christian in the Bible is, as before remarked, analogous to that which all men have in the moral law, which they recognize not only as truth, but as having the authority of God. What the natural man perceives with regard to the moral law the renewed man is enabled to perceive in regard to \ldblquote the things of the Spirit,\rdblquote by the testimony of that Spirit with and by the truth to his heart.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf2\i Proof from Express Declarations of Scripture.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 1. That this is the Scriptural doctrine on the subject is plain from the express declarations of the Scriptures. Our Lord promised to send the Spirit for this very purpose. \ldblquote He will reprove the world of sin,\rdblquote especially of the sin of not believing in Christ; \ldblquote and of righteousness,\rdblquote that is, of his righteousness, \emdash the rightfulness of his claims to be regarded and received as the Son of God, God manifest in the flesh, and the Saviour of the world, \ldblquote and of judgment,\rdblquote that is, of the final overthrow of the kingdom of darkness and triumph of the kingdom of light. (\cf3\ul Joh_16:8\cf0\ulnone .) Faith, therefore, is always represented in Scripture as one of the fruits of the Spirit, as the gift of God, as the product of his energy (\cf4\f2\'f0\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'f4\'e9\'f2 \'f4\lang1033\f3\u8134?\lang1032\f4\'f2 \lang1033\f3\u7952?\lang1032\f4\'ed\'e5\'f1\'e3\'e5\lang1033\f3\u8055?\lang1032\f4\'e1\'f2 \'f4\'ef\lang1033\f3\u8166?\lang1032\f4 \'c8\'e5\'ef\lang1033\f3\u8166?\cf0\f0 ) (\cf3\ul Col_2:12\cf0\ulnone ). Men are\cf1\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 said to believe in virtue of the same power which wrought in Christ, when God raised Him from the dead. (\cf3\ul Eph_1:19-20\cf0\ulnone .) The Apostle Paul elaborately sets forth the ground of faith in the second chapter of First Corinthians. He declares that he relied for success not on the enticing words of man\rquote s wisdom, but on the demonstration of the Spirit, in order that the faith of the people might rest not on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God. Faith was not to rest on argument, on historical or philosophical proof, but on the testimony of the Spirit. The Spirit demonstrates the truth to the mind, \i i.e\i0 ., produces the conviction that it is truth, and leads the soul to embrace it with assurance and delight. Passages have already been quoted which teach that faith rests on the testimony of God, and that unbelief consists in rejecting that testimony. The testimony of God is given through the Spirit, whose office it is to take of the things of Christ and show them unto us. The Apostle John tells his readers, \ldblquote Ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things. The anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you: and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul 1Jo_2:20-27\cf0\ulnone .) This passage teaches, (1.) That true believers receive from Christ (the Holy One) an unction. (2.) That this unction is the Holy Ghost. (3.) That it secures the knowledge and conviction of the truth. (4.) That this inward teaching which makes them believers is abiding, and secures them from apostasy.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\ul\i 1Co_2:14.\cf0\ulnone\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj Equally explicit is the passage in \cf3\ul 1Co_2:14\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.\rdblquote The things of the Spirit, are the things which the Spirit has revealed. Concerning these things, it is taught: (1.) that the natural or unrenewed man does not receive them. (2.) That the spiritual man, \i i.e\i0 ., the man in whom the Spirit dwells, does receive them. (3.) That the reason of this difference is that the former has not, and that the latter has, spiritual discernment. (4.) This spiritual discernment is the apprehension of the truth and excellence of the things discerned. (5.) It is spiritual, as just stated, both because\cf1\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 due to the operation of the Spirit, and because the conformity of the truths discerned to the nature of the Spirit, is apprehended.\par When Peter confessed that Jesus was the Christ the Son of the living God, our Lord said, \ldblquote Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Mat_16:17\cf0\ulnone .) Other men had the same external evidence of the divinity of Christ that Peter had. His faith was due not to that evidence alone, but to the inward testimony of God. Our Lord rendered thanks that God had hidden the mysteries of his kingdom from the wise and prudent and revealed them unto babes. (\cf3\ul Mat_11:25\cf0\ulnone .) The external revelation was made to both classes. Besides this external revelation, those called babes received an inward testimony which made them believers. Hence our Lord said, No man can come unto me except he be drawn or taught of God. (\cf3\ul Joh_6:44-45\cf0\ulnone .) The Apostle tells us that the same Gospel, the same objective truths, with the same external and rational evidence, which was an offence to the Jew and foolishness to the Greek, was to the called the wisdom and the power of God. Why this difference? Not the superior knowledge or greater excellence of the called, but the inward divine influence, the \cf4\f4\'ea\'eb\f3\u8134?\lang1032\f4\'f3\'e9\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 , of which they were the subjects. Paul\rquote s instantaneous conversion is not to be referred to any rational process of argument; nor to his moral suceptibility to the truth; nor to the visible manifestation of Christ, for no miracle, no outward light or splendour could change the heart and transform the whole character in a moment. It was, as the Apostle himself tells us (\cf3\ul Gal_1:15-16\cf0\ulnone ), the inward revelation of Christ to him by the special grace of God. It was the testimony of the Spirit, which being inward and supernatural, enabled him to see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. The Psalmist prayed that God would open his eyes that he might see wondrous things out of his law. The Apostle prayed for the Ephesians that God would give them the Holy Spirit, that the eyes of their souls might be opened, that they might know the things freely given to them of God. (\cf3\ul Eph_1:17-18\cf0\ulnone .) Everywhere in the Bible the fact that any one believes is referred not to his subjective state, but to the work of the Spirit on his heart.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf2\i Proof from the Way the Apostles acted.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 2. As the Scriptures thus expressly teach that the ground of true or saving faith is the inward witness of the Spirit, the Apostles always acted on that principle. They announced the truth \cf1\f1\fs16 73\cf0\f0\fs24 and demanded its instant reception, under the pain of eternal death. Our Lord did the same. \ldblquote He that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Joh_3:18\cf0\ulnone .) Immediate faith was demanded. Being demanded by Christ, and at his command by the Apostles, that demand must be just and reasonable. It could, however, be neither unless the evidence of the truth attended it. That evidence could not be the external proofs of the divinity of Christ and his Gospel, for those proofs were present to the minds of comparatively few of the hearers of the Gospel; nor could it be rational proof or philosophical arguments, for still fewer could appreciate such evidence, and if they could it would avail nothing to the production of saving faith. The evidence of truth, to which assent is demanded by God the moment it is announced, must be in the truth itself. And if this assent be obligatory, and dissent or unbelief a sin, then the evidence must be of a nature, to which a corrupt state of the soul renders a man insensible. \ldblquote If our gospel be hid,\rdblquote says the Apostle, \ldblquote it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them. [But] God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul 2Co_4:3-6\cf0\ulnone .) It is here taught, (1.) That wherever and whenever Christ is preached, the evidence of his divinity is presented. The glory of God shines in his face. (2.) That if any man fails to see it, it is because the God of this world hath blinded his eyes. (3.) That if any do perceive it and believe, it is because of an inward illumination produced by Him who first commanded the light to shine out of darkness.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf2\i Proof from the Practice in the Church.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 3. As Christ and the Apostles acted on this principle, so have all faithful ministers and missionaries from that day to this. They do not expect to convince and convert men by historical evidence or by philosophical arguments. They depend on the demonstration of the Spirit.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf2\i Proof from Analogy.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 4. This doctrine, that the true and immediate ground of faith in the things of the Spirit is the testimony of the Spirit, producing \cf1\f1\fs16 74\cf0\f0\fs24 spiritual discernment, is sustained by analogy. If a man cannot see the splendour of the sun, it is because he is blind. If he cannot perceive the beauties of nature and of art, it is because he has no taste. If he cannot apprehend \ldblquote the concord of sweet sounds,\rdblquote it is because he has not a musical ear. If he cannot see the beauty of virtue, or the divine authority of the moral law, it is because his moral sense is blunted. If he cannot see the glory of God in his works and in his Word, it is because his religious nature is perverted. And in like manner, if he cannot see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, it is because the god of this world has blinded his eyes.\par No one excuses the man who can see no excellence in virtue, and who repudiates the authority of the moral law. The Bible and the instinctive judgment of men, condemn the atheist. In like manner the Scriptures pronounce accursed all who do not believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of the living God. This is the denial of supreme excellence; the rejection of the clearest manifestation of God ever made to man. The solemn judgment of God is, \ldblquote If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema maranatha.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul 1Co_16:22\cf0\ulnone .) In this judgment the whole intelligent universe will ultimately acquiesce.\par Faith in the Scriptures, therefore, is founded on the testimony of God. By testimony, as before stated, is meant attestation, anything which pledges the authority of the attester in support of the truth to be established. As this testimony is of different kinds, so the faith which it produces, is also different. So far as the testimony is merely external, the faith it produces is simply historical or speculative. So far as the testimony is moral, consisting in the power which the Spirit gives to the truth over the natural conscience, the faith is temporary, depending on the state of mind which is its proximate cause. Besides these, there is the inward testimony of the Spirit, which is of such a nature and of such power as to produce a perfect revoluticn in the soul, compared in Scripture to that effected by opening the eyes of the blind to the reality, the wonders, and glories of creation. There is, therefore, all the difference between a faith resting on this inward testimony of the Spirit, and mere speculative faith, that there is between the conviction a blind man has of the beauties of nature, before and after the opening of his eyes. As this testimony is informing, enabling the soul to see the truth and excellence of the \ldblquote things of the Spirit,\rdblquote so far as the consciousness of the believer is concerned, his faith is a form of knowledge. He sees to be true, what the Spirit reveals and authenticates.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf5\f5\fs23\par } jjn Q1.16.3. Different Kinds of Faith{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\froman\fprq2\fcharset161{\*\fname Times New Roman;}Times New Roman Greek;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~4. \i Faith and Knowledge.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\b0 The relation of faith to knowledge is a wide field. The discussions on the subject have been varied and endless. There is little probability that the points at issue will ever be settled to the satisfaction of all parties. The ground of faith is authority. The ground of knowledge is sense or reason. We are concerned here only with Christian faith, \i i.e\i0 ., the faith which receives the Scriptures as the Word of God and all they teach as true on his authority.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Is a Supernatural Revelation needed?\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The first question is, Whether there is any need of a supernatural revelation, whether human reason be not competent to discover and to authenticate all needful truth. This question has already been considered under the head of Rationalism, where it was shown, (1.) That every man\rquote s consciousness tells him that there are questions concerning God and his own origin and destiny, which his reason cannot answer. (2.) That he knows \lang1142\i\'e0 priori\lang1033\i0 , that the reason of no other man can satisfactorily answer them. (3.) That he knows from experience that they never have been answered by the wisdom of men, and (4.) That the Scriptures declare that the world by wisdom knows not God, that the wisdom of the world is foolishness in his estimation, and that God has therefore himself made known truths undiscoverable by reason, for the salvation of man.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Must the Truths of Revelation be Demonstrable by Reason?\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 A second question is, Whether truths, supernaturally revealed, must be able to authenticate themselves at the bar of reason before they can be rationally received; so that they are received, not on the ground of authority, but of rational proof. This also has been previously discussed. It has been shown that the assumption that God can reveal nothing which human reason cannot, when known, demonstrate to be true, assumes that human reason is the measure of all truth; that there is no intelligence in the universe higher than that of man; and that God cannot have purposes and plans, the grounds or reasons of which we are competent to discover and appreciate. It emancipates the from the authority of God, refusing to believe anything except the authority of reason. Why may we not believe on the testimony of God that there is a spiritual world, as well as believe that there is such a nation as the Chinese on the testimony of men? No man acts on the principle of believing only what he can understand and prove, in any other department. There are multitudes of truths which every sane man receives on trust, without being able either to prove or comprehend them. If we can believe only what we can prove at the bar of reason to be true, then the kingdom of heaven would be shut against all but the wise. There could be no Christian who was not also a philosopher. In point of fact no man acts on this principle. It is assumed in the pride of reason, or as an apology for rejecting unpalatable truths, but men believe in God, in sin, in freedom of the will, in responsibility, without the ability of comprehending or reconciling these truths with each other or with other facts of consciousness or experience.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i May not Revealed Truths be Philosophically vindicated?\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 A third question is, Whether, admitting a supernatural revelation, and moreover admitting the obligation to receive on the authority of God the doctrines which revelation makes known, the revealed doctrines may not be philosophically vindicated, so as to commend them to the acceptance of those who deny revelation. May not the Scriptural doctrines concerning God, creation, providence, the trinity, the incarnation, sin, redemption, and the future state, be so stated and sustained philosophically. as to constrain acquiescence in them as truths of the reason. This was the ground taken in the early Church by the theologians of the Alexandrian School, who undertook to elevate the \cf2\f1\'f0\f2\u8055?\lang1032\f3\'f3\'f4\'e9\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 of the people into a \cf2\f3\'e3\'ed\f2\u8182?\lang1032\f3\'f3\'e9\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 for the philosophers. Thus the sacred writers were made Platonists, and Christianity was transmuted into Platonism. A large part of the mental activity of the School-men, during the Middle Ages, was expended in the same way. They received the Bible as a supernatural revelation from God. They received the Church interpretation of its teachings. They admitted their obligation to believe its doctrines on the authority of God and of the Church. Nevertheless they held that all these doctrines could be philosophically proved. In later times Wolf undertook to demonstrate all the doctrines of Christianity on the principles of the Leibnitzian philosophy. In our own day this principle and these attempts have been carried further than ever. Systems of theology, constructed on the philosophy of Hegel, of Schelling, and of Schleiermacher, have almost superseded the old Biblical systems. If any man of ordinary \cf3\f4\fs16 77\cf0\f0\fs24 culture and intelligence should take up a volume of what is called \ldblquote Speculative Theology,\rdblquote (that is, theology presented in the forms of the speculative philosophy,) he would not understand a page and would hardly understand a sentence. He could not tell whether the theology which it proposed to present was Christianity or Buddhism. Or, at best, he would find a few drops of Biblical truth so diluted by floods of human speculation that the most delicate of chemical tests would fail to detect the divine element.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Attempts to do this Futile.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 All such attempts are futile. The empirical proof of this is, that no such attempt has ever succeeded. The experiment has been made hundreds of times, and always with the same result. Where are now the philosophical expositions and vindications of Scripture doctrines by the Platonizing fathers; by the Schoolmen; by the Cartesians; by the Leibnitzians? What power over the reason, the conscience, or the life, has any of the speculative systems of our day? Who, beyond the devotees of the systems which they represent, understand or adopt the theology of Daub, of Marheinecke, of Lange, and others? Strauss, therefore, is right when he repudiates all these vain attempts to reconcile Christianity with philosophy, or to give a form to Christian doctrine which satisfies the philosophical thinker.\par But apart from this argument from experience, the assumption is preposterous that the feeble intellect of man can explain, and from its own resources, vindicate and prove the deep things of God. An infant might as well undertake to expound Newton\rquote s \ldblquote Principia.\rdblquote If there are mysteries in nature, in every blade of grass, in the insect, in the body and in the soul of man, there must be mysteries in religion. The Bible and our consciousness teach us that God is incomprehensible, and his ways past finding out; that we cannot explain either his nature or his acts; we know not how he creates, upholds, and governs without interfering with the nature of his creatures; how there can be three persons in the Godhead; how in the one person of Christ there can be two intelligences and two wills; how the Spirit inspires, renews, sanctifies, or comforts. It belongs to the \ldblquote self-deifying\rdblquote class of philosophers to presume to know all that God knows, and to banish the incomprehensible from the religion which he has revealed. \ldblquote To the school of Hegel,\rdblquote says Bretschneider,\cf3\f4\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24\ldblquote there are mysteries in religion only for those who have not raised themselves to the Hegelian grade of knowledge. For the latter all is clear; all is knowledge; and Christianity is the solution, and therefore the revelation of all mysteries.\rdblquote This may be consistent in those who hold that man is God in the highest form of his existence, and the philosopher the highest style of man. Such an assertion, however, by whomsoever it may be made, is the insanity of presumption.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i May what is True in Religion be False in Philosophy?\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 A fourth question included in this general subject is, Whether there is or may be a real conflict between the truths of reason and those of revelation? Whether that which is true in religion may be false in philosophy? To this question different answers have been given.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i The Fathers on this Question.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 First, while the Greek fathers were disposed to bring religion and philosophy into harmony, by giving a philosophical form to Christian doctrines, the Latins were inclined to represent the two as irreconcilable. \ldblquote What,\rdblquote asks Tertullian, \ldblquote has Athens to do with Jerusalem? The academy with the Church? What have heretics to do with Christians? Our instruction is from the porch of Solomon, who himself taught that the Lord was to be sought in the simplicity of the heart. We need no seeking for truth after Christ; no research after the Gospel. When we believe, we desire nothing beyond faith, because we believe that there is nothing else we should do. To know nothing beyond is to know all things.\rdblquote He went so far as to say, \ldblquote\lang1142 Prorsus credibile est, quia ineptum est; certum est, quia impossibile est.\lang1033\rdblquote Without going to this extreme, the theologians of the Latin Church, those of them at least most zealous\cf3\f4\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 for Church doctrines, were inclined to deny to reason even the prerogative of a \lang1142\i judicium contradictionis\lang1033\i0 . They were constrained to take this ground because they were called upon to defend doctrines whici contradicted not only reason but the senses. When it was objected to the doctrine that the consecrated wafer is the real body of Christ, that our senses pronounce it to be bread, and that it is impossible that a human body should be in heaven and in all parts of the earth at the same time, what could they say but that the senses and reason are not to be trusted in the sphere of faith? That what is false to the reason and the senses may be true in religion?\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Lutheran Teaching on this Point.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The Lutherans were under the same necessity. Their doctrine of the person of Christ involves the denial of the primary truth, that attributes cannot be separated from the substance of which they are the manifestation. Their doctrine concerning the Lord\rquote s Supper involves the assumption of the ubiquity of Christ\rquote s body, which seems to be a contradiction in terms.\par Luther\rquote s utterances on this subject are not very consistent. When arguing against the continued obligation of monastic vows, he did not hesitate to say that what was contrary to reason was contrary to God. \ldblquote\lang1031 Was nun der Vernunft entgegen ist, ist gewiss dass es Gott viehmehr entgegen ist. Denn wie sollte es nicht wider die g\'f6ttliche Wahrheit seyn, das wider Vernunft und menschliche Wahrheit ist.\lang1033\rdblquote But in the sacramentarian controversy he will not allow reason to be heard. \ldblquote In the things of God,\rdblquote he says, reason or nature is stock-star-and-stone blind. \ldblquote It is, indeed,\rdblquote he adds, \ldblquote audacious enough to plunge in and stumble as a blind horse; but all that it explains or concludes is as certainly false and wrong as that God lives.\rdblquote In another place he says that reason, when she attempts to speculate about divine things, becomes a fool; which, indeed, is very much what Paul says. (\cf4\ul Rom_1:22\cf0\ulnone , \cf4\ul 1Co_1:18-31\cf0\ulnone .)\par The Lutheran theologians made a distinction between reason in the abstract, or reason as it was in man before the fall, and reason as it now is. They admit that no truth of revelation can contradict reason as such; but it may contradict the reason of men all of whose faculties are clouded and deteriorated by sin. By this was not meant simply that the unrenewed man is opposed to the truth of God; that \ldblquote the things of the Spirit\rdblquote are foolishness to him, that it seems to him absurd that God should be found in fashion as a man; that He should demand a satisfaction for sin; or save one man and not another, according to his own good pleasure. This the Bible clearly teaches and all Christians believe. In all this there is no contradiction between reason and religion. The being of God is foolishness to the atheist; and personal immortality is foolishness to the pantheist. Yet who would admit that these doctrines are contrary to reason? The Lutheran theologians intended to teach, not only that the mysteries of the Bible are above reason, that they can neither be understood nor demonstrated; and not only that \ldblquote the things of the Spirit\rdblquote are foolishness to the natural man, but that they are really in conflict with the human understanding; that by a correct process of reasoning they can be demonstrated to be false; so that in the strict sense of the terms what is true in religion is false in philosophy. \ldblquote The Sorbonne,\rdblquote says Luther, \ldblquote has pronounced a most abominable decision in saying that what is true in religion is also true in philosophy; and moreover condemning as heretics all who assert the contrary. By this horrible doctrine it has given it to be clearly understood that the doctrines of faith are to be subjected to the yoke of human reason.\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Sir William Hamilton.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Secondly, the ground taken by Sir William Hamilton on this subject is not precisely the same with that taken by the Lutherans. They agree, indeed, in this, that we are bound to believe what (at the bar of reason) we can prove to be false, but they differ entirely as to the cause and nature of this conflict between reason and faith. According to the Lutherans, it arises from the corruption and deterioration of our nature by the fall. It is removed in part in this world by regeneration, and entirely hereafter by the perfection of our sanctification. According to Hamilton, this conflict arises from the necessary limitation of human thought. God has so made us that reason, acting according to its own laws, of necessity arrives at conclusions directly opposed to the doctrines of religion both natural and revealed. We can prove demonstrably that the Absolute being cannot know, cannot be a cause, cannot be conscious. It may be proved with equal clearness that the Infinite cannot be a person, or possess moral attributes. Here, then, what is true in religion, what we are bound to believe, and what in point of fact all men, in virtue of the constitution of their nature do believe, can be proved to be false. There is thus an irreconcilable conflict between our intellectual and moral nature. But as, according to the idealist, reason forces us to the conclusion that the external world does not exist, while, nevertheless, it is safe and proper to act on the assumption that it is, and is what it appears to be; so, according to Hamilton, it is not only safe, but obligatory on us to act on the assumption that God is a person, although infinite, while our reason demonstrates that an infinite person is a contradiction. The conflict between reason and faith is avowed, while the obligation of faith on the testimony of our moral and religious nature and of the Word of God is affirmed. This point has been already discussed.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i The View of Speculative Philosophers.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Thirdly, we note the view taken by the speculative philosophers. They, too, maintain that reason demonstrates the doctrines of revelation and even of natural religion to be false. But they do not recognize their obligation to receive them as objects of faith. Being contrary to reason, those doctrines are false, and being false, they are, by enlightened men, to be rejected. If any cling to them as a matter of feeling, they are to be allowed to do so, but they must renounce all claim to philosophic insight.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i May the Objects of Faith be above, and yet not against Reason?\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 A fifth question is, Whether the objects of faith may be above, and yet not contrary to reason? The answer to this question is to be in the affirmative, for the distinction implied is sound and almost universally admitted. What is above reason is simply incomprehensible. What is against reason is impossible. It is contrary to reason that contradictions should be true; that a part should be greater than the whole; that a thing should be and not be at the same time; that right should be wrong and wrong right. It is incomprehensible how matter attracts matter; how the mind acts on the body, and the body on the mind. The distinction between the incomprehensible and the impossible, is therefore plain and admitted. And the distinction between what is above reason, and what is against reason, is equally obvious and just. The great body of Christian theologians have ever taken the ground that the doctrines of the Bible are not contrary to reason, although above it. That is, they are matters of faith to be received on the authority of God, and not because they can be either understood or proved. As it is incomprehensible how a soul and body can be united in one conscious life; so it is incomprehensible how a divine and human nature can be united in one person m Christ. Neither is impossible, and therefore neither is contrary to reason. We know the one fact from consciousness; we believe the other on the testimony of God. It is impossible, and therefore contrary to reason, that three should be one. But it is not impossible that the same numerical essence should subsist in three distinct persons. Realists tell us that humanity, as one numerical essence, subsists in all the millions of human individuals. Thomas Aquinas takes the true ground when he says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Ea qu\'e6 sunt supra naturam, sola fide tenemus. Quod autem credimus, auctoritati debemus. Unde in omnibus asserendis sequi debemus naturam rerum, pr\'e6ter ea, qu\'e6 auctoritate divina traduntur, qu\'e6 sunt supra naturam.\lang1033\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 Qu\'e6 igitur fidei sunt, non sunt tentanda probare nisi per auctoritates his, qui auctoritates suscipiunt. Apud alios vero sufficit defendere non esse impossibile quod pr\'e6dicat fides\lang1033 .\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 Quidquid in aliis scientiis invenitur veritati hujus scienti\'e6 [sacr\'e6 doctrin\'e6] repugnans, totum condemnatur ut falsum.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i The Objects of Faith are consistent with Reason.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 While, therefore, the objects of faith as revealed in the Bible, are not truths of the reason, \i i.e\i0 ., which the human reason can discover, or comprehend, or demonstrate, they are, nevertheless, perfectly consistent with reason. They involve no contradictions or absurdities; nothing impossible, nothing inconsistent with the intuitions either of the intellect or of the conscience; nothing inconsistent with any well established truth, whether of the external world or of the world of mind. On the contrary, the contents of the Bible, so far as they relate to things within the legitimate domain of human knowledge, are found to be consistent, and must be consistent, with all we certainly know from other sources than a divine revelation. All that the Scriptures teach concerning the external world accords with the facts of experience. They do not teach that the earth is a plane; that it is stationary in space; that the sun revolves around it. On the other hand, they do teach that God made all plants and animals, each after its own kind; and, accordingly, all experience shows that species are immutable. All the anthropological doctrines of the Bible agree with what we know of man from consciousness and observation. The Bible teaches that God made of one blood all nations which dwell on the face of the earth. We accordingly find that all the varieties of our race have the same anatomical structure; the same physical nature; the same rational and moral faculties. The Bible teaches that man is a fr ee, accountable agent; that all men are sinners; that all need redemption, and that no man can redeem himself or find a ransom for his brother. With these teachings the consciousness of all men agrees. All that the Scriptures reveal concerning the nature and attributes of Gods corresponds with our religious nature, satisfying, elevating, and sanctifying all our powers and meeting all our necessities. If the contents of the Bible did not correspond with the truths which God has revealed in his external wor ks and the constitution of our nature, it could not be received as coming from Him, for God cannot contradict himself. Nothing, therefore, can be more derogatory to the Bible than the assertion that its doctrines are contrary to reason.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Faith in the Irrational impossible.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The assumption that reason and faith are incompatible; that we must become irrational in order to become believers is, however it may be intended, the language of i nfidelity; for faith in the irrational is of necessity itself irrational. It is impossible to believe that to be true which the mind sees to be false. This would be to believe and disbelieve the same thing at the same time. If, therefore, as modern philosophers assert, it is impossible that an infinite being can be a person, then faith in the personality of God is impossible. Then there can be no religion, no sin, no accountability, no immortality. Faith is not a blind, irrational conviction. In order to  believe, we must know what we believe, and the grounds on which our faith rests. And, therefore, the refuge which some would take in faith, from the universal scepticism to which they say reason necessarily leads, is insecure and worthless.\par While admitting that the truths of revelation are to be received upon the authority of God; that human reason can neither comprehend nor prove them; that a man must be converted and become as a little child before he can truly receive the doctrines of the Bible; a nd admitting, moreover, that these doctrines are irreconcilable with every system of philosophy, ever framed by those who refuse to be taught of God, or who were ignorant of his Word, yet it is ever to be maintained that those doctrines are unassailable; that no created intellect can prove them to be impossible or irrational. Paul, while spurning the wisdom of the world, still claimed that he taught the highest wisdom, even the wisdom of God. (\cf4\ul 1Co_2:6-7\cf0\ulnone .) And who will venture to say that the wisdom of God is irrational?\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Knowledge essential to Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 A sixth question, included under the head of the relation of faith to knowledge is, Whether knowledge is essential to faith? That is, whether a truth must be known in order to be believed? This Protestants affirm and Romanists deny.\par Protestants of course admit that mysteries, or truths which we are unable to comprehend, may be, and are, proper objects of faith. They repudiate the rationalistic doctrine that we can believe only what we understand and what we can prove, or, at least, elucidate so that it appears to be true in its own light. What Protestants maintain is that knowledge, \i i.e\i0 ., the cognition of the import of the proposition to be believed, is essential to faith; and, consequently, that faith is limited by knowledge. We can believe only what we know, \i i.e\i0 ., what we intelligently apprehend. If a proposition be announced to us in an unknown language, we can affirm nothing about it. We can neither believe nor disbelieve it. Should the man who makes the declaration, assert that it is true, if we have confidence in his competency and integrity, we may believe that he is right, but the proposition itself is no part of our faith. The Apostle recognizes this obvious truth when he says, \ldblquote Except ye utter by the tongue words easy to be understood (\cf2\f3\'e5\f2\u8020?\lang1032\f3\'f3\'e7\'ec\'ef\'ed \'eb\lang1033\f2\u8057?\lang1032\f3\'e3\'ef\'ed\cf0\lang1033\f0 ), how shall it be known what is spoken? for ye shall speak into the air. If I know not the meaning of the voice, I shall be unto him that speaketh a barbarian, and he that speaketh shall be a barbarian unto me.. When thou shalt bless with the Spirit, how shall he that occupieth the room of the unlearned, say Amen at thy giving of thanks? seeing he understandeth not what thou sayest?\rdblquote (\cf4\ul 1Co_14:9-16\cf0\ulnone .) To say Amen, is to assent to, to make one\rquote s own. According to the Apostle, therefore, knowledge, or the intelligent apprehension of the meaning of what is proposed, is essential to faith. If the proposition \ldblquote God is a Spirit,\rdblquote be announced to the unlearned in Hebrew or Greek, it is impossible that they should assent to its truth. If they understand the language, if they know what the word \ldblquote God\rdblquote means, and what the word \ldblquote Spirit\rdblquote means, then they may receive or reject the truth which that proposition affirms. The declaration \ldblquote Jesus is the Son of God,\rdblquote admits of different interpretations.\cf3\f4\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 Some say the term Son is an official title, and therefore the proposition \ldblquote Jesus is the Son of God,\rdblquote means that Jesus is a ruler. Others say it is a term of affection, then the proposition means that Jesus was the special object of the love of God. Others say that it means that Jesus is of the same nature with God; that He is a divine person. If this be the meaning of the Spirit in declaring Jesus to be the Son of God, then those who do not attach that sense to the words, do not believe the truth intended to be taught. When it is said God set forth Christ to be a propitiation for our sins, if we do not understand what the word propitiation means, the proposition to us means nothing, and nothing cannot be an object of faith.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Knowledge the Measure of Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 It follows from what has been said, or rather is included in it, that knowledge being essential to faith, it must be the measure of it. What lies beyond the sphere of knowledge, lies beyond the sphere of faith. Of the unseen and eternal we can believe only what God has revealed; and of what God has revealed, we can believe only what we know. It has been said that he who believes the Bible to be the Word of God, may properly be said to believe all it teaches, although much of its instructions may be to him unknown. But this is not a correct representation. The man who believes the Bible, is prepared to believe on its authority whatever it declares to be true. But he cannot properly be said to believe any more of its contents than he knows. If asked if he believed that men bitten by poisonous serpents were ever healed by merely looking at a brazen serpent, he might, if ignorant of the Pentateuch, honestly answer, No. But should he come to read and understand the record of the healing of the dying Israelites, as found in the Bible, he would rationally and sincerely, answer, Yes. This disposition to believe whatever the Bible teaches, as soon as we know what is taught, may be called an implicit faith, but it is no real faith. It has none of its characteristics and none of its power.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Proof that Knowledge is Essential to Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qc That knowledge, in the sense above stated, is essential to faith is obvious, \emdash\cf0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj 1. From the very nature of faith. It includes the conviction of the truth of its object. It is an affirmation of the mind that a thing is true or trustworthy, but the mind can affirm nothing of that of which it knows nothing.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf3\f4\fs16 86\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj 2. The Bible everywhere teaches that without knowledge there can be no faith. This, as just stated, is the doctrine of the Apostle Paul. He condemned the speaking in an unknown tongue in a promiscuous assembly, because the hearers could not understand what was said; and if they did not know the meaning of the words uttered, they could neither assent to them, nor be profited by them. In another place (\cf4\ul Rom_10:14\cf0\ulnone ) he asks, \ldblquote How shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard?\rdblquote \ldblquote Faith,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote cometh by hearing.\rdblquote The command of Christ was to preach the Gospel to every creature; to teach all nations. Those who received the instructions thus given, should, He assured his disciples, be saved; those who rejected them, should be damned. This takes for granted that without the knowledge of the Gospel, there can be no faith. On this principle the Apostles acted everywhere. They went abroad preaching Christ, proving from the Scriptures that He was the Son of God and Saviour of the world. The communication of knowledge always preceded the demand for faith.\par 3. Such is the intimate connection between faith and knowledge, that in the Scriptures the one term is often used for the other. To know Christ, is to believe upon Him. To know the truth, is intelligently and believingly to apprehend and appropriate it. Conversion is effected by knowledge. Paul says he was made a believer by the revelation of Christ within him. The Spirit is said to open the eyes of the understanding. Men are said to be renewed so as to know. We are translated from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. Believers are children of the light. Men are said to perish for the lack of knowledge. Nothing is more characteristic of the Bible than the importance which it attaches to the knowledge of the truth. We are said to be begotten by the truth; to be sanctified by the truth; and the whole duty of ministers and teachers is said to be to hold forth the word of life. It is because Protestants believe that knowledge is essential to faith, that they insist so strenuously on the circulation of the Scriptures and the instruction of the people.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Romish Doctrine on this Subject.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Romanists make a distinction between explicit and implicit faith. By the former is meant, faith in a known truth; by the latter faith in truths not known. They teach that only a few primary truths of religion need be known, and that faith without knowledge, as to all other truths, is genuine and sufficient. On \cf3\f4\fs16 87\cf0\f0\fs24 this subject Thomas Aquinas says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Quantum ad prima credibilia, qu\'e6 sunt articuli fidei, tenetur homo explicite credere. Quantum autem ad alia credibilia non tenetur homo explicite credere, sed solum implicite, vel in pr\'e6paratione animi, in quantum paratus est credere quidquid divina Scriptura continet.\lang1033\rdblquote Implicit faith is defined as, \ldblquote\lang1142 Assensus, qui omnia, quamvis ignota, qu\'e6 ab ecclesia probantur, amplectitur.\lang1033\rdblquote Bellarmin says, \ldblquote\lang1142 In eo qui credit, duo sunt, apprehensio et judicium, sive assensus: sed apprehensio non est fides, sed aliud fidem pr\'e6cedens. Possunt enim infideles apprehendere mysteria fidei. Pr\'e6terea, apprehensio non dicitur proprie notitia. Mysteria fidei, qu\'e6 rationem superant, credimus, non intelligimus, ac per hoc fides distingintur contra scientiam, et melius per ignorantiam, quam per notitiam definitur.\lang1033\rdblquote The faith required of the people is simply, A general intention to believe whatever the Church believes.\rdblquote The Church teaches that there ar e seven sacraments. A man who has no idea what the word sacrament means, or what rites are regarded by the Church as having a sacramental character, is held to believe that orders, penance, matrimony, and extreme unction, are sacraments. So, of all other doctrines of the Church. True faith is said to be consistent with absolute ignorance. According to this doctrine, a man may be a true Christian, if he submits to the Church, although in his internal convictions and modes of thought, he be a pantheist or p!agan.\par It is to this grave error as to the nature of faith, that much in the character and practice of the Romish Church is to be referred, \emdash\par 1. This is the reason why the Scriptures are withheld from the people. If knowledge is not necessary to faith, there is no need that the people should know what the Bible teaches.\par 2. For the same reason the services of public worship are conducted in an unknown language.\par 3. Hence, too, the symbolism which characterizes their worship. The end" to be accomplished is a blind reverence and awe. For this end there is no need that these symbols should be understood. It is enough that they affect the imagination.\par 4. To the same principle is to be referred the practice of reserve in preaching. The truth may be kept back or concealed. The cross is held up before the people, but it is not necessary that the doctrine of the sacrifice for sin made thereon should be taught. It is enough if the people are impressed; it matters not whether they believe# that the sign, or the material, or the doctrine symbolized, secures salvation. Nay, the darker the mind, the more vague and mysterious the feeling excited, and the more blind the submission rendered, the more genuine is the exercise of faith. \ldblquote Religious light,\rdblquote says Mr. Newman, \ldblquote is intellectual darkness.\rdblquote\par 5. It is on the same principle the Roman Catholic missions have always been conducted. The people are converted not by the truth, not by a course of instruction, but by baptism. They are made Christians by thousands, not by the intelligent adoption of Christianity as a system of doctrine, of that they may be profoundly ignorant, but by simple submission to the Church and its prescribed rites. The consequence has been that the Catholic missions, although continued in some instances for more than a hundred years, take no hold on the people, but almost uniformly die out, as soon as the supply of foreign ministers is cut off.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf5\f5\fs23\par } FF E1.16.4. Faith and Knowledge{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f2\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f3\froman\fprq2\fcharset161{\*\fname Times New Roman;}Times New Roman Greek;}{\f4\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\&man;}Times New Roman Greek;}{\f4\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~5. \i Faith and Feeling.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qc\cf1\b0 It has already been seen, \emdash\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 1. That faith, the act of believing, cannot properly be defined as the assent of the unders'tanding determined by the will. There are, unquestionably, many cases in which a man believes against his will.\par 2. It has also been argued that it is not correct to say that faith is assent founded on feeling. On this point it was admitted that a man\rquote s feelings have great influence upon his faith; that it is comparatively easy to believe what is agreeable, and difficult to believe what is disagreeable. It was also admitted that in saving faith, the gift of God, resting on the inward illuminati(ng testimony of the Holy Spirit, there is a discernment not only of the truth but of the divine excellence of the things of the Spirit, which is inseparably connected with appropriate feeling. It was moreover conceded that, so far as the consciousness of the believer is concerned, he seems to receive the truth on its own evidence, on its excellence and power over his heart and conscience. This, however, is analogous to other facts in his experience. When a man repents and believes, he is conscious only of) his own exercises and not of the supernatural influences of the Spirit, to which those exercises owe their origin and nature. Thus also in the exercise of faith, consciousness does not reach the inward testimony of the Spirit on which that faith is founded. Nevertheless, notwithstanding these admissions, it is still incorrect to say that faith is founded on feeling, because it is only of certain forms or exercises of faith that this can even be plausibly said; and because there are many exercises of even* saving faith (that is, of faith in a true believer,) which are not attended by feeling. This is the case when the object of faith is some historical fact. Besides, the Scriptures clearly teach that the ground of faith is the testimony of God, or demonstration of the Spirit. He has revealed certain truths, and attends them with such an amount and kind of evidence, as produces conviction, and we receive them on his authority.\par 3. Faith is not necessarily connected with feeling. Sometimes it is, and som+etimes it is not. Whether it is or not, depends, (\i a\i0 .) On the nature of the object. Belief in glad tidings is of necessity attended by joy; of evil tidings with grief. Belief in moral excellence involves a feeling of approbation. Belief that a certain act is criminal, involves disapprobation. (\i b\i0 .) On the proximate ground of faith. If a man believes that a picture is beautiful on the testimony of competent judges, there is no \'e6sthetic feeling connected with his faith. But if he personally p,erceives the beauty of the object, then delight is inseparable from the conviction that it is beautiful. In like manner if a man believes that Jesus is God manifest in the flesh, on the mere external testimony of the Bible, he experiences no due impression from that truth. But if his faith is founded on the inward testimony of the Spirit, by which the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ is revealed to him, then he is filled with adoring admiration and love.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Religious -Faith more than Simple Assent.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 4. Another question agitated on this subject is, Whether faith is a purely intellectual exercise; or Whether it is also an exercise of the affections. This is nearly allied to the preceding question, and must receive substantially the same answer. Bellarmin, says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Tribus in rebus ab h\'e6reticis Catholici dissentiunt; Primum, in objecto fidei justificantis, quod h\'e6retici restringunt ad solam promissionem miserico.rdi\'e6 specialis, Catholici tam late patere volunt, quam late patet verbam.\~Deinde \cf2\f1\fs16 90\cf0\f0\fs24 in facultate et potentia animi qu\'e6 sedes est fidei. Siquidem illi fidem collocant in voluntate [seu in corde] cum fiduciam esse definiunt; ac per hoc eam cum spe confundunt. Fiducia enim nihil est aliud, nisi spes roborata.\~.Catholici fidem in intellectu sedem habere docent. Denique, in ipso actu intellectus. Ipsi enim per notitiam fidem definiunt, nos per assensum. Assentimur enim Deo, qua/mvis ea nobis credenda proponat, qu\'e6 non intelligimus.\lang1033\rdblquote Regarding faith as a mere intellectual or speculative act, they consistently deny that it is necessarily connected with salvation. According to their doctrine, a man may have true faith, \i i.e\i0 ., the faith which the Scriptures demand, and yet perish. On this point the Council of Trent says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Si quis dixerit, amissa per peccatum gratia, simul et fidem semper amitti, aut fidem, qu\'e6 remanet, non esse veram0 fidem, licet non sit viva; aut eum, qui fidem sine caritate habet, non esse Christianum; anathema sit.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Protestant Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 On the other hand Protestants with one voice maintain that the faith which is connected with salvation, is not a mere intellectual exercise. Calvin says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Verum observemus, fidei sedem non in cerebro esse, sed in corde: neque vero de eo contenderim, qua in parte corporis si1ta sit fides: sed quoniam cordis nomen pro serio et sincero affectu fere capitur, dico firmam esse et efficacem fiduciam, non nudam tantum notionem.\lang1033\rdblquote He also says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Quodsi expenderent illud Pauli, Corde creditur ad justitiam (\cf3\ul Rom_10:10\cf0\ulnone ): fingere desinerent frigidam illam qualitatem. Si una h\'e6c nobis suppeteret ratio, valere deberet ad litem finiendam: assensionem scilicet ipsam sicuti ex parte attigi, et fusius iterum repetam, cordis esse magis 2quam cerebri, et affectus magis quam intelligenti\'e6.\lang1033\rdblquote\par The answer in the Heidelberg Catechism, to the question, What is Faith? is, \ldblquote It is not merely a certain knowledge, whereby I receive as true all that God has revealed to us in his Word, but also a cordial trust, which the Holy Ghost works in me by the Gospel, that not only to others, but to me also, the forgiveness of sin, and everlasting righteousness and life are given by God, out of pure grace, and only for the sak3e of Christ\rquote s merit.\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\cf2\f1\fs16 91\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj That saving faith is not a mere speculative assent of the understanding, is the uniform doctrine of the Protestant symbols. On this point, however, it may be remarked, in the first place, that,as has often been stated before, the Scriptures do not make the sharp distinction between the understanding, the feelings, and the will, which is common in our day. A large class of our inward acts a4nd states are so complex as to be acts of the whole soul, and not exclusively of any one of its faculties. In repentance there is of necessity an intellectual apprehension of ourselves as sinners, of the holiness of God, of his law to which we have failed to be conformed and of his mercy in Christ; there is a moral disapprobation of our character and conduct; a feeling of sorrow, shame, and remorse; and a purpose to forsake sin and lead a holy life. Scarcely less complex is the state of mind expressed by 5the word faith as it exists in a true believer. In the second place, there is a distinction to be made between faith in general and saving faith. If we take that element of faith which is common to every act of believing; if we understand by it the apprehension of a thing as true and worthy of confidence, whether a fact of history or of science, then it may be said that faith in its essential nature is intellectual, or intelligent assent. But if the question be, What is that act or state of mind which is 6required in the Gospel, when we are commanded to believe; the answer is very different. To believe that Christ is \ldblquote God manifest in the flesh,\rdblquote is not the mere intellectual conviction that no one, not truly divine, could be and do what Christ was and did; for this conviction demoniacs avowed; but it is to receive Him as our God. This includes the apprehension and conviction of his divine glory, and the adoring reverence, love, confidence, and submission, which are due to God alone. When7 we are commanded to believe in Christ as the Saviour of men, we are not required merely to assent to the proposition that He does save sinners, but also to receive and rest upon Him alone for our own salvation. What, therefore, the Scriptures mean by faith, in this connection, the faith which is required for salvation, is an act of the whole soul, of the understanding, of the heart, and of the will.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Proof of the Protestant Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf08 The Protestant doctrine that saving faith includes knowledge, assent, and trust, and is not, as Romanists teach, mere assent, in sustained by abundant proofs.\par 1. In the first place, it is proved from the nature of the object of saving faith. That object is not merely the general truth of Scripture, not the fact that the Gospel reveals God\rquote s plan of saving sinners; but it is Christ himself; his person and work, and the offer of salvation to us personally and individually. From the nature of th9e case we cannot, as just remarked, believe in Christ on the inward testimony of the Spirit which reveals his glory and his love, without the feelings of reverence, love, and trust mingling with the act and constituting its character. Nor is it possible that a soul oppressed with a sense of sin should receive the promise of deliverance from its guilt and power, without any feeling of gratitude and confidence. The act of faith in such a promise is in its nature an act of appropriation and confidence.\par :2. We accordingly find that in many cases in the Bible the word trust is used instead of faith. The same act or state of mind which in one place is expressed by the one word, is in others expressed by the other. The same promises are made to trust as are made to faith. The same effects are attributed to the one, that are attributed to the other.\par 3. The use of other words and forms of expression as explanatory of the act of faith, and substituted for that word, shows that it includes trust as an essen;tial element of its nature. We are commanded to look to Christ, as the dying Israelites looked up to the brazen serpent. This looking involved trusting; and looking is declared to be believing. Sinners are exhorted to flee to Christ as a refuge. The man-slayer fled to the city of refuge because he relied upon it as a place of safety. We are said to receive Christ, to rest upon Him, to lay hold of Him. All these, and other modes of expression which teach us what we are to do when we are commanded to believes and rests on Jesus Christ for salvation, as He is freely offered to us in the Gospel.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf2\f1\fs16 93\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj The controversy between Romanists and Protestants on this subject turns on the view taken of the plan of salvation. If, as Protestants hold, every man in order to be saved, must receive the record which God has given of his Son; must believe that He is God manifest in the flesh, the propitiation for our sins, the prophet, priest, and king ?of his people, then it must be admitted that faith involves trust in Christ as to us the source of wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. But if, as Romanists teach, the benefits of redemption are conveyed only through the sacraments, effective \lang1142\i ex opere operato\lang1033\i0 , then faith is the opposite of infidelity in its popular sense. If a man is not a believer, he is an infidel, \i i.e\i0 ., a rejecter of Christianity. The object of faith is divine revelation as contained in the Bible. It is a simple assent to the fact that the Scriptures are from God, and that the Church is a divinely constituted and supernaturally endowed institute for the salvation of men. Believing this, the sinner comes to the Church and receives through her ministrations, in his measure, all the benefits of redemption. According to this system the nature and office of faith are entirely different from what they are according to the Protestant theory of the Gospel.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf5\f4\fs23\par } '] !1.16.7. The Object of Saving Faith{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 TNq=1.16.6. Faith and Love{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\Ae }]1.16.5. Faith and Feeling{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f3\froman\fprq2\fcharset161{\*\fname Times New Ro%Bf1\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f2\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f3\froman\fprq2\fcharset161{\*\fname Times New Roman;}Times New Roman Greek;}{\f4\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~6. \i Faith and Love.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qjC\b0 As to the relation between faith and love there are three different views: \emdash\par 1. That love is the ground of faith; that men believe the truth because they love it. Faith is founded on feeling. This view has already been sufficiently discussed.\par 2. That love is the invariable and necessary attendant and consequent of saving faith. As no man can see and believe a thing to be morally good without the feeling of approbation; so no one can see and believe the glory of God as revealed in the SDcriptures without adoring reverence being awakened in his soul; no one can believe unto salvation that Christ is the Son of God and the Son of Man; that He loved us and gave Himself for us, and makes us kings and priests unto God, without love and devotion, in proportion to the clearness and strength of this faith, filling the heart and controlling the life. Hence faith is said to work by love and to purify the heart. Romanists, indeed, render \cf1\f1\'f0\f2\u8055?\lang1032\f3\'f3\'f4\'e9\'f2 \'e4\'e9\lanEg1033\f2\u8125?\lang1032\f3 \lang1033\f2\u7936?\lang1032\f3\'e3\lang1033\f2\u8049?\lang1032\f3\'f0\'e7\'f2 \lang1033\f2\u7952?\lang1032\f3\'ed\'e5\'f1\'e3\'ef\'f5\'ec\lang1033\f2\u8051?\lang1032\f3\'ed\'e7\cf0\lang1033\f0 in this passage (\cf2\ul Gal_5:6\cf0\ulnone ), \ldblquote faith perfected or completed by love.\rdblquote But this is contrary to the constant usage of the word \cf1\f2\u7952?\lang1032\f3\'ed\'e5\'f1\'e3\'e5\lang1033\f2\u8150?\lang1032\f3\'f3\'e8\'e1\'e9\cf0\lang1033\f0 in the New TeFstament, which is always used in a middle sense, \ldblquote\lang1142 vim suam exserere\lang1033 .\rdblquote According to the Apostle\rquote s teaching in \cf2\ul Rom_7:4-6\cf0\ulnone , love without faith, or anterior to it, is impossible. Until we believe, we are under the condemnation of the law. While under condemnation, we are at enmity with God. While at enmity with God, we bring forth fruit unto death. It is only when reconciled to God and united to Christ, that we bring forth fruit unto God. BelievGing that God loves us we love Him. Believing that Christ gave Himself for us, we devote our lives to Him. Believing that the fashion of this world passes away, that the things unseen are eternal, those who have that faith which is the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen, set their affections on things above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God. This necessary connection between faith and love, has already been sufficiently insisted upon.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cHf3\i Romanists make Love the Essence of Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 3. The third doctrinal view on this subject is that of the Romanists, who make love the essence of faith. In other words, love with them is the form (in the scholastic sense of the word) of faith; it is that which gives it being or character as a Christian virtue or grace. While on the one hand they teach, as we have seen with the Council of Trent, that faith is in itself mere intellectual assent, without any moral virtIue, and which may be exercised by the unrenewed or by those in a state of mortal sin; on the other hand, they hold that there is such a Christian grace as faith; but in that case, faith is only another name for love. This is not the distinction between a living and dead faith which the Scriptures and all Evangelical Christians recognize. With Romanists the \lang1142\i fides informis\lang1033\i0 is true faith, and the \lang1142\i fides formata\lang1033\i0 is love. On this point, Peter Lombard says: \ldblJquote\lang1142 Fides qua dicitur [creditur?], si cum caritate sit, virtus est, quia caritas ut ait Ambrosius mater est omnium virtutum, qu\'e6 omnes informat, sine qua nulla vera virtus est.\lang1033\rdblquote Thomas Aquinas says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Actus fidei ordinatur ad objectum voluntatis, quod est bonum, sicut ad finem. Hoc autem bonum quod est finis fidei, scilicet bonum divinum, est proprium objectum charitatis: et ideo charitas dicitur forma fidei, in quantum per charitatem actus fidei perficitKur et formatur.\lang1033\rdblquote Bellarmin says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Quod si charitas est forma fidei, et fides non justificat formaliter, nisi ab ipsa caritate formata certe multo\cf4\f4\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 magis charitas ipsa justificat. Fides qu\'e6 agitur, ac movetur, formatur, et quasi animatur per dilectionem.\~Apostolus Paulus . explicat dilectionem formam esse extrinsecam fidei non intrinsecam, qu\'e6 det illi, non ut sit, sed ut moveatur.\lang1033\rdblquote All this is intelligible and reasonaLble, provided we admit subjective justification, and the merit of good works. If justification is sanctification, then it may be admitted that love has more to do with making men holy, than faith considered as mere intellectual assent. And if it be conceded that we are accepted by God on the ground of our own virtue, then it may be granted that love is more valuable than any mere exercise of the intellect. Romanists argue, \ldblquote\lang1142 Maxima virtus maxime justificat. Dilectio est maxima virtus. ErMgo maxime justificat.\lang1033\rdblquote It was because this distinction between a \ldblquote formed and unformed faith\rdblquote was made in the interest of justification on the ground of our own character and merit, that Luther, with his usual vehement power, says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Ipsi duplicem faciunt fidem, informem et formatam, hanc pestilentissimam et satanicam glossam non possum non vehementer detestari.\lang1033\rdblquote It is only as connected with false views of justification that this question has any real importance. For it is admitted by all Protestants that saving faith and love are inseparably connected; that faith without love, \i i.e\i0 ., that a faith which does not produce love and good works, is dead. But Protestants are strenuous in denying that we are justified on account of love, which is the real meaning of the Romanists when they say \ldblquote\lang1142 fides non justificat formaliter, nisi ab ipsa caritate formata.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\cf5\f5\fs23\par } Oimes;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~7. \i The Object of Saving Faith.\i0\par \cf1\b0\i Fides Generalis.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 It is conceded thatP all Christians are bound to believe, and that all do believe everything taught in the Word of God, so far as the contents of the Scriptures are known to them. It is correct, therefore, to say that the object of faith is the whole revelation of God as contained in his Word. As the Bible is with Protestants the only infallible rule of faith and practice, nothing not expressly taught in Scripture, or deduced therefrom by necessary inference, can be imposed on the people of God as an article of faith. This iQs \ldblquote the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free,\rdblquote and in which we are bound to stand fast. This is our protection on the one hand, against the usurpations of the Church. Romanists claim for the Church the prerogative of infallible and authoritative\cf2\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 teaching. The people are bound to believe whatever the Church, \i i.e\i0 ., its organs the bishops, declare to be a part of the revelation of God. They do not, indeed, assume the right \ldblquote to make\rdblquote R new articles of faith. But they claim the authority to decide, in such a way as to bind the conscience of the people, what the Bible teaches; and what by tradition the Church knows to be included in the teaching of Christ and his Apostles. This gives them latitude enough to teach for doctrines the commandments of men. Bellarmin says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Omnium dogmatum firmitas pendet ab auctoritate pr\'e6sentis ecclesi\'e6.\lang1033\rdblquote On the other hand, however, it is not only against the usurpSations of the Church, that the principle above mentioned is our security, but also against the tyranny of public opinion. Men are as impatient of contradiction now as they ever were. They manifest the same desire to have their own opinions enacted into laws, and enforced by divine authority. And they are as fierce in their denunciations of all who venture to oppose them. Hence they meet in conventions or other assemblies, ecclesiastical or voluntary, and decide what is true and what is false in doctrine, Tand what is right and what is wrong in morals. Against all undue assumptions of authority, true Protestants hold fast to the two great principles, \emdash the right of private judgment, and that the Scriptures are the only infallible rule of faith and practice. The object of faith, therefore, is all the truths revealed in the Word of God. All that God in the Bible declares to be true, we are bound to believe. This is what theologians call \lang1142\i fides generalis\lang1033\i0 .\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\Uqc\cf1\i Fides Specialis.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 But, besides this, there is a \lang1142\i fides specialis\lang1033\i0 necessary to salvation. In the general contents of the Scriptures there are certain doctrines concerning Christ and his work, and certain promises of salvation made through Him to sinful men, which we are bound to receive and on which we are required to trust. The special object of faith, therefore, is Christ, and the promise of salvation through Him. And the special defVinite act of faith which secures our salvation is the act of receiving and resting on Him as He is offered to us in the Gospel. This is so clearly and so variously taught in the Scriptures as hardly to admit of being questioned.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Christ\rquote s Testimony.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 In the first place, our Lord repeatedly declares that what men are required to do, and what they are condemned because they do not do, is to believe on Him. He was lifted up, \ldblqWuote That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Joh_3:15\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Joh_5:18\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: but he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.\rdblquote (\cfX3\ul Joh_5:36\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote This is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Joh_6:40\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life. I am that bread of life. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven,. any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Joh_6:47-51\cf0\ulnone .) In Yanother place our Lord says, \ldblquote This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent. (\cf3\ul Joh_6:29\cf0\ulnone .) The passages, however, in which faith in Christ is expressly demanded as the condition of salvation, are too numerous to be cited.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i We are said to be saved by receiving Christ.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 That Christ is the immediate object of saving faith is also taught in all those passages in which we are said to receive CZhrist, or the testimony of God concerning Christ, and in which this act of receiving is said to secure our salvation. For example, in \cf3\ul Joh_1:12\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote As many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God.\rdblquote \ldblquote I am come in my Father\rquote s name, and ye receive me not.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Joh_5:43\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater: for this is the witness of God which he hath testified of h[is Son. He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God has made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul 1Jo_5:9-10\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote He that hath the Son hath life; he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.\rdblquote (v. 12.) \ldblquote Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God.\rdblquote (v. 1.) It is, therefore, receiving Christ; receiving the record which God has given of hi\s Son; believing that He is the Christ the Son of the living God, which is the specific act required of us in order to salvation. Christ, therefore, is the immediate object of those exercises of faith which secure salvation. And, therefore, faith is expressed by looking to Christ; coming to Christ; committing the soul to Him, etc.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf2\f1\fs16 98\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Teaching of the Apostles\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Accordingly the Apostle teaches ]we are justified \ldblquote by the faith of Christ.\rdblquote It is not faith as a pious disposition of the mind not faith as general confidence in God; not faith in the truth of divine revelation; much less faith \ldblquote in eternal verities,\rdblquote or the general principles of truth and duty, but that faith of which Christ is the object. \cf3\ul Rom_3:22\cf0\ulnone : \ldblquote The righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe.\rdblquote \cf3\ul G^al_2:16\cf0\ulnone : \ldblquote Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Gal_3:24\cf0\ulnone : \ldblquote The law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Gal_5:26\cf0\ulnone : \ldblquote For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.\rdbl_quote \cf3\ul Gal_2:20\cf0\ulnone : \ldblquote I live by the faith of the Son of God,\rdblquote etc., etc.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Christ our Ransom.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Christ declares that He gave Himself as a ransom for many; He was set forth as a propitiation for sins; He offered Himself as a sacrifice unto God. It is through the merit of his righteousness and death that men are saved. All these representations which pervade the Scriptures necessarily assume that the fai`th which secures salvation must have special reference to Him. If He is our Redeemer, we must receive and trust Him as such. If He is a propitiation for sins, it is through faith in his blood that we are reconciled to God. The whole plan of salvation, as set forth in the Gospel, supposes that Christ in his person and work is the object of faith and the ground of confidence.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i We live in Christ by Faith.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The same thing follows from the arepresentations given of the relation of the believer to Christ. We are in Him by faith. He dwells in us. He is the head from whom we, as members of his body, derive our life. He is the vine, we are the branches. It is not we that live, but Christ, who liveth in us. These and other representations are utterly inconsistent with the doctrine that it is a vague general faith in God or in the Scriptures which secures our salvation. It is a faith which terminates directly on Christ, which takes Him to be our Gbod and Saviour. God sent his Son into the world, clothed in our nature, to reveal his will, to die\cf2\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 for our sins and to rise again for our justification. In Him dwells the fulness of the Godhead, from his fulness we are filled. He to us is wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. Those who receive this Saviour as being all He claimed to be, and commit their souls into his hands to be used in his service and saved to his glory, are, in the Scriptural sense of the termc, believers. Christ is not only the object of their faith, but their whole inward, spiritual life terminates on Him. Nothing, therefore, can be more foreign to the Gospel than the Romish doctrine, substantially revived by the modern philosophy which turns the mind away from the historical, really existing, objective Christ, to the work within us; leaving us nothing to love and trust, but what is in our own miserable hearts.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Christ is not received in a Special Office alone.d\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Admitting that Christ is the immediate and special object of those acts of faith which secure salvation, it is asked, Whether it is Christ in all his offices, or Christ in his priestly office, especially, that is the object of justifying faith? This seems an unnecessary question. It is not raised in the Bible; nor does it suggest itself to the believer. He receives Christ. He does not ask himself for what special function of his saving work he thus accepts Him. He etakes Him as a Saviour, as a deliverer from the guilt and power of sin, from the dominion of Satan, and from all the evils of his apostasy from God. He takes Him as his wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. He takes Him as his God and Saviour, as the full, complete, satisfying, life-giving portion of the soul. If this complex act of apprehension and surrender were analyzed it doubtless would be found to include submission to all his teaching, reliance on his righteousness and intercessionf, subjection to his will, confidence in his protection, and devotion to his service. As He is offered to us as a prophet, priest, and king, as such He is accepted. And as He is offered to us as a source of life, and glory, and blessedness, as the supreme object of adoration and love, as such He is joyfully accepted.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Is the Sinner required to believe that God loves him?\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 Again, it is questioned, Whether the object of saving faith is thgat God is reconciled to us; that our sins are forgiven; that we are the objects of the saving love of God? This is not the question above considered, namely, Whether, as Romanists say, the object of faith is the whole revelation of God, or, as Protestants\cf2\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 contend, Christ and the promise of redemption through Him, although many of the arguments of the Romanists are directed against the special form of the doctrine just stated. They argue that it is contradictory to say that we areh pardoned because we believe; and, in the same breath, to say that the thing to be believed is that our sins are already pardoned. Again, they argue that the only proper object of faith is some revelation of God, but it is nowhere revealed that we individually are reconciled to God, or that our sins are pardoned, or that we are the objects of that special love which God has to his own people.\par In answer to the first of these objections, the Reformed theologians were accustomed to say, that a distinctiion is to be made between the remission of sin \lang1142\i de jure\lang1033\i0 already obtained through the death of Christ, and remission \lang1142\i de facto\lang1033\i0 through the efficacious application of it to us. In the former sense, \ldblquote\lang1142 remissio peccatorum jam impetrata\lang1033\rdblquote is the object of faith. In the latter sense, it is \ldblquote remissio impetranda,\rdblquote because faith is the instrumental cause of justification, and must precede it. \lang1142\ldblquote jUnde,\rdblquote says Turrettin, \ldblquote ad obtinendam remissionem peccatorum, non debeo credere peccata mihi jam remissa, ut perperam nobis impingunt; sed debeo credere peccata mihi credenti et p\'9cnitenti, juxta promissionem factam credentibus et p\'9cnitentibus, remissum iri certissime, qu\'e6 postea actu secundari et reflexo ex sensu fidei credo mihi esse remissa.\rdblquote\lang1033\par The second objection was answered by distinguishing between the direct and the reflex act of faith. By the direkct act of faith we embrace Christ as our Saviour; by the reflex act, arising out of the consciousness of believing, we believe that He loved us and died for us, and that nothing can ever separate us from his love. These two acts are inseparable, not only as cause and effect, antecedent and consequent; but they are not separated in time, or in the consciousness of the believer. They are only different elements of the complex act of accepting Christ as He is offered in the Gospel. We cannot separate the joyl and gratitude with which a great favour is accepted. Although a psychological analysis might resolve these emotions into the effects of the act of acceptance, they belong, as revealed in consciousness, to the very nature of the act. It is a cordial and grateful acceptance of a promise made to all who embrace it. If a general promise of pardon be made to criminals on the condition of the confession of guilt, every one of their number who makes the confession knows\cf2\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 or believes thamt the promise is made to him. On this point the early Reformed and Lutheran theologians were agreed in teaching that when the sinner exercises saving faith. He believes that for Christ\rquote s sake he is pardoned and accepted of God. In other words, that Christ loved him and gave Himself for him. We have already seen that the \ldblquote Heidelberg Catechism,\rdblquote the symbolical book of so large a portion of the Reformed Church, declared saving faith to be \ldblquote\lang1142 Certa fiducia, a Spiritnu Sancto per evangelium in corde meo accensa, qua in Deo acquiesco, certo statuens, non solum aliis, sed mihi quoque remissionem peccatorum \'e6ternam, justitiam et vitam donatam esse idque gratis, ex Dei misericordia, propter unius Christi meritum.\lang1033\rdblquote In the \ldblquote Apology of the Augsburg Confession of the Lutheran Church\rdblquote it is said, \ldblquote\lang1142 Nos pr\'e6ter illam fidem [fidem generalem] requirimus, ut credat sibi quisque remitti peccata.\lang1033\rdblquote Calvion says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Grati\'e6 promissione opus est, qua nobis testificetur se propitium esse Patrem: quando nec aliter ad eum appropinquare possumus, et in eam solam reclinare cor hominis potest. Nunc justa fidei definitio nobis constabit, si dicamus esse divin\'e6 erga nos benevolenti\'e6 firmam certamque cognitionem, qu\'e6 gratuit\'e6 in Christo promissionis veritate fundata, per Spiritum Sanctum et revelatur mentibus nostris et cordibus obsignatur.\lang1033\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 Hic ppr\'e6cipuus fidei cardo vertitur, ne quas Dominus offert misericordi\'e6 promissiones, extra nos tantum veras esse arbitremur, in nobis minime: sed ut potius eas intus complectendo nostras faciamus. In summa, vere fidelis non est nisi qui solida persuasione Deum sibi propitium benevolumque patrem esse persuasus, de ejus benignitate omnia sibi pollicetur: nisi qui divin\'e6 erga se benevolenti\'e6 promissionibus fretus, indubitatam salutis expectationem pr\'e6sumit.\lang1033\rdblquote\par This is strong lqanguage. The doctrine, however, is not that faith implies assurance. The question concerns the nature of the object seen, not the clearness of the vision; what it is that the soul believes, not the strength of its faith. This Calvin himself elsewhere beautifully expresses, saying, \ldblquote When the least drop of faith is instilled into our minds, we begin to see the serene and placid face of our reconciled Father; far off and on high, it may be, but still it is seen.\rdblquote A man in a dungeon may sere only a ray of light streaming through a crevice. This is very different from broad daylight. Nevertheless, what he sees is light. So what\cf2\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 the penitent sinner believes is, that God for Christ\rquote s sake is reconciled to him. It may be with a very dim and doubtful vision, he apprehends that truth; but that is the truth on which his trust is stayed.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf1\i Proof of this Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 This is involved in the appropriastion of the general promise of the Gospel. The Scriptures declare that God is love; that He set forth his Son to be a propitiation for sin; that in Him He is reconciled; that He will receive all who come to Him through Christ. To appropriate these general declarations, is to believe that they are true, not only in relation to others, but to ourselves that God is reconciled to us. We have no right to exclude ourselves. This self-exclusion is unbelief. It is refusing to take of the waters of life, freely oftfered to all.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\cf3\ul Gal_2:20\cf0\ulnone\i .\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj Accordingly the Apostle in \cf3\ul Gal_2:20\cf0\ulnone , says, \ldblquote The life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.\rdblquote The object of the Apostle\rquote s faith, therefore, the truths which he believed, and faith in which gave life to his soul, were, (1.) That Christ is the Son of God; (2.) That He loved him; (3.) Thaut He gave Himself for him. The faith by which a believer lives, is not specifically different in its nature or object from the faith required of every man in order to his salvation. The life of faith is only the continued repetition, it may be with ever increasing strength and clearness, of those exercises by which we first receive Christ, in all his fuiness and in all his offices, as our God and Saviour. \ldblquote\lang1142 Qui fit ut vivamus Christi fide? quia nos dilexit, et se ipsum tradidit pro nobisv. Amor, inquam, quo nos complexus est Christus, fecit ut se nobis coadunaret. Id implevit morte sua nam se ipsum tradendo pro nobis, non secus atque in persona nostra passus est. Neque parum energi\'e6 habet pro me: quia non satis fuerit Christum pro mundi salute mortuum reputare, nisi sibi quisque effectum ac possessionem hujus grati\'e6 privatim vindicet.\lang1033\rdblquote\par It is objected to this view of the case that by the \ldblquote love of God,\rdblquote or \ldblquote of Christ,\rdblquote in wthe above statement, is not meant the general benevolence or philanthropy of God, but his special, electing, and saving love. When Paul said he lived by the faith of Christ who loved him, and gave Himself for him, he meant something\cf2\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 more than that Christ loved all men and therefore him among the rest. He evidently believed himself to be a special object of the Saviour\rquote s love. It was this conviction which gave power to his faith. And a like conviction enters into the faith xof every true believer. But to this it is objected that faith must have a divine revelation for its object. But there is no revelation of God\rquote s special love to individuals, and, therefore, no individual has any Scriptural ground to believe that Christ loved him, and gave Himself for him. Whatever force there may be in this objection, it bears against Paul\rquote s declaration and experience. He certainly did believe that Christ loved him and died for him. It will not do to say that this was a conclyusion drawn from his own experience; or to assume that the Apostle argued himself into the conviction that Christ loved him. Christ specially loves all who believe upon Him. I believe upon Him. Therefore Christ specially loves me. But a conclusion reached by argument is not an object of faith. Faith must rest on the testimony of God. It must be, therefore, that God in some way testifies to the soul that it is the object of his love. This he does in two ways. First, by the general invitations and promises zof the Gospel. The act of appropriating, or of accepting these promises, is to believe that they belong to us as well as to others. Secondly, by the inward witness of the Spirit. Paul says (\cf3\ul Rom_5:5\cf0\ulnone ), \ldblquote The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.\rdblquote That is, the Holy Ghost convinces us that we are the objects of God\rquote s love. This is done, not only by the various manifestations of his love in providence and redemption, but{ by his inward dealings with the soul. \ldblquote He that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Joh_14:21\cf0\ulnone ). This manifestation is not outward through the word. It is inward. God has fellowship or intercourse with the souls of his people. The Spirit calls forth our love to God, and reveals his love to us. Again, in \cf3\ul Rom_8:16\cf0\ulnone , the Apostle says, \ldblquote The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spiri|t, that we are the children of God.\rdblquote This does not mean that the Spirit excites in us filial feelings toward God, from whence we infer that we are his children. The Apostle refers to two distinct sources of evidence of our adoption. The one is that we can call God Father; the other, the testimony of the Spirit. The latter is joined with the former. The word is \cf4\f2\'f3\'f5\'ec\'ec\'e1\'f1\'f4\'f5\'f1\'e5\f3\u8150?\cf0\f0 , unites in testifying. Hence we are said to be sealed, not only marked }and secured, but assured by the\cf2\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 Spirit; and the Spirit is a pledge, an assurance, that we are, and ever shall be, the objects of God\rquote s saving love. (\cf3\ul Eph_1:13-14\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Eph_4:30\cf0\ulnone . \cf3\ul 2Co_1:22\cf0\ulnone .)\par This is not saying that a man must believe that he is one of the elect. Election is a secret purpose of God. The election of any particular person is not revealed, and, therefore, is not an object of faith. It is a thing to be proved, or made sure, as the Apostle Peter says, by the fruits of the Spirit. All that the doctrine of the Reformers on this subject includes is, that the soul in committing itself to Christ does so as to one who loved it and died for its salvation. The woman healed by touching our Saviour\rquote s garment, believed that she was an object of his compassionate love, because all who touched Him with faith were included in that number. Her faith included that conviction.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf5\f4\fs23\par } ttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~8. \i Effects of Faith.\i0\par \cf1\b0\i Union with Christ.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The first effect of faith, according to the Scriptures, is union with Christ. We are in Him by faith. There is indeed a federal union between Christ and his people, founded on the covenant of redemption between the Father and the Son in the counsels of eternity. We are, therefore, said to be in Him before the foundation of the world. It is one of the promises of that covenant, that all whom the Father had given the Son should come to Him; that his people should be made willing in the day of his power. Christ has, therefore, been exalted to the right hand of God, to give repentance and the remission of sins. But it was also, as we learn from the Scriptures, included in the stipulations of that covenant, that his people, so far as adults are concerned, should not receive the saving benefits of that covenant until they were united to Him by a voluntary act of faith. They are \ldblquote by nature the children of wrath, even as others.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Eph_2:8\cf0\ulnone .) They remain in this state of condemnation until they believe. Their union is consummated by faith. To be in Christ, and to believe in Christ, are, therefore, in the Scriptures convertible forms of expression. They mean substantially the same thing and, therefore, the same effects are attributed to faith as are attributed to union with Christ.\par \pard\cf3\f1\fs16 105\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\cf1\i Justification an Effect of Faith.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The proximate effect of this union, and, consequently, the see. ond effect of faith, is justification. We are \ldblquote justified by the faith of Christ.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Gal_2:16\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_7:1\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote He that believeth on him is not condemned.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Joh_2:18\cf0\ulnone .) Faith is the condition on which God promises in the covenant of redemption, to impute unto men the righteousness of Christ. As soon, therefore, as they believe, they cannot be condemned. They are clothed with a righteousness which answers all the demands of justice. \ldblquote Who shall lay anything to the charge of God\rquote s elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_8:33-34\cf0\ulnone .)\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf1\i Participation of Christ\rquote s Life an Effect of Faith.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The third effect of faith, or of union with Christ, is a participation of his life. Those united with Christ, the Apostle teaches (\cf2\ul Rom_6:4-10\cf0\ulnone ), so as to be partakers of his death, are partakers also of his life. \ldblquote Because I live, ye shall live also.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Joh_14:19\cf0\ulnone .) Christ dwells in our hearts by faith. (\cf2\ul Eph_3:17\cf0\ulnone .) Christ is in us. (\cf2\ul Rom_8:10\cf0\ulnone .) It is not we that live, but Christ liveth in us. (\cf2\ul Gal_2:20\cf0\ulnone .) Our Lord\rquote s illustration of this vital union is derived from a vine and its branches. (\cf2\ul Joh_15:1-6\cf0\ulnone .) As the life of the vine is diffused through the branches, and as they live only as connected with the vine, so the life of Christ is diffused through his people, and they are partakers of spiritual and eternal life, only in virtue of their union with Him. Another familiar illustration of this subject is derived from the human body. The members derive their life from the head, and perish if separated from it. (\cf2\ul Eph_1:22\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul 1Co_12:12-27\cf0\ulnone , and often). In \cf2\ul Eph_4:15-16\cf0\ulnone , the Apostle carries out this illustration in detail. \ldblquote The head, even Christ: from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love.\rdblquote As the principle of animal life located in the head, through the complicated yet ordered system of nerves extending to every member, diffuses life and energy through the whole body; so the Holy \cf3\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 Spirit, given without measure to Christ the head of the Church, which is his body, diffuses life and strength to every member. Hence, according to Scripture, Christ\rquote s dwelling in us is explained as the Spirit\rquote s dwelling in us. The indwelling of the Spirit is the indwelling of Christ. If God be in you; if Christ be in you; if the Spirit be in you, \emdash all mean the same thing. See \cf2\ul Rom_8:9-11\cf0\ulnone .\par To explain this vital and mystical union between Christ and his people as a mere union of thought and feeling, is utterly inadmissible. (1.) In the first place, it is contrary to the plain meaning of his words. No one ever speaks of Plato\rquote s dwelling in men; of his being their life, so that without him they can do nothing; and much less, so that holiness, happiness, and eternal life depend upon that union. (2.) Such interpretation supposes that our relation to Christ is analogous to the relation of one man to another. Whereas it is a relation between men and a divine person, who has life in Himself, and gives life to as many as He wills. (3.) It ignores all that the Scriptures teach of the work of the Holy Spirit and of his dwelling in the hearts of men. (4.) It overlooks the supernatural character of Christianity, and would reduce it to a mere philosophical and ethical system.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf1\i Peace as the Fruit of Faith.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The fourth effect of faith is peace. \ldblquote Being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_5:1\cf0\ulnone .) Peace arises from a sense of reconciliation. God promises to pardon, to receive into his favour, and finally to save all who believe the record which He has given of his Son. To believe, is therefore to believe this promise; and to appropriate this promise to ourselves is to believe that God is reconciled to us. This faith may be weak or strong. And the peace which flows from it may be tremulous and intermitting, or it may be constant and assured.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf1\i Assurance.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 To make assurance of personal salvation essential to faith, is contrary to Scripture and to the experience of God\rquote s people. The Bible speaks of a weak faith. It abounds with consolations intended for the doubting and the desponding. God accepts those who can only say, \ldblquote Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.\rdblquote Those who make assurance the essence of faith, generally reduce faith to a mere intellectual assent. They are often censorious, refusing to recognize as brethren those who do not agree with them, and sometimes they are antinomian.\par At the same time, Scripture and experience teach that assurance is not only attainable, but a privilege and a duty. There may indeed be assurance, where there is no true faith at all; but where there is true faith, the want of assurance is to be referred either to the weakness of faith, or to erroneous views of the plan of salvation. Many sincere believers are too introspective. They look too exclusively within, so that their hope is graduated by the degree of evidence of regeneration which they find in their own experience. This, except in rare cases, can never lead to the assurance of hope. We may examine our hearts with all the microscopic care prescribed by President Edwards in his work on \ldblquote The Religious Affections,\rdblquote and never be satisfied that we have eliminated every ground of misgiving and doubt. The grounds of assurance are not so much within, as without us. They are, according to Scripture, (1.) The universal and unconditional promise of God that those who come to Him in Christ, He will in no wise cast out; that whosoever will, may take of the water of life without money and without price. We are bound to be assured that God is faithful and will certainly save those who believes (2.) The infinite, immutable, and gratuitous love of God. In the first ten verses of the fifth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, and in the eighth chapter of that epistle from the thirty-first verse to the end, the Apostle dwells on these characteristics of the love of God, as affording an immovable foundation of the believer\rquote s hope. (3.) The infinite merit of the satisfaction of Christ, and the prevalence of his continued intercession. Paul, in \cf2\ul Rom_8:34\cf0\ulnone , especially emphasizes these points. (4.) The covenant of redemption in which it is promised that all given by the Father to the Son, shall come to Him, and that none of them shall be lost. (5.) From the witness of the Spirit, Paul says, \ldblquote We rejoice in hope of the glory of God,\rdblquote because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost given unto us. That is, the Holy Ghost assures us that we are the objects of that love which he goes on to describe as infinite, immutable, and gratuitous. (\cf2\ul Rom_5:3-5\cf0\ulnone .) And again, \ldblquote The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.\rdblquote If, therefore, any true believer lacks the assurance of faith, the fault is in himself and not in the plan of salvation, or in the promises of God.\par \pard\cf3\f1\fs16 108\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\cf1\i Sanctification a Fruit of Faith.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The fifth effect of faith is sanctification. \ldblquote Which are sanctified,\rdblquote says our Lord \ldblquote by faith that is in me.\rdblquote Although in this verse (Acts 26:18), the words \ldblquote by faith\rdblquote do not qualify the preceding clause, \ldblquote are sanctified,\rdblquote alone, but are to be referred to all the preceding particulars, illumination, deliverance from Satan, forgiveness of sins, and the eternal inheritance, yet the immediate antecedent is not to be omitted. We are sanctified by faith as is elsewhere clearly taught. \ldblquote Faith which worketh by love and purifies the heart.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Gal_5:6\cf0\ulnone , and \cf2\ul Act_15:9\cf0\ulnone .)\par The relation of faith to sanctification is thus set forth in the Scriptures, \emdash\par 1. We are justified by faith. So long as we are under the law, we are under the curse, and bring forth fruit unto death. There is, and can be no love to God, and no holy living until we are delivered from his wrath due to us for sin. We are freed from the law, delivered from its condemnation, by the body or death of Christ. It is by faith in Him as the end of the law for righteousness, that we personally are freed from condemnation and restored to the favour of God. See all this clearly taught in Romans 6., and in the first six verses of the seventh chapter. It is thus by faith we pass from judicial death to judicial life, or justification. This is the first and indispensable step of sanctification so far as it reveals itself in the consciousness of the believer.\par 2. It is by faith that we receive the indwelling of the Spirit. Christ (or the Spirit of Christ) dwells in our hearts by faith. Faith is the indispensable condition (so far as adults are concerned) of this indwelling of the Spirit. And the indwelling of the Spirit is the source of all spiritual life. Faith is indeed the fruit of the Spirit, and therefore the gift of the Spirit must precede the exercise of faith. It is nevertheless true that faith is the condition of the indwelling of the Spirit, and consequently of spiritual life. Life must precede breathing, and yet breathing is the necessary condition of living.\par 3. Faith is not only the condition of the Spirit\rquote s dwelling in us as the source of spiritual life, but we live by faith. That is, the continuance and exercise of spiritual life involve and suppose the constant exercise of faith. We live by exercising faith in God, in his attributes, in his providence, in his promises, and in all the truths which He has revealed. Especially is this life sustained by those exercises of faith of which Christ is the object; his divine and mysteriously constituted person, as God manifest in the flesh his finished work for our redemption; his constant intercession; his intimate relation to us not only as our prophet, priest, and king, but as our living head in whom our life is hid in God, and from whom it flows into our souls. We are thus sanctified by faith, because it is through faith that all the religious affections and all the activities of spiritual life are called into exercise.\par 4. We are sanctified by faith, as it is the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen. \ldblquote The things of God,\rdblquote the truths which He has revealed concerning the spiritual and eternal world exist for us while in this world, only as the objects of faith. But faith is to the soul what the eye is to the body. It enables us to see the things unseen and eternal. It gives them substance, reality, and therefore power, \emdash power in some little measure in proportion to their value. Thus the things seen and temporal lose their dominant power over the soul. They are not worthy to be compared with the things which God has prepared for them that love Him. The believer, \emdash the ideal, and at times the actual believer, as we learn from Scripture and from history, is raised above the things of time and sense, overcomes the world, and becomes heavenly minded. He lives in heaven, breathes its atmosphere, is pervaded by its spirit, and has a prelibation of its joys. This renders him pure, spiritual, humble, self-denying, laborious, meek, gentle, forgiving, as well as firm and courageous. The whole of the eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews is devoted to the illustration of the power of faith especially in this aspect. The Apostle shows that in times past, even under the dim light of the former dispensation, it enabled Noah to stand alone against the world, Abraham to offer up his only son, Moses to prefer the reproach of Christ to the treasures of Egypt; that others through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire; that others were by faith made strong out of weakness, waxed valiant in fight; that others submitted to the trial of cruel mockings and scourgings that others by faith endured to be stoned, sawn asunder, or slain with the sword; and that yet others through faith consented to wander about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, afflicted, and tormented. All these, we are told, through faith obtained a good report.\par 5. Faith sanctifies because it is the necessary condition of the efficacy of the means of grace. It is through the Word, sacraments, and prayer, that God communicates constant supplies of\cf3\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 grace. They are the means of calling the activities of spiritual life into exercise. But these means of grace are inoperative unless they are received and used by faith. Faith does not, indeed, give them their power, but it is the condition on which the Spirit of God renders them efficacious.\par That good works are the certain effects of faith is included in the doctrine that we are sanctified by faith. For it is impossible that there should be inward holiness, love, spirituality, brotherly kindness, and zeal, without an external manifestation of these graces in the whole outward life. Faith, therefore, without works, is dead. We are saved by faith. But salvation includes deliverance from sin. If, therefore, our faith does not deliver us from sin, it does not save us. Antinomianism involves a contradiction in terms.\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf1\i Certainty of Salvation.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 A sixth effect attributed to faith in the Scriptures is security, or, certainty of salvation. \ldblquote God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Joh_3:16\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Joh_5:24\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Joh_6:51\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Joh_6:37-40\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote My sheep hear my voice, and I know them. and they follow me: and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Joh_10:27-28\cf0\ulnone .)\par \pard\sb180\qc\cf1\i The Eighth Chapter of Romans.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\cf0 The whole of the eighth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans is designed to prove the certain salvation of all who believe. The proposition to be established is, that there is \ldblquote no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.\rdblquote That is, they can never perish; they can never be so separated from Christ as to come into condemnation. The Apostle\rquote s first argument to establish that proposition, is, that believers are delivered from the law by the sacrifice of Christ. The believer, therefore, is not under the law\cf3\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 which condemns, as Paul had before said (Rom 6:14), \ldblquote Ye are not under the law, but under grace.\rdblquote But if not under the law he cannot be condemned. The law has had its course, and found full satisfaction in the work of Christ, who is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth. He renders every one righteous, in the sight of the law, who believes on Him. This is the first reason which the Apostle gives why those who are in Christ shall never be condemned.\par His second argnment is that they have already within them the principle of eternal life. That principle is the Spirit of God; \ldblquote the life-giving\rdblquote as He was designated by the ancient Church. To be carnally minded is death. To be spiritually minded is life and peace. Sin is death; holiness is life. It is a contradiction to say that those in whom the Spirit of life dwells, should die. And, therefore, the Apostle says, Although the body dies, the soul lives. And if the Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken even your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you. The indwelling of the Spirit, therefore, secures not only the life of the soul, but also the ultimate and glorious life of the body.\par The third argument for the security of believers, is, that they are the sons of God. As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. That is, they are partakers of his nature, the special objects of his love, and entitled to the inheritance which He gives. If sons then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. According to the Apostle\rquote s mode of thinking, that any of the sons of God should perish, is impossible. If sons they shall certainly be saved.\par The fourth argument is from the purpose of God. Those whom He has predestinated to be conformed to the image of his Son, them He calls to the exercise of faith and repentance; and whom He thus calls He justifies, He provides for them and imputes to them a righteousness which satisfies the demands of the law, and which entitles them in Christ and for his sake to eternal life; and those whom He justifies He glorifies. There is no flaw in this chain. If men were predestinated to eternal life on the ground of their repenting and believing through their own strength, or through a cooperation with the grace of God which others fail to exercise, then their continuance in a state of grace might be dependent on themselves. But if faith and repentance are the gifts of God, the results of his effectual vocation, then bestowing \cf3\f1\fs16 112\cf0\f0\fs24 those gifts is a revelation of the purpose of God to save those to whom they are given. It is an evidence that God has predestinated them to be conformed to the image of his Son, \i i.e\i0 ., to be like Him in character, destiny, and glory, and that He will infallibly carry out his purpose. No one can pluck them out of his hands.\par Paul\rquote s fifth argument is from the love of God. As stated above, the Apostle argues from the greatness, the freeness, and the immutability of that love that its objects never can be lost. \ldblquote He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things.\rdblquote If He has done the greater, will He not do the less? If he gave even his own Son, will He not give us faith to receive and constancy to persevere even unto the end? A love so great as the love of God to his people cannot fail of its object. This love is also gratuitous. It is not founded on the attractiveness of its objects. He loved us \ldblquote while we were yet sinners;\rdblquote \ldblquote when we were enemies.\rdblquote \ldblquote Much more, then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.\rdblquote God\rquote s love in this aspect is compared to parental love. A mother does not love her child because it is lovely. Her love leads her to do all she can to render it attractive and to keep it so. So the love of God, being in like manner mysterious, unaccountable by anything in its objects, secures his adorning his children with the graces of his Spirit, and arraying them in all the beauty of holiness. It is only the lamentable mistake that God loves us for our goodness, that can lead any one to suppose that his love is dependent on our self-sustained attractiveness, when we should look to his fatherly love as the source of all goodness, and the ground of the assurance that He will not allow Satan or our own evil hearts to destroy the lineaments of his likeness which He has impressed upon our souls. Having loved his own, He loves them to the end. And Christ prays for them that their faith may not fail.\par It must be remembered that what the Apostle argues to prove is not merely the certainty of the salvation of those that believe but their certain perseverance in holiness. Salvation in sin, according to Paul\rquote s system, is a contradiction in terms. This perseverance in holiness is secured partly by the inward secret influence\cf3\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 of the Spirit, and partly by all the means adapted to secure that end \emdash instructions, admonitions, exhortations, warnings, the means of grace, and the dispensations of his providence. Having, through love, determined on the end, He has determined on the means for its accomplishment.\par The sixth argument of the Apostle is that, as the love of God is infinitely great and altogether gratuitous, it is also immutable, and, therefore, believers shall certainly be saved. Hence the conclusion, \ldblquote I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.\rdblquote\par It will be seen that the Apostle does not rest the perseverance of the saints on the indestructible nature of faith, or on the imperishable nature of the principle of grace in the heart, or on the constancy of the believer\rquote s will, but solely on what is out of ourselves. Perseverance, he teaches us, is due to the purpose of God, to the work of Christ, to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and to the primal source of all, the infinite, mysterious, and immutable love of God. We do not keep ourselves; we are kept by the power of God, through faith unto salvation. (\cf2\ul 1Pe_1:5\cf0\ulnone .)\par \pard\cf4\f2\fs23\par } ywi1.17.0. CHAPTER XVII JUSTIFICATION{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\d;y 1.16.8. Effects of Faith{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fon~eff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green192\blue128;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\stylesheet{ Normal;}{\s1 heading 1;}{\s2 heading 2;}{\s3 heading 3;}} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\s3\sb180\sa100\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\highlight1\lang1033\b\f0\fs48\par \par \par JUSTIFICATION\par \pard\cf2\highlight0\b0\f1\fs23\par } \green51\blue0;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;\red255\green192\blue128;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~1. \i Symbolical Statement of the Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0\scaps Justification\scaps0  is defined in the Westminster Catechism, \ldblquote An act of God\rquote s free grace, wherein He pardoneth all our sins, and accepteth us as righteous in his sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith alone.\rdblquote\par The Heidelberg Catechism in answer to the question, \ldblquote How dost thou become righteous before God?\rdblquote answers, \ldblquote\lang1142 Sola fide in Jesum Christum, adeo ut licet mea me conscientia accuset, quod adversus omnia mandata Dei graviter peccaverim, nec ullum eorum servaverim, adh\'e6c etiamnum ad omne malum propensus sim, nihilominus tamen (modo h\'e6c beneficia vera animi fiducia amplectar), sine ullo meo merito, ex mera Dei misericordia, mihi perfecta satisfactio, justitia, et sanctitas Christi, imputetur ac donetur; perinde ac si nec ullum ipse peccatum admisissem, nec ulla mihi labes inh\'e6reret; imo vero quasi eam obedientiam, quam pro me Christus pr\'e6stitit, ipse perfecte pr\'e6stitissem.\lang1033\rdblquote And in answer to the question, Why faith alone justifies? it says. \ldblquote\lang1142 Non quod dignitate me\'e6 fidei Deo placeam, sed quod sola satisfactio, justitia ac sanctitas Christi, mea justitia sit coram Deo. Ego vero eam non alia ratione, quam fide amplecti, et mihi applicare queam.\lang1033\rdblquote\par The Second Helvetic Confession, says \ldblquote\lang1142 Justificare significat Apostolo in disputatione de justificatione, peccata remittere, a culpa et p\'9cna absolvere, in gratiam recipere, et justum pronunciare. Etenim ad Romanos dicit apostolus, \lquote Deus est, qui justificat, quis ille, qui condemnet?\rquote opponuntur justificare et condemnare. Etenim Christus peccata mundi in se recepit et sustulit, divin\'e6que justiti\'e6 satisfecit. Deus ergo propter solum Christum passum et resuscitatum, propitius est peccatis nostris, nec illa nobis imputat, imputat autem justitiam Christi pro nostra: ita ut jam simus non solum mundati a peccatis et purgati, vel sancti, sed etiam donati justitia Christi, adeoque absoluti a peccatis, morte vel condemnatione, justi denique ac h\'e6redes vit\'e6 \'e6tern\'e6. Proprie ergo loquendo, Deus solus nos justificat, et duntaxat propter Christum justificat, non imputans nobis peccata, sed imputans ejus nobis justitiam.\lang1033\rdblquote\par These are the most generally received and authoritative standards of the Reformed Churches, with which all other Reformed symbols agree. The Lutheran confessions teach precisely the same doctrine on this subject.\ldblquote\lang1142 Unanimi consensu, docemus et confitemur. quod homo peccator coram Deo justificetur, hoc est, absolvatur ab omnibus suis peccatis et a judicio justissim\'e6 condemnationis, et adoptetur in numerum filiorum Dei atque h\'e6res \'e6tern\'e6 vit\'e6 scribatur, sine ullis nostris meritis, aut dignitate, et absque ullis pr\'e6cedentibus, pr\'e6sentibus, aut sequentibus nostris operibus, ex mera gratia, tantummodo propter unicum meritum, perfectissimam obedientiam, passionem acerbissimam, mortem et resurrectionem Domini nostri, Jesu Christi, cujus obedientia nobis ad justitiam imputatur.\lang1033\rdblquote\par Again, \ldblquote\lang1142 Credimus, docemus, et confitemur, hoc ipsum nostram esse coram Deo justitiam, quod Dominus nobis peccata remittit, ex mera gratia, absque ullo respectu pr\'e6cedentium, pr\'e6sentium, aut consequentium nostrorum operum, dignitatis, aut meriti. Ille enim donat atque imputat nobis justitiam obedienti\'e6 Christi; propter eam justitiam a Deo in gratiam recipimur et justi reputamur.\lang1033\rdblquote\ldblquote\lang1142 Justificari significat hic non ex impio justum effici, sed usu forensi justum pronuntiari.\lang1033\rdblquote And \ldblquote\lang1142 Justificare hoc loco (\cf1\ul Rom_5:1\cf0\ulnone .) forensi cousuetudine significat reum absolvere et pronuntiare justum, sed propter alienam justitiam, videlicet Christi, qu\'e6 aliena justitia communicatur nobis per fidem.\lang1033\rdblquote So also \ldblquote\lang1142 Vocabulum justificationis in hoc negotio significat justum pronuntiare, a peccatis et \'e6ternis peccatorum suppliciis absolvere, propter justitiam Christi, qu\'e6 a Deo fidei imputatur.\lang1033\rdblquote\par Hase, concisely states the Lutheran doctrine on this subject in these words: \ldblquote\lang1142 Justificatio est actus forensis, quo Deus, sola gratia ductus, peccatori, propter Christi meritum fide apprehensum, justitiam Christi imputat, peccata remittit, eumque sibi reconciliat.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\f1\fs16 116\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 The\rdblquote Form of Concord\rdblquote says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Hic articulus, de justitia fidei, pr\'e6cipuus est (ut Apologia loquitur) in tota doctrina Christiana, sine quo conscienti\'e6 perturbat\'e6 nullam veram et firmam consolationem habere, aut divitias grati\'e6 Christi recte agnoscere possunt. Id D. Lutherus suo etiam testimonio confirmavit, cum inquit: Si unicus his articulus sincerus permanserit, etiam Christiana Ecclesia sincera, concors et sine omnibus sectis permanet: sin vero corrumpitur, impossibile est, ut uni errori aut fanatico spiritui recte obviam iri possit.\lang1033\rdblquote The Lutheran theologians, therefore, speak of it as the \ldblquote\cf3\f2\u7936?\f3\'ea\'f1\f2\u8057?\f3\'f0\'ef\'eb\'e9\'f2\f4 \cf0\lang1142\f0 totius Christian\'e6 religionis, ac nexus, quo omnia corporis doctrin\'e6 Christian\'e6 membra continentur, quoque rupto solvuntur.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i President Edwards.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 This statement of the doctrine of justification has retained symbolical authority in the Lutheran and Reformed churches, to the present day. President Edwards, who is regarded as having initiated certain departures from some points of the Reformed faith, was firm in his adherence to this view of justification, which he held to be of vital importance. In his discourse on \ldblquote Justification by Faith alone,\rdblquote he thus defines justification: \ldblquote A person is said to be justified when he is approved of God as free from the guilt of sin and its deserved punishment; and as having that righteousness belonging to him that entitles to the reward of life. That we should take the word in such a sense and understand it as the judge\rquote s accepting a person as having both a negative and positive righteousness belonging to him, and looking on him therefore as not only quit or free from any obligation to punishment, but also as just and righteous, and so entitled to a positive reward, is not only most agreeable to the etymology and natural import of the word, which signifies to make righteous, or to pass one for righteous in judgment, but also manifestly agreeable to the force of the word as used in Scripture.\rdblquote He then shows how it is, or why faith alone justifies. It is not on account of any virtue or goodness in faith, but as it unites us to Christ, and involves the acceptance of Him as our righteousness. Thus it is we are justified \ldblquote by faith alone, without any manner of virtue or goodness of our own.\rdblquote\par The ground of justification is the righteousness of Christ imputed to the believer. \ldblquote By that righteousness being imputed to us,\rdblquote says Edwards, \ldblquote is meant no other than this, that that righteousness \cf2\f1\fs16 117\cf0\f0\fs24 of Christ is accepted for us, and admitted instead of that perfect inherent righteousness that ought to be in ourselves: Christ\rquote s perfect obedience shall be reckoned to our account, so that we shall have the benefit of it, as though we had performed it ourselves: and so we suppose that a title to eternal life is given us as the reward of this righteousness. The opposers of this doctrine suppose that there is an absurdity in it: they say that to suppose that God imputes Christ\rquote s obedience to us, is to suppose that God is mistaken, and thinks that we performed that obedience that Christ performed. But why cannot that righteousness be reckoned to our account, and be accepted for us, without any such absurdity? Why is there any more absurdity in it, than in a merchant\rquote s transferring debt or credit from one man\rquote s account to another, when one man pays a price for another, so that it shall be accepted, as if that other had paid it? Why is there any more absurdity in supposing that Christ\rquote s obedience is imputed to us, than that his satisfaction is imputed? If Christ has suffered the penalty of the law for us, and in our stead, then it will follow, that his suffering that penalty is imputed to us, \i i.e\i0 ., that it is accepted for us, and in our stead, and is reckoned to our account, as though we had suffered it. But why may not his obeying the law of God be as rationally reckoned to our account, as his suffering the penalty of the law?\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Points included in the above Statement of the Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 According to the above statements, justification is, \emdash\par 1. An act, and not, as sanctification, a continued and progressive work.\par 2. It is an act of grace to the sinner. In himself he deserves condemnation when God justifies him.\par 3. As to the nature of the act, it is, in the first place, not an efficient act, or an act of power. It does not produce any subjective change in the person justified. It does not effect a change of character, making those good who were bad, those holy who were unholy. That is done in regeneration and sanctification. In the second place, it is not a mere executive act, as when a sovereign pardons a criminal, and thereby restores him to his civil rights, or to his former status in the commonwealth. In the third place, it is a forensic, or judicial act, the act of a judge, not of a sovereign. That is, in the case of the sinner, or, \lang1142\i in foro Dei\lang1033\i0 , it is an act of God not in his character of sovereign, but in his\cf2\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 character of judge. It is a declarative act in which God pronounces the sinner just or righteous, that is, declares that the claims of justice, so far as he is concerned, are satisfied, so that he cannot be justly condemned, but is in justice entitled to the reward promised or due to perfect righteousness.\par 4. The meritorious ground of justification is not faith; we are not justified on account of our faith, considered as a virtuous ot holy act or state of mind. Nor are our works of any kind the ground of justification. Nothing done by us or wrought in us satisfies the demands of justice, or can be the ground or reason of the declaration that justice as far as it concerns us is satisfied. The ground of justification is the righteousness of Christ, active and passive, \i i.e\i0 ., including his perfect obedience to the law as a covenant, and his enduring the penalty of the law in our stead and on our behalf.\par 5. The righteousness of Christ is in justification imputed to the believer. That is, is set to his account, so that he is entitled to plead it at the bar of God, as though it were personally and inherently his own.\par 6. Faith is the condition of justification. That is, so far an adults are concerned, God does not impute the righteousness of Christ to the sinner, until and unless, he (through grace) receives and rests on Christ alone for his salvation.\par That such is the doctrine of the Reformed and Lutheran churches on this important doctrine, cannot be disputed. The statements of the standards of those churches are so numerous, explicit, and discriminating as to preclude all reasonable doubt on this subject. That such is the doctrine of the Word of God appears from the following considerations.\par It will not be necessary to discuss all the points above specified separately, as some of them are necessarily included in others. The following propositions include all the essential points of the doctrine.\par \pard\cf5\highlight6\f5\fs23\par } ~9Q1.17.1. Symbolical Statement of Doctrine{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f3\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f4\froman\fcharset0 Gentium;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red153blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~10.\i Departures from the Protestant Doctrine.\i0\par \cf1\b0\i Osiander.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 During the lifetime of the Reformers, a very earnest controversy began in the Lutheran Church on the nature of justification. This arose from the views of Andreas Osiander, a man of distinguished learning and of a speculative turn of mind; eminent first as a preacher, and afterwards as a professor in the university of K\'f6nigsberg. His principal work is entitled \ldblquote De Unico Mediatore Jesu Christo et Justificatione Fidei. Confessio Andre\'e6 Osiandri.\rdblquote His difference of opinion from the other Reformers so clearly indicated in the following words, in which he denounces the errors which he means to oppose: \ldblquote\lang1142 Omnes horribiliter errant. Primo, quia verbum justificare tantum pro justum reputare et pronunciare intelligunt, atque interpretantur, et non pro eo, quod\cf2\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 est, reipsa et in veritate justum efficere. Deinde etiam in hoc quod nullam differentiam tenent inter redemptionem et justificationem, quum tamen magna differentia sit, sicut vel inde intelligi sit, quod homines furem a suspendio redimere possunt, bonum et justum efficere non possunt. Porro etiam in hoc, quod nihil certe statuere possunt, quid tandem justitia Christi sit, quam per fidem in nobis esse, nobisque imputari oporteat. Ac postremo errant omnium rudissime etiam in hoc, quod divinam naturam Christi a justificatione separant, et Christum dividunt atque solvunt, id quod haud dubie execrandi Satan\'e6 opus est.\lang1033\rdblquote\par Osiander taught, (1.) That Christ has redeemed us by the satisfaction which He rendered to divine justice. (2.) But he denied that this was any part of our justification. (3.) He maintained that to justify does not mean to declare just, or to render righteous in a judicial or forensic sense, but to render inherently or subjectively just and holy. (4.) That the righteousness of Christ by which the believer is justified, and which he receives by faith, and which is imputed to him in the judgment of God, is not, as the Protestants taught, the work of Christ, consisting in what He did and suffered as the substitute of sinners, nor is it, as Romanists teach, the work of the Holy Spirit consisting in the infusion of a holy nature or of new habits of grace, but it is the \ldblquote essential righteousness of God,\rdblquote \ldblquote the divine essence, \ldblquote God Himself.\rdblquote (5.) That consequently the proximate and real ground of our acceptance with God, and of our reception into heaven, is what we are, or what we become, in virtue of this in-dwelling of God in the soul.\par The speculations of Osiander as to the nature of God and his relation to man, might have led him under any circumstances to adopt the peculiar views above stated, but the proximate cause was no doubt the reaction from the too exclusive prominence given at that time to the objective work of Christ. This is not to be wondered at, and perhaps was not to be blamed. The Romanists, with whom the Protestants had to contend, did not deny the necessity of an inward change in the nature of fallen man. But they made this almost all of Christ\rquote s redeeming work. What He did for the expiation of sin and for meeting the demands of justice, was only to open the way for God\rquote s giving renewing and sanctifying grace to sinners. Men were themselves to merit eternal life. It was unavoidable therefore, that the Reformers should strenuously insist upon what Christ did for us\cf2\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 and that they should protest against confounding justification with sanctification. Osiander\rquote s cast of mind made him revolt at this, and carried him completely over to the Romish side, so far as the nature of justification is concerned. He said that the Protestant doctrine of justification is \ldblquote colder than ice.\rdblquote It is as though a man should pay the ransom of a Turkish slave, and leave him and his children in bondage. Still more violent is his denunciation of the doctrine that Christ\rquote s righteousness, of which we partake through faith, consists of his obedience and sufferings. What good can they do us? Christ obeyed and suffered centuries ago; we cannot appropriate what He then did and make it our own. Imputing it to us does not alter the case. It does not make us better. Speculative as well as Biblical reasons, however, prevented Osiander from accepting the Romish solution of the difficulty. What we are said to receive is \ldblquote the righteousness of Christ,\rdblquote \ldblquote the righteousness of God;\rdblquote but sanctifying grace is never called the righteousness of God. If, therefore, that righteousness by which the believer is constituted righteous, be neither the obedience of Christ, nor infused grace, what can it be other than the essential righteousness of God, the divine essence itself? Calvin, who in his \ldblquote Institutes\rdblquote earnestly combats the theory of Osiander, says that he invented \ldblquote\lang1142 monstrum nescio quod essentialis justiti\'e6\lang1033 .\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 Dilucide exprimit, se non ea justitia contentum, qu\'e6 nobis obedientia et sacrificio mortis Christi parta est, fingere nos substantialiter in Deo justos esse tam essentia quam qualitate infusa. Substantialem mixtionem ingerit, qua Deus se in nos transfundens, quasi partem sui faciat. Nam virtute Spiritus sancti fieri, ut coalescamus cum Christo, nobisque sit caput et nos ejus membra, fere pro nihilo ducit, nisi ejus essentia nobis misceatur.\lang1033\rdblquote\par But what theory of the nature of God and of his relation to man did Osiander hold, which admitted of this doctrine of the infusion of the divine essence into the soul? His views on this point were not clearly brought out, but the primary idea which underlies his speculation is the old doctrine of the oneness of God and man. Man is God in at least one form of his existence. He held that Christ is the image, the representative, the realized ideal of the Godhead, not as Logos or Son, but as Godman, the Theanthropos. As from its nature or from the nature of God this idea realized, this manifestation of God in his true idea must occur, and therefore the incarnation would have taken\cf2\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 place had man never sinned. The fall of Adam only modified the circumstances attending the incarnation, determining that it should involve suffering and death. But the incarnation itself, the appearance of God in fashion as a man arose from a law of the divine nature. Adam was created not after the image of God as such, but after the image of Christ; in some sort, a God-man. The affinity of this theory with the modern pantheistic speculations is apparent. Baur, therefore, is doubtless right when he says, at the close of his apologetic notice of Osiander\rquote s doctrine, that his idea of the relation between the divine and human \ldblquote is that which at last found its adequate scientific expression by Schleiermacher and Hegel, that Christ as Redeemer is the perfected creation of human nature; or, that the divine nature is the truth of humanity, and human nature the reality, or existence-form (\lang1031 die Wirklichkeit\lang1033 ) of the divine nature.\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Stancarus.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Stancarus, a contemporary and opponent of Osiander, went to the extreme of asserting that the righteousness of Christ was the work of his human nature exclusively. This doctrine was however repudiated by the Romanists as well as by Protestants. If it was Christ\rquote s human nature as such (and not the divine person) who obeyed, then the human nature in Christ was a distinct subsistence, and thus the unity of his person is destroyed. Besides, if it was not a divine person in his human nature who obeyed and suffered, then we have but a human Saviour, and a righteousness of no higher than a human value. We know from Scripture that it was the Lord of glory who was crucified, the Son of God who, being born of a woman, was made under the law.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Piscator.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The first conspicuous departure from the Protestant doctrine of justification among the Reformed, was on the part of Piscator, whose denial of the imputation of the active obedience of Christ to the believer, excited for some years a good deal of discussion, but it passed away without leaving any distinct trace in the theology of the Reformation. Baur, indeed, assigns to it more importance, as he regards it as the first step in the downfall of the whole doctrine of the satisfaction of Christ, over which he rejoices. Piscator was a native of Strasburg, and a member of\cf2\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 the Lutheran Church, to whose service his first ministerial and professional labors were devoted. It coming to the knowledge of the ecclesiastical authorities that in his exposition of the Epistle to the Philippians he denied the ubiquity of the human nature of Christ, and taught the doctrine of predestination, he was deprived of his position in the Lutheran Church and passed over to the Reformed. He was soon appointed one of the professors of the new Institution of Hebron founded by the Duke of Nassau. He remained in connection with that institution from 1584 until his death in 1625, in the seventy-ninth year of his age. He was a prolific writer. Besides a new translation of the Bible, he wrote numerous commentaries on books of the Old and New Testaments, and conducted many controversies with Lutherans and Romanists, before he embroiled himself with the theologians of his own church. He took the ground that the \ldblquote\lang1142 imputatio justiti\'e6\lang1033\rdblquote and \ldblquote\lang1142 remissio peccatorum\lang1033\rdblquote are identical; the former means nothing more than the latter; and consequently that Christ\rquote s work consists simply in the expiation of sin. His active obedience to the divine law constitutes no part of the righteousness by which the believer is justified before God. He admits that Christ rendered a twofold obedience, \emdash the one to the law of God as a rule of duty; the other to the special command given to Him as Mediator. He came to accomplish a certain work; to do the will of the Father, which was to make satisfaction for sin. In this we are interested; but his obedience to the moral law was for Himself, and was the necessary condition of his satisfaction. He could not have made atonement for others had He not been Himself holy. \lang1142\ldblquote Tribuitur morti,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote quod ei tribuendum, nimirum, quod sit plenissima satisfactio pro peccatis nostris; sic etiam vit\'e6 obedienti\'e6 tribuitur, quod scriptura ei tribuendum perhibet, nimirum, quod sit causa, sine qua non potuerat Christus idoneus esse mediator inter Deum et hominem.\rdblquote\lang1033 Although Piscator made some effort to prove exegetically that pardon and justification, the remission of sin and imputation of righteousness, are identical, yet his arguments against the received doctrine, that the obedience of Christ is part our justifying righteousness, are not Biblical. The question before his mind was not simply, What do the Scriptures teach? but, What is true, logical, and symmetrical? He saw objections\cf2\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 to the imputation of the active obedience of Christ, which seemed to him fatal, and on the ground of those objections he rejected the doctrine. Thus, for example, he argues that Christ\rquote s obedience to the law was due from Himself as a man, and therefore not imputable to others. He argues thus, \ldblquote\lang1142 Qui Christum dicunt ubique ut hominem, Christum dicunt non hominem, dum enim dico ubique, dico Deum, qui solus est in c\'9clo et in terra. Similiter cum dico subjectum legi, dico hominem. Qui ergo Christum subjectum legi negant, negant ipsum esse hominem.\lang1033\rdblquote Every man as such in virtue of being a man\rquote s individually bound to obey the moral law. Christ was a man; therefore He was bound to obey the law for Himself. He did not perceive, or was not willing to admit, that the word \ldblquote man\rdblquote is taken in different senses in the different members of this syllogism, and therefore, the conclusion is vitiated. In the first clause, \ldblquote man\rdblquote means a human person; in the second clause, it means human nature. Christ was not a human person, although He assumed human nature. He was a man in the sense in which we are dust and ashes. But because we are dust, it does not follow that all that may be predicated of dust, may be predicated of us; \i e.g\i0 ., that we have no life, no reason, no immortality. In like manner, although the eternal Son of God took upon Himself a true body and a reasonable soul, yet as He was a divine person, it does not follow that everything that is true of human persons must be true of Him. Piscator also argues that the law binds either to punishment or to obedience, but not to both at once. Therefore, if Christ\rquote s obedience is imputed to us, there was no necessity that He should die for us. On the other hand, if He died for us, there was no necessity that He should obey for us. The principle here assumed may be true with regard to unfallen man. But where sin has been committed there is need of expiation as well as of obedience, and of obedience as well as expiation, if the reward of perfect obedience is to be conferred. Again, he says, if Christ has fulfilled the law for us, we are not bound to keep it. This is the old objection of the Jews; if justified by grace we may live in sin. But Christ has fulfilled the law for us only as a covenant of works. In that sense, says the Apostle, we are not under the law, but it does not thence follow that we are free from all moral obligation arising from our relation to God, as rational creatures. It may be true as Baur, himself a thorough skeptic in the English and American sense of that word, thinks,\cf2\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 that this innovation of Piscator prepared the way for the rejection of the whole Scriptural doctrine of satisfaction. Certain it is that both Lutherans and Reformed united, with scarcely a dissenting voice, in the condemnation of Piscator\rquote s doctrine. It was judicially repudiated by the national Synod of France on several different occasions; first in 1603, again at La Rochelle in 1607, and afterwards in 1612 and 1613. The Swiss churches in the \ldblquote Formula Consensus Helvetica,\rdblquote which received symbolical authority in Switzerland, pronounced clearly in favour of the old doctrine. This matter was soon lost sight of in consequence of the rise of Arminianism of far more historical importance.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i The Arminian Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Jacobus Arminius, a man of learning, talents, attractive accomplishments, and exemplary character, was born in Holland 1560, and died professor in the University of Leyden, in 1609, having filled the chair of theology since 1603. His departures from the Reformed doctrines in which he had been educated were far less serious than those of his successors, although involving them, apparently, by a logical necessity. His great difficulty was with the doctrine of predestination or the sovereignty of God in election. He could not, however, get rid of that doctrine without denying the entire inability of man to do what is spiritually good. He, therefore, taught that although mankind fell in Adam and are born in a state of sin and condemnation, and are of themselves entirely unable to turn from sin to holiness, yet that they are able to co\'f6perate with the grace of the Holy Spirit given to all men, especially to all who hear the Gospel, in sufficient measure to enable them to repent and believe, and to persevere in holy living unto the end. But whether any man doe thus repent and believe, or, having believed, perseveres in a holy life, depends on himself and not on God. The purpose of election, therefore, is not a purpose to save, and to that end to give faith and repentance to a definite number of individuals, but a purpose to save those who repent, believe, and persevere in faith until the end. The work of Christ has, therefore, an equal reference to all men. He made full satisfaction to God for the sins of all and every man, so that God can now consistently offer salvation to all men on the conditions laid down in the Gospel.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 This is a self-consistent scheme. One part implies, or necessitates admission of the others. The above statement includes all the doctrines presented by the followers of Arminius, after his death, to the authorities in the form of a Remonstrance, as a justification of their views. Hence the Arminians were called Remonstrants. The document just mentioned contains the five points on which its authors and their associates differed from the Reformed faith. The first relates to predestination, which is explained as the purpose \ldblquote\lang1142 illos in Christo, propter Christum et per Christum servare, qui Spiritus Sancti gratia, in eundem ejus filjum credunt, et in ea, fideique obedientia, per eandem gratiam in finem perseverant: contra vero eos, qui non convertentur et infideles, in peccato et ir\'e6 subjectos relinquere, et condemnare,secundum illud Evang. Joann\lang1033\par \i Osiander.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 During the lifetime of the Reformers, a very earnest controversy began in the Lutheran Church on the nature of justification. This arose from the views of Andreas Osiander, a man of distinguished learning and of a speculative turn of mind; eminent first as a preacher, and afterwards as a professor in the university of K\'f6nigsberg. His principal work is entitled \ldblquote De Unico Mediatore Jesu Christo et Justificatione Fidei. Confessio Andre\'e6 Osiandri.\rdblquote His difference of opinion from the other Reformers so clearly indicated in the following words, in which he denounces the errors which he means to oppose: \ldblquote\lang1142 Omnes horribiliter errant. Primo, quia verbum justificare tantum pro justum reputare et pronunciare intelligunt, atque interpretantur, et non pro eo, quod est, reipsa et in veritate justum efficere. Deinde etiam in hoc quod nullam differentiam tenent inter redemptionem et justificationem, quum tamen magna differentia sit, sicut vel inde intelligi sit, quod homines furem a suspendio redimere possunt, bonum et justum efficere non possunt. Porro etiam in hoc, quod nihil certe statuere possunt, quid tandem justitia Christi sit, quam per fidem in nobis esse, nobisque imputari oporteat. Ac postremo errant omnium rudissime etiam in hoc, quod divinam naturam Christi a justificatione separant, et Christum dividunt atque solvunt, id quod haud dubie execrandi Satan\'e6 opus est.\lang1033\rdblquote\par Osiander taught, (1.) That Christ has redeemed us by the satisfaction which He rendered to divine justice. (2.) But he denied that this was any part of our justification. (3.) He maintained that to justify does not mean to declare just, or to render righteous in a judicial or forensic sense, but to render inherently or subjectively just and holy. (4.) That the righteousness of Christ by which the believer is justified, and which he receives by faith, and which is imputed to him in the judgment of God, is not, as the Protestants taught, the work of Christ, consisting in what He did and suffered as the substitute of sinners, nor is it, as Romanists teach, the work of the Holy Spirit consisting in the infusion of a holy nature or of new habits of grace, but it is the \ldblquote essential righteousness of God,\rdblquote \ldblquote the divine essence, \ldblquote God Himself.\rdblquote (5.) That consequently the proximate and real ground of our acceptance with God, and of our reception into heaven, is what we are, or what we become, in virtue of this in-dwelling of God in the soul.\par The speculations of Osiander as to the nature of God and his relation to man, might have led him under any circumstances to adopt the peculiar views above stated, but the proximate cause was no doubt the reaction from the too exclusive prominence given at that time to the objective work of Christ. This is not to be wondered at, and perhaps was not to be blamed. The Romanists, with whom the Protestants had to contend, did not deny the necessity of an inward change in the nature of fallen man. But they made this almost all of Christ\rquote s redeeming work. What He did for the expiation of sin and for meeting the demands of justice, was only to open the way for God\rquote s giving renewing and sanctifying grace to sinners. Men were themselves to merit eternal life. It was unavoidable therefore, that the Reformers should strenuously insist upon what Christ did for us and that they should protest against confounding justification with sanctification. Osiander\rquote s cast of mind made him revolt at this, and carried him completely over to the Romish side, so far as the nature of justification is concerned. He said that the Protestant doctrine of justification is \ldblquote colder than ice.\rdblquote It is as though a man should pay the ransom of a Turkish slave, and leave him and his children in bondage. Still more violent is his denunciation of the doctrine that Christ\rquote s righteousness, of which we partake through faith, consists of his obedience and sufferings. What good can they do us? Christ obeyed and suffered centuries ago; we cannot appropriate what He then did and make it our own. Imputing it to us does not alter the case. It does not make us better. Speculative as well as Biblical reasons, however, prevented Osiander from accepting the Romish solution of the difficulty. What we are said to receive is \ldblquote the righteousness of Christ,\rdblquote \ldblquote the righteousness of God;\rdblquote but sanctifying grace is never called the righteousness of God. If, therefore, that righteousness by which the believer is constituted righteous, be neither the obedience of Christ, nor infused grace, what can it be other than the essential righteousness of God, the divine essence itself? Calvin, who in his \ldblquote Institutes\rdblquote earnestly combats the theory of Osiander, says that he invented \ldblquote\lang1142 monstrum nescio quod essentialis justiti\'e6\lang1033 .\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 Dilucide exprimit, se non ea justitia contentum, qu\'e6 nobis obedientia et sacrificio mortis Christi parta est, fingere nos substantialiter in Deo justos esse tam essentia quam qualitate infusa. Substantialem mixtionem ingerit, qua Deus se in nos transfundens, quasi partem sui faciat. Nam virtute Spiritus sancti fieri, ut coalescamus cum Christo, nobisque sit caput et nos ejus membra, fere pro nihilo ducit, nisi ejus essentia nobis misceatur.\lang1033\rdblquote\par But what theory of the nature of God and of his relation to man did Osiander hold, which admitted of this doctrine of the infusion of the divine essence into the soul? His views on this point were not clearly brought out, but the primary idea which underlies his speculation is the old doctrine of the oneness of God and man. Man is God in at least one form of his existence. He held that Christ is the image, the representative, the realized ideal of the Godhead, not as Logos or Son, but as Godman, the Theanthropos. As from its nature or from the nature of God this idea realized, this manifestation of God in his true idea must occur, and therefore the incarnation would have taken\cf2\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 place had man never sinned. The fall of Adam only modified the circumstances attending the incarnation, determining that it should involve suffering and death. But the incarnation itself, the appearance of God in fashion as a man arose from a law of the divine nature. Adam was created not after the image of God as such, but after the image of Christ; in some sort, a God-man. The affinity of this theory with the modern pantheistic speculations is apparent. Baur, therefore, is doubtless right when he says, at the close of his apologetic notice of Osiander\rquote s doctrine, that his idea of the relation between the divine and human \ldblquote is that which at last found its adequate scientific expression by Schleiermacher and Hegel, that Christ as Redeemer is the perfected creation of human nature; or, that the divine nature is the truth of humanity, and human nature the reality, or existence-form (\lang1031 die Wirklichkeit\lang1033 ) of the divine nature.\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\i Stancarus.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 Stancarus, a contemporary and opponent of Osiander, went to the extreme of asserting that the righteousness of Christ was the work of his human nature exclusively. This doctrine was however repudiated by the Romanists as well as by Protestants. If it was Christ\rquote s human nature as such (and not the divine person) who obeyed, then the human nature in Christ was a distinct subsistence, and thus the unity of his person is destroyed. Besides, if it was not a divine person in his human nature who obeyed and suffered, then we have but a human Saviour, and a righteousness of no higher than a human value. We know from Scripture that it was the Lord of glory who was crucified, the Son of God who, being born of a woman, was made under the law.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\i Piscator.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 The first conspicuous departure from the Protestant doctrine of justification among the Reformed, was on the part of Piscator, whose denial of the imputation of the active obedience of Christ to the believer, excited for some years a good deal of discussion, but it passed away without leaving any distinct trace in the theology of the Reformation. Baur, indeed, assigns to it more importance, as he regards it as the first step in the downfall of the whole doctrine of the satisfaction of Christ, over which he rejoices. Piscator was a native of Strasburg, and a member of the Lutheran Church, to whose service his first ministerial and professional labors were devoted. It coming to the knowledge of the ecclesiastical authorities that in his exposition of the Epistle to the Philippians he denied the ubiquity of the human nature of Christ, and taught the doctrine of predestination, he was deprived of his position in the Lutheran Church and passed over to the Reformed. He was soon appointed one of the professors of the new Institution of Hebron founded by the Duke of Nassau. He remained in connection with that institution from 1584 until his death in 1625, in the seventy-ninth year of his age. He was a prolific writer. Besides a new translation of the Bible, he wrote numerous commentaries on books of the Old and New Testaments, and conducted many controversies with Lutherans and Romanists, before he embroiled himself with the theologians of his own church. He took the ground that the \ldblquote\lang1142 imputatio justiti\'e6\lang1033\rdblquote and \ldblquote\lang1142 remissio peccatorum\lang1033\rdblquote are identical; the former means nothing more than the latter; and consequently that Christ\rquote s work consists simply in the expiation of sin. His active obedience to the divine law constitutes no part of the righteousness by which the believer is justified before God. He admits that Christ rendered a twofold obedience, \emdash the one to the law of God as a rule of duty; the other to the special command given to Him as Mediator. He came to accomplish a certain work; to do the will of the Father, which was to make satisfaction for sin. In this we are interested; but his obedience to the moral law was for Himself, and was the necessary condition of his satisfaction. He could not have made atonement for others had He not been Himself holy. \lang1142\ldblquote Tribuitur morti,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote quod ei tribuendum, nimirum, quod sit plenissima satisfactio pro peccatis nostris; sic etiam vit\'e6 obedienti\'e6 tribuitur, quod scriptura ei tribuendum perhibet, nimirum, quod sit causa, sine qua non potuerat Christus idoneus esse mediator inter Deum et hominem.\rdblquote\lang1033 Although Piscator made some effort to prove exegetically that pardon and justification, the remission of sin and imputation of righteousness, are identical, yet his arguments against the received doctrine, that the obedience of Christ is part our justifying righteousness, are not Biblical. The question before his mind was not simply, What do the Scriptures teach? but, What is true, logical, and symmetrical? He saw objections\cf2\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 to th e imputation of the active obedience of Christ, which seemed to him fatal, and on the ground of those objections he rejected the doctrine. Thus, for example, he argues that Christ\rquote s obedience to the law was due from Himself as a man, and therefore not imputable to others. He argues thus, \ldblquote\lang1142 Qui Christum dicunt ubique ut hominem, Christum dicunt non hominem, dum enim dico ubique, dico Deum, qui solus est in c\'9clo et in terra. Similiter cum dico subjectum legi, dico hominem. Qui er go Christum subjectum legi negant, negant ipsum esse hominem.\lang1033\rdblquote Every man as such in virtue of being a man\rquote s individually bound to obey the moral law. Christ was a man; therefore He was bound to obey the law for Himself. He did not perceive, or was not willing to admit, that the word \ldblquote man\rdblquote is taken in different senses in the different members of this syllogism, and therefore, the conclusion is vitiated. In the first clause, \ldblquote man\rdblquote means a hum an person; in the second clause, it means human nature. Christ was not a human person, although He assumed human nature. He was a man in the sense in which we are dust and ashes. But because we are dust, it does not follow that all that may be predicated of dust, may be predicated of us; \i e.g\i0 ., that we have no life, no reason, no immortality. In like manner, although the eternal Son of God took upon Himself a true body and a reasonable soul, yet as He was a divine person, it does not follow that eve rything that is true of human persons must be true of Him. Piscator also argues that the law binds either to punishment or to obedience, but not to both at once. Therefore, if Christ\rquote s obedience is imputed to us, there was no necessity that He should die for us. On the other hand, if He died for us, there was no necessity that He should obey for us. The principle here assumed may be true with regard to unfallen man. But where sin has been committed there is need of expiation as well as of obedience , and of obedience as well as expiation, if the reward of perfect obedience is to be conferred. Again, he says, if Christ has fulfilled the law for us, we are not bound to keep it. This is the old objection of the Jews; if justified by grace we may live in sin. But Christ has fulfilled the law for us only as a covenant of works. In that sense, says the Apostle, we are not under the law, but it does not thence follow that we are free from all moral obligation arising from our relation to God, as rational creatures. It may be true as Baur, himself a thorough skeptic in the English and American sense of that word, thinks, \cf2\f1\fs16 185\cf0\f0\fs24 that this innovation of Piscator prepared the way for the rejection of the whole Scriptural doctrine of satisfaction. Certain it is that both Lutherans and Reformed united, with scarcely a dissenting voice, in the condemnation of Piscator\rquote s doctrine. It was judicially repudiated by the national Synod of France on several different occasions; first in 1603, again at La Rochelle in 1607, and afterwards in 1612 and 1613. The Swiss churches in the \ldblquote Formula Consensus Helvetica,\rdblquote which received symbolical authority in Switzerland, pronounced clearly in favour of the old doctrine. This matter was soon lost sight of in consequence of the rise of Arminianism of far more historical importance.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\i The Arminian Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 Jacobus Arminius, a man of learning, talents, attractive accomplishments, and exemplary character, was born in Holland 1560, and died professor in the University of Leyden, in 1609, having filled the chair of theology since 1603. His departures from the Reformed doctrines in which he had been educated were far less serious than those of his successors, although involving them, apparently, by a logical necessity. His great difficulty was with the doctrine of predestination or the sovereignty of God in election. He could not, however, get rid of that doctrine without denying the entire inability of man to do what is spiritually good. He, therefore, taught that although mankind fell in Adam and are born in a state of sin and condemnation, and are of themselves entirely unable to turn from sin to holiness, yet that they are able to co\'f6perate with the grace of the Holy Spirit given to all men, especially to all who hear the Gospel, in sufficient measure to enable them to repent and believe, and to persevere in holy living unto the end. But whether any man doe thus repent and believe, or, having believed, perseveres in a holy life, depends on himself and not on God. The purpose of election, therefore, is not a purpose to save, and to that end to give faith and repentance to a definite number of individuals, but a purpose to save those who repent, believe, and persevere in faith until the end. The work of Christ has, therefore, an equal reference to all men. He made full satisfaction to God for the sins of all and every man, so that God can now consistently offer salvation to all men on the conditions laid down in the Gospel.\par This is a self-consistent scheme. One part implies, or necessitates admission of the others. The above statement includes all the doctrines presented by the followers of Arminius, after\cf2\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 his death, to the authorities in the form of a Remonstrance, as a justification of their views. Hence the Arminians were called Remonstrants. The document just mentioned contains the five points on which its authors and their associates differed from the Reformed faith. The first relates to predestination, which is explained as the purpose \ldblquote\lang1142 illos in Christo, propter Christum et per Christum servare, qui Spiritus Sancti gratia, in eundem ejus filjum credunt, et in ea, fideique obedientia, per eandem gratiam in finem perseverant: contra vero eos, qui non convertentur et infideles, in peccato et ir\'e6 subjectos relinquere, et condemnare, secundum illud Evang. Joann. iii. 36.\lang1033\rdblquote\par The second relates to the work of Christ, as to which it is said, \ldblquote\lang1142 Proinde Jesum Christum mundi servatorem pro omnibus et singulis mortuum esse, atque ita quidem, ut omnibus per mortem Christi reconciliationem et peccatorum remissionem impetravit: ea tamen conditione, ut nemo illa remissione peccatorum re ipsa fruatur, pr\'e6ter hominem fidelem, et hoc quoque secundum Evang. Joann. iii. 16, et 1 Joann. ii. 2.\lang1033\rdblquote\par The third, concerning the sinner\rquote s ability, declares, \ldblquote\lang1142 Hominem vero salutarem fidem a se ipso non habere, nec vi liberi sui arbitrii, quandoquidem in statu defectionis et peccati nihil boni, quandoquidem vere bonum est, quale quid est fides salutaris, ex se possit cogitare, vel facere: sed necessarium esse eum a Deo in Christo per Spiritum Sanctum regigni et renovari mente, affectibus, seu voluntate et omnibus facultatibus, ut aliquid boni possit intelligere, cogitare, velle et perficere. Ev. Joann. xv. 5.\lang1033\rdblquote No Augustinian, whether Lutheran or Calvinist, can say more than that, or desire more to be said by others.\par The fourth article, concerning grace, however, shows the point of departure: \ldblquote\lang1142 Hanc Dei gratiam esse initium, progressum ac perfectionem omnis boni, atque id eo quidem usque ut ipse homo regenitus absque hac pr\'e6cedentia, sen adventitia excitante, consequente et cooperante gratia, neque boni quid cogitare, velle, aut facere possit, neque etiam ulli mal\'e6 tentatione resistere; adeo quidem ut omnia bona opera, qu\'e6 excogitare possumus, Dei grati\'e6 in Christo tribuenda sint; quod vero modum operationis illius grati\'e6, illa non irresistibilis; de multis enim dicitur eos Spiritui Sancto resistere, \cf3\ul Act_7:51\cf0\ulnone et alibi multis locis.\lang1033\rdblquote It was not to be expected, in a brief exposition of principles designed for the justification of those who hold them, as members of a Reformed or Calvinistic church, that doubtful terms should be explained. It is beyond controversy, however, and, it is believed, is not controverted, that irresistible is here used in the sense of certainty efficacious. The Holy Spirit operates on the hearts of all men. Some are thereby renewed and brought to faith and repentance; others are not. This difference, according to the Remonstrants, is not to be referred to the nature of the influence exerted, but to the fact that some yield to this grace and co\'f6perate with it; while others reject and resist it.\par The fifth article refers to the perseverance of the saints, and is indefinite. It admits that the Spirit furnishes grace abundantly sufficient to enable the believer to persevere in holiness: \ldblquote\lang1142 Sed an illi ipsi negligentia sua initium sui esse in Christo deserere non possint, et pr\'e6sentem mundum iterum amplecti, a sancta doctrina ipsis semel tradita deficere, conscienti\'e6 naufragium facere, a gratia excidere; penitus ex sacra Scriptura esset expendum, antequam illud cum plena animi tranquillitate et \cf4\lang1033\f2\'f0\'eb\'e7\'f1\'ef\'f6\'ef\'f1\f3\u8055?\f2\'e1\cf0\lang1142\f0 docere possent.\lang1033\rdblquote Of course no man who believed the doctrine could write thus, and this doubtful mode of expression was soon laid aside, and \ldblquote falling from grace,\rdblquote in the common sense of the phrase, was admitted to be an Arminian doctrine.\par It will be observed that the doctrine of justification is not embraced in the five points in the Remonstrance as presented to the authorities in Holland, and as made the basis of the decisions of the Synod of Dort. The aberration of the Arminians, however, from the faith of the Reformed churches, extended to all the doctrines connected with the plan of salvation. Arminius himself, at least, held far higher and more Scriptural views on original sin, inability, and the necessity of supernatural grace, than those which have since become so prevalent even among the Reformed or Calvinistic churches themselves. In matters concerning the method of salvation, especially as to the nature of Christ\rquote s work and its application to the believer, they at first adhered closely to the language of the Reformed confessions. Thus they did not hesitate to say that Christ made full satisfaction for the sins of men; that He was a ransom, a sacrifice, a propitiation; that He made expiation for sin; that his righteousness or obedience is the ground of our acceptance with God; that the faith which saves is not mere assent to truth, or pious confidence in God, but specifically faith in Christ as the Saviour of men; and that justification is an act of God pronouncing the sinner just, or in which He pardons sin and accepts the sinner as righteous. All this is satisfactory to the ear. Language, however, admits a different interpretations and it soon became apparent and\cf2\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 avowed that the Remonstrants intended something very different from what the Reformed Church meant to express by the same terms.\par 1. They said that Christ\rquote s work was a satisfaction to divine justice. But they did not mean by satisfaction, either a \ldblquote\lang1142 solutio\lang1033 ,\rdblquote a real value rendered for what was due; nor even an \ldblquote\lang1142 acceptio\lang1033 ,\rdblquote taking one thing for another as an equivalent; but an \ldblquote\lang1142 accept ilatio\lang1033 ,\rdblquote a gracious acceptance as a satisfaction of that which in its own nature was no equivalent; as though God should accept the life of a brute for that of a man; or faith for perfect obedience. Neither did the Remonstrants mean by justice the attribute which requires the righteous distribution of rewards and punishments, and which renders it necessary that the penalty of the law should be executed in case of transgression.\par With regard to this latter point (the nature of justi!ce) the language of Grotius, and of the great body of the Remonstrant or Arminian theologians, is perfectly explicit. Grotius says: \ldblquote\lang1142 P\'9cnas infligere, aut a p\'9cnis aliquem liberare, quem punire possis, quod justificare vocat Scriptura, non est nisi rectoris, qua talis primo et per se: ut, puta, in familia patris; in republica regis, in universo Dei.. Unde sequitur, omnino hic Deum considerandum, ut rectorem.\lang1033\rdblquote Again,\ldblquote\lang1142 Ratio [cur \lquote rectori re"laxare legem talem non liceat, nisi causa aliqua accedat, si non necessaria, certe sufficiens\rquote ] est, quod actus ferendi aut relaxandi legem non sit actus absoluti dominii, sed actus imperii, qui tendere debeat ad boni ordinis conservationem.\lang1033\rdblquote\ldblquote\lang1142 P\'9cna enim omnis propositum habet bonum commune.\lang1033\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 Prudentia quoque hoc nomine rectorem ad p\'9cnam incitat. Augetur pr\'e6terea causa puniendi, ubi lex aliqua publicata est, qu\'e6 #p\'9cnam minatur. Nam tunc omissio p\'9cn\'e6 ferme aliquid detrahit de legis authoritate apud subditos.\lang1033\rdblquote\par Here everything is purely governmental. It is not justice, in the proper and ordinary sense of the word, that is satisfied, but God\rquote s wise and benevolent regard to the interests of his moral government. This changes everything. If God\rquote s justice be not satisfied guilt is not removed, and sin is not expiated. And therefore conscience is not appeased; nor can the real$ authority and honour of the law be upheld.\par As to the other point, the nature of the satisfaction rendered\cf2\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 it was not a real equivalent, which by its intrinsic value met the obligations of the sinner, but it was something graciously accepted as such. Although Grotius rejects the use of the word \ldblquote\lang1142 acceptilatio\lang1033 ,\rdblquote and endeavours to show that it does not express his meaning, nevertheless, though he repudiates the word, he retains the idea. H%e says,\ldblquote\lang1142 Ea est pretii natura, ut sui valore aut \'e6stimatione alterum moveat ad concedendam rem, aut jus aliquod, puta impunitatem.\lang1033\rdblquote This amounts to the principle of Duns Scotus that a thing avails (is worth) for what God pleases to take it. Although Grotius does not carry out the principle to the length to which the Schoolmen carried it, and say that God might have accepted the death of one man as a satisfaction for the sins of the world, or the blood of bulls or of& goats as a real expiation, nevertheless, he teaches that God graciously accepted \ldblquote\lang1142 aliquid pro aliquo\lang1033 ,\rdblquote the death of Christ for the death of all the world, not because of its being a real equivalent in itself, but because as ruler, having the right to remit sin without any satisfaction, He saw that the interests of his government could thereby be promoted. Still more clearly is this idea expressed by Limborch:\ldblquote\lang1142 In eo errant quam maxime, quod velint 'redemtionis pretium per omnia equivalens esse debere miseri\'e6 illi, e qua redemtio fit: redemtionis pretium enim constitui solet pro libera \'e6stimatione illius, qui captivum detinet, non autem solvi pro captivi merito. Ita pretium, quod Christus persolvit, juxta Dei Patris \'e6stimationem persolutum est.\lang1033\rdblquote\par According to Grotius, Christ died as an example, \ldblquote\lang1142 exemplum p\'9cn\'e6\lang1033 .\rdblquote The whole efficacy of his work was its moral impression on the un(iverse. It was not an expiation or satisfaction for past sins, but a means of deterring from the commission of sin in the future. This, as Baur and Strauss remark, is the point in which the theory of Grotius and that of Socinus coincide. They both refer the efficacy of Christ\rquote s work to the moral impression which it makes on the minds of intelligent creatures. They refer that moral influence, indeed, to different causes, but moral impression is all the efficacy it has. Although the word satisfaction) is retained by Grotius, the idea attached to it by the Church is rejected. The leading Remonstrant or Arminian theologians, as Episcopius, Curcell\'e6us, and Limborch, differ from Grotius in their mode of presenting this subject. Instead of regarding the work of Christ as an example of punishment, designed to deter from\cf2\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 the commission of sin, they adhere to the Scriptural mode of regarding Him as a ransom and sacrifice. The difference however is more in form than in reality. The*y admit that Christ redeems us by giving Himself as a ransom for man\lang1142 36.\lang1033\rdblquote\par The second relates to the work of Christ, as to which it is said, \ldblquote\lang1142 Proinde Jesum Christum mundi servatorem pro omnibus et singulis mortuum esse, atque ita quidem, ut omnibus per mortem Christi reconciliationem et peccatorum remissionem impetravit: ea tamen conditione, ut nemo illa remissione peccatorum re ipsa fruatur, pr\'e6ter hominem fidelem, et hoc quoque secundum Evang. Joann.+ iii. 16, et 1 Joann. ii. 2.\lang1033\rdblquote\par The third, concerning the sinner\rquote s ability, declares, \ldblquote\lang1142 Hominem vero salutarem fidem a se ipso non habere, nec vi liberi sui arbitrii, quandoquidem in statu defectionis et peccati nihil boni, quandoquidem vere bonum est, quale quid est fides salutaris, ex se possit cogitare, vel facere: sed necessarium esse eum a Deo in Christo per Spiritum Sanctum regigni et renovari mente, affectibus, seu voluntate et omnibus facultatibus, ut ,aliquid boni possit intelligere, cogitare, velle et perficere. Ev. Joann. xv. 5.\lang1033\rdblquote No Augustinian, whether Lutheran or Calvinist, can say more than that, or desire more to be said by others.\par The fourth article, concerning grace, however, shows the point of departure: \ldblquote\lang1142 Hanc Dei gratiam esse initium, progressum ac perfectionem omnis boni, atque id eo quidem usque ut ipse homo regenitus absque hac pr\'e6cedentia, sen adventitia excitante, consequente et cooperante gr-atia, neque boni quid cogitare, velle, aut facere possit, neque etiam ulli mal\'e6 tentatione resistere; adeo quidem ut omnia bona opera, qu\'e6 excogitare possumus, Dei grati\'e6 in Christo tribuenda sint; quod vero modum operationis illius grati\'e6, illa non irresistibilis; de multis enim dicitur eos Spiritui Sancto resistere, \cf3\ul Act_7:51\cf0\ulnone et alibi multis locis.\lang1033\rdblquote It was not to be expected, in a brief exposition of principles designed for the justification of those who. hold them, as members of a Reformed or Calvinistic church, that doubtful terms should be explained. It is beyond controversy, however, and, it is believed, is not controverted, that irresistible is here used in the sense of certainty efficacious. The Holy Spirit operates on the hearts of all men. Some are thereby renewed and brought to faith and repentance; others are not. This difference, according to the Remonstrants, is not to be referred to the nature of the influence exerted, but to the fact that so/me yield to this grace and co\'f6perate with it; while others reject and resist it.\par The fifth article refers to the perseverance of the saints, and is indefinite. It admits that the Spirit furnishes grace abundantly sufficient to enable the believer to persevere in holiness: \ldblquote\lang1142 Sed an illi ipsi negligentia sua initium sui esse in Christo deserere non possint, et pr\'e6sentem mundum iterum amplecti, a sancta doctrina ipsis semel tradita deficere, conscienti\'e6 naufragium facere, a gr0atia excidere; penitus ex sacra Scriptura esset expendum, antequam illud cum plena animi tranquillitate et \cf4\lang1033\f2\'f0\'eb\'e7\'f1\'ef\'f6\'ef\'f1\f3\u8055?\f2\'e1\cf0\lang1142\f0 docere possent.\lang1033\rdblquote Of course no man who believed the doctrine could write thus, and this doubtful mode of expression was soon laid aside, and \ldblquote falling from grace,\rdblquote in the common sense of the phrase, was admitted to be an Arminian doctrine.\par It will be observed that the doctrine 1of justification is not embraced in the five points in the Remonstrance as presented to the authorities in Holland, and as made the basis of the decisions of the Synod of Dort. The aberration of the Arminians, however, from the faith of the Reformed churches, extended to all the doctrines connected with the plan of salvation. Arminius himself, at least, held far higher and more Scriptural views on original sin, inability, and the necessity of supernatural grace, than those which have since become so preva2lent even among the Reformed or Calvinistic churches themselves. In matters concerning the method of salvation, especially as to the nature of Christ\rquote s work and its application to the believer, they at first adhered closely to the language of the Reformed confessions. Thus they did not hesitate to say that Christ made full satisfaction for the sins of men; that He was a ransom, a sacrifice, a propitiation; that He made expiation for sin; that his righteousness or obedience is the ground of our acce3ptance with God; that the faith which saves is not mere assent to truth, or pious confidence in God, but specifically faith in Christ as the Saviour of men; and that justification is an act of God pronouncing the sinner just, or in which He pardons sin and accepts the sinner as righteous. All this is satisfactory to the ear. Language, however, admits a different interpretations and it soon became apparent and avowed that the Remonstrants intended something very different from what the Reformed Church mean4t to express by the same terms.\par 1. They said that Christ\rquote s work was a satisfaction to divine justice. But they did not mean by satisfaction, either a \ldblquote\lang1142 solutio\lang1033 ,\rdblquote a real value rendered for what was due; nor even an \ldblquote\lang1142 acceptio\lang1033 ,\rdblquote taking one thing for another as an equivalent; but an \ldblquote\lang1142 acceptilatio\lang1033 ,\rdblquote a gracious acceptance as a satisfaction of that which in its own nature was no equival5ent; as though God should accept the life of a brute for that of a man; or faith for perfect obedience. Neither did the Remonstrants mean by justice the attribute which requires the righteous distribution of rewards and punishments, and which renders it necessary that the penalty of the law should be executed in case of transgression.\par With regard to this latter point (the nature of justice) the language of Grotius, and of the great body of the Remonstrant or Arminian theologians, is perfectly explici6t. Grotius says: \ldblquote\lang1142 P\'9cnas infligere, aut a p\'9cnis aliquem liberare, quem punire possis, quod justificare vocat Scriptura, non est nisi rectoris, qua talis primo et per se: ut, puta, in familia patris; in republica regis, in universo Dei.. Unde sequitur, omnino hic Deum considerandum, ut rectorem.\lang1033\rdblquote Again,\ldblquote\lang1142 Ratio [cur \lquote rectori relaxare legem talem non liceat, nisi causa aliqua accedat, si non necessaria, certe sufficiens\rquote ] . est, quod 7actus ferendi aut relaxandi legem non sit actus absoluti dominii, sed actus imperii, qui tendere debeat ad boni ordinis conservationem.\lang1033\rdblquote\ldblquote\lang1142 P\'9cna enim omnis propositum habet bonum commune.\lang1033\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 Prudentia quoque hoc nomine rectorem ad p\'9cnam incitat. Augetur pr\'e6terea causa puniendi, ubi lex aliqua publicata est, qu\'e6 p\'9cnam minatur. Nam tunc omissio p\'9cn\'e6 ferme aliquid detrahit de legis authoritate apud subditos.\lang1033\8rdblquote\par Here everything is purely governmental. It is not justice, in the proper and ordinary sense of the word, that is satisfied, but God\rquote s wise and benevolent regard to the interests of his moral government. This changes everything. If God\rquote s justice be not satisfied guilt is not removed, and sin is not expiated. And therefore conscience is not appeased; nor can the real authority and honour of the law be upheld.\par As to the other point, the nature of the satisfaction rendered it9 was not a real equivalent, which by its intrinsic value met the obligations of the sinner, but it was something graciously accepted as such. Although Grotius rejects the use of the word \ldblquote\lang1142 acceptilatio\lang1033 ,\rdblquote and endeavours to show that it does not express his meaning, nevertheless, though he repudiates the word, he retains the idea. He says,\ldblquote\lang1142 Ea est pretii natura, ut sui valore aut \'e6stimatione alterum moveat ad concedendam rem, aut jus aliquod, puta i:mpunitatem.\lang1033\rdblquote This amounts to the principle of Duns Scotus that a thing avails (is worth) for what God pleases to take it. Although Grotius does not carry out the principle to the length to which the Schoolmen carried it, and say that God might have accepted the death of one man as a satisfaction for the sins of the world, or the blood of bulls or of goats as a real expiation, nevertheless, he teaches that God graciously accepted \ldblquote\lang1142 aliquid pro aliquo\lang1033 ,\rdblquot;e the death of Christ for the death of all the world, not because of its being a real equivalent in itself, but because as ruler, having the right to remit sin without any satisfaction, He saw that the interests of his government could thereby be promoted. Still more clearly is this idea expressed by Limborch:\ldblquote\lang1142 In eo errant quam maxime, quod velint redemtionis pretium per omnia equivalens esse debere miseri\'e6 illi, e qua redemtio fit: redemtionis pretium enim constitui solet pro liberCurcell\'e6us, and Limborch, differ from Grotius in their mode of presenting this subject. Instead of regarding the work of Christ as an example of punishment, designed to deter from\cf2\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 the commission of sin, they adhere to the Scriptural mode of regarding Him as a ransom and sacrifice. The difference however is more in form than in reality. They admit that Christ redeems us by giving Himself as a ransom for many. But a ransom, as Curcell\'e6us says, is not an equivalent; it is anyt?hing the holder of the captive sees fit to accept. It is admitted, also, that Christ gave Himself as a sacrifice for our salvation; but a sacrifice is said not to be a satisfaction to justice, but simply the condition on which pardon is granted. Under the Old Testament God pardoned sin on the occasion of the sacrifice of irrational animals; under the New Testament, on the occasion of the sacrifice of Christ. \ldblquote Sacrificia,\rdblquote says Limborch,\ldblquote\lang1142 non sunt solutiones debitorum,@ neque plenari\'e6 pro peccatis satisfactiones; sed illis peractis conceditur gratuita peccati remissio.\lang1033\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 Redemtionis pretium constitui solet pro libera \'e6stimatione illius, qui captivum detinet.\lang1033\rdblquote We know, however, from Scripture that a sacrifice was not merely an arbitrarily appointed antecedent of gratuitous forgiveness; it was not simply an acknowledgment of guilt. We know also that the blood of bulls and of goats under the Old Testament couldA not take away sin; it availed only to the purifying of the flesh, or the remission of ceremonial penalties. The only efficacy of the Old Testament sacrifices, so far as sin committed against God is concerned, was sacramental; that is, they signified, sealed, and applied the benefits of the only real and effectual expiation for sin, to those who believed. As the victim symbolically bore the penalty due to the offender, so the eternal Son of God really bore our sins, really became a curse for us, and thus Bmade a true and perfect satisfaction to God for our offences.\par 2. As the Remonstrants denied that Christ\rquote s work was a real satisfaction for sin, they of necessity denied any real justification of the sinner. Justification with them is merely pardon. This is asserted by Grotius in the passage above cited; and even the Rev. Richard Watson, whose excellent system of theology, or \ldblquote Theological Institutes,\rdblquote is deservedly in high repute among the Wesleyan Methodists, not only over Cand over defines justification as pardon, but elaborately argues the question. \ldblquote The first point,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote which we find established by the language of the New Testament is, that justification, the pardon and remission of sins, the non-imputation of sin, and the imputation of righteousness, are terms and phrases of the same import.\rdblquote He then goes on to establish that position.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\txD10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\f1\fs16 191\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 If therefore, pardon and justification are distinct things, the one the executive act of a ruler, the other a judicial act; the one setting aside the demands of justice, the other a declaration that justice is satisfied; then those who reduce justification to mere pardon, deny the doctrine of justiEfication as understood and professed by the Lutheran and Reformed churches. It of course is not intended that these Remonstrant or Arminian theologians do not hold what they call justification; nor is it denied that they at times, at least, express their doctrine in the very language of the Symbols of the Protestant churches. Thus the Remonstrants say, \ldblquote\lang1142 Justificatio est actio Dei, quam Deus pure pute in sua ipsius mente efficit, quia nihil aliud est, quam volitio aut decretum, quo peccaFta remittere, et justitiam imputare aliquando vult iis, qui credunt, id est, quo vult p\'9cnas, peccatis eorum promeritas, iis non infligere, eosque tanquam justos tractare et premio afficere.\lang1033\rdblquote Nevertheless they tell us that they mean by this only pardon. Protestants, when they say justification includes pardon \ldblquote and\rdblquote the imputation of righteousness, mean two distinct things by pardon and imputation of righteousness. The Remonstrants regard them as identical, and, theGrefore, can use the very language of Protestants, while rejecting their doctrine. As every one feels and knows that when a criminal is pardoned by the executive, and allowed to resume his rights of property and right of voting, he is not thereby justified; so every candid mind must admit that there is an immense difference between the Remonstrant or Arminian doctrine of justification and that held as the cardinal principle of the Reformation by both Lutherans and Reformed.\par 3. This difference becomes Hstill more apparent when we consider what the Remonstrants make the ground of justification As they deny that Christ made any real satisfaction to divine justice (as distinguished from benevolence), so they deny that the righteousness of Christ is imputed to the believer as the ground of his justification. On this point, Limborch says, \ldblquote\lang1142 H\'e6c autem, qu\'e6 nobis imputatur, non est Christi justitia; nus quam enim Scriptura docet, Christi justitiam nobis imputari; sed tantum fidem nobis Iimputari in justitiam, et quidem propter Christum.\lang1033\rdblquote And Curcell\'e6us says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Nullibi docet Scriptura justitiam Christi nobis imputari. Et id absurdum est. Nemo enim in se injustus aliena justitia potest esse formaliter justus, non magis, quam aliena albedine \'c6thiops esse albus.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\f1\fs16 192\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fiJ360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 As the righteousness of Christ is not imputed to the believer, the ground of his justification, that which is accepted as righteousness, is faith and its fruits, or faith and evangelical obedience. On this subject Limborch says, that under the new covenant God demands \ldblquote\lang1142 obedientiam fidei, hoc est, non rigidam et omnibus \'e6qualem, prout exigebat lex; sed tantKam, quantam fides, id est, certa de divinis promissionibus persuasio, in unoquoque efficere potest; in qua etiam Deus multas imperfectiones et lapsus condonat, modo animo sincero pr\'e6ceptorum ipsius observationi incumbamus, et continuo in eadem proficere studeamus.\lang1033\rdblquote\par And again,\ldblquote\lang1142 Deus non judicat hominum justitiam esse perfectam, imo eam judicat esse imperfectam; sed justitiam, quam imperfectam judicat, gratiose accipit ac si perfecta esset.\lang1033\rdblquote He,L therefore, thus defines justification, \ldblquote\lang1142 Est gratiosa \'e6stimatio, seu potius acceptatio justiti\'e6 nostr\'e6 imperfect\'e6 (qu\'e6, si Deus rigide nobiscum agere vellet, in judicio Dei nequaquam consistere posset) pro perfecta, propter Jesum Christum.\lang1033\rdblquote\par The same view is presented when he speaks of faith in its relation to justification. Faith is said to be imputed for righteousness; but Limborch says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Sciendum, quando dicimus, nos fide justifMicari, nos non excludere opera, qu\'e6 fides exigit et tanquam f\'9ccunda mater producit; sed ea includere.\lang1033\rdblquote Again,\ldblquote\lang1142 Fides est conditio in nobis et a nobis requisita, ut justificationem consequamur. Est itaque talis actus, qui, licet in se spectatus perfectus nequaquam sit, sed in multis deficiens, tamen a Deo gratiosa et liberrima voluntate pro pleno et perfecto acceptatur et propter quem Deus homini gratiose remissionem peccatorum et vit\'e6 \'e6tern\'e6 pr\'e6mium cNonferre vult.\lang1033\rdblquote\par Fletcher says, \ldblquote With respect to the Christless law of paradisaical obedience, we entirely disclaim sinless perfection.\rdblquote \ldblquote We shall not be judged by that law; but by a law adapted to our present state and circumstances, a milder law, called the law of Christ.\rdblquote \ldblquote Our Heavenly Father never expects of us, in our debilitated state, the obedience of immortal Adam in paradise.\rdblquote\par Dr. Peck says, \ldblquote The standaOrd of character set up in the Gospel must be such as is practicable by man, fallen as he is. Coming up to this standard is what we call Christian perfection.\rdblquote\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\f1\fs16 193\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 Under the covenant of works as made with PAdam, perfect obedience was the condition of acceptance with God and of eternal life; under the Gospel, for Christ\rquote s sake, imperfect, or evangelical obedience, is the ground of justification, \i i.e\i0 ., it is that (\lang1142 propter quam\lang1033 ) on account of which God graciously grants us the remission of sin and the reward of eternal life.\par We have then the three great systems. First, that of the Romanists, which teaches that on account of the work of Christ God grants, through ChristianQ baptism, an infusion of divine grace, by which all sin is purged from the soul and all ground for the infliction of the penalty is removed and the sinner rendered inherently just or holy. This is the first justification. Then in virtue of the new principle of spiritual life thus imparted, the baptized or regenerated are enabled to perform good works, which are really meritorious and on account of which they are admitted to heaven.\par Secondly, the Arminian theory, that on account of what Christ has donRe, God is pleased to grant sufficient grace to all men, and to accept the imperfect obedience which the believer is thus enabled to render in lieu of the perfect obedience required under the covenant made with Adam, and on account of that imperfect obedience, eternal life is graciously bestowed.\par Thirdly, the Protestant doctrine that Christ, as the representative and substitute of sinners or of his people, takes their place under the law, and in their name and in their behalf fulfils all righteousnessS, thereby making a real, perfect, and infinitely meritorious satisfaction to the law and justice of God, which righteousness is imputed, or set to the account of the believer, who is thereupon and on that account freely pardoned and pronounced righteous in the sight of God, and entitled not only to the remission of sin but also to eternal life. Being united to Christ by faith, the believer becomes partaker of his life, so that it is not he that lives but Christ that liveth in him, and the life which the bTeliever now lives in the flesh is by faith of the Son of God, who loved him, and gave Himself for him.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Comparison of the Different Doctrines.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The first remark which suggests itself on the comparison of these several sUchemes is, that the relation between the believer and Christ is far more close, peculiar, and constant on the Protestant scheme than on any other. He is dependent on Him every hour; for the imputation of his righteousness; for the supplies of\cf2\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 the Spirit of life; and for his care, guidance, and intercession. He must look to Him continually; and continually exercise faith in Him as an ever present Saviour in order to live. According to the other schemes, Christ has merely made the Vsalvation of all men possible. There his work ended. According to Romanists, He has made it possible that God should give sanctifying grace in baptism; according to the Remonstrants, He has rendered it possible for Him to give sufficient grace to all men whereby to sanctify and save themselves. We are well aware that this is theory; that the true people of God, whether Romanists or Remonstrants, do not look on Christ thus as a Saviour afar off. They doubtless have the same exercises towards Him that theirW fellow believers have; nevertheless, such is the theory. The theory places a great gulf between the soul and Christ.\par Secondly, it hardly admits of question that the Protestant view conforms to the Scriptural mode of presenting the plan of salvation. Christ in the Bible is declared to be the head of his people, their representative; they were in Him in such a sense that they died in Him; they are raised with Him, and sit with Him in heavenly places. They were in Him as the race was in Adam, and as brXanches are in the vine. They individually receive the sprinkling of that blood which cleanses from all sin. They are constituted righteous by his obedience. As He was made sin for them, so are they made the righteousness of God in Him. He is not only an example of punishment as Grotius represents, a mere governmental device, but a sacrifice substituted for us, on whose head every believer must lay his hand and to whom he must transfer the burden of his sins.\par Thirdly, what is included indeed in the abYove, but is so important and decisive as to require distinct and repeated mention; all schemes, other than the Protestant, refer the proximate ground of our acceptance with God to our own subjective character. It is because of our own goodness that we are regarded and treated as righteous. Whereas conscience demands, the Scriptures reveal, and the believer instinctively seeks something better than that. His own goodness is badness. It cannot satisfy his own bleared vision; how then can it appear before thZe eyes of God? It matters not how the Romanist may exalt his \ldblquote inward habits of grace;\rdblquote or how the Arminian may sublimate his evangelical obedience to perfection; neither can satisfy either the conscience or God.\par Fourthly, the Protestant doctrine is the only one on which the\cf2\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 soul can live. This has been urged before when speaking of the work of Christ. It is fair to appeal from theology to hymnology from the head to the heart; from what man thinks to what [God makes men feel. It is enough to say on this point, that Lutheran and Reformed Christians can find nowhere, out of the Bible, more clear, definite, soul-satisfying expression of their doctrinal views upon this subject, than are to be found in many, of the hymns of the Latin and Arminian churches. As a single example may be cited the following stanzas from John Wesley\rquote s \ldblquote Hymns and Spiritual Songs\rdblquote : \emdash\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\ldblquote Join, earth and heaven to bless The Lord our Righteousness. The mystery of redemption this, This the Saviour\rquote s strange design \emdash Man\rquote s offence was counted his. Ours his righteousness divine. \ldblquote In Him complete we shine; His death, his life, is mine; Fully am I justified, Free from sin, and more than free, Guiltless, since for me He died; Righteous, since He lived for me.\rdblquote\par \pard\cf5\f4\fs23\par } (Q 1.17.10. Departures from the Protestant Doctrine{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\^{\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~11. \i Modern Views on Justification.\i0\par \cf1\b0\i Rationalistic Theories.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx_10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 These cannot be given in detail. Certain classes of opinions can be referred to only in the briefest manner. The Rationalists were divided into two classes; first, those who regarded the Scriptures as a supernatural revelation of natural religion, or of the truths of reason; and secondly, those who denied the supernatural origin of the Scriptures altogether, assigning to them no higher authority than belongs to the writings of good and wise men.\par The f`ormer class came to agree very nearly with the latter as to what the Bible actually teaches, or, at least, as to what is by us to be regarded and received as true. Those who admitted the divine origin of the Scriptures got rid of its distinctive doctrines by the adoption of a low theory of inspiration, and by the application of arbitrary principles of interpretation. Inspiration was, in the first instance, confined to the religious teachings of the Bible, then to the ideas or truths, but not to the form ian which they were presented, nor to the arguments by which they were supported. The fact that Christ saves men in some way was admitted, but not as a sacrifice nor as a ransom, nor by being a\cf2\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 substitute for sinners. The miracles of Christ were acknowledged as historical facts, but they were explained as mere natural events distorted by the imaginations of spectators and historians. It was granted by some that Christ and the Apostles did teach the Church doctrines, but this, it wabs said, was done only by way of accommodation to the prejudices, superstitions, or modes of thought of the men of that generation. The first step in this process was the denial of all distinction between the prophetic, priestly, and kingly offices of Christ. In this way a wet sponge was passed over all the doctrines of redemption, and their outlines obliterated. This unnatural process could not be long continued, and, therefore, the majority of Rationalists soon threw off all regard to the normal authoritcy of the Bible, and avowed their faith in nothing which did not commend itself to their own understanding as true, and for that reason alone.\par As to the doctrine of justification, the whole tendency of the efforts during this period was, as Baur correctly says, to make the reconciliation of man to God the work of the man himself. \ldblquote A man was entitled to regard himself as reconciled with God as soon as he determined to repent and to reform.\rdblquote God was regarded as a father. A father is ddispleased with a son only so long as he is disobedient. The only end of any chastisement he may inflict, is the reformation of his child. If that be accomplished, all necessity and all propriety of punishment cease. Wegscheider, a representative of this class of theologians, says,\ldblquote\lang1142 Quicunque e vita turpi, qua p\'9cnas sibi contraxit, ad virtutem emerserit, is eadem proportione, qua jam in virtutis studio progressus fuerit, in gratiam cum Deo reversus, ab eodem pr\'e6miis dignus judicabietur.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Philosophical Theories.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The philosophical theories on this subject were as different as the systems on which they were founded. Some of these systems were theistic, others pantheistic, and othefrs monistic, \i i.e\i0 ., founded \ldblquote a the oneness of God and man, without denying the distinct personality of either.\par The influence of Kant\rquote s philosophy upon theology, for a time at least, was very great, and in some aspects salutary. As he exalted the power of the pure reason, making it give law to the outward, subordinating, as his disciples say, the objective to the subjective, so in the sphere of religion and morality he exalted the power and authority of the practical reason. Evegrything was subordinate to moral excellence. Happiness was not the end. It was only a means of promoting and rewarding what is morally good. The attainment of the highest amount of moral excellence requires perfect harmony between happiness and goodness, that is, that rational creatures should be happy in exact proportion to their goodness, and miserable in proportion as they are wicked. The punishment of sin is therefore inevitable. It is determined by the immutable moral order of the universe, which canh no more be changed or set aside than any physical law on which the existence or order of the external world depends.\par From these principles some of the Kantian theologians inferred that the pardon of sin is impossible. Misery is as inseparable from sin as pain is from the laceration of the body. If the only punishment of sin, however, be its natural consequences, then the removal of sin effects the removal of punishment. This determines the view which many of the disciples of Kant take of the nature iof redemption. It is purely subjective. Men are delivered from sin and thereby from its punishment.\par To others, however, this view was unsatisfactory, (1.) Because the punishment of sin is not purely or exclusively natural. It is not so even in this world, as is proved by the deluge, by the destruction of the cities of the plain, and by a thousand other instances. Much less is it true with regard to the future world. Conscience is not the only worm that never dies, or remorse the only fire which is nejver quenched. (2.) Because this theory reverses the natural order of events. It makes reformation precede pardon, whereas pardon must precede reformation. On this point Bretschneider quotes even Ewald as saying, \ldblquote It is as unpsychological as it is unchristian so to present Christian reformation, that a man must become better before he is forgiven. It is precisely through the love of God anticipating our reformation, by which the man morally dead is quickened, that the elements of all religion, grkatitude, trust, and love are called into exercise.\rdblquote This is certainly Paul\rquote s doctrine. (3.) The theory in question overlooks guilt, responsibility to justice for sins already committed. (4.) The ends of punishment (according to the Kantians) are, first, the satisfaction of the moral excellence of God, who by necessity of his moral perfection must punish sin; secondly, the improvement of the offender; and thirdly, the upholding the moral order of the universe. The two former of these ends,l Bretschneider says, may be answered by the reformation of the sinner. When a man ceases to sin, he ceases to be opposed to God, and God ceases to be opposed to him. But the third end of punishment, namely, preserving the moral order of the universe, is not answered by the sinner\rquote s reformation. He is not the only person to be considered. The interests of morality would suffer, if he were rendered happy notwithstanding his past transgression. The question then is, is there any way in which the authomrity of the moral law can be sustained, and yet the sinner be forgiven and rendered blessed? The Church answer to this question, the disciples of Kant reject as contrary to reason; but reason, says Bretschneider, has nothing to object to the doctrine stated generally that God can consistently pardon sin for Christ\rquote s sake. He sums up under the following heads, what reason may accept in regard to this whole subject. (1.) That the divine nature of Christ rendered his sufferings more important for the nspiritual world and more available for man than they otherwise would have been. (2.) We cannot properly say that He suffered the penalty of the law, or the punishment of our sins, but that He endured his unmerited sufferings for the good of the world. (3.) That He did not make satisfaction for sin, but rendered secure the moral order of the universe. (4.) Although He did not make satisfaction, He procured or mediated our pardon. He is not our sponsor, but our \ldblquote\lang1142 mediator salutis\lang1033 o.\rdblquote (5.) The expression \ldblquote the merit of Christ\rdblquote does not mean any good imputed to us, or any title belonging to us, but simply the claim of Christ that his sufferings shall avail to the good of men. (6.) The word \ldblquote reconciliation\rdblquote is anthropopathic. It does not express any change in God; but either objectively the possibility of pardon, or subjectively the hope of pardon. (7.) \ldblquote To impute the merit of Christ\rdblquote does not mean that God regards Cphrist\rquote s obedience as our obedience, or his sufferings as our punishment, but simply that, through love, God has determined to render his sufferings available for the good of men. (8.) That Christ\rquote s death was vicarious in so far that in consequence thereof sin may be pardoned in the renewed. (9.) Justification is the application to individuals of the general declaration of God that He will save all who strive to reform. This is the highest form in which theologians regarded as rationalistic aqre willing to receive the doctrines of atonement and justification.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\f1\fs16 199\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Speculative Theologians.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\txr11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The views of the speculative theologians on these points have already been presented in the chapters on the person of Christ and on his work, as fully as is proper in such a work as this.\par However much this class of theologians may differ as to their philosophical principles, or as to the length to which they carry those principles in their explanation of Christian doctrine, they agree, first, in rejecting the Church view of the plan of salvation; they deny that Chrisst obeyed the law and bore its penalty vicariously, or as the substitute of sinners; they deny that his righteousness is imputed to the believer as the ground of his justification; they deny that saving faith consists in receiving and resting on the righteousness of Christ as something objective; they deny that justification is a forensic or judicial act in which God pronounces the sinner just, not on the ground of his subjective state or character, but on the ground of what Christ has done for him. All thtis they pronounce mechanical, external, magical, unreal, and unsatisfactory. On the other hand, they agree in representing justification as an act by which the sinner is made inherently or subjectively just; and consequently that his acceptance with God, and his title to eternal life, are founded on what he is; they agree in regarding faith as that state of mind which renders the sinner receptive of the infusion of whatever it is that renders him thus subjectively righteous in the sight of God. What that uis, is the main point on which their representations differ. Those who regard man as only a form of the manifestation of God, say that one man\rquote s being justified and not another, means that God is more fully developed in the one than in the other; or that the one realizes more truly the idea of man than the other; and this, after all, consists in one\rquote s coming to the consciousness of his oneness with God, which others have not attained. \ldblquote The most universal and essential idea of redemvption and reconciliation is man\rquote s becoming one with God. The necessary objective assumption, on which alone the individual can be one with God, or redeemed and reconciled, is the truth, that man as such is one with God (\lang1031 dass der Mensch an sich mit Gott Eins ist\lang1033 ).\rdblquote This, according to one view, is an eternal process; God is ever becoming man, and man is ever returning into God. According to Schleiermacher, as already repeatedly stated, this manifestation of God in man waws hindered and could never become perfect by a process\cf2\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 of natural development; and, therefore, by a new creative act Christ was produced, in whom the idea of man was fully realized, or in whom the oneness of God and man was clearly exhibited, and from Him a new process of development commenced as perfectly natural as the process before his advent, and the redemption of man consists in the communication of the sinlessness and blessedness of Christ to the individual. This is expresxsed commonly by saying that the life of Christ, \emdash not the Holy Spirit as derived from Him; not his divine nature; not his humanity; but his divine-human life, \emdash is communicated to the Church and to all its members. In other words, as Christ is God in human form, so is every believer. The incarnation goes forward in the Church. In the language of the older mystics, what is communicated is \ldblquote the essential righteousness of God,\rdblquote or \ldblquote the essence of God,\rdblquote thye life of God, or God Himself.\par According to this view the objective work of Christ, what He did and suffered is of no avail for us; it is not that which makes us righteous, or by which we are redeemed. Redemption and reconciliation are a purely subjective process; something which takes place in the sinner\rquote s own soul, and not something which was done for him. It matters little whether there was a historical Christ or not; or, at least, whether the facts recorded of Him be true or untrue; whethezr the Gospels are historical or mythical.\par According to another view, the work of Christ was in no sense a satisfaction to divine justice; neither his obedience nor his suffering was designed to be set over to his people with its merit, as the ground of their justification. The Word became flesh. He assumed our fallen humanity into personal union with Himself. This necessitated conflict and suffering as the only way in which the new life could triumph over the law of sin and death which belonged to ou{r fallen humanity. This was the atonement of Christ, the triumph of health over disease. This was the victory of Christ over sin and hell. Thus He becomes the author of salvation to men. Humanity in Christ suffered and died, and rose again. That humanity is our nature. It is that which constitutes us what we are. By union with the Church, which is the body of Christ animated by his theanthropic nature or life, we become one with Him. What is communicated to us is not his merit, nor his Spirit, but his ess|ence, his substance, his life. There is no dualism between the soul and body. They are one life. The soul externalizes itself in the body, they are\cf2\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 one. So there is no dualism in Christ; not a divine and human substance; not a divine and human life; but one life which is simply and purely human and yet divine; for God and man are one; and humanity reaches its completion only when thus identified with the divine. This divine-human life passes over from Christ to the Church; and th}is takes place in the way of history, growth, and development. Partaking thus of the life of Christ, we partake of its righteousness, its holiness, and its glory. Thus redemption is purely subjective. It is wrought in us, although the source is without us. As we partake of Adam\rquote s sin and condemnation, because we partake of his nature; so we partake of Christ\rquote s righteousness and holiness because we partake of his divine-human life, or of humanity as healed and exalted in Him.\par \pard\sb180~\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Ebrard of Erlangen.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 There is an important class of modern theological writers, of whom Dr. J. H. A. Ebrard of Erlangen may be taken as a representative, who consider themselves faithful to the doctrines of the Reformation, while developing them into new forms. As Ebrard represents this class of writers among the Reformed, so Delitzsch does the same for the Lutheran theologians. These writers are abundantly orthodox in their exposition of the nature of Christ\rquote s work. This is especially true of Delitzsch in his admirable treatise on \ldblquote The Vicarious Satisfaction of Christ.\rdblquote As these writers identify regeneration and justification, their views may be found briefly stated in the chapter on regeneration.\par Christ, it is admitted, made expiation for sin and satisfied the justice of God as our substitute by his vicarious obedience and sufferings. This righteousness, however, becomes ours not by being received by faith and imputed to us by the just judgment of God, but by regeneration, whereby we become partakers of the life, substance, or essence, however it may be designated, of Christ. On this subject Ebrard says: \ldblquote Regeneration is the substantial objective ground both of the transient act of justification, and of the progressive work of sanctification; whereas conversion (repentance and faith) is the subjective condition of both. And justification as the act of the Father, is a forensic judicial act; as the act of Christ, it is identical with regeneration,\cf2\f1\fs16 2\cf0\i\f0\fs24 i.e\i0 ., with the real implantation of Christ in us and of us in Christ.\rdblquote Both propositions, therefore, he says, are equally true, namely, \ldblquote Christ justifies us; and faith justifies us.\rdblquote In explaining this, he says: \ldblquote\cf3\f2\'c4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 before God is one who does not merit punishment; who is free from guilt in the sight of God\rquote s eternal law, either because he is absolutely sinless, or holy, never having contracted guilt, as in the case of Christ; or because his guilt has been expiated, and his lack of the righteousness demanded by the law is covered. \cf3\f2\'c4\'e9\'ea\'e1\'ef\f3\u8166?\f2\'ed\cf0\f0 means either to acknowledge as \cf3\f2\'e4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 one who is \cf3\f2\'e4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 or to make \cf3\f2\'e4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 one who is not \cf3\f2\'e4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 .\rdblquote The latter is its sense when used in reference to sinners. In their case, \ldblquote The act of \cf3\f2\'e4\'e9\'ea\'e1\f3\u8055?\f2\'f9\'f3\'e9\'f2\cf0\f0 consists, (1.) In the gift of the expiation (\lang1031 S\'fchne\lang1033 ) made by Christ without the sinner\rquote s co\'f6peration; and (2.) In the gift of the absolute righteousness of Christ, in such sense that God does not regard the sinner as he is by nature, and by self-development, but as he is as implanted in Christ.\rdblquote There is, therefore, a clear distinction to be made between the appropriation of righteousness, and the procuring of righteousness. \ldblquote Christ has procured and merited (\lang1031 erworben hat\lang1033 ) righteousness by his historical life and sufferings; it is applied by Christ\rquote s being born in us.\rdblquote \ldblquote The Scriptures,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote do not speak of Christ\rquote s righteousness being imputed to us. They teach that it comes upon us (\cf4\ul Rom_5:18\cf0\ulnone ), and becomes our own. It is our own, however, because the person of Christ becomes ours in the strictest possible (\lang1031 allerrealsten\lang1033 , the most literal) sense of the terms.\rdblquote What Ebrard contends for is (\lang1031 die substantielle Lebenseinheit mit der Person Christi\lang1033 ), the substantial oneness of life with Christ; or as he often elsewhere expresses it, \ldblquote the mysterious, mystical communication of the substance of Christ to the central substance of man.\rdblquote Dr. Alexander Schweizer of Z\'fcrich, although differing much in other points from Ebrard, agrees with him in this. The essential element in the work of Christ, he says, \ldblquote is the founding and upholding a community animated or pervaded by his theanthropic life (\lang1031 gottmenschlichen Lebenspotenz\lang1033 ). Dr. Nevin says, \ldblquote Our nature reaches after a true and real union with the nature of God, as the necessary complement and consummation of its own life. The idea which it embodies can never be fully actualized, under any other form. The incarnation is the proper completion of humanity. Christ is the true ideal man.\rdblquote \ldblquote The incarnation was no mere theophany; no transient wonder; no illusion exhibited to the senses.\~ The Word became flesh; not a single man only, as one among many; but \lquote flesh,\rquote or humanity in its universal conception. How else could He be the principle of a general life, the origin of a new order of existence for the human world as such? How else could the value of his mediatorial work be made over to us in a real way, by a true imputation, and not a legal fiction only?\rdblquote \ldblquote Christianity is a life, not only as revealed at first in Christ, but as continued also in the Church. It flows over from Christ to his people, always in this form. They do not simply bear his name and acknowledge his doctrine. They are so united to Him as to have part in the substance of his life itself.\rdblquote He had before said, that \ldblquote by the hypostatical union of the two natures in the person of Jesus Christ, our humanity as fallen in Adam was exalted again to a new and imperishable divine life.\rdblquote \ldblquote The object of the incarnation was to couple the human nature in real union with the Logos, as a permanent source of life.\rdblquote Again, \ldblquote the new life of which Christ is the source and organic principle, is in all respects a true human life; . not a new humanity, wholly dissevered from that of Adam; but the humanity of Adam itself, only raised to a higher character, and filled with new meaning and power, by its union with the divine nature Christ\rquote s life, as now described, rests not in his separate person, but passes over to his people; thus constituting the Church, which is his body, the fulness of Him that filleth all in all.\rdblquote \ldblquote Christ communicates his own life substantially to the soul on which He acts, causing it to grow into his very nature. This is the mystical union; the basis of our whole salvation; the only medium by which it is possible for us to have an interest in the grace of Christ under any other view.\rdblquote With his substance, his life, his divine-human nature thus communicated to the soul come his merit, his holiness, his power, his glory. These are predicates of the nature which becomes ours, constituting our personal life and character. Even the resurrection is to be effected, not by the power of Christ operating \ldblquote\lang1142 ab extra\lang1033 ,\rdblquote as when He raised Lazarus from the dead, but by \ldblquote a new divine element, introduced into our nature by the incarnation.\rdblquote\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\f1\fs16 204\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Objections to these Theories.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 In opposition to these views it may be said very briefly in the way of recapitulation of what has been more fully said in the chapters above referred to, \emdash\par 1. That this is a philosophy. The scheme has its entire basis in a philosophical theory as to the nature of man and his relation to God. This is undeniable, and is hardly denied. Dr. Nevin states three \ldblquote scientific principles,\rdblquote ignorance of which led the Reformers to a misapprehension and imperfect representation of Christianity, and the recognition of which and of their application to theology, enables the modern theologian to set forth the nature and plan of salvation in a much more satisfactory light. Those principles are, (1.) The true import of organic law. The Reformers did not make a clear distinction, he says, \ldblquote between the idea of the organic law which constitutes the proper identity of a human body, and the material volume it is found to embrace as exhibited to the senses.\rdblquote There may be, therefore, a real communication of Christ and even of his body to his people without a communication of his flesh. (2.) The absolute unity involved in personality. In the case of Christ, body, soul, and divinity are united in \ldblquote a single indivisible life,\rdblquote so that where the one is, all are. To communicate Christ to the soul is therefore to communicate that indivisible life, including in it as an organizing, organic principle, body, soul, and divinity. (3.) The distinction between individual and generic life. \ldblquote In every sphere of life,\rdblquote it is said, \ldblquote the individual and the general are found closely united in the same subject.\rdblquote The acorn, in one view, is only a single existence; but it includes the force of a life capable of reaching far beyond itself. The life of a forest of oaks is only the expansion of the life of the original acorn, \ldblquote and the whole general existence thus produced is bound together, inwardly and organically, by as true and close a unity as that which holds in any of the single existences embraced in it, separately considered.\rdblquote Thus also Adam, in one view, was a man; in another, he was the man. A whole world of separate personalities lay involved in his life, as a generic principle or root. \ldblquote Adam lives in his posterity as truly as he has ever lived in his own person.\rdblquote In like manner, although in a higher form, the life of Christ is to be viewed under the same twofold aspect In one view the Saviour was a man; but in another, He was the man, \ldblquote the Son of man, in whose person stood revealed the true\cf2\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 idea of humanity, under its ultimate and most comprehensive form. Without any loss or change of character in the first view, his life is carried over in this last view continually into the persons of his people. He lives in Himself, and yet lives in their really and truly at the same time.\rdblquote As we participate in Adam\rquote s whole nature, soul and body, so the people of Christ participate in his whole nature, body, soul, and divinity. These are one indivisible life; and that one theanthropic life is communicated to believers and constitutes them Christians. In this is included all their participation in the righteousness, merit, and glory of their Redeemer.\par Behind and under these three scientific principles there is another without which the three mentioned amount to nothing; namely, the unity of God and man. Man in his highest form; the ideal or perfect man; He in whom the idea of humanity is fully realized, is God. What does it amount to, if we admit that \ldblquote organic law\rdblquote constitutes identity, as in the case of man; or that personality includes the idea of \ldblquote one indivisible life;\rdblquote that in man there is not one life of the body and another of the soul, that these are only different manifestations of one and the same life; that the soul can no more be without the body than the body without the soul; and that in Christ there is not one life of the divinity and another of his humanity? Suppose we deny what the Church in all ages has affirmed, that there are two \cf3\f3\u7952?\f2\'ed\f3\u8051?\f2\'f1\'e3\'e5\'e9\'e1\'e9\cf0\f0 in Christ, what does this amount to? Or what does it avail to admit the realistic doctrine of a generic life; if that life (one and indivisible) be merely human, Adamic? How can it redeem us? It is only on the assumption that the human and the divine are one, that this unity, fully realized in Christ, constitutes the \ldblquote one indivisible life\rdblquote which passes over to us; that it has any redeeming power; and that it exalts man from his degradation, and brings him back to conscious as well as real unity with God.\par This theory as presented by Schleiermacher, its author in modern times, was undeniably pantheistic; as held by many of his disciples, it is, in their apprehension, theistic. In either form the leading idea of the identity of God and man is retained. Christ is the ideal man. In Him the idea of humanity is fully realized. and therefore He is God. The manifestation of God in the form of man, belongs to the divine nature. The incarnation is entirely independent of the fall of man; or, admitting that the failure of the race to reach its true ideal in the first instance was the occasion of a new, special, and supernatural intervention, yet the whole end of that intervention was to realize the original idea of humanity as God made flesh.\par The watchword of this whole system is, in the language of Dr. Ullmann, \ldblquote The life of Christ is Christianity;\rdblquote \i i.e\i0 ., the one indivisible life of Christ; the life of God in the form of humanity. And that life as communicated to men brings them to this real, substantial life union with God. \ldblquote What,\rdblquote asks Dr. Ullmann, \ldblquote is that in the personality of Christ by which He is constituted a perfect Saviour in the way of atonement and redemption? We reply generally, his own substantial nature, at once human and divine; his life filled with all the attributes of God, and representing at the same time the highest conception of nature and man; complete and self-sufficient in its own fulness, and yet by this fulness itself the free principle of a new corresponding life-process, in the way of self-communication, for the human world. This life itself, however, has again its central heart, to which especially we must look for the peculiar being of Christ. Here the whole theology of the present time, in all its different tendencies, may be said to have but one voice. That which constitutes the special being of Christ, makes Him to be what He is and gives Him thus his highest significance for the world, is the absolute unity of the divine and human in his nature. Deity and manhood in Him come fully together and are made one. This is the last ground of Christianity. Here above all we are to look for its distinctive character.\rdblquote He goes on to show that on this point all are agreed. God and man are one. The difference is between the pantheistic and the Christian view which acknowledges a personal God and a positive revelation. \ldblquote For the whole apprehension of Christianity, we may say, not only that much, but that all depends on the question, which of these views shall be adopted; whether this central fact shall be regarded as a general \lquote unity of the divine and human\rquote realizing itself in the consciousness of the race as such, or be conceived of as a concrete \lquote union of God and man,\rquote that actualizes itself from a definite point and only under certain moral conditions.\rdblquote That is, whether God is incarnate in the race or in the Church. According to the latter view, the life of Christ, his human life, \ldblquote filled with all the attributes of God,\rdblquote passes over to his people, by a process of natural\cf2\f1\fs16 7\cf0\f0\fs24 development. As we are fallen men by partaking of the nature or generic life of Adam, we are God-men, and therefore redeemed by partaking of the divine human nature or generic life of Christ.\par That the oneness of God and man is the ultimate principle on which this \cf3\f3\u7957?\f2\'f4\'e5\'f1\'ef\'ed\f4 \f2\'e5\f3\u8016?\f2\'e1\'e3\'e3\f3\u8051?\f2\'eb\'e9\'ef\'ed\cf0\f0 rests, is obvious not only from the general character of the philosophy from which it is derived, but also from the fact that everything is made to depend upon the life of Christ becoming the life of his people, not by his controlling their life by his Spirit dwelling in them, but by a substantial union and identification of their life with his, of them with Him. We can measurably understand what is meant by life, by organic life, by a life principle or force which develops itself, and communicates and transmits itself in a given form. We know what is meant when it is said that the life of the acorn is developed into an oak, and communicated to other acorns, and thus to other oaks in endless succession and boundless multiplication. But here the essential idea is the unity and sameness of the life transmitted. You cannot combine the \ldblquote organic law,\rdblquote or life, of the apple with that of the acorn, so that the life transmitted should be \ldblquote an acorn-apple-life.\rdblquote Much less can you combine the organic life principle of an animal with that of the acorn, so as to produce an \ldblquote acorn-bovine,\rdblquote or, \ldblquote an acorn-equine life.\rdblquote Least of all can you combine the intellectual life of man with that of the oak, so as to have a \ldblquote human-oak-life.\rdblquote Therefore if the life of God and the life of man be so combined as to constitute one life and that a divine-human life, then God and man must be one; \i i.e\i0 ., one substance, one life differently manifested. Those who press the modern doctrine of the correlation of forces to the extreme of making thought and gravity identical, may accept these conclusions. With them the universe and all it contains, all its physical, mental, \'e6sthetic, moral, and religious phenomena are to be referred to one and the same force variously modified. The same force modified by the brain produces all the phenomena of mind; as modified by animal tissues, all the phenomena of animal life; and as modified by vegetable organisms all the phenomena of vegetable life, \emdash a theory which has been annihilated as by a bolt from heaven by the single question. Where is the brain which elaborated the mind, which framed the universe?\par It may indeed be said, and is said by modern theologians, that God became man, and therefore man may become God. God and man, they say, were so united as to become one nature or life in the person of Christ. But this is contrary to Scripture\cf2\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 and to the faith of the Church universal. There is not a historical Church on earth, and never has been, whose creed does not teach that in the person of Christ two distinct natures or substances are united, that He was born, not merely \ldblquote\lang1142 per\lang1033 ,\rdblquote but \ldblquote\lang1142 ex matre sua Maria\lang1033 ,\rdblquote of her substance; that He is as man consubstantial with men, as God consubstantial with the Father; or as the Apostle expresses it, \cf3\f2\'ea\'e1\'f4\f3\u8048?\f4 \f2\'f3\'e1\'f1\'ea\f3\u8049?\cf0\f0 , He is the son of David, \cf3\f2\'ea\'e1\'f4\f3\u8048?\f4 \f2\'f0\'ed\'e5\f3\u8166?\f2\'ec\'e1\cf0\f0 the Son of God. Humanity and divinity in Him are no more identified or reduced to one life, than soul and body in man are identified or reduced to one life.\par This whole modern theory of the Gospel rests, therefore, ultimately on the idea of the identity of God and man; that man is a \ldblquote\lang1142 modus existendi\lang1033\rdblquote of God.\par The grand objection to this scheme is that it is a philosophy. It is a product of the human mind. It is the wisdom of the world. It is the recent philosophy of the speculative school of Germany, clothed in Biblical forms and phrases. The reason why the Reformers did not present the plan of salvation in this form, is declared to be that they were ignorant of modern philosophy. It is because Hegel thought that the Gospel admitted of being cast into the mould of his philosophy that he pronounced Christianity to be the absolute religion. All, therefore, that the Bible says of the \ldblquote wisdom of the wise,\rdblquote \ldblquote of the wisdom of men,\rdblquote of \ldblquote the wisdom of the world,\rdblquote of \ldblquote philosophy as a vain deceit,\rdblquote applies, and was intended to apply to this scheme and to all of like nature. \ldblquote To the poor the gospel is preached.\rdblquote The Gospel is designed for babes and sucklings. He that runs may read and understand it. This system not one man in ten thousand can understand.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i These Theories Unscriptural.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 2. The second great objection to this scheme is that it is unscriptural. The Bible tells us that Christ saves us as a priest. This a child can understand. He knows that a priest takes the place of those for whom he acts; that he approaches God in their behalf; that he makes expiation for sin; that he does what satisfies the demands of God\rquote s justice against the sinner, so that He can be just and yet justify the ungodly. He knows that a priest saves, not by what he does in us, not by imparting his life to us, but by what he does for us; by an objective, and not by a subjective work. What there is of an inward work, and that is much and absolutely necessary, is not the work of a priest, under which aspect the work of Christ is so prominently presented in the Scriptures. Again, Christ saves us as a sacrifice; but a sacrifice is a substitute; it bears the sins of the offender; dies in his stead, and by its vicarious death delivers the offerer from the penalty which he had incurred. A sacrifice is not a symbol of an inward conflict between good and evil; its proximate design is not to effect a subjective change in the sinner; it does not produce or communicate a new principle of life, much less its own generic life to the offerer by which his real redemption is effected.\par In like manner the Bible teaches that Christ gave Himself as a ransom for many. But a ransom is a price paid. Those delivered by it are bought. They are delivered by purchase. A ransom meets and satisfies the claims of a third party. This is its essential idea, and cannot be omitted without rejecting the very truth, which the Scriptures, in the use of the term, design to teach. This again is an objective work. It is something which the person redeemed neither does, nor inwardly experiences; but which is done for him and without him and not in him.\par Moreover, the whole idea of redemption, the primary truth taught in setting forth Christ as a Redeemer, is that He delivers his people not by power, not by instruction, not by moral influence, not by any subjective change wrought in them, and not by any new form of life imparted to them, but by purchase. This is the signification and the meaning of the word. The words \cf3\f3\u7936?\f2\'f0\'ef\'eb\f3\u8059?\f2\'f4\'f1\'f9\'f3\'e9\'f2\f4 , \f2\'eb\'f5\'f4\'f1\'ef\f3\u8166?\f2\'ed\f4 , \f3\u7936?\f2\'e3\'ef\'f1\f3\u8049?\f2\'e6\'e5\'e9\'ed\f4 , \f3\u7952?\f2\'ee\'e1\'e3\'ef\'f1\f3\u8049?\f2\'e6\'e5\'e9\'ed\cf0\f0 , are never used in Scripture in reference to the work of Christ in any other sense than that of deliverance by purchase or payment of a ransom; and to substitute any other mode of deliverance, is to put man\rquote s thoughts in the place of God\rquote s truth; it is to substitute the human for the divine; the worthless for the priceless.\par Moreover, Christ is constantly represented as a rock, a refuge, a hiding place. The duty required of sinners is trust; relying on Him and his work, as something out of themselves on which to place their hope toward God.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i These Theories lead Men to trust to themselves.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 3. This introduces the third great objection to this scheme. It makes redemption subjective. It is what we are; what we become; it is the Christ within us; the new heart, the new nature, the new life, the divine-human life of Christ, or whatever else it may be called, which is at once the ground of our justification and the source of sanctification. This is utterly inconsistent with\cf2\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 the Bible, and with the experience of the people of God in all ages and under all dispensations. In no instance are believers represented as trusting to what is within them, but to what is without them. The Protestant doctrine, as we have seen, makes full provision for an inward work of deliverance from the power of sin, as well as for redemption from the curse of the law; for sanctification as well as for justification. But it does not confound the two, neither does it refer either or both to the new principle of life, the new seed or leaven implanted or inserted which works as \ldblquote an organic law,\rdblquote and by a regular process of development, as natural as the operation of any other law. The whole work of the Spirit is ignored in this new theory of redemption. What in the Bible is referred to the Spirit of God is, by the theologians of this class, referred to the \ldblquote divine-human\rdblquote nature of Christ. The latter, and not the former, is the proximate and efficient source of holiness of heart and life. \ldblquote Christ,\rdblquote says Dr. Nevin, \ldblquote does dwell in us, by his Spirit; but only as his Spirit constitutes the very form and power of his own presence as the incarnate and everlasting Word.\rdblquote That is, the Spirit is the power of the incarnate Word, \i i.e\i0 ., of the divine-human life of Christ. \ldblquote The life,\rdblquote he adds, \ldblquote thus wrought in our souls by his agency, is not a production out of nothing, but the very life of Jesus Himself organically continued in this way over into our persons.\rdblquote \ldblquote It is with the mediatorial life of Christ that the Christian salvation, in the form now contemplated, is concerned. In this is comprehended the entire new creation revealed by the Gospel; the righteousness of Christ, and all the benefits He has procured for his people. But the mediatorial life, by the communication of which only all this grace is made to pass over to men, is one and undivided;\rdblquote and this life, as he goes on to show, includes his body, soul, and divinity. To the same effect, it is said, \ldblquote That the whole spiritual life of the Christian, including the resurrection of his body, is thus organically connected with the mediatorial life of the Lord Jesus, might seem to be too plainly taught in the New Testament to admit of any question; and yet we find many slow to allow the mystery, notwithstanding. A very common view appears to be, that the whole salvation of the Gospel is accomplished in a more or less outward and mechanical way, by supernatural might and power, rather than by the Spirit of the Lord as a revelation of a new historical life in the person of the believer Himself. So we have an outward\cf2\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 imputation of righteousness to begin with; a process of sanctification carried forward by the help of proper spiritual machinery brought to bear on the soul, including perhaps, as its basis, the notion of an abrupt creation \lquote\lang1142 de novo\lang1033 ,\rquote by the fiat of the Holy Ghost; and finally, to crown all, a sudden unprepared refabrication of the body, to be superadded to the life of the spirit already complete in its state of glory.\rdblquote The doctrines of justification by the imputation of the righteousness of Christ; of the regeneration and sanctification of the soul by the supernatural power of the Spirit, and the resurrection of the body by the power of God at the last day, are rejected and despised; and the doctrine substituted for them is, that the divine-human life of Christ, as a new organic law, develops itself in the Church, just as the life of the acorn develops itself in the oak and in the forest, by a natural, historical process, so that the members of the Church, in virtue of their participation of this life, are justified and sanctified, and their bodies (since the life of Christ is a human life actualizing itself outwardly in a body as well as inwardly in a soul), ultimately raised from the dead, are fashioned after the glorious body of Christ. The resurrection of the body is as much a natural process as the development of a seed into a flower, or of a grub into a butterfly. This is Dr. Nevin\rquote s own illustration: \ldblquote The birth of the butterfly, as it mounts in the air on wings of light, is comparatively sudden, too; but this is the revelation only of a life which had been gradually formed for this efflorescence before, under cover of the vile, unsightly larve.\rdblquote \ldblquote The new creation,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote is indeed supernatural; but as such it is strictly conformable to the general order and constitution of life. It is a new creation in Christ Jesus, not by Him in the way of mere outward power. The subjects of it are saved, only by being brought within the sphere of his life, as a regular, historical, divine-human process, in the Church. The new nature implanted in them at their regeneration, is not a higher order of existence framed for them at the moment out of nothing by the fiat of God, but truly and strictly a continuation of Christ\rquote s life over in their persons.\rdblquote\par This is the modern view of Christianity introduced by Schleiermacher, modified more or less by his disciples, and which has passed over into England and into this country. Humanity as revealed in Adam as a generic life was too feeble. Its development failed and would have ever failed to reach the ideal.\cf2\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 Therefore God interposed and interrupted the process of natural development by the production of a new ideal man containing in himself a generic life, a seed, a principle, an organic law, which develops itself in the Church by a historical process, just as the life of Adam developed itself in his posterity. We, therefore, are justified, not by what Christ did, but by his life in us, which is as truly and properly our life, as the life we derived from Adam is our own life. We must stand before God to be justified or condemned, accepted or rejected, on the ground of what we are. We have nothing to offer but our own subjective, inherent character such as it is. The man is to be pitied who dares to do this. It is surely better to agree with Paul, who renounced his own righteousness, his own goodness, everything pertaining to himself, everything subjective, and trusted only and confidently to the righteousness of Christ received by faith.\par \pard\cf5\f5\fs23\par } d)-1.17.11. Modern Views on Justification{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\froman\fcharset0 Gentium;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} ]t0 Gentium;}{\f6\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~2. \i Justification is a Forensic Act.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 By this the Reformers intended, in the first place, to deny the Romish doctrine of subjective justification. That is, that justification consists in an act or agency of God making the sinner subjectively holy. Romanists confound or unite justification and sanctification. They define justification as \ldblquote the remission of sin and infusion of new habits of grace.\rdblquote By remission of sin they mean not simply pardon, but the removal of everything of the nature of sin from the soul. Justification, therefore, with them, is\cf1\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 purely subjective, consisting in the destruction of sin and the infusion of holiness. In opposition to this doctrine, the Reformers maintained that by justification the Scriptures mean something different from sanctification. That the two gifts, although inseparable, are distinct, and that justification, instead of being an efficient act changing the inward character of the sinner, is a declarative act, announcing and determining his relation to the law and justice of God.\par In the second place, the Symbols of the Reformation no less explicitly teach that justification is not simply pardon and restoration. It includes pardon, but it also includes a declaration that the believer is just or righteous in the sight of the law. He has a right to plead a righteousness which completely satisfies its demands.\par And, therefore, in the third place, affirmatively, those Symbols teach that justification is a judicial or forensic act, \i i.e\i0 ., an act of God as judge proceeding according to law, declaring that the sinner is just, \i i.e\i0 ., that the law no longer condemns him, but acquits and pronounces him to be entitled to eternal life.\par Here, as so often in other cases, the ambiguity of words is apt to create embarrassment. The Greek word \cf2\f2\'e4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 and the English word \i righteous\i0 , have two distinct senses. They sometimes express moral character. When we say that God is righteous, we mean that He is right. He is free from any moral imperfection. So when we say that a man is righteous, we generally mean that he is upright and honest; that he is and does what he ought to be and do. In this sense the word expresses the relation which a man sustains to the rule of moral conduct. At other times, however, these words express, not moral character, but the relation which a man sustains to justice. In this sense a man is just with regard to whom justice is satisfied; or, against whom justice has no demands. The lexicons, therefore, tell us that \cf2\f2\'e4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 sometimes means, \lang1142\i leges observans\lang1033\i0 ; at others \lang1142\i insons\lang1033\i0 ,\lang1142\i culpa vacans\lang1033\i0 (free from guilt or obligation to punishment) \emdash \lang1142\i judicio Dei insons\lang1033\i0 . Pilate (\cf3\ul Mat_27:24\cf0\ulnone ) said, \ldblquote I am innocent of the blood of this just person;\rdblquote \i i.e\i0 ., of this person who is tree from guilt; free from anything which justifies his condemnation to death. \ldblquote Christ, also,\rdblquote says the Apostle, \ldblquote hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust;\rdblquote the innocent for the guilty. See \cf3\ul Rom_2:18\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Rom_6:19\cf0\ulnone . \ldblquote As by one man\rquote s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.\rdblquote \ldblquote As the predicate of \lang1142\i judicandus\lang1033\i0 in his relation to the\cf1\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 judge, \lquote righteousness\rquote expresses, not a positive virtue, but a judicial negative freedom from \lang1142\i reatus\lang1033\i0 . In the presence of his judge, he is \lang1037\f4\rtlch\fs27\'f6\'c7\'f8\'cc\'c4\'e9\'f7\lang1033\f0\ltrch\fs24 who stands free from guilt and desert of punishment (\lang1031 straflos\lang1033 ), either because he has contracted no guilt (as, \i e.g\i0 ., Christ), or, because in the way demanded by the Judge (under the Old Testament by expiatory sacrifice) he has expiated the guilt contracted.\rdblquote If, therefore, we take the word righteous in the former of the two senses above mentioned, when it expresses moral character, it would be a contradiction to say that God pronounces the sinner righteous. This would be equivalent to saying that God pronounces the sinner to be not a sinner, the wicked to be good, the unholy to be holy. But if we take the word in the sense in which the Scriptures so often use it, as expressing relation to justice, then when God pronounces the sinner righteous or just, He simply declares that his guilt is expiated, that justice is satisfied, that He has the righteousness which justice demands. This is precisely what Paul says, when he says that God \ldblquote justifieth the ungodly.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Rom_4:5\cf0\ulnone .) God does not pronounce the ungodly to be godly; He declares that notwithstanding his personal sinfulness and unworthiness, he is accepted as righteous on the ground of what Christ has done for him.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Proof of the Doctrine just stated.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 That to justify means neither simply to pardon, nor to make inherently righteous or good is proved, \emdash\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i From the Usage of Scripture.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 1. By the uniform usage of the word to \i justify\i0 in Scripture it is never used in either of those senses, but always to declare or pronounce just. It is unnecessary to cite passages in proof of a usage which is uniform. The few following examples are enough. \cf3\ul Deu_25:1\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote If there be a controversy between men, and they come unto judgment, that the judges may judge them; then they shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Exo_23:7\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote I will not justify the wicked.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Isa_5:23\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote Which justify the wicked for reward.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Pro_17:15\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote He that justifieth the wicked\rdblquote is \ldblquote abomination to the Lord.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Luk_10:29\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote He willing to justify himself.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Luk_16:15\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote Ye are they which justify yourselves before men.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Mat_11:19\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote Wisdom is justified\cf1\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 of her children.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Gal_2:16\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote A man is not justified by the works of the law,\rdblquote v. 6, \ldblquote Whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace.\rdblquote Thus men are said to justify God. \cf3\ul Job_32:2\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote Because he justified himself, rather than God.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Psa_51:4\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote That thou mightest be justified when thou speakest.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Luk_7:29\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote All the people that heard him, and the publicans, justified God.\rdblquote The only passage in the New Testament where the word \cf2\f2\'e4\'e9\'ea\'e1\'e9\f3\u8057?\f2\'f9\cf0\f0 is used in a different sense is \cf3\ul Rev_22:11-6\cf0\ulnone , \cf2\f3\u8001?\f5 \f2\'e4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\f5 , \f2\'e4\'e9\'ea\'e1\'e9\'f9\'e8\f3\u8053?\f2\'f4\'f9\f5 \f3\u7956?\f2\'f4\'e9\cf0\f0 , \ldblquote He that is righteous, let him be righteous still.\rdblquote Here the first aorist passive appears to be used in a middle sense, \lquote Let him show himself righteous, or continue righteous.\rquote Even if the reading in this passage were undoubted, this single case would have no force against the established usage of the word. The reading, however, is not merely doubtful, but it is, in the judgment of the majority of the critical editors, Tischendorf among the rest, incorrect. They give, as the true text, \cf2\f2\'e4\'e9\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f3\f3\u8059?\f2\'ed\'e7\'ed\f5 \f2\'f0\'ef\'e9\'e7\'f3\f3\u8049?\f2\'f4\'f9\f5 \f3\u7956?\f2\'f4\'e9\cf0\f0 . Even if this latter reading be, as De Wette thinks, a gloss, it shows that \cf2\f3\u8001?\f5 \f2\'e4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\f5 \f2\'e4\'e9\'ea\'e1\'e9\'f9\'e8\f3\u8053?\f2\'f4\'f9\f5 \f3\u7956?\f2\'f4\'e9\cf0\f0 was as intolerable to a Greek ear as the expression, \lquote He that is righteous, let him justify himself still,\rquote would be to us.\par The usage of common life as to this word is just as uniform as that of the Bible. It would be a perfect solecism to say of a criminal whom the executive had pardoned, that he was justified, or that a reformed drunkard or thief was justified. The word always expresses a judgment, whether of the mind, as when one man justifies another for his conduct, or officially of a judge. If such be the established meaning of the word, it ought to settle all controversy as to the nature of justification. We are bound to take the words of Scripture in their true established sense. And, therefore, when the Bible says, \ldblquote God justifies the believer,\rdblquote we are not at liberty to say that it means that He pardons, or that He sanctifies him. It means, and can mean only that He pronounces him just.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Justification the Opposite of Condemnation.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 2. This is still further evident from the antithesis between condemnation and justification. Condemnation is not the opposite either of pardon or of reformation. To condemn is to pronounce guilty; or worthy of punishment. To justify is to declare not guilty; or that justice does not demand punishment; or that the person concerned cannot justly be condemned. When, therefore, the Apostle says (\cf3\ul Rom_1:1\cf0\ulnone ), \ldblquote There is therefore, now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus,\rdblquote he declares that they are absolved from guilt; that the penalty of the law cannot justly be inflicted upon them. \ldblquote Who,\rdblquote he asks, \ldblquote shall lay anything to the charge of God\rquote s elect? God who justifieth? Who is he that condemneth? Christ who died?\rdblquote (vers. 33, 34.) Against the elect in Christ no ground of condemnation can be presented. God pronounces them just, and therefore no one can pronounce them guilty.\par This passage is certainly decisive against the doctrine of subjective justification in any form. This opposition between condemnation and justification is familiar both in Scripture and in common life. \cf3\ul Job_19:20\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote If I justify myself, mine own mouth shall condemn me.\rdblquote \cf3\ul Job_34:17\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote And wilt thou condemn him that is most just.\rdblquote If to condemn does not mean to make wicked, to justify does not mean to make good. And if condemnation is a judicial, as opposed to an executive act, so is justification. In condemnation it is a judge who pronounces sentence on the guilty. In justification it is a judge who pronounces or who declares the person arraigned free from guilt and entitled to be treated as righteous.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Argument from Equivalent Forms of Expression.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 3. The forms of expression which are used as equivalents of the word \ldblquote justify\rdblquote clearly determine the nature of the act. Thus Paul speaks of \ldblquote the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Rom_4:6\cf0\ulnone .) To impute righteousness is not to pardon; neither is it to sanctify. It means to justify, \i i.e\i0 ., to attribute righteousness. The negative form in which justification is described is equally significant. \ldblquote Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Rom_4:7-8\cf0\ulnone .) As \ldblquote to impute sin\rdblquote never means and cannot mean to make wicked; so the negative statement \ldblquote not to impute sin cannot mean to sanctify. And as \ldblquote to impute sin\rdblquote does mean to lay sin to one\rquote s account and to treat him accordingly; so to justify means to lay righteousness to one\rquote s account and treat him accordingly. \ldblquote God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Joh_3:17-18\cf0\ulnone .)\par For \ldblquote as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to\cf1\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Rom_5:18\cf0\ulnone .) It was \cf2\f2\'ea\'f1\f3\u8150?\f2\'ec\'e1\cf0\f0 , a judicial sentence, which came on men for the offence of Adam, and it is a judicial sentence (justification, a \cf2\f2\'e4\'e9\'ea\'e1\f3\u8055?\f2\'f9\'f3\'e9\'f2\cf0\f0 ) which comes for the righteousness of Christ, or, as is said in ver. 16 of the same chapter, it was a \cf2\f2\'ea\'f1\f3\u8150?\f2\'ec\'e1\f5 \f2\'e5\f3\u7984?\f2\'f2\f5 \f2\'ea\'e1\'f4\f3\u8049?\f2\'ea\'f1\'e9\'ec\'e1\cf0\f0 , a condemnatory sentence that came for one offence; and \cf2\f2\'f7\f3\u8049?\f2\'f1\'e9\'f3\'ec\'e1\f5 \f2\'e5\f3\u7984?\f2\'f2\f5 \f2\'e4\'e9\'ea\'e1\f3\u8055?\f2\'f9\'ec\'e1\cf0\f0 , a sentence of gratuitous justification from many offences. Language cannot be plainer. If a sentence of condemnation is a judicial act, then justification is a judicial act.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Argument from the Statement of the Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 4. The judicial character of justification is involved in the mode in which the doctrine is presented in the Bible. The Scriptures speak of law, of its demands, of its penalty, of sinner. as arraigned at the bar of God, of the day of judgment. The question is, How shall man be just with God? The answer to this question determines the whole method of salvation. The question is not, How a man can become holy? but, How can he become just? How can he satisfy the claims which justice has against him? It is obvious that if there is no such attribute as justice in God; if what we call justice is only benevolence, then there is no pertinency in this question. Man is not required to be just in order to be saved. There are no claims of justice to be satisfied. Repentance is all that need be rendered as the condition of restoration to the favour of God. Or, any didactic declaration or exhibition of God\rquote s disapprobation of sin, would open the way for the safe pardon of sinners. Or, if the demands of justice were easily satisfied; if partial, imperfect obedience and fatherly chastisements, or self-inflicted penances, would suffice to satisfy its claims, then the sinner need not be just with God in order to be saved. But the human soul knows intuitively that these are refugee of lies. It knows that there is such an attribute as justice. It knows that the demands thereof are inexorable because they are righteous. It knows that it cannot be saved unless it be justified, and it knows that it cannot be declared just unless the demands of justice are fully satisfied. Low views of the evil of sin and of the justice of God lie at the foundation of all false views of this great doctrine.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i The Apostle\rquote s Argument in the Epistle to the Romans.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The Apostle begins the discussion of this subject by assuming\cf1\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 that the justice of God, his purpose to punish all sin, to demand perfect conformity to his law, is revealed from heaven, \i i.e\i0 ., so revealed that no man, whether Jew or Gentile, can deny it. (\cf3\ul Rom_1:18\cf0\ulnone .) Men, even the most degraded pagans, know the righteous judgment of God that those who sin are worthy of death, (ver. 32.) He next proves that all men are sinners, and, being sinners are under condemnation. The whole world is \ldblquote guilty before God.\rdblquote (iii. 19.) From this he infers, as intuitively certain (because plainly included in the premises), that no flesh living can be justified before God \ldblquote by the deeds of the law,\rdblquote \i i.e\i0 ., on the ground of his own character and conduct. If guilty he cannot be pronounced not guilty, or just. In Paul\rquote s argument, to justify is to pronounce just. \cf2\f2\'c4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 is the opposite of \cf2\f3\u8017?\f2\'f0\f3\u8057?\f2\'e4\'e9\'ea\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 (\i i.e\i0 ., \ldblquote\lang1142 reus, satisfactionem alteri debens\lang1033\rdblquote ). That is, righteous is the opposite of guilty. To pronounce guilty is to condemn. To pronounce righteous, \i i.e\i0 ., not guilty, is to justify. If a man denies the authority of Scripture; or if he feels at liberty, while holding what he considers the substance of Scripture doctrines, to reject the form, it is conceivable that he may deny that justification is a judicial act; but it seems impossible that any one should deny that it is so represented in the Bible. Some men professing to believe the Bible, deny that there is anything supernatural in the work of regeneration and sanctification. \lquote Being born of the Spirit;\rquote \lquote quickened by the mighty power of God;\rquote \lquote created anew in Christ Jesus,\rquote are only, they say, strong oriental expressions for a self-wrought reformation. By a similar process it is easy to get rid, not only of the doctrine of justification as a judicial act, but of all other distinguishing doctrines of the Scriptures. This, however, is not to interpret, but to pervert.\par The Apostle, having taught that God is just, \i i.e\i0 ., that He demands the satisfaction of justice, and that men are sinners and can render no such satisfaction themselves, announces that such a righteousness has been provided, and is revealed in the Gospel. It is not our own righteousness, which is of the law, but the righteousness of Christ, and, therefore, the righteousness of God, in virtue of which, and on the ground of which, God can be just and yet justify the sinner who believes in Christ. As long as the Bible stands this must stand as a simple statement of what Paul teaches as to the method of salvation. Men may dispute as to what he means, but this is surely what he says.\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\f1\fs16 125\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Argument from the Ground of Justification.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 5. The nature of justification is determined by its ground. This indeed is an anticipation of another part of the subject, but it is in point here. If the Bible teaches that the ground of justification, the reason why God remits to us the penalty of the law and accepts us as righteous in his sight, is something out of ourselves, something done for us, and not what we do or experience, then it of necessity follows that justification is not subjective. It does not consist in the infusion of righteousness, or in making the person justified personally holy. If the \ldblquote formal cause\rdblquote of our justification be our goodness; then we are justified for what we are. The Bible, however, teaches that no man living can be justified for what he is. He is condemned for what he is and for what he does. He is justified for what Christ has done for him.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Justification not mere Pardon.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 For the same reason justification cannot be mere pardon. Pardon does not proceed on the ground of a satisfaction. A prisoner delivered by a ransom is not pardoned. A debtor whose obligations have been cancelled by a friend, becomes entitled to freedom from the claims of his creditor. When a sovereign pardons a criminal, it is not an act of justice. It is not on the ground of satisfaction to the law. The Bible, therefore, is reaching that justification is on the ground of an atonement or satisfaction; that the sinner\rquote s guilt is expiated; that he is redeemed by the precious blood of Christ; and that judgment is pronounced upon him as righteous, does thereby teach that justification is neither pardon nor infusion of righteousness.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Argument from the Immutability of the Law.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 6. The doctrine that justification consists simply in pardon, and consequent restoration, assumes that the divine law is imperfect and mutable. In human governments it is often expedient and right that men justly condemned to suffer the penalty of the law should be pardoned. Human laws must be general. They cannot take in all the circumstances of each particular case. Their execution would often work hardship or injustice. Human judgments may therefore often be set aside. It is not so with the divine law. The law of the Lord is perfect. And being perfect it cannot be disregarded. It demands nothing which ought not to be demanded. It threatens nothing which ought not to be inflicted.\cf1\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 It is in fact its own executioner. Sin is death. (\cf3\ul Rom_7:6\cf0\ulnone .) The justice of God makes punishment as inseparable from sin, as life is from holiness. The penalty of the law is immutable, and as little capable of being set aside as the precept. Accordingly the Scriptures everywhere teach that in the justification of the sinner there is no relaxation of the penalty. There is no setting aside, or disregarding the demands of the law. We are delivered from the law, not by its abrogation, but by its execution. (\cf3\ul Gal_2:19\cf0\ulnone .) We are freed from the law by the body of Christ. (\cf3\ul Rom_7:4\cf0\ulnone .) Christ having taken our places bore our sins in his own body on the tree. (\cf3\ul 1Pe_2:24\cf0\ulnone .) The handwriting which was against us, he took out of the way, nailing it to his cross. (\cf3\ul Col_2:14\cf0\ulnone .) We are therefore not under the law, but under grace. (\cf3\ul Rom_6:14\cf0\ulnone .) Such representations are inconsistent with the theory which supposes that the law may be dispensed with; that the restoration of sinners to the favour and fellowship of God, requires no satisfaction to its demands; that the believer is pardoned and restored to fellowship with God, just as a thief or forger is pardoned and restored to his civil rights by the executive in human governments. This is against the Scriptures. God is just in justifying the sinner. He acts according to justice.\par It will be seen that everything in this discussion turns on the question, Whether there is such an attribute in God as justice? If justice be only \ldblquote benevolence guided by wisdom,\rdblquote then there is no justification. What evangelical Christians so regard, is only pardon or sanctification. But if God, as the Scriptures and conscience teach, be a just God, as immutable in his justice as in his goodness and truth, then there can be no remission of the penalty of sin except on the ground of expiation, and no justification except on the ground of the satisfaction of justice, and therefore justification must be a judicial act, and neither simply pardon nor the infusion of righteousness. These doctrines sustain each other. What the Bible teaches of the justice of God, proves that justification is a judicial declaration that justice is satisfied. And what the Bible teaches of the nature of justification, proves that justice in God is something more than benevolence. It is thus that all the great doctrines of the Bible are concatenated.\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\f1\fs16 127\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Argument from the Nature of our Union with Christ.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 7. The theory which reduces justification to pardon and its consequences, is inconsistent with what is revealed concerning our union with Christ. That union is mystical, supernatural, representative, and vital. We were in Him before the foundation of the world (\cf3\ul Eph_1:4\cf0\ulnone ); we are in Him as we were in Adam (\cf3\ul Rom_5:12-21\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul 1Co_15:22\cf0\ulnone ); we are in Him as the members of the body are in the head (\cf3\ul Eph_1:23\cf0\ulnone , \cf3\ul Eph_4:16\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul 1Co_12:12-27\cf0\ulnone , and often); we are in Him as the branches are in the vine (\cf3\ul Joh_15:1-12\cf0\ulnone ). We are in Him in such a sense that his death is our death, we were crucified with Him (\cf3\ul Gal_2:20\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Rom_6:1-8\cf0\ulnone ) ; we are so united with Him that we rose with Him, and sit with Him in heavenly places. (\cf3\ul Eph_2:1-6\cf0\ulnone .) In virtue of this union we are (in our measure) what He is. We are the sons of God in Him. And what He did, we did. His righteousness is our righteousness. His life is our life. His exaltation is our exaltation. Such is the pervading representation of the Scriptures. All this is overlooked by the advocates of the opposite theory. According to that view, Christ is no more united to his people, except in sentiment, than to other men. He has simply done what renders it consistent with the character of God and the interests of his kingdom, to pardon any and every man who repents and believes. His relation is purely external. He is not so united to his people that his merit becomes their merit and his life their life. Christ is not in them the hope of glory. (\cf3\ul Col_1:27\cf0\ulnone .) He is not of God made unto them wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. (\cf3\ul 1Co_1:30\cf0\ulnone .) They are not so in Him that, in virtue of that union, they are filled with all the fulness of God. (\cf3\ul Col_2:10\cf0\ulnone ; and \cf3\ul Eph_3:19\cf0\ulnone .) On the other hand, the Protestant doctrine of justification harmonizes with all these representations. If we are so united to Christ as to be made partakers of his life, we are also partakers of his righteousness. What He did in obeying and suffering He did for his people. One essential element of his redeeming work was to satisfy the demands of justice in their behalf, so that in Him and for his sake they are entitled to pardon and eternal life.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Arguments from the Effects ascribed to Justification.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 8. The consequences attributed to justification are inconsistent with the assumption that it consists either in pardon or in the infusion of righteousness. Those consequences are peace, reconciliation, \cf1\f1\fs16 128\cf0\f0\fs24 and a title to eternal life. \ldblquote Being justified by faith,\rdblquote says the Apostle, \ldblquote we have peace with God.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Rom_5:1\cf0\ulnone .) But pardon does not produce peace. It leaves the conscience unsatisfied. A pardoned criminal is not only just as much a criminal as he was before, but his sense of guilt and remorse of conscience are in no degree lessened. Pardon can remove only the outward and arbitrary penalty. The sting of sin remains. There can be no satisfaction to the mind until there is satisfaction of justice. Justification secures peace, not merely because it includes pardon, but because that pardon is dispensed on the ground of a full satisfaction of justice. What satisfies the justice of God, satisfies the conscience of the sinner. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin (\cf3\ul 1Jo_1:7\cf0\ulnone ) by removing guilt, and thus producing a peace which passes all understanding. When the soul sees that Christ bore his sins upon the cross, and endured the penalty which he had incurred; that all the demands of the law are fully satisfied; that God is more honoured in his pardon than in his condemnation; that all the ends of punishment are accomplished by the work of Christ, in a far higher degree than they could be by the death of the sinner; and that he has a right to plead the infinite merit of the Son of God at the bar of divine justice, then he is satisfied. Then he has peace. He is humble; he does not lose his sense of personal demerit, but the conscience ceases to demand satisfaction. Criminals have often been known to give themselves up to justice. They could not rest until they were punished. The infliction of the penalty incurred gave them peace. This is an element in Christian experience. The convinced sinner never finds peace until he lays his burden of sin on the Lamb of God; until he apprehends that his sins have been punished, as the Apostle says (\cf3\ul Rom_8:3\cf0\ulnone ), in Christ.\par Again, we are said to be reconciled to God by the death of his Son. (\cf3\ul Rom_5:10\cf0\ulnone .) But pardon does not produce reconciliation. A pardoned criminal may be restored to his civil rights, so far as the penalty remitted involved their forfeiture, but he is not reconciled to society. He is not restored to its favour. Justification, however, does secure a restoration to the favour and fellowship of God. We become the sons of God by faith in Jesus Christ. (\cf3\ul Gal_3:26\cf0\ulnone .) No one can read the eighth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans without being convinced that in Paul\rquote s apprehension a justified believer is something more than a pardoned criminal. He is a man whose salvation is secure because he is free from the law and all its demands; because the righteousness\cf1\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 of the law (\i i.e\i0 ., all its righteous requirements) has been fulfilled him; because thereby he is so united to Christ as to become a partaker of his life; because no one can lay anything to the charge of those for whom Christ died and whom God has justified; and because such believers being justified are revealed as the objects of the mysterious, immutable, and infinite love of God.\par Again, justification includes or conveys a title to eternal life. Pardon is purely negative. It simply removes a penalty. It confers no title to benefits not previously enjoyed. Eternal life, however, is suspended on the positive condition of perfect obedience. The merely pardoned sinner has no such obedience. He is destitute of what, by the immutable principles of the divine government, is the indispensable condition of eternal life. He has no title to the inheritance promised to the righteous. This is not the condition of the believer. The merit of Christ is entitled to the reward. And the believer, being partaker of that merit, shares in that title. This is constantly recognized in the Scriptures. By faith in Christ we become the sons of God. But sonship involves heirship, and heirship involves a title to the inheritance. \ldblquote If children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ.\rdblquote (Rom 8:17.) This is the doctrine taught in \cf3\ul Rom_5:12-21\cf0\ulnone . For the offence of one, judgment passed on all men to condemnation. For the righteousness of one, the sentence of justification of life has passed on all; that is, of a justification which entitles to life. As the sin of Adam was the judicial ground of our condemnation (\i i.e\i0 ., was the ground on which justice demanded condemnation), so the righteousness of Christ is the judicial ground of justification. That is, it is the ground on which the life promised to the righteous should in justice be granted to the believer. The Church in all ages has recognized this truth. Believers have always felt that they had a title to eternal life. For this they have praised God in the loftiest strains. They have ever regarded it as intuitively true that heaven must be merited The only question was, Whether that merit was in them or in Christ. Being in Christ, it was a free gift to them; and thus righteousness and peace kissed each other. Grace and justice unite in placing the crown of righteousness on the believer\rquote s head.\par It is no less certain that the consequences attributed to justification do not flow from the infusion of righteousness. The amount of holiness possessed by the believer does not give him peace. Even perfect holiness would not remove guilt. Repentance does not atone for the crime of murder. It does not still\cf1\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 the murderer\rquote s conscience; nor does it satisfy the sense of justice iu the public mind. It is the \cf2\f2\'f0\'f1\f3\u8182?\f2\'f4\'ef\'ed\f5 \f2\'f8\'e5\f3\u8166?\f2\'e4\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 of Romanism, and of every theory of subjective justification, that they make nothing of guilt, or reduce it to a minimum. If there were no guilt, then infusion of righteousness would be all that is necessary for salvation. But if there be justice in God then no amount of holiness can atone for sin, and justification cannot consist in making the sinner holy. Besides this, even admitting that the past could be ignored, that the guilt which burdens the soul could be overlooked or so easily removed, subjective righteousness, or holiness, is so imperfect that it could never give the believer peace. Let the holiest of men look within himself and say whether what he sees there satisfies his own conscience. If not, how can it satisfy God. He is greater than our hearts, and knoweth all things. No man, therefore, can have peace with God founded on what he is or on what he does. Romanists admit that nothing short of perfect holiness justifies or gives peace to the soul. In answer to the Protestant argument founded on that admission, Bellarmin says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Hoc argumentum, si quid probat, probat justitiam actualem non esse perfectam: non autem probat, justitiam habitualem, qua formaliter justi sumus,\~. non esse ita perfectam, ut absolute, simpliciter, et proprie justi nominemur, et simus. Non enim formaliter justi sumus opere nostro, sed opere Dei, qui simul maculas peccatorum tergit, et habitum fidei, spei, et caritatis infundit. Dei autem perfecta sunt opera.\~Unde parvuli baptizati, vere justi sunt, quamvis nihil operis fecerint.\lang1033\rdblquote Again, \ldblquote\lang1142 Justitia enim actualis, quamvis aliquo modo sit imperfecta, propter admixtionem venalium delictorum, et egeat quotidiana remissione peccati, tamen non propterea desinit esse vera justitia, et suo etiam quodam modo perfecta.\lang1033\rdblquote No provision is made in this system for guilt. If the soul is made holy by the infusion of habits, or principles, of grace, it is just in the sight of God. No guilt or desert of punishment remains. \ldblquote\lang1142 Reatus\lang1033 ,\rdblquote says Bellarmin,. \ldblquote\lang1142 est relatio\lang1033 ,\rdblquote but if the thing of which it is a relation be taken away, where is the relation. It is impossible that such a view of justification can give peace. It makes no provision for the satisfaction of justice, and places all our hopes upon what is within, which our conscience testifies cannot meet the just requirements of God.\par Neither can the theory of subjective justification account for reconciliation with God, and for the same reasons. What is infused, the degree of holiness imparted, does not render us the objects of divine complacency and love. His love to us is of the nature of grace; love for the unlovely. We are reconciled to God by the death of his Son. That removes the obstacle arising from justice to the outflow toward us of the mysterious, unmerited love of God. We are accepted in the be loved. We are not in ourselves fit for fellowship with God. And if driven to depend on what is within, on our subjective righteousness, instead of peace we should have despair.\par Again, justification according to the Scriptures gives a title to eternal life. For this our own righteousness is utterly inadequate. So far from anything in us being meritorious, or entitled to reward, the inward state and the exercises of the holiest of men, come so far short of perfection as to merit condemnation. In us the re is no good thing. When we would do good, evil is present with us. There is ever a law in our members warring against the law of the mind. Indwelling sin remains. It forced even Paul to cry out, \ldblquote O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death.\rdblquote (Rom. vii. 24.) \ldblquote\lang1142 Nullum unquam exstitisse pii hominis opus, quod, si severo Dei judicio examinaretur, non esset damnabile.\lang1033\rdblquote Ignoring this plain truth of Scripture and of Christi an experience expressing itself in daily and hourly confession, humiliation, and prayers for forgiveness, the doctrine of subjective justification assumes that there is no sin in the believer, or no sin which merits the condemnation of God, but on the contrary that there is in him what merits eternal life. The Romanists make a distinction between a first and second justification. The first they admit to be gratuitous, and to be founded on the merit of Christ, or rather, to be gratuitously bestowed for Chr ist\rquote s sake. This consists in the infusion of habitual grace (\i i.e\i0 ., regeneration). This justifies in rendering the soul subjectively just or holy. The second justification is not a matter of grace. It is founded on the merit of good works, the fruits of regeneration. But if these fruits are, as our consciousness testifies, deified by sin, how can they merit eternal life? How can they cancel the handwriting which is against us? How can they be the ground of Paul\rquote s confident challenge, \ ldblquote Who shall lay anything to the charge of God\rquote s elect?\rdblquote It is not what is within us, but what is without us; not what we are or do, but what Christ is and has done, that is the ground of confidence and of our title to eternal life. This is the admitted doctrine of the\cf1\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 Protestant Reformation. \ldblquote\lang1142 Apud theologos Augustan\'e6 confessionis extra controversiam positum est\lang1033 ,\rdblquote says the \ldblquote Form of Concord,\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 totam justitiam nostram extra nos, et extra omnium hominum merita, opera, virtutes atque dignitatem qu\'e6rendam, eamque in solo Domino nostro, Jesu Christo consistere.\lang1033\rdblquote As high as the heavens are above the earth, so high is a hope founded on the work of Christ for us, above a hope founded on the merit of anything wrought in us. Calvin teaches the same doctrine as Luther. He quotes Lombard as saying that our justification in Christ may be interpreted in two ways: \ldblquote\lang1142 Primum, mors Christi nos justificat, dum per eam excitatur caritas in cordibus nostris, qua justi efficimur: deinde quod per eandem exstinctum est peccatum; quo nos captivos distinebat diabolus, ut jam non habeat unde nos damnet.\lang1033\rdblquote To which Calvin replies, \ldblquote\lang1142 Scriptura autem, quem de fidei justitia loquitur, longe alio nos ducit: nempe ut ab intuitu operum nostrorum aversi, in Dei misericordiam ac Christi perfectionem, tantum respiciamus.\~Hic est fidei sensus, per quem peccator in possessionem venit su\'e6 salutis, dum ex Evangeli doctrina agnoscit Deo se reconciliatum: quod intercedente Christi justitia, impetrata peccatorum remissione, justificatus sit: et quanquam Spiritu Dei regeneratus, non in bonis operibus, quibus incumbit, sed sola Christi justitia repositam sibi perpetuam justitiam cogitat.\lang1033\rdblquote\par That justification is not merely pardon, and that it is not the infusion of righteousness whereby the sinner is made inherently just or holy, but a judgment on the part of God that the demands of the law in regard to the believer are satisfied, and that he has a right to a righteousness which entitles him to eternal life, has been argued, (1.) From the uniform usage of Scripture both in the Old and New Testament. (2.) From the constant opposition between justification and condemnation. (3.) From equivalent forms of expression. (4.) From the whole design and drift of the Apostle\rquote s argument in his Epistles to the Romans and to the Galatians. (5.) From the ground of justification, namely, the righteousness of Christ. (6.) From the immutability of the law and the justice of God. (7.) From the nature of our union with Christ. (8.) From the fact that peace, reconciliation with God, and a title to eternal life which according to Scripture, are the consequences of justification, do not flow either from mere pardon or from subjective righteousness, or from sanctification. That\cf1\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 this is the doctrine of Protestants, both Lutheran and Reformed, cannot with any show of reason be disputed.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Calvin\rquote s Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 It is true, indeed, that by the earlier Reformers, and especially by Calvin, justification is often said to consist in the pardon of sin. But that that was not intended as a denial of the judicial character of justification, or as excluding the imputation of the righteousness of Christ by which the believer is counted just in the sight of the law, is obvious, \emdash\par 1. From the nature of the controversy in which those Reformers were engaged. The question between them and the Romanists was, Does justification consist in the act of God making the sinner inherently just or holy? or, Does it express the judgment of God by which the believer is pronounced just. What Calvin denied was that justification is a making holy. What he affirmed was that it was delivering the believer from the condemnation of the law and introducing him into a state of favour with God. The Romanists expressed their doctrine by saying that justification consists in the remission of sin and the infusion of charity or righteousness. But by the remission of sin they meant the removal of sin; the putting off the old man. In other words, justification with them consisted (to use the scholastic language then in vogue) in the removal of the habits of sin and the infusion of habits of grace. In those justified, therefore, there was no sin, and, therefore, nothing to punish. Pardon, therefore, followed as a necessary consequence. It was a mere accessary. This view of the matter makes nothing of guilt; nothing of the demands of justice. Calvin therefore, insisted that besides the subjective renovation connected with the sinner\rquote s conversion, his justdication concerned the removal of guilt, the satisfaction of justice, which in the order of nature, although not of time, must precede the communication of the life of God to the soul. That Calvin did not differ from the other Reformers and the whole body of the Reformed Church on this subject appears from his own explicit declarations, and from the perfectly unambiguous statements of the Confessions to which he gave his assent. Thus he says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Porro ne impingamus in ipso limine (quod fieret si de re incognita disputationem ingrediremur) primum explicemus quid sibi velint ist\'e6 loquutiones, Hominem coram Deo justificari, Fide justificari, vel operibus. Justificari coram Deo dicitur qui judicio Dei et censetur justus, et acceptus est ob suam justitiam: siqui dem ut Deo abominabilis est iniquitas, ita nec peccator in ejus oculis potest invenire gratiam, quatenus est peccator, et quamdiu talis censetur. Proinde ubicunque peccatum est, illic etiam se profert ira et ultio Dei. Justificatur autem qui non loco peccatoris, sed justi habetur, eoque nomine consistit coram Dei tribunali, ubi peccatores omnes corruunt. Quemadmodum si reus innocens ad tribunal \'e6qui judicis adducatur, ubi secundum innocentiam ejus judicatum fuerit, justificatus apud judicem dicitur: sic apud Deum justificatur, qui numero peccatorum exemptus, Deum habet su\'e6 justiti\'e6 testem et assertorem. Justificari, ergo, operibus ea ratione dicetur, in cujus vita reperietur ea puritas ac sanctitas qu\'e6 testimonium justiti\'e6 apud Dei thronum mereatur: seu qui operum suorum integritate respondere et satisfacere illius judicio queat. Contra, justificabitur ille fide, qui operum justitia exclusus, Christi justitiam per fidem apprehendit, qua vestitus in Dei conspectu non ut peccator, sed tanquam justus apparet. Ita nos justificationem simpliciter interpretamur acceptionem, qua nos Deus in gratiam receptos pro justos habet. Eamque in peccatorum remissione ac justiti\'e6 Christi imputatione positam ease dicimus.\lang1033\rdblquote This passage is decisive as to the views of Calvin; for it is professedly a formal statement of the \ldblquote Status Questionis\rdblquote given with the utmost clearness and precision. Justification consists \ldblquote in the remission of sins and the imputation of the righteousness of Christ.\rdblquote \ldblquote He is justified in the sight of God, who is taken from the class of sinners, and has God for the witness and assertor of his righteousness.\rdblquote\cf5\f6\fs23\par } z5M1.17.2. Justification is a Forensic Act{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\froman\fprq2\fcharset177 Times New Roman;}{\f5\froman\fcharse\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~3.\i Works not the Ground of Justification.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 In reference to men since the fall the assertion is so explicit and so often repeated, that justification is not of works, that that proposition has never been called in question by any one professing to receive the Scriptures as the word of God. It being expressly asserted that the whole world is guilty before God, that by the works of the law no flesh living can be justified, the only question open for discussion is, What is meant by works of the law?\par To this question the following answers have been given, First, that by works of the law are meant works prescribed in the Jewish law. It is assumed that as Paul\rquote s controversy was with those who taught that unless men were circumcised and kept the law af Moses, they could not be saved (\cf1\ul Act_15:1-24\cf0\ulnone ), all he intended to teach was the reverse of that proposition. He is to be understood as saying that the observance of Jewish rites and ceremonies is not essential to salvation; that men are not made righteous or good by external ceremonial works, but by works morally good. This is the ground taken by Pelagians and b y most of the modern Rationalists. It is only a modification of this view that men are not justified, that is, that their character before God is not determined so much by their particular acts or works, as by their general disposition and controlling principles. To be justified by faith, therefore, is to be justified on the ground of our trust, or pious confidence in God and truth. Thus Wegscheider says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Homines non singulis quibusdam recte factis operibusque operatis, nec propter mer!itum quoddam iis attribuendum, sed sola vera fide, \i i.e\i0 ., animo ad Christi exemplum ejusdemque pr\'e6cepta composito et ad Deum et sanctissimum et benignissimum converso, ita, ut omnia cogitata et facta ad Deum ejusque voluntatem sanctissimam pie referant, Deo vere probantur et benevolenti\'e6 Dei confisi spe beatitatis futur\'e6 pro dignitate ipsorum morali iis concedend\'e6 certissima imbuuntur.\lang1033\rdblquote Steudlin, expresses the same view. \ldblquote All true reformation, every good act,"\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote must spring from faith, provided we understand by faith the conviction that something is right, a conviction of general moral and religious principles.\rdblquote Kant says that Christ in a religious aspect is the ideal of humanity. When a man so regards him and endeavours to conform his heart and life to that ideal, he is justified by faith. According to all these views, mere ceremonial works are excluded, and the ground of justification is made to be our own natural moral# character and conduct.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\i Romish Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Secondly. The doctrine of Romanists on this subject is much higher. Romanism retains the supernatural element of Christianity throughout. Indeed it is a matter of devout thankf$ulness to God that underneath the numerous grievous and destructive errors of the Romish Church, the great truths of the Gospel are preserved. The Trinity, the true divinity of Christ, the true doctrine concerning his person as God and man in two distinct natures and one person forever; salvation through his blood, regeneration and sanctification through the almighty power of the\cf3\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 Spirit, the resurrection of the body, and eternal life, are doctrines on which the people of God in t%hat communion live, and which have produced such saintly men as St. Bernard, F\'e9n\'e9lon, and doubtless thousands of others who are of the number of God\rquote s elect. Every true worshipper of Christ must in his heart recognize as a Christian brother, wherever he may be found, any one who loves, worships, and trusts the Lord Jesus Christ as God manifest in the flesh and the only Saviour of men. On the matter of justification the Romish theologians have marred and defaced the truth as they have almost a&ll other doctrines pertaining to the mode in which the merits of Christ are made available to our salvation. They admit, indeed, that there is no good in fallen man; that he can merit nothing and claim nothing on the ground of anything he is or can do of himself. He is by nature dead in sin; and until made partaker of a new life by the supernatural power of the Holy Ghost, he can do nothing but sin. For Christ\rquote s sake, and only through his merits, as a matter of grace, this new life is imparted to t'he soul in regeneration (\i i.e\i0 ., as Romanists teach, in baptism). As life expels death; as light banishes darkness, so the entrance of this new divine life into the soul expels sin (\i i.e\i0 ., sinful habits), and brings forth the fruits of righteousness. Works done after regeneration have real merit, \ldblquote\lang1142 meritum condigni\lang1033 ,\rdblquote and are the ground of the second justification the first justification consisting in making the soul inherently just by the infusion of righte(ousness. According to this view, we are not justified by works done before regeneration, but we are justified for gracious works, \i i.e\i0 ., for works which spring from the principle of divine life infused into the heart. The whole ground of our acceptance with God is thus made to be what we are and what we do.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\i Remonstrant Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\t)x916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Thirdly. According to the Remonstrants or Arminians the works which are excluded from our justification are works of the law as distinguished from works of the Gospel. In the covenant made with Adam God demanded perfect obedience as the condition of life. For Christ\rquote s sake, God in the Gospel has entered into a new covenant with men, promising them salvation on the condition of eva*ngelical obedience. This is expressed in different forms. Sometimes it is said that we are justified on account of faith. Faith is accepted in place of that perfect righteousness demanded by the Adamic law. But by faith is not meant the act of receiving and resting upon Christ alone for salvation. It is regarded\cf3\f1\fs16 7\cf0\f0\fs24 as a permanent and controlling state of mind. And therefore it is often said that we are justified by a \ldblquote\lang1142 fides obsequiosa\lang1033 ,\rdblquote an obed+ient faith; a faith which includes obedience. At other times, it is said that we are justified by evangelical obedience, i.e., that kind and measure of obedience which the Gospel requires, and which men since the fall, in the proper use of \ldblquote sufficient grace\rdblquote granted to all men, are able to render. Limborch says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Sciendum, quando dicimus, nos fide justificari, nos non excludere opera, qu\'e6 fides exigit et tanquam f\'9ccunda mater producit; sed ea includere.\lang103,3\rdblquote And again, \ldblquote\lang1142 Est itaque [fides] talis actus, qui, licet in se spectatus perfectus nequaquam sit, sed in multis deficiens, tamen a Deo, gratiosa et liberrima voluntate, pro pleno et perfecto acceptatur, et propter quem Deus homini gratiose remissionem peccatoram et vit\'e6 \'e6tern\'e6 premium conferre vult.\lang1033\rdblquote Again, God, he says, demands, \ldblquote\lang1142 obedientiam fidei, hoc est, non rigidam et ab omnibus \'e6qualem, prout exigebat lex; sed tantam, qu-antam fides, id est, certa de divinis promissionibus persuasio, in unoquoque efficere potest.\lang1033\rdblquote Therefore justification, he says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Est gratiosa \'e6stimatio, seu potius acceptatio justiti\'e6 nostr\'e6 imperfect\'e6 pro perfecta, propter Jesum Christum.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\i Protestant Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\t.x1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Fourthly. According to the doctrine of the Lutherans and Reformed, the works excluded from the ground of our justification are not only ritual or ceremonial works, nor merely works done before regeneration, nor the perfect obedience required by the law given to Adam, but works of all kinds, everything done by us or wrought in us. That this is the doctrine of the Bible is plain, \emdash\par 1./ Because the language of Scripture is unlimited. The declaration is, that we are not justified \ldblquote by works.\rdblquote No specific kind of works is designated to the exclusion of all others. But it is \ldblquote works;\rdblquote what we do; anything and everything we do. It is, therefore, without authority that any man limits these general declarations to any particular class of works.\par 2. The word law is used in a comprehensive sense. It includes all revelations of the will of God as the rul0e of man\rquote s obedience and, therefore, by \ldblquote works of the law\rdblquote must be intended all kinds of works. As \cf4\f2\'ed\f3\u8057?\f2\'ec\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 means that which binds, it is used for the law of nature, or the law written on the heart (\cf1\ul Rom_2:14\cf0\ulnone ),\cf3\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 for the Decalogne, for the law of Moses, for the whole of the Old Testament Scriptures. (\cf1\ul Rom_3:19\cf0\ulnone .) Sometimes one, and sometimes another of these aspects of the law is spe1cially referred to. Paul assures the Jews that they could not be justified by the works of the law, which was especially binding on them. He assures the Gentiles that they could not be justified by the law written on their hearts. He assures believers under the Gospel that they cannot be justified by works of the law binding on them. The reason given includes all possible works That reason is, that all human obedience is imperfect; all men are sinners: and the law demands perfect obedience. (\cf1\ul Gal_32:10\cf0\ulnone .) Therefore, it is that \ldblquote by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul Rom_3:20\cf0\ulnone .)\par 3. The law of which Paul speaks is the law which says, \ldblquote Thou shalt not covet\rdblquote (\cf1\ul Rom_7:7\cf0\ulnone ); the law which is spiritual (ver. 14); which is \ldblquote holy, and just, and good\rdblquote (ver. 12); the law of which the great command is, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbour as thyse3lf. Besides, what are called works of the law are in \cf1\ul Tit_3:5\cf0\ulnone called \ldblquote works of righteousness.\rdblquote Higher works than these there cannot be. The Apostle repudiates any ground of confidence in his \ldblquote own righteousness\rdblquote (\cf1\ul Phi_3:9\cf0\ulnone ), \i i.e\i0 ., own excellence, whether habitual or actual. He censures the Jews because they went about to establish their own righteousness, and would not submit to the righteousness of God. (\cf1\ul Rom_10:3\c4f0\ulnone .) From these and many similar passages it is clear that it is not any one or more specific kinds of work which are excluded from the ground of justification, but all works, all personal excellence of every kind.\par 4. This is still further evident from the contrast constantly presented between faith and works. We are not justified by works, but by faith in Jesus Christ. (\cf1\ul Gal_2:16\cf0\ulnone , and often elsewhere.) It is not one kind of works as opposed to another; legal as opposed to 5evangelical; natural as opposed to gracious; moral as opposed to ritual; but works of every kind as opposed to faith.\par 5 The same is evident from what is taught of the gratuitous nature of our justification. Grace and works are antithetical. \ldblquote To him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul Rom_4:4\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote If by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul Rom_11:6\cf0\ulnone .) Grace of ne6cessity excludes works of every kind, and more especially those of the highest kind, which might have some show of merit. But merit of any degree is of necessity excluded, if our salvation be by grace.\par 6. When the positive ground of justification is stated, it is always declared to be not anything done by us or wrought in us, but what was done for us. It is ever represented as something external to ourselves. We are justified by the blood of Christ (\cf1\ul Rom_5:9\cf0\ulnone ); by his obedience (\cf71\ul Rom_5:19\cf0\ulnone ); by his righteousness (ver. 18). This is involved in the whole method of salvation. Christ saves us as a priest; but a priest does not save by making those who come to him good. He does not work in them, but for them. Christ saves us by a sacrifice; but a sacrifice is effectual, not because of its subjective effect upon the offerer, but as an expiation, or satisfaction to justice. Christ is our Redeemer; he gave himself as a ransom for many. But a ransom does not infuse righteou8sness. It is the payment of a price. It is the satisfaction of the claims of the captor upon the captive. The whole plan of salvation, therefore, as presented in the Bible and as it is the life of the Church, is changed, if the ground of our acceptance with God be transferred from what Christ has done for us, to what is wrought in us or done by us. The Romish theologians do not agree exactly as to whether habitual or actual righteousness is the ground of justification. Bellarmin says it is the former. He 9says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Solam esse habitualem justitiam, per quam formaliter justi nominamur, et sumus: justitiam vero actualem, id est, opera vere justa justificare quidem, ut sanctus Jacobus loquitur, cum ait cap. 2 ex operibus hominem justificari, sed meritorie, non formaliter.\lang1033\rdblquote This he says is clearly the doctrine of the Council of Trent, which teaches,\ldblquote\lang1142 Causam formalem justificationis esse justitiam, sive caritatem, quam Deus unicuique propriam infundit, secundu:m mensuram dispositionum, et qu\'e6 in cordibus justificatorum inn\'e6ret.\lang1033\rdblquote This follows also, he argues, from the fact that the sacraments justify, \ldblquote\lang1142 per modum instrumenti ad infusionem justiti\'e6 habitualis.\lang1033\rdblquote This, however, only amounts to the distinction, already referred to, between the first and second justification. The infusion of righteousness renders the soul inherently righteous; then good works merit salvation. The one is the formal, the ;other the meritorious cause of the sinner\rquote s justification. But according to the Scriptures, both habitual and actual righteousness, both inherent grace and its fruits are excluded from any share in the ground of our justification.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\f1\fs16 140\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx1<1908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 7. This still further and most decisively appears from the grand objection to his doctrine which Paul was constantly called upon to answer. That objection was, that if our personal goodness or moral excellence is not the ground of our acceptance with God, then all necessity of being good is denied, and all motive to good works is removed. We may continue in sin that grace may abound. This objection has been reiterated a thousand times since it was urged against the Apostles. I=t seems so unreasonable and so demoralizing to say as Paul says, \cf1\ul Rom_3:22\cf0\ulnone , that so far as justification is concerned there is no difference between Jew and Gentile; between a worshipper of the true God and a worshipper of demons; between the greatest sinner and the most moral man in the world, that men have ever felt that they were doing God service in denouncing this doctrine as a soul-destroying heresy. Had Paul taught that men are justified for their good moral works as the Pelagian>s and Rationalists say; or for their evangelical obedience as the Remonstrants say; or for their inherent righteousness and subsequent good works as the Romanists say, there would have been no room for this formidable objection. Or, if through any misapprehension of his teaching, the objection had been urged, how easy had it been for the Apostle to set it aside. How obvious would have been the answer, \lquote I do not deny that really good works are the ground of our acceptance with God. I only say that r?itual works have no worth in his sight, that He looks on the heart; or, that works done before regeneration have no real excellence or merit; or, that God is more lenient now than in his dealing with Adam; that He does not demand perfect obedience, but accepts our imperfect, well-meant endeavours to keep his holy commandments.\rquote How reasonable and satisfactory would such an answer have been. Paul, however, does not make it. He adheres to his doctrine, that our own personal moral excellence has nothi@ng to do with our justification; that God justifies the ungodly, that He receives the chief of sinners. He answers the objection in deed, and answers it effectually; but his answer supposes him to teach just what Protestants teach, that we are justified without works, not for our own righteousness, but gratuitously, without money and without price, solely on the ground of what Christ has done for us. His answer is, that so far from its being true that we must be good before we can be justified, we must beA justified before we can be good; that so long as we are under the curse of the law we bring forth fruit unto death; that it is\cf3\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 not until reconciled unto God by the death of his Son, that we bring forth fruit unto righteousness; that when justified by the righteousness of Christ, we are made partakers of his Spirit; being justified we are sanctified; that union with Christ by faith secures not only the imputation of his righteousness to our justification, but the participation of his life unto our sanctification, so that as surely as He lives and lives unto God, so they that believe on Him shall live unto God; and that none are partakers of the merit of his death who do not become partakers of the power of his life. We do not, therefore, he says, make void the law of God. Yea, we establish the law. We teach the only true way to become holy; although that way appears foolishness unto the wise of this world, whose wisdom is folly in the sight of God.\par \pard\cf5\f4\fs23\par } y1.17.4. Ground of Justification{\rtf1\ansi\defCbM1.17.3. Works not the Ground of Justification{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red153\green51\blue0;Df0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f2\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f4\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\laEng1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~4.\i The Righteousness of Christ the Ground of Justification.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 The imperative question remains, How shall a man be just with God? If our moral excellence be not the ground on which God pronounces us just, what is that ground? The grand reason why such different answers are given to this question is, that it is understood in different senFses. The Scriptural and Protestant answer is absurd, if the question means what Romanists and others understand it to mean. If \ldblquote just\rdblquote means good, \i i.e\i0 ., it the word be taken in its moral, and not in its judicial sense, then it is absurd to say that a man can be good with the goodness of another; or to say that God can pronounce a man to be good who is not good. Bellarmin says an Ethiopian clothed in a white garment is not white. Curcell\'e6us, the Remonstrant, says, \ldblquote A Gman can no more be just with the justice of another, than he can be white with the whiteness of another.\rdblquote Moehler says, it is impossible that anything should appear to God other than it really is; that an unjust man should appear to him, or be pronounced by him just. All this is true in the sense intended by these writers, \ldblquote The judgment of God is according to truth.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul Rom_2:2\cf0\ulnone .) Every man is truly just whom He justifies or dodares to be just. It is in vain Hto dispute until the \ldblquote\lang1142 status qu\'e6stionis\lang1033\rdblquote be clearly determined. The word \cf2\f1\'e4\f2\u8055?\f1\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 , \ldblquote righteous,\rdblquote or \ldblquote just,\rdblquote has two distinct senses, its above stated. It has a moral, and also a legal, forensic, or judicial sense. It sometimes expresses moral character, sometimes simply a relation to law and justice. In one sense to pronounce a man just, is to declare that he is morally good. In anotIher sense, it is to declare that the\cf3\f3\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 claims of justice against him are satisfied, and that he is entitled to the reward promised to the righteous. When God justifies the ungodly, he does not declare that he is godly, but that his sins are expiated, and that he has a title founded in justice to eternal life. In this there is no contradiction and no absurdity. If a man under attainder appear before the proper tribunal, and show cause why the attainder should in justice be reversed,J and he be declared entitled to his rank, titles, and estates, a decision in his favour would be a justification. It would declare him just in the eye of the law, but it would declare nothing and effect nothing as to his moral character. In the like manner, when the sinner stands at the bar of God, he can show good reason why he cannot be justly condemned, and why he should be declared entitled to eternal life. Now the question is, \ldblquote On what ground can God pronounce a sinner just in this legal orK forensic sense?\rdblquote It has been shown that to justify, according to uniform Scriptural usage, is to pronounce just in the sense stated, that it is not merely to pardon, and that it is not to render inherently righteous or holy. It has also been shown to be the doctrine of Scripture, what indeed is intuitively true to the conscience, that our moral excellence, habitual or actual, is not and cannot be the ground of any such judicial declaration. What then is the ground? The Bible and the people of GLod, with one voice answer, \ldblquote The righteousness of Christ.\rdblquote The ambiguity of words, the speculations of theologians, and misapprehensions, may cause many of the people of God to deny in words that such is the proper answer, but it is nevertheless the answer rendered by every believer\rquote s heart. He relies for his acceptance with God, not on himself but on Christ, not on what he is or has done, but on what Christ is and has done for him.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\Mtx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Meaning of the Terms.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 By the righteousness of Christ is meant all he became, did, and suffered to satisfy the demands of divine justice, and merit for his people the forgiveness of sin and the gift of eternal life. The righteousness of Christ is commonly representNed as including his active and passive obedience. This distinction is, as to the idea, Scriptural. The Bible does teach that Christ obeyed the law in all its precepts, and that he endured its penalty, and that this was done in such sense for his people that they are said to have done it. They died in Him. They were crucified with Him. They were delivered from the curse of the law by his being made a curse for them. He was made under the law that he might redeem those who were under the law. We are freed fOrom the law by the body of Christ. He was made sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. He is the end of the law for righteousness to all them that believe. It is by his obedience that many are made righteous. (\cf1\ul Rom_5:19\cf0\ulnone .) We obeyed in Him, according to the teaching of the Apostle, in \cf1\ul Rom_5:12-21\cf0\ulnone , in the same sense in which we sinned in Adam. The active and passive obedience of Christ, however, are only different phases or aspects of the same thing.P He obeyed in suffering. His highest acts of obedience were rendered in the garden, and upon the cross. Hence this distinction is not so presented in Scripture as though the obedience of Christ answered one purpose, and his sufferings another and a distinct purpose. We are justified by his blood. We are reconciled unto God by his death. We are freed from all the demands of the law by his body (\cf1\ul Rom_7:4\cf0\ulnone ), and we are freed from the law by his being made under it and obeying it in our steaQd. (\cf1\ul Gal_4:1-5\cf0\ulnone .) Thus the same effect is ascribed to the death or sufferings of Christ, and to his obedience, because both are forms or parts of his obedience or righteousness by which we are justified. In other words the obedience of Christ includes all He did in satisfying the demands of the law.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i The Righteousness of Christ is the RighteousnessR of God.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The righteousness of Christ on the ground of which the believer\rquote s justified is the righteousness of God. It is so designated in Scripture not only because it was provided and is accepted by Him; it is not only the righteousness which avails before God, but it is the righteousness of a divine person; of God manifest in the flesh. God purchasedS the Church with his own blood. (\cf1\ul Act_20:28\cf0\ulnone .) It was the Lord of glory who was crucified. (\cf1\ul 1Co_2:8\cf0\ulnone .) He who was in the form of God and thought it not robbery to be equal with God, became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross (\cf1\ul Phi_2:6-8\cf0\ulnone .) He who is the brightness of the Father\rquote s glory, and the express image of his person, who upholds all things by the word of his power; whom angels worship; who is called God; who in the beginning Tlaid the foundations of the earth, and of whose hands the heavens are the workmanship; who is eternal and immutable, has, the Apostle teaches, by death destroyed him who has the power of death and delivered those who through fear of death (\i i.e\i0 ., of the wrath of God) were all their lifetime subject to bondage. (\cf1\ul Heb_1:1\cf0\ulnone ., \cf1\ul Heb_2:1\cf0\ulnone )\cf3\f3\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 He whom Thomas recognized and avowed to be his Lord and God was the person into whose wounded side he thruUst his hand. He whom John says he saw, looked upon, and handled, he declares to be the true God and eternal life. The soul, in which personality resides, does not die when the man dies, yet it is the soul that gives dignity to the man, and which renders his life of unspeakably greater value in the sight of God and man, than the life of any irrational creature. So it was not the divine nature in Christ in which his personality resides, the eternal Logos, that died when Christ died. Nevertheless the hypostatic union between the Logos and the human nature of Christ, makes it true that the righteousness of Christ (his obedience and sufferings) was the righteousness of God. This is the reason why it can avail before God for the salvation of the whole world. This is the reason why the believer, when arrayed in this righteousness, need fear neither death nor hell. This is the reason why Paul challenges the universe to lay anything to the charge of God\rquote s elect.\par \pard\cf5\f4\fs23\par } Wbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~5.\i Imputation of Righteousness.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\Xtx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 The righteousness of Christ is imputed to the believer for his justification. The word impute is familiar and unambiguous. To impute is to ascribe to, to reckon to, to lay to one\rquote s charge. When we say we impute a good or bad motive to a man, or that a good or evil action is imputed to him, no one misunderstands our meaning. Philemon had no doubt what Paul meant when he told him to impute to him the debt of Onesimus. \ldblquote Let notY the king impute anything unto his servant.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul 1Sa_22:15\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote Let not my lord impute iniquity unto me.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul 2Sa_19:19\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote Neither shall it be imputed unto him that offereth it.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul Lev_7:18\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote Blood shall be imputed unto that man; he hath shed blood.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul Lev_17:4\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul Psa_22:2\cf0\Zulnone .) \ldblquote Unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul Rom_4:6\cf0\ulnone .) God is \ldblquote in Christ not imputing their trespasses unto them.\rdblquote (\cf1\ul 2Co_5:19\cf0\ulnone .)\par The meaning of these and similar passages of Scripture has never been disputed. Everyone understands them. We use the word impute in its simple admitted sense, when we say that the righteousness of Christ is imputed to the believer for his justification.\par It seems unnecessa[ry to remark that this does not, and cannot mean that the righteousness of Christ is infused into the believer\cf2\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 or in any way so imparted to him as to change, or constitute His moral character. Imputation never changes the inward, subjective state of the person to whom the imputation is made. When sin is imputed to a man he is not made sinful; when the zeal of Phinehas was imputed to him, he was not made zealous. When you impute theft to a man, you do not make him a thief. When yo\u impute goodness to a man, you do not make him good. So when righteousness is imputed to the believer, he does not thereby become subjectively righteous. If the righteousness be adequate, and if the imputation be made on adequate grounds and by competent authority, the person to whom the imputation is made has the right to be treated as righteous. And, therefore, in the forensic, although not in the moral or subjective sense, the imputation of the righteousness of Christ does make the sinner righteous. T]hat is, it gives him a right to the full pardon of all his sins and a claim in justice to eternal life.\par That this is the simple and universally accepted view of the doctrine as held by all Protestants at the Reformation, and by them regarded as the corner-stone of the Gospel, has already been sufficiently proved by extracts from the Lutheran and Reformed Symbols, and has never been disputed by any candid or competent authority. This has continued to be the doctrine of both the great branches of the P^rotestant Church, so far as they pretend to adhere to their standards. Schmid proves this by a whole catena of quotations so far as the Lutheran Church is concerned. Schweizer does the same for the Reformed Church. A few citations, therefore, from authors of a recognized representative character will suffice as to this point. Turrettin with his characteristic precision says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Cum dicimus Christi justitiam ad justificationem nobis imputari, et nos per justitiam illam imputatam justos ess_e coram Deo, et non per justitiam ullam qu\'e6 nobis inh\'e6reat; Nihil aliud volumus, quam obedientiam Christi Deo Patri nomine nostro pr\'e6stitam, ita nobis a Deo donari, ut vere nostra censeatur, eamque esse unicam et solam illam justitiam propter quam, et cujus merito, absolvamur a reatu peccatorum nostrum, et jus ad vitam obtinemus; nec ullam in nobis esse justitiam, aut ulla bona opera, quibus beneficia tanta promereamur, qu\'e6 ferre possint severum judicii divini examen, si Deus juxta legis su\'e`6 rigorem nobiscum agere vellet nihil nos illi posse opponere, nisi Christi meritum et satisfactionem, in qua sola, peccatorum conscientia territi, tutum adversus iram divinam perfugium, et animarum nostrarum pacem invenire possumus.\lang1033\rdblquote\par On the following page he refers to Bellarmin, who says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Si [Protestantes hoc] solum vellent, nobis imputari Christi merita, quia [a Deo] nobis donata sunt, et possumus ea [Deo] Patri offere pro peccatis nostris, quoniam Christus susacepit super se onus satisfaciendi pro nobis, nosque Deo Patri reconciliandi, recta esset eorum sententia.\lang1033\rdblquote On this Turrettin remarks, \ldblquote\lang1142 Atqui nihil aliud volumus; Nam quod addit, nos velle \lquote ita imputari nobis Christi justitiam, ut per eam formaliter justi nominemur et simus,\rquote hoc gratis et falso supponit, ex perversa et pr\'e6postera sua hypothesi de justificatione morali. Sed qu\'e6ritur, Ad quid imputatio ista fiat? An ad justificationem et vitam, ut nobs pertendimus, An vero tantum ad grati\'e6 intern\'e6 et justiti\'e6 inh\'e6rentis infusionem, ut illi volunt; Id est, an ita imputentur et communicentur nobis merita Christi, ut sint causa meritoria sola nostr\'e6 justificationis, nec ulla alia detur justitia propter quam absolvamur in conspectu Dei; quod volumus; An vero ita imputentur, ut sint conditiones caus\'e6 formalis, id. justiti\'e6 inh\'e6rentis, ut ea homo donari possit, vel caus\'e6 extrinsec\'e6, qu\'e6 mereantur infusionem justiti\'e6, per cquam justificatur homo; ut ita non meritum Christi proprie, sed justitia inh\'e6rens per meritum Christi acquisita, sic causa propria et vera, propter quam homo justificatur; quod illi statuunt.\lang1033\rdblquote It may be remarked in passing that according to the Protestant doctrine there is properly no \ldblquote formal cause\rdblquote of justification. The righteousness of Christ is the meritorious, but not the formal cause of the sinner\rquote s being pronounced righteous. A formal cause is that whdich constitutes the inherent, subjective nature of a person or thing. The formal cause of a man\rquote s being good, is goodness, of his being holy, holiness; of his being wicked, wickedness. The formal cause of a rose\rquote s being red, is redness; and of a wall\rquote s being white, is whiteness. As we are not rendered inherently righteous by the righteousness of Christ, it is hardly correct to say that his righteousness is the formal cause of our being righteous. Owen, and other eminent writers do indeeed often use the expression referred to, but they take the word \ldblquote formal\rdblquote out of its ordinary scholastic sense.\par Campegius Vitringa says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Tenendum est certissimum hoc fundamentum, quod justificare sit vocabulum forense, notetque in Scriptura actum judicis, quo causam alicujus in judicio justam esse declarat; sive eum a crimine, cujus postulatus est, absolvat (qu\'e6 est genuina, et maxime propria vocis significatio), sive etiam jus ad hanc, vel illam rem ei sentfentia addicat, et adjudicet.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \ldblquote\lang1142 17. Per justificationem peccatoris intelligimus actum Dei Patris, ut judicis, quo peccatorem credentem, natura filium ir\'e6, neque ullum jus ex se habentem bona c\'9clestia petendi, declarat immunem esse ab omni reatu, et condemnatione, adoptat in filium, et in eum ex gratia confert jus ad suam communionem, cum salute \'e6terna, bonisque omnibus cum ea conjunctis, postulandi.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \ldblquote\lang1142 27. Teneamus gnullam carnem in se posse reperire et ex se producere causam, et fundamentum justificationis. 29. Qu\'e6rendum igitur id, propter quod peccator justificatur, extra peccatorem in obedientia Filli Dei, quam pr\'e6stitit Patri in humana natura ad mortem, imo ad mortem crucis, et ad quam pr\'e6standam se obstrinxerat in sponsione. (\cf1\ul Rom_5:19\cf0\ulnone .)\rdblquote \ldblquote 32. H\'e6c [obedientia] imputatur peccatori a Deo judice ex gratia juxta jus sponsionis, de quo ante dictum.\lang1033\rdblquoteh\par Owen in his elaborate work on justification, proves that the word to justify, \ldblquote whether the act of God towards men, or of men towards God, or of men among themselves, or of one towards another, be expressed thereby, is always used in a \lquote forensic\rquote sense, and does not denote a physical operation, transfusion, or transmutation.\rdblquote He thus winds up the discussion: \ldblquote Wherefore as condemnation is not the infusing of a habit of wickedness into him that is condemned, inor the making of him to be inherently wicked, who was before righteous, but the passing a sentence upon a man with respect to his wickedness; no more is justification the change of a person from inherent unrighteousness to righteousness, by the infusion of a principle of grace, but a sentential declaration of him to be righteous.\rdblquote\par The ground of this justification in the case of the believing inner is the imputation of the righteousness of Christ. This is set forth at length. \ldblquote The jjudgment of the Reformed Churches herein,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote is known to all and must be confessed, unless we intend by vain cavils to increase and perpetuate contentions. Especially the Church of England is in her doctrine express as to the imputation of the righteousness of Christ, both active and passive, as it is usually distinguished. This has been of late so fully manifested out of her authentic writings, that is, the \lquote Articles of Religion\rquote and \lquote Books of Homilies,\rqkuote and other writings publicly authorized, that it is altogether needless to give any further demonstration of it.\rdblquote\par President Edwards in his sermon on justification sets forth the Protestant doctrine in all its fulness. \ldblquote To suppose,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote that a man is justified by his own virtue or obedience, derogates from the honour of the Mediator, and ascribes that to man\rquote s virtue that belongs only to the righteousness of Christ. It puts man in Christ\rquote ls stead, and makes him his own saviour, in a respect in which Christ only is the Saviour: and so it is a doctrine contrary to the nature and design of the Gospel, which is to abase man, and to ascribe all the glory of our salvation to Christ the Redeemer. It is inconsistent with the doctrine of the imputation of Christ\rquote s righteousness, which is a gospel doctrine. Here I would (1.) Explain what we mean by the imputation of Christ\rquote s righteousness. (2.) Prove the thing intended by it to be truem. (3.) Show that this doctrine is utterly inconsistent with the doctrine of our being justified by our own virtue or sincere obedience.\par \ldblquote First. I would explain what we mean by the imputation of Christ\rquote s righteousness. Sometimes the expression is taken by our divines in a larger sense, for the imputation of all that Christ did and suffered for our redemption, whereby we are free from guilt, and stand righteous in the sight of God; and so implies the imputation both of Christ\rquote s nsatisfaction and obedience. But here I intend it in a stricter sense, for the imputation of that righteousness or moral goodness that consists in the obedience of Christ. And by that righteousness being imputed to us, is meant no other than this, that that righteousness of Christ is accepted for us, and admitted instead of that perfect inherent righteousness that ought to be in ourselves: Christ\rquote s perfect obedience shall be reckoned to our account so that we shall have the benefit of it, as though owe had performed it ourselves: and so we suppose that a title to eternal life is given us as the reward of this righteousness.\rdblquote In the same connection, he asks, \ldblquote Why is there any more absurdity in supposing that Christ\rquote s obedience is imputed to us, than that his satisfaction is imputed? If Christ has suffered the penalty of the law for us, and in our stead, then it will follow that his suffering that penalty is imputed to us, \i i.e\i0 ., that it is accepted for us, and in our sptead, and is reckoned to our account, as though we had suffered it. But why may not his obeying the law of God be as rationally reckoned to our account\cf2\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 as his suffering the penalty of the law.\rdblquote He then goes on to argue that there is the same necessity for the one as for the other.\par Dr. Shedd says, \ldblquote A second difference between the Anselmic and the Protestant soteriology is seen in the formal distinction of Christ\rquote s work into his active and his passivqe righteousness. By his passive righteousness is meant his expiatory sufferings, by which He satisfied the claims of justice, and by hie active righteousness is meant his obedience to the law as a rule of life and conduct. It was contended by those who made this distinction, that the purpose of Christ as the vicarious substitute was to meet the entire demands of the law for the sinner. But the law requires present and perfect obedience, as well as satisfaction for past disobedience. The law is not completrely fulfilled by the endurance of penalty only. It must also be obeyed Christ both endured the penalty due to man for disobedience, and perfectly obeyed the law for him; so that He was a vicarious substitute in reference to both the precept and the penalty of the law. By his active obedience He obeyed the law, and by his passive obedience He endured the penalty. In this way his vicarious work is complete.\rdblquote\par The earlier Symbols of the Reformation do not make this distinction. So far as the Lutsheran Church is concerned, it first appears in the \ldblquote Form of Concord\rdblquote (\scaps A.D.\scaps0 1576). Its statement is as follows: \ldblquote That righteousness which is imputed to faith, or to believers, of mere grace, is the obedience, suffering, and resurrection of Christ, by which He satisfied the law for us, and expiated our sins. For since Christ was not only man, but truly God and man in one undivided person, He was no more subject to the law than He was to suffering and death (if hits person, merely, be taken into account), because He was the Lord of the law Hence, not only that obedience to God his Father which He exhibited in his passion and death, but also that obedience which He exhibited in voluntarily subjecting Himself to the law and fulfilling it for our sakes, is imputed to us for righteousness, so that God on account of the total obedience which Christ accomplished (\lang1142 pr\'e6stitit\lang1033 ) for our sake before his heavenly Father, both in acting and in suffering, iun life and in death, may remit our sins to us, regard us as good and righteous, and give us eternal salvation.\rdblquote In this point the Reformed or Calvinistic standards agree.\par It has already been remarked that the distinction between the\cf2\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 active and passive obedience of Christ is, in one view, unimportant. As Christ obeyed in suffering, his sufferings were as much a part of his obedience as his observance of the precepts of the law. The Scriptures do not expressly make this distinction, as they include everything that Christ did for our redemption under the term righteousness or obedience. The distinction becomes important only when it is denied that his moral obedience is any part of the righteousness for which the believer is justified, or that his whole work in making satisfaction consisted in expiation or bearing the penalty of the law. This is contrary to Scripture, and vitiates the doctrine of justification as presented in the Bible.\par \pard\cf3\f2\fs23\par } vDUA1.17.7. Consequence of Imputation Righteousness{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\foX 11.17.6. Proof of the Doctrine{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fchaw%m1.17.5. Imputation of Righteousness{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttVxrset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f2\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f4\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~6. \i Proof of the Doctrine.\i0\par \payrd\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 That the Protestant doctrine as above stated is the doctrine of the word of God appears from the following considerations: \emdash\par 1. The word \cf1\f1\'e4\'e9\'ea\'e1\'e9\f2\u8057?\f1\'f9\cf0\f0 , as has been shown, means to declare \cf1\f1\'e4\f2\u8055?\f1\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 . No one can be truthfully pronounced \cf1\f1\'e4\f2\u8055?\f1\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2z\cf0\f0 to whom \cf1\f1\'e4\'e9\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f3\f2\u8059?\f1\'ed\'e7\cf0\f0 cannot rightfully be ascribed. The sinner (\lang1142 ex vi verbi\lang1033 ) has no righteousness of his own. God, therefore, imputes to him a righteousness which is not his own. The righteousness thus imputed is declared to be the righteousness of God, of Christ, the righteousness which is by faith. This is almost in so many words the declaration of the Bible on the subject. As the question, What is the method of justificati{on? is a Biblical question, it must be decided exegetically, and not by arguments drawn from assumed principles of reason. We are not at liberty to say that the righteousness of one man cannot be imputed to another; that this would involve a mistake or absurdity; that God\rquote s justice does not demand a righteousness such as the law prescribes, as the condition of justification; that He may pardon and save as a father without any consideration, unless it be that of repentance; that it is inconsistent w|ith his grace that the demands of justice should be met before justification is granted; that this view of justification makes it a sham, a calling a man just, when he is not just etc. All this amounts to nothing. It all pertains to that wisdom which is foolishness with God. All we have to do is to determine, (1.) What is the meaning of the word to justify as used in Scripture? (2.) On what ground does the Bible affirm that God pronounces the ungodly to be just? If the answer to these questions be what th}e Church in all ages, and especially the Church of the Reformation has given, then we should rest satisfied. The Apostle in express terms says that God imputes righteousness to the sinner. (\cf2\ul Rom_6:1-24\cf0\ulnone .) By righteousness every one admits is meant that which makes a man righteous, that which the law demands. It does not consist in the sinner\rquote s own obedience, or moral excellence, for it is said to be \ldblquote without works;\rdblquote and it is declared that no man can be justifi~ed on the ground of his own character or conduct. Neither does this righteousness consist in faith; for it is \ldblquote of faith,\rdblquote \ldblquote through faith,\rdblquote \ldblquote by faith.\rdblquote We are never said to be justified on account of faith. Neither is it a righteousness, or form of moral excellence springing from faith, or of which faith is the source or proximate cause; because it is declared to be the righteousness of God; a righteousness which is revealed; which is offered; which must be accepted as a gift. (\cf2\ul Rom_5:17\cf0\ulnone .) It is declared to be the righteousness of Christ; his obedience. (\cf2\ul Rom_5:19\cf0\ulnone .) It is, therefore, the righteousness of Christ, his perfect obedience in doing and suffering the will of God, which is imputed to the believer, and on the ground of which the believer, although in himself ungodly, is pronounced righteous, and therefore free from the curse of the law and entitled to eternal life.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\i The Apostle\rquote s Argument.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 2. All the points above stated are not only clearly affirmed by the Apostle but they are also set forth in logical order, and elaborately sustained and vindicated in the Epistle to the Romans. The Apostle begins with the declaration that the Gospel \ldblquote is the power of God unto salvation.\rdblquote It is not thus divinely efficacious because of the purity of its moral precepts; nor because it brings immortality to light; nor because it sets before us the perfect example of our Lord Jesus Christ; nor because it assures us of the love of God; nor because of the elevating, sanctifying, life-giving influence by which it is attended. There is something preliminary to all this. The first and indispensable requisite to salvation is that men should be righteous before God. They are under his wrath and curse. Until justice is satisfied, until God is reconciled, there is no possibility of any moral influence being of any avail. Therefore the Apostle says that the power of the Gospel is due to the fact that \ldblquote therein is the righteousness of God revealed.\rdblquote This cannot mean the goodness of God, for such is not the meaning of the word. It cannot in this connection mean his justice, because it is a righteousness which is \ldblquote of faith;\rdblquote because the justice of God is revealed from heaven and to all men; because the revelation of justice terrifies and drives away from God; because what is here called the righteousness of God, is\cf4\f3\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 elsewhere contrasted with our \ldblquote own righteousness\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_10:8\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Phi_3:9\cf0\ulnone ); and because it is declared to be the righteousness of Christ (\cf2\ul Rom_5:18\cf0\ulnone ), which is (\cf2\ul Rom_5:19\cf0\ulnone ) explained by his \ldblquote obedience,\rdblquote and in \cf2\ul Rom_5:9\cf0\ulnone and elsewhere declared to be \ldblquote his blood.\rdblquote This righteousness of Christ is the righteousness of God, because Christ is God; because God has provided, revealed, and offers it; and because it avails before God as a sufficient ground on which He can declare the believing sinner righteous. Herein lies the saving power of the Gospel. The question, How shall man be just with God? had been sounding in the ears of men from the beginning. It never had been answered. Yet it must be answered or there can be no hope of salvation. It is answered in the Gospel, and therefore the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; \i i.e\i0 ., to every one, whether Jew or Gentile, bond or free, good or bad, who, instead of going about to establish his own righteousness, submits himself in joyful confidence to the righteousness which his God and Saviour Jesus Christ has wrought out for sinners, and which is freely offered to them in the Gospel without money and without price.\par This is Paul\rquote s theme, which he proceeds to unfold and establish, as has been already stated under a previous head. He begins by asserting, as indisputably true from the revelation of God in the constitution of our nature, that God is just, that He will punish sin; that He cannot pronounce him righteous who is not righteous. He then shows from experience and from Scripture, first as regards the Gentiles, then as regards the Jews, that there is none righteous, no not one; that the whole world is guilty before God. There is therefore no difference, since all have sinned.\par Since the righteousness which the law requires cannot be found in the sinner nor be rendered by him, God has revealed another righteousness (\cf2\ul Rom_3:21\cf0\ulnone ); \ldblquote the righteousness of God,\rdblquote granted to every one who believes. Men are not justified for what they are or for what they do, but for what Christ has done for them. God has set Him forth as a propitiation for sin, in order that He might be just and yet the justifier of them that believe.\par The Apostle teaches that such has been the method of justification from the beginning. It was witnessed by the law and the prophets. There had never, since the fall, been any other way of justification possible for men. As God justified Abraham because he believed in the promise of redemption through the Messiah; so He justifies those now who believe in the fulfilment \cf4\f3\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 of that promise. (\cf2\ul Rom_4:3-24\cf0\ulnone .) It was not Abraham\rquote s believing state of mind that was taken for righteousness. It is not faith in the believer now; not faith as a virtue, or as a source of a new life, which renders us righteous. It is faith in a specific promise. Righteousness, says the Apostle, is imputed to us, \ldblquote if we believe on Him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_4:24\cf0\ulnone .) Or, as he expresses it in \cf2\ul Rom_10:9\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.\rdblquote The promise which Abraham believed, is the promise which we believe (\cf2\ul Gal_3:14\cf0\ulnone ); and the relation of faith to justification, in his case, is precisely what it is in ours. He and we are justified simply because we trust in the Messiah for our salvation. Hence, as the Apostle says, the Scriptures are full of thanksgiving to God for gratuitous pardon, for free justification, for the imputation of righteousness to those who have no righteousness of their own. This method of justification, he goes on to show, is adapted to all mankind. God is not the God of the Jews only but also of the Gentiles. It secures peace and reconciliation with God. (\cf2\ul Rom_5:1-3\cf0\ulnone .) It renders salvation certam, for if we are saved not by what we are in ourselves, but for what Christ has done for us, we may be sure that if we are \ldblquote justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_5:9\cf0\ulnone .) This method of justification, he further shows, and this only, secures sanctification, namely, holiness of heart and life. it is only those who are reconciled to God by the death of his Son, that are \ldblquote saved by his life.\rdblquote (v. 10.) This idea he expands and vindicates in the sixth and seventh chapters of this Epistle.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\i The Parallel between Adam and Christ.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 3. Not content with this clear and formal statement of the truth that sinners can be justified only through the imputation of a righteousness not their own; and that the righteousness thus imputed is the righteousness (active and passive if that distinction be insisted upon) of the Lord Jesus Christ; he proceeds to illustrate this doctrine by drawing a parallel between Adam and Christ. The former, he says, was a type of the latter. There is an analogy between our relation to Adam and our relation to Christ. We are so united to Adam that his first transgression was the ground of the sentence of condemnation being passed on all mankind, and on account of that condemnation we derive from him a corrupt nature so that all mankind descending from him\cf4\f3\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 by ordinary generation, come into the world in a state of spiritual death. In like manner we are so united to Christ, when we believe, that his obedience is the ground on which a sentence of justification passes upon all thus in Him, and in consequence of that sentence they derive from Him a new, holy, divine, and imperishable principle of spiritual life. These truths are expressed in explicit terms. \ldblquote The judgment was by one (offence) to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offences unto justification.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_5:16\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. For as by one man\rquote s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_5:18-19\cf0\ulnone .) These two great truths, namely, the imputation of Adam\rquote s sin and the imputation of Christ\rquote s righteousness, have graven themselves on the consciousness of the Church universal. They have been reviled, misrepresented, and denounced by theologians, but they have stood their ground in the faith of God\rquote s people, just as the primary truths of reason have ever retained control over the mass of men, in spite of all the speculations of philosophers. It is not meant that the truths just mentioned have always been expressed in the terms just given; but the truths themselves have been, and still are held by the people of God, wherever found, among the Greeks, Latins, or Protestants. The fact that the race fell in Adam; that the evils which come upon us on account of his transgression are penal; and that men are born in a state of sin and condemnation, are outstanding facts of Scripture and experience, and are avowed every time the sacrament of baptism is administered to an infant. No less universal is the conviction of the other great truth. It is implied in every act of saving faith which includes trust in what Christ has done for us as the ground of our acceptance with God, as opposed to anything done by us or wrought in us. As a single proof of the hold which this conviction has on the Christian consciousness, reference may be made to the ancient direction for the visitation of the sick, attributed to Anselm, but of doubtful authorship: \ldblquote Dost thou believe that thou canst not be saved, but by the death of Christ? The sick man answereth, Yes. Then let it be said unto him, Go to, then, and whilst thy soul abideth in thee, put all thy confidence in this death alone, place thy trust in no other thing, commit thyself wholly to this death, cover thyself wholly with this alone, cast thyself wholly on this death, wrap thyself wholly in this death. And if God would judge them, say, Lord, I place the death of our Lord Jesus Christ between me and thy judgment, and otherwise I will not contend, or enter into judgment with thee. And if He shall say unto thee, that thou art a sinner, say, I place the death of our Lord Jesus Christ between me and my sins. If He shall say unto thee, that thou hast deserved damnation, say, Lord, I put the death of our Lord Jesus Christ between thee and all my sins; and I offer his merits for my own, which I should have, and have not. If He say that He is angry with thee: say, Lord, I place the death of our Lord Jesus Christ between me and thy anger.\rdblquote\par Such being the real and only foundation of a sinner\rquote s hope towards God, it is of the last importance that it should not only be practically held by the people, but that it should also be clearly presented and maintained by the clergy. It is not what we do or are, but solely what Christ is and has done that can avail for our justification before the bar of God.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\i Other Passages teaching the same Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 4. This doctrine of the imputation of the righteousness of Christ; or, in other words, that his righteousness is the judicial ground of the believer\rquote s justification, is not only formally and argumentatively presented as in the passages cited, but it is constantly asserted or implied in the word of God. The Apostle argues, in the fourth chapter of his Epistle to the Romans, that every assertion or promise of gratuitous forgiveness of sin to be found in the Scriptures involves this doctrine. He proceeds on the assumption that God is just; that He demands a righteousness of those whom He justifies. If they have no righteousness of their own, one on just grounds must be imputed to them. If, therefore, He forgives sin, it must be that sin is covered, that justice has been satisfied. \ldblquote David, also,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works; saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_4:6-8\cf0\ulnone .) Not to impute sin implies the imputation of righteousness.\par In \cf2\ul Rom_5:9\cf0\ulnone , we are said to be \ldblquote justified by his blood.\rdblquote In \cf2\ul Rom_3:25\cf0\ulnone , God is said to have set Him forth as a propitiation for sin, that He might be just in justifying the ungodly. As to justify does not mean to pardon, but judicially to pronounce\cf4\f3\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 righteous, this passage distinctly asserts that the work of Christ is the ground on which the sentence of justification is passed. In \cf2\ul Rom_10:3-4\cf0\ulnone , he says of the Jews, \ldblquote They being ignorant of God\rquote s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.\rdblquote It can hardly be questioned that the word (\cf1\f1\'e4\'e9\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f3\f2\u8059?\f1\'ed\'e7\cf0\f0 ) righteousness must have the same meaning in both members of the first of these verses. If a man\rquote s \ldblquote own righteousness\rdblquote is that which would render him righteous, then \ldblquote the righteousness of God,\rdblquote in this connection, must be a justifying righteousness. It is called the righteousness of God, because, as said before, He is its author. It is the righteousness of Christ. It is provided, offered, and accepted of God. Here then are two righteousnesses; the one human, the other divine; the one valueless, the other infinitely meritorious. The folly of the Jews, and of thousands since their day, consists in refusing the latter and trusting to the former. This folly the Apostle makes apparent in the fourth verse. The Jews acted under the assumption that the law as a covenant, that is, as prescribing the conditions of salvation, was still in force, that men were still bound to satisfy its demands by their personal obedience in order to be saved, whereas Christ had made an end of the law. He had abolished it as a covenant, in order that men might be justified by faith. Christ, however, has thus made an end of the law, not by merely setting it aside, but by satisfying its demands. He delivers us from its curse, not by mere pardon, but by being made a curse for us. (\cf2\ul Gal_3:13\cf0\ulnone .) He redeems us from the law by being made under it (\cf2\ul Gal_4:4-5\cf0\ulnone ), and fulfilling all righteousness.\par In \cf2\ul Phi_3:8-9\cf0\ulnone , the Apostle says, he \ldblquote suffered the loss of all things,\rdblquote that he might be found in Christ, not having his \ldblquote own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.\rdblquote Here again one\rquote s own righteousness is contrasted with that which is of God. The word must have the same sense in both members. What Paul trusted to, was not his own righteousness, not his own subjective goodness, but a righteousness provided for him and received by faith. De Wette (no Augustinian) on this passage says, the righteousness of God here means,\rdblquote a righteousness received from God (graciously imputed) on condition of faith\rdblquote (\ldblquote\lang1031 die von Gott empfangene (aus Gnaden zugerechnete) Gerechtigkeit um des Glaubenswillen.\lang1033\rdblquote )\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\f3\fs16 157\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 The Apostle says (\cf2\ul 1Co_1:30\cf0\ulnone ), Christ of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.\rdblquote In this enumeration sanctification and righteousness are distinguished. The one renders us holy; the other renders us just, \i i.e\i0 ., satisfies the demands of justice. As Christ is to us the source of inward spiritual life, so He is the giver of that righteousness which secures our justification. Justification is not referred to sanctification as its proximate cause and ground. On the contrary, the gift of righteousness precedes that of sanctification. We are justified in order that we may be sanctified. The point here, however, is that righteousness is distinguished from anything and everything in us which can recommend us to the favour of God. We are accepted, justified, and saved, not for what we are, but for what He has done in our behalf. God \ldblquote made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul 2Co_5:21\cf0\ulnone .) As Christ was not made sin in a moral sense; so we are not (in justification) made righteousness in a moral sense. As He was made sin in that He \ldblquote bare our sins;\rdblquote so we are made righteousness in that we bear his righteousness. Our sins were the judicial ground of his humiliation under the law and of all his sufferings; so his righteousness is the judicial ground of our justification. In other words, as our sins were imputed to Him; so his righteousness is imputed to us. If imputation of sin did not render Him morally corrupt; the imputation of righteousness does not make us holy or morally good.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\i Argument from the General Teachings of the Bible.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 5. It is unnecessary to dwell upon particular passages in support of a doctrine which pervades the whole Scriptures. The question is, What is the ground of the pardon of sin and of the acceptance of the believe as righteous (in the forensic or judicial sense of the word), in the sight of God? Is it anything we do, anything experienced by us, or wrought in us; or, is it what Christ has done for us? The whole revelation of God concerning the method of salvation shows that it is the latter and not the former. In the first place, this is plain from what the Scriptures teach of the covenant of redemption between the Father and the Son. That there was such covenant cannot be denied if the meaning of the words be once agreed upon. It is plain from Scripture that Christ came into the world to do a certain work, on a certain condition. The promise made to Him was that a multitude whom no man can number, of the fallen race of man, should be saved. This included the promise that they should be justified, sanctified, and made partakers of eternal life. The very nature of this transaction involves the idea of vicarious substitution. It assumes that what He was to do was to be the ground of the justification, sanctification, and salvation of his people.\par In the second place this is involved in the nature of the work which He came to perform. He was to assume our nature, to be born of a woman, to take part of flesh and blood with all their infirmities, yet without sin. He was to take his place among sinners; be made subject to the law which they are bound to obey, and to endure the curse which they had incurred. If this be so, then what He did is the ground of our salvation from first to last; of our pardon, of our reconciliation with God, of the acceptance of our persons, of the indwelling of the Spirit, of our being transformed into His image, and of our admission into heaven. \ldblquote Not unto us, \scaps O Lord\scaps0 , not unto us, but unto Thy name give glory,\rdblquote has, therefore, been the spontaneous language of every believer from the beginning until now.\par In the third place, the manner in which Christ was to execute the work assigned as described in the prophets, and the way in which it was actually accomplished as described by Himself and by his Apostles, prove that what He did and suffered is the ground of our salvation. He says that He came \ldblquote to give his life a ransom for many.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Mat_20:28\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote There is one God,\rdblquote says the Apostle, \ldblquote and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; who gave Himself a ransom for all.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul 1Ti_2:5-6\cf0\ulnone .) The deliverance effected by a ransom has no reference to the character or conduct of the redeemed. Its effects are due exclusively to the ransom paid. It is, therefore, to deny that Christ was a ransom, that we are redeemed by his blood, to affirm that the proximate ground of our deliverance from the curse of the law and of our introduction into the liberty of the sons of God, is anything wrought in us or done by us. Again, from the beginning to the end of the Bible, Christ is represented as a sacrifice. From the first institution of sacrifices in the family of Adam; during the patriarchal period; in all the varied and costly ritual of the Mosaic law; in the predictions of the prophets; in the clear didactic statements of the New Testament, it is taught with a constancy, a solemnity, and an amplitude, which proves it to be a fundamental and vital element of the divine plan of redemption,\cf4\f3\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 that the Redeemer was to save his people by offering himself as a sacrifice unto God in their behalf. There is no one characteristic of the plan of salvation more deeply engraven on the hearts of Christians, which more effectually determines their inward spiritual life, which so much pervades their prayers and praises, or which is so directly the foundation of their hopes, as the sacrificial nature of the death of Christ. Strike from the Bible the doctrine of redemption by the blood of Christ, and what have we left? But if Christ saves us as a sacrifice, then it is what He does for us, his objective work, and nothing subjective, nothing in us, which is the ground of our salvation, and of all that salvation includes. For even our sanctification is due to his death. His blood cleanses from all sin. (\cf2\ul 1Jo_1:7\cf0\ulnone .) It cleanses from the guilt of sin by expiation; and secures inward sanctification by securing the gift of the Holy Spirit.\par Again, the whole Bible is full of the idea of substitution. Christ took our place. He undertook to do for us what we could not do for ourselves. This is taught in every possible way. He bore our sins. He died for us and in our place. He was made under the law for us. He was made a curse for us. He was made sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. The chastisement of our peace was laid on Him. Everything, therefore, which the Bible teaches of the method of salvation, is irreconcilable with the doctrine of subjective justification in all its forms. We are always and everywhere referred to something out of ourselves as the ground of our confidence toward God.\par In the fourth place, the effects ascribed to the work of Christ, as before remarked, are such as do not flow from anything in the believer himself, but must be referred to what has been done for him. These effects are expiation of sin, propitiation, the gift and indwelling of the life-giving Spirit of God; redemption, or deliverance from all forms of evil; and a title to eternal life and actual participation in the exaltation, glory, and blessedness of the Son of God. It is out of all question that these wonderful effects should be referred to what we personally are; to our merit, to our holiness, to our participation of the life of Christ. In whatever sense these last words may be understood, they refer to what we personally are or become. His life in us is after all a form of our life. It constitutes our character. And it is self-evident to the conscience that our character is not, and cannot be the ground of our pardon, of God\rquote s peculiar love, or of our eternal glory and blessedness in heaven.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\f3\fs16 160\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 In the fifth place, the condition on which our participation of the benefits of redemption is suspended, is inconsistent with any form of the doctrine of subjective justification. We are never said to be justified on account of faith, considered either as an act or as a principle, as an exercise or as a permanent state of the mind. Faith is never said to be the ground of justification Nor are we saved by faith as the source of holiness or of spiritual life in the soul, or as the organ of receiving the infused life of God. We are saved simply \ldblquote by\rdblquote faith, by receiving and resting upon Christ alone for salvation. The thing received is something out of ourselves. It is Christ, his righteousness, his obedience, the merit of his blood or death. We look to Him. We flee to Him. We lay hold on Him. We hide ourselves in Him. We are clothed in his righteousness. The Romanist indeed says, that an Ethiopian in a white robe does not become white. True, but a suit of armor gives security from the sword or spear, and that is what we need before attending to the state of our complexion. We need protection from the wrath of God in the first instance. The inward transformation of the soul into his likeness is provided for by other means.\par In the sixth place and finally, the fact that we are saved by grace proves that the ground of salvation is not in ourselves. The grace of God, his love for the unlovely, for the guilty and polluted, is represented in the Bible as the most mysterious of the divine perfections. It was hidden in God. It could not be discovered by reason, neither was it revealed prior to the redemption of man. The specific object of the plan of salvation is the manifestation of this most wonderful, most attractive, and most glorious attribute of the divine nature. Everything connected with our salvation, says the Apostle, is intended for the \ldblquote praise of the glory of his grace\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Eph_1:6\cf0\ulnone .) God hath quickened us, he says, and raised us up, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, in order \ldblquote that in the ages to come, he might show the exceeding riches of his grace, in his kindness toward us, through Christ Jesus.\rdblquote\par From their nature, grace and works are antithetical. The one excludes the other. What is of grace, is not of works. And by works in Scripture, in relation to this subject, is meant not individual acts only, but states of mind, anything and everything internal of which moral character can be predicated. When, therefore, it is said that salvation is of grace and not of works, it is thereby said that it is not founded upon anything in the believer\cf4\f3\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 himself. It was not any moral excellence in man, that determined God to interpose for his redemption, while He left the apostate angels to their fate. This was a matter of grace. To deny this, and to make the provision of a plan of salvation for man a matter of justice, is in such direct contradiction to everything in the Bible, that it hardly ever has been openly asserted. The gift of his Son for the redemption of man is ever represented as the most wonderful display of unmerited love. That some and not all men are actually saved, is expressly declared to be not of works, not on account of anything distinguishing favourably the one class from the other, but a matter of pure grace. When a sinner is pardoned and restored to the favour of God, this again is declared to be of grace. If of grace it is not founded upon anything in the sinner himself. Now as the Scriptures not only teach that the plan of salvation is thus gratuitous in its inception, execution, and application, but also insist upon this characteristic of the plan as of vital importance, and even go so far as to teach that unless we consent to be saved by grace, we cannot be saved at all, it of necessity follows that the doctrine of subjective justification is contrary to the whole spirit of the Bible. That doctrine in all its forms teaches that that which secures our acceptance with God, is something in ourselves, something which constitutes character. If so, then salvation is not of grace; and if not of grace, it is unattainable by sinners.\par \pard\cf5\f4\fs23\par } nttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~7.\i The Consequences of the Imputation of Righteousness.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 It is frequently said that justification consists in the pardon of sin and in the imputation of righteousness. This mode of statement is commonly adopted by Lutheran theologians. This exhibition of the doctrine is founded upon the sharp distinction made in the \ldblquote Form of Concord\rdblquote between the passive and active obedience of Christ. To the former is referred the remission of the penalty due to us for sin; to the latter our title to eternal life. The Scriptures, however, do not make this distinction so prominent. Our justification as a whole is sometimes referred to the blood of Christ, and sometimes to his obedience. This is intelligible because the crowning act of his obedience, and that without which all else had been unavailing, was his laying down his life for us. It is, perhaps, more correct to say that the righteousness of Christ, including all He did and suffered in our stead, is imputed to the believer as the ground of his justification, and that the consequences of this imputation are, first, the remission of sin, and secondly, the acceptance of the believer as righteous. And if righteous, then he is entitled to be so regarded and treated.\par By the remission of sin Romanists understand the removal of the pollution of sin. So that their definition of justification as consisting in the remission of sin and infusion of righteousness, is only a statement of the negative and positive aspects of sanctification, \i i.e\i0 ., putting off the old man and putting on the new man. The effect of remission is constantly declared to be that nothing of the nature of sin remains in the soul. The Council of Trent says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Justificatio . non est sola peccatorum remissio, sed et sanctificatio, et renovatio interioris hominis per voluntariam susceptionem grati\'e6 et donorum. Quanquam nemo possit esse justus, nisi cui merita passionis Domini nostri Jesu Christi communicantur: id tamen in hac impii justificatione fit, dum ejusdem sanctissim\'e6 passionis merito per Spiritum Sanctum caritas Dei diffunditur in cordibus eorum, qui justificantur, atque ipsis inh\'e6ret.\lang1033\rdblquote \ldblquote\lang1142 Quibus verbis justificationis impii descriptio insinuatur, ut sit translatio ab eo statu, in quo homo nascitur filius primi Ad\'e6, in statum grati\'e6 et adoptionis filiorum Dei, per secundum Adam Jesum Christum, salvatorem nostrum: qu\'e6 quidem translatio post evangelium promulgatum sine lavacro regenerationis, aut ejus voto fieri non potest.\lang1033\rdblquote By \ldblquote\lang1142 status grati\'e6\lang1033\rdblquote in this definition is not meant a state of favour, but a state of subjective grace or holiness; because in other places and most commonly justification is said to consist in the infusion of grace. In this definition, therefore, the pardon of sin in the proper sense of the words is not included. Bellarmin says this translation into a state of adoption as sons of God, \ldblquote\lang1142 non potest . fieri, nisi homo per remissionem peccati desinat esse impius; et per infusionem justiti\'e6 incipiat esse pius. Sed sicut a\'ebr cum illustratur a sole per idem lumen, quod recipit, desinit esse tenebrosus et incipit esse lucidus: sic etiam homo per eandem justitiam sibi a sole justiti\'e6 donatam atque infusam desinit esse injustus, delente videlicet lumine grati\'e6 tenebras peccatorum.\lang1033\rdblquote The remission of sin is therefore defined to be the removal of sin. Bellarmin argues in support of this view that guilt is removed by holiness, that guilt is a relation; the relation of sin to justice. When the thing itself is taken away, the relation itself of course ceases. Hence remission of sin, even in the sense of pardon, is effected by the\cf1\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 infusion of righteousness, as darkness is banished by the introduction of light. It is thus, as remarked above, that guilt is either ignored, or reduced to a minimum by the Romish theory of justification. There is really no satisfaction of justice in the case. The merits of Christ avail to secure for man the gift of the Holy Ghost, by whose power as exercised in the sacrament of baptism, the soul is made holy, and by the introduction of holiness everything of the nature of sin is banished, and all ground for the infliction of punishment is removed. A scheme so opposed to Scripture, and so inconsistent with even the natural conscience, cannot be practically adopted by the mass of the people. The conviction is too intimate that the desert of punishment is not removed by the reformation, or even by the regeneration of the sinner, to allow the conscience to be satisfied with any scheme of salvation which does not provide for the expiation of the guilt of sin by what really satisfies the justice of God.\par In the Bible, therefore, as well as in common life, pardon is not a mere consequence of sanctification. It is exemption from the infliction of the deserved penalty of the law. Whether this exemption is a mere matter of caprice, or unworthy partiality for the offender, or for considerations of expediency, or at the promptings of compassion, or upon the ground of an adequate satisfaction to the demands of justice, makes no difference so far as the nature of pardon is concerned. It is in all cases the remission of a penalty adjudged to be deserved. It is in this sense, therefore, that justification is declared to include the pardon of sins, founded on the imputation to the believing sinner of the perfect righteousness of Christ. It is this that gives the believer peace. He sees that he is delivered from \ldblquote the wrath and curse of God\rdblquote due to him, not by any arbitrary exercise of executive authority, but because God, as a righteous judge, can, in virtue of the propitiation of Christ, be just and yet justify the ungodly.\par The sins which are pardoned in justification include all sins, past, present, and future. It does indeed seem to be a solecism that sins should be forgiven before they are committed. Forgiveness involves remission of penalty. But how can a penalty be remitted before it is incurred? This is only an apparent difficulty arising out of the inadequacy of human language. The righteousness of Christ is a perpetual donation. It is a robe which hides, or as the Bible expresses it, covers from the eye of justice the sins of the believer. They are sins; they deserve the wrath and curse of God, but the necessity for the infliction of\cf1\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 that curse no longer exists. The believer feels the constant necessity for confession and prayer for pardon, but the ground of pardon is ever present for him to offer and plead. So that it would perhaps be a more correct statement to say that in justification the believer receives the promise that God will not deal with him according to his transgressions, rather than to say that sins are forgiven before they are committed.\par This subject is thus presented by the Apostle: believers \ldblquote are not under the law but under grace.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_6:14\cf0\ulnone .) They are not under a legal system administered according to the principles of retributive justice, a system which requires perfect obedience as the condition of acceptance with God, and which says, \ldblquote Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.\rdblquote They are under grace, that is, under a system in which believers are not dealt with on the principles of justice, but on the principles of undeserved mercy, in which God does not impute \ldblquote their trespasses unto them.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul 2Co_5:19\cf0\ulnone .) There is therefore to them no condemnation. They are not condemned for their sins, not because they are not sins and do not deserve condemnation, but because Christ has already made expiation for their guilt and makes continual intercession for them.\par The second consequence attributed to the imputation of Christ\rquote s righteousness, is a title to eternal life. This in the older writers is often expressed by the words \ldblquote adoption and heirship.\rdblquote Being made the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus (\cf2\ul Gal_3:26\cf0\ulnone ), they are heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ of a heavenly inheritance. (\cf2\ul Rom_8:17\cf0\ulnone .) The mere expiation of guilt confers no title to eternal life. The condition of the covenant under which man was placed was perfect obedience. This, from all that appears in Scripture, the perfection of God requires. As He never pardons sins unless the demands of justice be satisfied, so He never grants eternal life unless perfect obedience be rendered. Heaven is always represented as a purchased possession. In the covenant between the Father and the Son the salvation of his people was promised as the reward of his humiliation, obedience, and death. Having performed the stipulated conditions. He has a claim to the promised recompense. And this claim inures to the benefit of his people. But besides this, as the work of Christ consisted in his doing all that the law of God, or covenant of works requires for the salvation of men, and as that righteousness is freely offered to every one that believes,\cf1\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 every such believer has as valid a claim to eternal life as he would have had, had he personally done all that the law demands. Thus broad and firm is the foundation which God has laid for the hopes of his people. It is the rock of ages; Jehovah our righteousness.\par \pard\cf3\f2\fs23\par } {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~8.\i Relation of Faith to Justification.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 All who profess to be Christians admit the doctrine of justification by faith. There are different views, however, as to the relation between faith and justification, as has been already intimated.\par 1. Pelagians and rationalists teach that faith in God\rquote s being and perfection, or in the great principles of moral and religious truth, is the source of that moral excellence on account of which we are accepted of God. It is perhaps only a different way of expressing the same idea, to say that God, in the case of Abraham, and, therefore, of other men, accepts the pious state of mind involved in the exercise of faith or confidence in God, in lieu of perfect righteousness.\par 2. Romanists make faith mere assent. It does not justify as a virtue, or as apprehending the offered righteousness of Christ. It is neither the formal nor the instrumental cause of justification, it is merely the predisposing or occasional cause. A man assents to the truth of Christianity, and to the more special truth that the Church is a divine institution for saving men. He therefore comes to the Church and receives the sacrament of baptism, by which, \ldblquote\lang1142 ex opere operato\lang1033 ,\rdblquote a habit of grace, or spiritual life is infused into the soul, which is the formal cause of justification; \i i.e\i0 ., it renders the soul inherently just or holy. In this sense the sinner may be said to be justified by faith. This is the first justification. After the man is thus rendered holy or regenerated, then the exercises of faith have real merit, and enter into the ground of his second justification, by which he becomes entitled to eternal life. But here faith stands on a level with other Christian graces. It is not the only, nor the most important ground of justification. It is in this view inferior to love, from which faith indeed derives all its virtue as a Christian grace. It is then \ldblquote\lang1142 fides formata\lang1033 ,\rdblquote \i i.e\i0 ., faith of which love s the essence, the principle which gives it character.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\f1\fs16 166\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\i The Romish Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 According to the Romish scheme (1.) God is the efficient cause of justification, as it is by his power or supernatural grace that the soul is made just. (2.) Christ is the meritorious cause, as it is for his sake God grants this saving grace, or influence of the Spirit to the children of men. (3.) Inherent righteousness is the formal cause, since thereby the soul is made really just or holy. (4.) Faith is the occasional and predisposing cause, as it leads the sinner to seek justification (regeneration), and disposes God to grant the blessing. In this aspect it has the merit of congruity only, not that of condignity. (5.) Baptism is the essential instrumental cause, as it is only through or by baptism that inherent righteousness is infused or justification is effected. So much for the first justification. After this justification, which makes the sinner holy, then, (6.) Good works, all the fruits and exercises of the new life, have real merit and constitute the ground of the Christian\rquote s title to eternal life.\par The language of the Council of Trent on this subject is as follows: \ldblquote\lang1142 Hujus justificationis caus\'e6 sunt, finalis quidem, gloria Dei et Christi, ac vita \'e6terna: efficiens vero, misericors Deus, qui gratuito abluit et sanctificat, signans et ungens Spiritu promissionis sancto,\~. meritoria autem dilectissimus unigenitus suus, Dominus noster, Jesus Christus, qui, cum essemus inimici, propter nimiam caritatem, qua dilexit nos, sua sanctissima passione in ligno crucis nobis justificationem [\i i.e\i0 ., regeneration] meruit et pro nobis Deo Patri satisfecit: instrumentalis item, sacramentum baptismi, quod est sacramentum fidei, sine qua nulli unquam contigit justificatio: demum unica formalis causa est justitia Dei, non qua ipse justus est, sed qua nos justos facit: qua videlicet ab eo donati, renovamur spiritu mentis nostr\'e6, et non modo reputamur, sed vere justi nominamur, et sumus, justitiam in nobis recipientes, unusquisque suam secundum mensuram, quam Spiritus Sanctus partitur singulis prout vult, et secundum propriam cujusque dispositionem et cooperationem.\lang1033\rdblquote Again, it is said: \ldblquote\lang1142 Qu\'e6 enim justitia nostra dicitur, quia per eam nobis inh\'e6rentem justificamur; illa eadem Dei est, quia a Deo nobis infunditur per Christi meritum.\lang1033\rdblquote All this relates to the first justifications or regeneration, in which the soul passes from spiritual death to spiritual Life. Of the second justification, which gives a title to eternal life, Bellarmin says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Habet communis catholicorum omnium sententia, opera bona justorum vere, ac proprie esse merita, et merita non cujuscunque pr\'e6mii, sed ipsius vit\'e6 \'e6tern\'e6.\lang1033\rdblquote The thirty-second canon of the Tridentine Council at this sixth session anathematizes any one who teaches a different doctrine. \ldblquote\lang1142 Si quis dixerit, hominis justificati bona opera ita esse dona Dei, ut non sint etiam bona ipsius justificati merita; aut ipsum justificatum bonis operibus, qu\'e6 ab eo per Dei gratiam et Jesu Christi meritum, cujus vivum membrum est, fiunt, non vere mereri augmentum grati\'e6, vitam \'e6ternam, et ipsius vit\'e6 \'e6tern\'e6, si tamen in gratia decesserit, consecutionem, atque etiam glori\'e6 augmentum; anathema sit.\lang1033\rdblquote It appears from all this that, according to the doctrine of the Church of Rome, faith has no special or direct connection with justification, and that \ldblquote justification by faith\rdblquote in that Church means something entirely different from what is intended by those words in the lips of evangelical Christians.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\i Remonstrant View.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 3. According to the Remonstrants or Arminians, faith is the ground of justification. Under the Gospel God accepts our imperfect obedience including faith and springing from it, in place of the perfect obedience demanded by the law originally given to Adam. There is one passage in the Bible, or rather one form of expression, which occurs in several places, which seems to favour this view of the subject. In \cf3\ul Rom_4:3\cf0\ulnone , it is said, \ldblquote Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness;\rdblquote and again in ver. 22 of that chapter, and in \cf3\ul Gal_3:6\cf0\ulnone . If this phrase be interpreted according to the analogy of such passages as \cf3\ul Rom_2:26\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote Shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision?\rdblquote it does mean that faith is taken or accepted for righteousness. The Bible, however, is the word of God and therefore self-consistent. Consequently if a passage admits of one interpretation inconsistent with the teaching of the Bible in other places, and of another interpretation consistent with that teaching, we are bound to accept the latter. This rule, simple and obvious as it is, is frequently violated, not only by those who deny the inspiration of the Scriptures, but even by men professing to recognize their infallible authority. They seem to regard it as a proof of independence to make each passage mean simply what its grammatical structure and logical connection indicate, without the least regard to the analogy of Scripture. This is unreasonable. In \cf3\ul Gen_15:1\cf0\ulnone . we are told that Abraham lamented before the Lord that he was childless, and that one born in his house was\cf1\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 to be his heir. And God said unto him, \ldblquote This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels, shall be thine heir. And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them. And he said unto him, So shall thy seed be. And he believed in the \scaps Lord\scaps0 : and He counted it to him for righteousness.\rdblquote Taking this passage by itself, it is inferred that the object of Abraham\rquote s faith was the promise of a numerous posterity. Supposing this to be true, which it certainly is not, what right has any one to assume that Abraham\rquote s faith\rquote s being imputed to him for righteousness, means anything more than when it is said that the zeal of Phinehas was imputed for righteousness (\cf3\ul Psa_106:31\cf0\ulnone ); or when in \cf3\ul Deu_24:13\cf0\ulnone , it is said that to return a poor man\rquote s pledge \ldblquote shall be righteousness unto thee before the \scaps Lord\scaps0 thy God.\rdblquote No one supposes that one manifestation of zeal, or one act of benevolence, is taken for complete obedience to the law. All that the phrase \ldblquote to impute for righteousness\rdblquote by itself means, according to Old Testament usage, is, to esteem as right, to approve. The zeal of Phinehas was right. Returning a poor man\rquote s pledge was right. These were acts which God approved. And so He approved of Abraham\rquote s faith. He gained the favour of God by believing. Now while this is true, far more, as the Apostle teaches, is true. He teaches, first, that the great promise made to Abraham, and faith in which secured his justification, was not that his natural descendants should be as numerous as the stars of heaven, but that in his seed all the nations of the earth should be blessed; secondly, that the seed intended was not a multitude, but one person, and that that one person was Christ (\cf3\ul Gal_3:16\cf0\ulnone ); and, thirdly, that the blessing which the seed of Abraham was to secure for the world was redemption. \ldblquote Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: . that the blessing ol Abraham (\i i.e\i0 ., the promise made to Abraham) might come on\rdblquote us. The promise made to Abraham, therefore, was redemption through Christ. Hence those who are Christ\rquote s, the Apostle teaches, are Abraham\rquote s seed and heirs of his promise. What, therefore, Abraham believed, was that the seed of the woman, the Shiloh, the promised Redeemer of the world, was to be born of him. He believed in Christ, as his Saviour, as his righteousness, and deliverer, and therefore it was that he was accepted as righteous, not for the merit of his faith, and not on the ground of faith, or by taking faith in lieu of righteousness, but because he received and rested on Christ alone for his salvation.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\f1\fs16 169\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 Unless such be the meaning of the Apostle, it is hard to see how there is any coherence or force in his arguments. His object is to prove that men are justified, not by works, but gratuitously; not for what they are or do, but for what is done for them. They are saved by a ransom; by a sacrifice. But it is absurd to say that trust in a ransom redeems, or is taken in place of the ransom; or that faith in a sacrifice, and not the sacrifice itself, is the ground of acceptance. To prove that such is the Scriptural method of justification, Paul appeals to the case of Abraham. He was not justified for his works, but by faith in a Redeemer. He expected to be justified as ungodly. (\cf3\ul Rom_4:5\cf0\ulnone .) This, he tells us, is what we must do. We have no righteousness of our own. We must take Christ for our wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. In the immediately preceding chapter the Apostle had said we are justified by faith in the blood of Christ, as a propitiation for sin; and for him to prove this from the fact that Abraham was justified on account of his confiding, trusting state of mind, which led him to believe that, although a hundred years old, he should be the father of a numerous posterity, would be a contradiction.\par Besides, it is to be remembered, not only that the Scriptures never say that we are justified \ldblquote on account\rdblquote of faith (\cf4\f2\'e4\'e9\f3\u8048?\f4 \f2\'f0\f3\u8055?\f2\'f3\'f4\'e9\'ed\cf0\f0 ), but always \ldblquote by,\rdblquote or \ldblquote through\rdblquote faith (\cf4\f2\'e4\'e9\f3\u8048?\cf0\f0 or \cf4\f3\u7952?\f2\'ea\f4 \f2\'f0\f3\u8055?\f2\'f3\'f4\'e5\'f9\'f2\cf0\f0 or \cf4\f2\'f0\f3\u8055?\f2\'f3\'f4\'e5\'e9\cf0\f0 ); but also that it is not by faith as such; not by faith in God, nor in the Scriptures; and not by faith in a specific divine promise such as that made to Abraham of a numerous posterity, or of the possession of the land of Canaan; but only by faith in one particular promise, namely, that of salvation through Christ. It is, therefore, not on account of the state of mind, of which faith is the evidence, nor of the good works which are its fruits, but only by faith as an act of trust in Christ, that we are justified. This of necessity supposes that He, and not our faith, is the ground of our justification. He, and not our faith, is the ground of our confidence. How can any Christian wish it to be otherwise? What comparison is there between the absolutely perfect and the infinitely meritorious righteousness of Christ, and our own imperfect evangelical obedience as a ground of confidence and peace!\par This doctrine is moreover dishonouring to the Gospel. It supposes the Gospel to be less holy than the law. The law required perfect obedience; the Gospel is satisfied with imperfect obedience. And how imperfect and insufficient our best obedience is\cf1\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 the conscience of every believer certifies. If it does not satisfy us, how can it satisfy God?\par The grand objection, however, to this Remonstrant doctrine is to the relation between faith and justification, is that it is in direct contradiction to the plain and pervading teachings of the Word of God. The Bible teaches that we are not justified by works. This doctrine affirms that we are justified by works. The Bible teaches that we are justified by the blood of Christ; that it is for his obedience that the sentence of justification is passed on men. This doctrine affirms that God pronounces us righteous because of our own righteousness. The Bible from first to last teaches that the whole ground of our salvation or of our justification is objective, what Christ as our Redeemer, our ransom, our sacrifice, our surety, has done for us. This doctrine teaches us to look within, to what we are and to what we do, as the ground of our acceptance with God. It may safely be said that this is altogether unsatisfactory to the awakened conscience. The sinner cannot rely on anything in himself. He instinctively looks to Christ, to his work done for us as the ground of confidence and peace. This in the last resort is the hope of all believers, whatever their theory of justification may be. Whether Papist, Remonstrant, or Augustinian, they all cast their dying eyes on Christ. \ldblquote As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up; that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\i Protestant Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 4. The common doctrine of Protestants on this subject is that faith is merely the instrumental cause of justification. It is the act of receiving and resting upon Christ, and has no other relation to the end than any other act by which a proffered good is accepted. This is clearly the doctrine of Scripture, (1.) Because we are constantly said to be justified by, or through faith. (2.) Because the faith which justifies is described as a looking, as a receiving, as a coming, as a fleeing for refuge, as a laying hold of, and as a calling upon. (3.) Because the ground to which our justification is referred, and that on which the sinner\rquote s trust is placed, is declared to be the blood, the death, the righteousness, the obedience of Christ. (4.) Because the fact that Christ is a ransom, a sacrifice, and as such effects our salvation, of necessity supposes that the faith which interests us in the merit of his work is a simple act of trust. (5.) Because any\cf1\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 other view of the case is inconsistent with the gratuitous nature of justification, with the honour of Christ, and with the comfort and confidence of the believer.\par \pard\cf5\f5\fs23\par } :AA1.17.8. Relation of Faith to Justification{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\froman\fcharset0 Gentium;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} \fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f4\froman\fcharset0 Gentium;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~9. \i Objections to the Protestant Doctrine of Justification.\i0\par \cf1\b0\i It is said to lead to Licentiousness.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 1. The first, most obvious, and most persistently urged objection against the doctrine of gratuitous justification through the imputation of the righteousness of Christ, has already been incidentally considered. That objection is that the doctrine leads to license; that if good works are not necessary to justification, they are not necessary at all; that if God accepts the chief of sinners as readily as the most moral of men, on the simple condition of faith in Christ, then what profit is there in circumcision? in Judaism? in being in the Church? in being good in any form? Why not live in sin that grace may abound? This objection having been urged against the Apostle, it needs no other answer than that which he himself gave it. That answer is found in the sixth and seventh chapters of his Epistle to the Romans, and is substantially as follows:\par First, the objection involves a contradiction. To speak of salvation in sin is as great an absurdity as to speak of life in death. Salvation is deliverance from sin. How then can men be delivered from sin in order that they may live in it. Or, as Paul expresses it, \ldblquote How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?\rdblquote\par Secondly, the very act of faith which secures our justification, secures also our sanctification. It cannot secure the one without securing also the other. This is not only the intention and the desire of the believer, but it is the ordinance of God; a necessary feature of the plan of salvation, and secured by its nature. We take Christ as our Redeemer from sin, from its power as well as from its guilt. And the imputation of his righteousness consequent on faith secures the indwelling of the Holy Spirit as certainly, and for the very same reasons (the covenant stipulations), that it secures the pardon of our sins. And, therefore, if we are partakers of his death, we are partakers of his life. If we die with Him, we rise with Him. If we are justified, we are sanctified. He, therefore, who lives in sin, proclaims himself an unbeliever. He has neither part nor lot in the redemption of Him who came to save his people from their sins.\par Thirdly, our condition, the Apostle says, is analogous to that of a slave, belonging first to one master, then to another. So long as he belonged to one man, he was not under the authority of another. But if freed from the one and made the slave of the other, then he comes under an influence which constrains obedience to the latter. So we were the slaves of sin, but now, freed from that hard master, we have become the servants of righteousness. For a believer, therefore, to live in sin, is just as impossible as for the slave of one man to be at the same time the slave of another. We are indeed free; but not free to sin. We are only free from the bondage of the devil and introduced into the pure, exalted, and glorious liberty of the sons of God.\par Fourthly, the objection as made against the Apostle and as constantly repeated since, is urged in the interests of morality and of common sense. Reason itself, it is said, teaches that a man must be good before he can be restored to the favour of God, and if we teach that the number and heinousness of a man\rquote s sins are no barrier to his justification, and his good works are no reason why he should be justified rather than the chief of sinners, we upset the very foundations of morality. This is the wisdom of men. The wisdom of God, as revealed in the Scriptures, is very different. According to the Bible the favour of God is the life of the soul. The light of his countenance is to rational creatures what the light of the sun is to the earth, the source of all that is beautiful and good. So long, therefore, as a soul is under his curse, there is no life-giving or life-sustaining intercourse between it and God. In this state it can only, as the Apostle expresses it, \ldblquote bring forth fruit unto death.\rdblquote As soon, however, as it exercises faith, it receives the imputation of the righteousness of Christ, God\rquote s justice is thereby satisfied, and the Spirit comes and takes up his dwelling in the believer as the source of all holy living. There can therefore be no holiness until there is reconciliation with God, and no reconciliation with God except through the righteousness imputed to us and received by faith alone. Then follow the indwelling of the Spirit, progressive sanctification, and all the fruits of holy living.\par It may be said that this scheme involves an inconsistency. there can be no holiness until there is reconciliation, and no reconciliation (so far as adults are concerned) until there is faith. But faith is a fruit of the Spirit, and an act of the renewed soul. Then there is and must be, after all, holy action before there is reconciliation. It might be enough to say in answer to this objection, that logical order and chronological succession are different things; or that the order of nature and order of time are not to be confounded. Many things are contemporaneous or co-instantaneous which nevertheless stand in a certain logical, and even causal relation to each other. Christ commanded the man with a withered arm to stretch forth his hand. He immediately obeyed, but not before he received strength. He called to Lazarus to come forth from the grave; and he came forth. But this presupposes a restoration of life. So God commands the sinner to believe in Christ; and he thereupon receives Him as his Saviour; though this supposes supernatural power or grace.\par Our Lord, however, gives another answer to this objection. He says, as recorded in \cf2\ul Joh_17:9\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine.\rdblquote The intercession of Christ secures for those given to Him by the Father the renewing of the Holy Ghost. The first act of the renewed heart is faith; as the first act of a restored eye is to see. Whether this satisfies the understanding or not, it remains clear as the doctrine of the Bible that good works are the fruits and consequences of reconciliation with God, through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Inconsistent with the Grace of the Gospel.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 2. It is objected that the Protestant doctrine destroys the gratuitous nature of justification. If justice be satisfied; if all the demands of the law are met, there can, it is said, be no grace in the salvation of the sinner. If a man owes a debt, and some one pays it for him, the creditor shows no grace in giving an acquittal. This objection is familiar, and so also is the answer. The work of Christ is not of the nature of a commercial transaction. It is not analogous to a pecuniary satisfaction except in one point. It secures the deliverance of those for whom it is offered and by whom it is accepted. In the case of guilt the demand of justice is upon the person of the offender. He, and he alone is bound to answer at the bar of justice. No one can take his place, unless with the consent of the representative of justice and of the substitute, as well as of the sinner himself. Among men, substitution in the case of crime and its penalty is rarely, if ever admissible, because no man has the right over his own life or liberty; he cannot give them up at pleasure; and because no human magistrate has the right to relieve the offender or to inflict the legal penalty on another. But Christ had power, \i i.e\i0 ., the right (\cf3\f1\u7952?\f2\'ee\'ef\'f5\'f3\f1\u8055?\f2\'e1\cf0\f0 ) to lay down his life and \ldblquote power to take it again\rdblquote And God, as absolute judge and sovereign, the Lord of the conscience, and the proprietor of all his creatures, was at full liberty to accept a substitute for sinners. This is proved beyond contradiction by what God has actually done. Under the old dispensation every sacrifice appointed by the law was a substitute for him in whose behalf it was offered. In the clearest terms it was predicted that the Messiah was to be the substitute of his people; that the chastisement of their sins was to be laid on Him, and that He was to make his soul an offering for sin. He was hailed as He entered on his ministry as the Lamb of God who was to bear the sins of the world. He died the just for the unjust. He redeemed us from the curse of the law by being made a curse for us. This is what is meant by being a substitute. To deny this is to deny the central idea of the Scriptural doctrine of redemption. To explain it away, is to absorb as with a sponge the life-blood of the Gospel.\par It is the glory, the power, and the preciousness of the Protestant doctrine that it makes the salvation of sinners a matter of grace from the beginning to the end. On the part of the eternal Father it was of grace, \i i.e\i0 ., of unmerited, mysterious, and immeasurable love that He provided a substitute for sinners, and that He spared not his own Son, but freely gave Him up for us all It was a matter of grace, \i i.e\i0 ., of love to sinners, to the ungodly, to his enemies, that the eternal Son of God became man, assumed the burden of our sins, fulfilled all righteousness, obeying and suffering even unto death, that we might not perish but have eternal life. It is of grace that the Spirit applies to men the redemption purchased by Christ; that He renews the heart; that He overcomes the opposition of sinners, making them willing in the day of his power; that He bears with all their ingratitude, disobedience, and resistance, and never leaves them until his work is consummated in glory. In all this the sinner is not treated according to his character and conduct. He has no claim to any one in this long catalogue of mercies. Everything to him is a matter of unmerited grace. Merited grace, indeed, is a solecism. And so is merited salvation in the case of sinners.\par Grace does not cease to be grace because it is not exercised in violation of order, propriety, and justice. It is not the weak fondness of a doting parent. It is the love of a holy God, who in order to reveal that love and manifest the exceeding glory of that attribute when exercised towards the unworthy, did what was\cf4\f3\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 necessary to render its exercise consistent with the other perfections of the divine nature. It was indispensable that God should be just in justifying the ungodly, but He does not thereby cease to be gracious, inasmuch as it was He who provided the ransom by which the objects of his love are redeemed from the curse of the law and the power of sin.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i God cannot declare the Unjust to be  Just.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 3. Another standing objection to the Protestant doctrine has been so often met, that nothing but its constant repetition justifies a repetition of the answer. It is said to be absurd that one man should be righteous with the righteousness of another; that for God to pronounce the unjust just is a contradiction. This is a mere play on words. It is, howe ver, very serious play; for it is caricaturing truth. It is indeed certain that the subjective, inherent quality of one person or thing cannot by imputation become the inherent characteristic of any other person or thing. Wax cannot become hard by the imputation of the hardness of a stone, nor can a brute become rational by the imputation of the intelligence of a man; nor the wicked become good by the imputation of the goodness of other men. But what has this to do with one man\rquote s assuming the respo nsibility of another man? If among men the bankrupt can become solvent by a rich man\rquote s assuming his responsibilities, why in the court of God may not the guilty become righteous by the Son of God\rquote s assuming their responsibilities? If He was made sin for us, why may we not be made the righteousness of God in Him? The objection assumes that the word \ldblquote just\rdblquote or \ldblquote righteous\rdblquote in this connection, expresses moral character; whereas in the Bible, when used in re lation to this subject, it is always used in a judicial sense, \i i.e\i0 ., it expresses the relation of the person spoken of to justice. \cf3\f2\'c4\f1\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 is antithetical to \cf3\f1\u8017?\f2\'f0\f1\u8057?\f2\'e4\'e9\'ea\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 . The man with regard to whom justice is unsatisfied, is \cf3\f1\u8017?\f2\'f0\f1\u8057?\f2\'e4\'e9\'ea\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 , \ldblquote guilty.\rdblquote He with regard to whom justice is satisfied, is \cf3\f2\'e4\f1\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e1\'e9\'e f\'f2\cf0\f0 , \ldblquote righteous.\rdblquote To declare righteous, therefore, is not to declare holy; and to impute righteousness is not to impute goodness; but simply to regard and pronounce chose who receive the gift of Christ\rquote s righteousness, free from condemnation and entitled to eternal life for his sake. Some philosophical theologians seem to think that there is real antagonism between love and justice in the divine nature, or that these attributes are incompatible or inharmonious. This is not so in man, why then should it be so in God? The highest form of moral excellence includes these attributes as essential elements of its perfection. And the Scriptures represent them as mysteriously blended in the salvation of man. The gospel is a revelation to principalities and powers in heaven of the \cf3\f2\'f0\'ef\'eb\'f5\'f0\'ef\f1\u8055?\f2\'ea\'e9\'eb\'ef\'f2\f4 \f2\'f3\'ef\'f6\f1\u8055?\f2\'e1\f4 \f2\'f4\'ef\f1\u8166?\f4 \f2\'c8\'e5\'ef\f1\u8166?\cf0\f0 , because therein He shows that He can be just and yet justify, love, sanctify, and glorify the chief of sinners. For which all sinners should render Him everlasting thanksgiving and praise.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Christ\rquote s Righteousness due for Himself.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 4. It was natural that Socinus, who regarded Christ as a mere man, should object to the doctrine of the imputation of his righteousness to the believer, that Christ was under the same obligation to obey the law and to take his share of human suffering as other men, and therefore that his righteousness being due for Himself, could not be imputed to others. This objection is substantially urged by some who admit the divinity of Christ. In doing so, however, they virtually assume the Nestorian, or dualistic view of Christ\rquote s person. They argue on the assumption that He was a human person, and that he stood, in virtue of his assumption of our nature, in the same relation to the law as other men. It is admitted, however, that the Son, who became incarnate, was from eternity the second person in the Godhead. If, therefore, humanity as assumed by him was a person, then we have two persons, \emdash two Christs, \emdash the one human, the other divine. But if Christ be only one person, and if that person be the eternal Son of God, the same in substance, and equal in power and glory with the Father, then the whole foundation of the objection is gone. Christ sustained no other relation to the law, except so far as voluntarily assumed, than that which God himself sustains. But God is not under the law. He is Himself the primal, immutable, and infinitely perfect law to all rational creatures. Christ\rquote s subjection to the law therefore, was as voluntary as his submitting to the death of the cross. As He did not die for Himself, so neither did He obey for Himself. In both forms of his obedience He acted for us, as our representative and substitute, that through his righteousness many might be made righteous.\par As to the other form of this objection, it has the same foundation and admits of the same answer. It is said that the obedience and sufferings of Christ, being the obedience and sufferings of a mere man, or at best of only the human element in the constitution of his person, could have only a human, and, therefore, only a finite value, and consequently could be no adequate satisfaction\cf4\f3\fs16 7\cf0\f0\fs24 for the sins of the whole world. Our Lord told his disciples. \ldblquote Ye are of more value than many sparrows.\rdblquote If, then, in the sight of God a man is of far greater value than irrational creatures, why should it be thought incredible that the blood of the eternal Son of God should cleanse from all sin? What a man does with his hands, the man does; and what Christ through his human nature did, in the execution of his mediatorial work, the Son of God did. Therefore, men who spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit did not hesitate to say, that the Lord of glory was crucified (\cf2\ul 1Co_2:8\cf0\ulnone ), and that God purchased the Church\rdblquote with his own blood.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Act_20:28\cf0\ulnone .) If, then, the obedience rendered, and the sufferings endured, were those of a divine person, we can only shut our mouths and bow down before God in adoring wonder, with the full assurance that the merit of that obedience and of those sufferings, must be abundantly sufficient for the justification of every sinner upon earth, in the past, the present, or the future.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Believers continue Guilty, and liable to Punishment.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 5. It is sometimes objected to the Protestant doctrine on this subject, that believers not only recognize themselves as justly exposed to condemnation for their present shortcomings and transgressions, but that the Scriptures so represent them, and constantly speak of God as punishing his people for their sins. How is this to be reconciled with the doctrine that they are not under\cf4\f3\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 condemnation; that, as regards them, justice has been fully satisfied, and that no one can justly lay anything to the charge of God\rquote s elect.\par It must be admitted, or rather it is fully acknowledged that every believer feels himself unworthy of the least of God\rquote s mercies. He knows that if God were to deal with him according to his character and conduct, he must inevitably be condemned. This sense of ill-desert or demerit, is indelible. It is a righteous judgment which the sinner passes, and cannot but pass upon himself. But the ground of his justification is not in himself. The believer acknowledges that in himself he deserves nothing but indignation and wrath, not only for what he has been, but for what he now is. This is what he feels when he looks at himself. Nevertheless, he knows that there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus; that Christ has assumed the responsibility of answering for him at the bar of God; that He constantly pleads his own perfect righteousness, as a reason why the deserved penalty should not be inflicted. If punishment were not deserved, pardon would not be gratuitous; and if not felt to be deserved, deliverance could not be received as a favour. The continued sense of ill-desert, on the part of the believer, is in no wise inconsistent with the Scriptural doctrine that the claims of justice in regard to him have been satisfied by his substitute and advocate. There is a great difference, as often remarked, between demerit and guilt. The latter is the liability in justice to the penalty of the law. The former is personal ill-desert. A criminal who has suffered the legal punishment of his crime, is no longer justly exposed to punishment for that offence. He however thinks of himself no better than he did before. He knows he cannot be subjected to further punishment; but his sense of demerit is not thereby lessened. And so it is with the believer; he knows that, because of what Christ has done for him, he cannot be justly condemned, but he feels and admits that in himself he is as hell-deserving as he was from the beginning. The heart of the believer solves many difficulties which the speculative understanding finds it hard to unravel. And it need not inordinately trouble him, if the latter be dissatisfied with the solution, provided he is sure that he is under the guidance of the Spirit by the word.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i This Theory concerns only the Outward.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 6. Modern theologians in many instances object to the Protestant doctrine of justification, that it is outward; concerns only\cf4\f3\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 legal relations; disregards the true nature of the mystical union, and represents Christ and his righteousness as purely objective, instead of looking upon Christ as giving Himself, his life to become the life of the believer, and with his life conveying its merits and its power. We are not concerned at present with the theory on which this objection is founded, but simply with the objection itself. What is urged as an objection to the doctrine is true. It does concern what is outward and objective; what is done for the sinner rather than what is done within him. But then it is to be considered, first, that this is what the sinner needs. He requires not only that his nature should be renewed and that a new principle of spiritual or divine life should be communicated to him; but also that his guilt should be removed, his sins expiated, and justice satisfied, as the preliminary condition of his enjoying this new life, and being restored to the favour of God. And secondly, that such is the constant representation of Scripture, our only trustworthy guide in matters of religious doctrine. The Bible makes quite as prominent what Christ does for us, as what He does in us. It says as much of his objective, expiatory work, as of the communication of a higher spiritual life to believers. It is only by ignoring this objective work of Christ, or by merging justification into inward renovation, that this objection has force or even plausibility. Protestants do not depreciate the value and necessity of the new life derived from Christ, because, in obedience to the Scriptures, they insist so strenuously upon the satisfaction which He has rendered by his perfect righteousness to the justice of God. Without the latter, the former is impossible.\par \pard\cf5\f5\fs23\par } \#au1.18.1. Its Nature{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f"e=1.18.0. CHAPTER XVIII SANCTIFICATION{\rtf1\ansi\de!`Q}1.17.9. Objections to Protestant Justification{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3ff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green192\blue128;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\stylesheet{ Normal;}{\s1 heading 1;}{\s2 heading 2;}{\s3 heading 3;}} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\s3\sb180\sa100\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\highlight1\lang1033\b\f0\fs48\par \par \par SANCTIFICATION\par \pard\cf2\highlight0\b0\f1\fs23\par } #1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;\red255\green192\blue128;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~1.$ \i Its Nature.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0\scaps Sanctification\scaps0 in the Westminster Catechism is said to be \ldblquote the work of God\rquote s free grace, whereby we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God, and are enabled more and more to die unto sin and live unto righteousness.\rdblquote\par Agreeably to this definition, justification differs from sanctification%, (1.) In that the former is a transient act, the latter a progressive work. (2.) Justification is a forensic act, God acting as judge, declaring justice satisfied so far as the believing sinner is concerned, whereas sanctification is an effect due to the divine efficiency. (3.) Justification changes, or declares to be changed, the relation of the sinner to the justice of God; sanctification involves a change of character. (4.) The former, therefore, is objective, the latter subjective. (5.) The former is& founded on what Christ has done for us; the latter is the effect of what He does in us. (6.) Justification is complete and the same in all, while sanctification is progressive, and is more complete in some than in others.\par Sanctification is declared to be a work of God\rquote s free grace. Two things are included in this. First, that the power or influence by which it is carried on is supernatural. Secondly, that granting this influence to any sinner, to one sinner rather than another, and to one mor'e than to another, is a matter of favour. No one has personally, or in himself, on the ground of anything he has done, the right to claim this divine influence as a just recompense, or as a matter of justice.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i It is a Supernatural Work.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\t(x13740\tx14656\cf0 In representing, in accordance with Scripture, sanctification as a supernatural work, or as a work of grace, the Church intends to deny the Pelagian or Rationalistic doctrine which confounds it with mere moral reformation. It not unfrequently happens that men who have been immoral in their lives, change their whole course of living. They become outwardly correct in their deportment, temperate, pure, honest, and benevolent. This is a great and praiseworthy change. It is in a high degree )beneficial to the subject of it, and to all with whom he is connected. It may be produced by different causes, by the force of conscience and by a regard for the authority of God and a dread of his disapprobation, or by a regard to the good opinion of men, or by the mere force of an enlightened regard to one\rquote s own interest. But whatever may be the proximate cause of such reformation, it falls very far short of sanctification. The two things differ in nature as much as a clean heart from clean cloth*es. Such external reformation may leave a man\rquote s inward character in the sight of God unchanged. He may remain destitute of love to God, of faith in Christ, and of all holy exercises or affections.\par Nor is sanctification to be confounded with the effects of moral culture or discipline. It is very possible, as experience proves, by careful moral training, by keeping the young from all contaminating influences, and by bringing them under the forming influences of right principles and good associat+es, to preserve them from much of the evil of the world, and to render them like the young man in the Gospel whom Jesus loved. Such training is not to be undervalued. It is enjoined in the Word of God. It cannot, however, change the nature. It cannot impart life. A faultless statue fashioned out of pure marble in all its beauty, is far below a living man.\par The word supernatural, as before said, is used in two senses. First, for that which is above nature, and by nature is meant everything out of God. ,An effect, therefore, is said to be supernatural, in the production of which nature exercises no efficiency. But secondly, the word is often used to mark the distinction between the providential efficiency of God operating according to fixed laws, and the voluntary agency of the Holy Spirit. The Bible makes a wide distinction between the providence of God and the operations of his grace. The difference between the two is, in some respects, analogous to that between the efficiency of a law, or of a uniform-ly acting force, and the agency of a person. The one is ordered, the other is exercised from time to time, the Spirit distributing his gifts to every one severally as He wills. In the providential agency of God, the effects produced never transcend the power of second causes as upheld and guided by Him; whereas the effects produced by the Spirit do transcend the power of second causes. The effect is due neither to the power of the truth, nor to that of the rational subject in whom the effect is produced. .It is due to the power of God over and above the power of the second causes concerned. The effects of grace, or fruits of the Spirit, are above the sphere of the natural they belong to the supernatural. The mere power of truth, argument, motive, persuasion, or eloquence cannot produce repentance, faith, or holiness of heart and life. Nor can these effects be produced by the power of the will, or by all the resources of man, however protracted or skilful in their application. They are the gifts of God, the/ fruits of the Spirit. Paul may plant and Apollos water, but it is God who gives the increase.\par In this latter sense of the word supernatural, the cooperation of second causes is not excluded. When Christ opened the eyes of the blind no second cause interposed between his volition and the effect. But men work out their own salvation, while it is God who worketh in them to will and to do, according to his own good pleasure. In the work of regeneration, the soul is passive. It cannot cooperate in the co0mmunication of spiritual life. But in conversion, repentance, faith, and growth in grace, all its powers are called into exercise. As, however, the effects produced transcend the efficiency of our fallen nature, and are due to the agency of the Spirit, sanctification does not cease to be supernatural, or a work of grace, because the soul is active and cooperating in the process.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx137401\tx14656\cf1\i Proof of its Supernatural Character.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 That sanctification is a supernatural work in the sense above stated is proved, \emdash\par 1. From the fact that it is constantly referred to God as its author. It is referred to God absolutely, or to the Father, as in \cf2\ul 1Th_5:23\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote The very God of peace sanctify you wholly.\rdb2lquote \cf2\ul Heb_13:20-21\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote The God of peace that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus .make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is well pleasing in his sight.\rdblquote It is also referred to the Son, as in \cf2\ul Tit_2:14\cf0\ulnone , He \ldblquote gave himself for us, that he might. purify unto himself a peculiar people zealous of good works.\rdblquote \cf2\ul Eph_5:25\cf0\ulnone , He \ldblquote loved the church and gave himself for3 it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.\rdblquote Predominantly sanctification is referred to the Holy Spirit, as his peculiar work in the economy of redemption. Hence He is called the Spirit of all grace; the Spirit of joy, of peace, of love, of faith, and of adoption. All Christian graces are set forth as fruits 4of the Spirit. We are said to be born of the Spirit, and by Him to he enlightened, taught, led, and cleansed. We are said to be in the Spirit, to live, to walk, and to rejoice in the Spirit. The Spirit dwells in the people of God, and is the abiding source of all the actings of that spiritual life which He implants in the soul. The Bible teaches that the Son and Spirit are in the Holy Trinity subordinate to the Father, as to their mode of subsistence and operation, although the same in substance, and equa5l in power and glory. Hence it is that the same work is often attributed to the Father, to the Son, and to the Spirit; and as the Father and Son operate through the Spirit, the effects due to the agency of God are referred specially to the Holy Ghost.\par This reference of sanctification to God proves it to be a supernatural work, because the insufficiency of second causes to produce the effect is declared to be the ground of this reference. It is because men cannot cleanse or heal themselves, that they 6are declared to be cleansed and healed by God. It is because rites, ceremonies, sacraments, truth, and moral suasion, cannot bring the soul back to God, that it is said to be transformed, by the renewing of the mind, through the power of the Spirit, into the image of God. We are, therefore, declared to be God\rquote s workmanship, created unto good works. And it is not we that live, but Christ that liveth in us.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx100776\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i All Holy Exercises referred to the Spirit as their Author.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 2. This reference of sanctification to God as its author, the more decisively proves the supernatural character of the work, because the reference is not merely general, as when the wind and rain, and the production of vegetable and animal life, are re8ferred to his universal providential agency. The reference is special. The effect is one which the Scriptures recognize as not within the sphere of second causes, and therefore ascribe to God. They recognize the free agency of man; they acknowledge and treat him as a moral and rational being; they admit the adaptation of of truth to convince the understanding, and of the motives presented to determine the will and to control the affections, and nevertheless they teach that these secondary causes and influ9ences be utterly ineffectual to the conversion and sanctification of the soul, without the demonstration of the Spirit. The sacred writers, therefore, constantly pray for this divine influence, \ldblquote\lang1142 extrinsecus accidens\lang1033 ,\rdblquote to attend the means of grace and to render them effectual, as well for sanctification as for regeneration and conversion. Every such prayer, every thanksgiving for grace imparted, every recognition of the Christian virtues as fruits of the Spirit, and g:ifts of God, are so many recognitions of the great truth that the restoration of man to the image of God is not a work of nature, either originated or carried on by the efficiency of second causes, but is truly and properly supernatural, as due to the immediate power of the Spirit producing effects for which second causes are inadequate.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i We are taught to pray for R;epentance, Faith, and other Graces.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 3. We accordingly find the Apostle and the sacred writers generally, referring not only regeneration, the communication of spiritual life to those spiritually dead, but the continuance of that life in its activity and growth, not merely to the power of God, but to his almighty power. Paul prays in \cf2\ul Eph_1:19\cf0\ulnodo exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us.\rdblquote It is almighty power, therefore, and not the impotence of secondary influences, which works in the believer and carries on the work of his salvation.\par They who are in Christ, therefore, are new creatures. They are created anew in Christ Jesus. This does not refer exclusively to their regeneration, but to the process by which the sinner is transformed into the image of Christ.\par \pard\tx916\?tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\f1\fs16 218\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Argument from the Believer\rquote s Union with Christ.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 4. All that the Scrip@tures teach concerning the union between the believer and Christ, and of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, proves the supernatural character of our sanctification. Men do not make themselves holy; their holiness, and their growth in grace, are not due to their own fidelity, or firmness of purpose, or watchfulness and diligence, although all these are required, but to the divine influence by which they are rendered thus faithful, watchful, and diligent, and which produces in them the fruits of righteousneAss. Without me, saith our Lord, ye can do nothing. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine, no more can ye, except ye abide in me. The hand is not more dependent on the head for the continuance of its vitality, than is the believer on Christ for the continuance of spiritual life in the soul.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Argument from related Doctrines.\i0\par \pBard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 5. This, however, is one of those doctrines which pervade the whole Scriptures. It follows of necessity from what the Bible teaches of the natural state of man since the fall; it is assumed, asserted, and implied in all that is revealed of the plan of salvation. By their apostasy, men lost the image of God; they are born in a state of alienation and condemnation. TheyC are by nature destitute of spiritual life. From this state it is as impossible that they should deliver themselves, as that those in the grave should restore life to their wasted bodies, and when restored, continue and invigorate it by their own power. Our whole salvation is of Christ. Those who are in the grave hear his voice. They are raised by his power. And when they live it is He who lives in them. This is the doctrine which our Lord Himself so clearly and so frequently teaches, and upon which his ADpostles so strenuously insist. St. Paul in the sixth and seventh chapters of his Epistle to the Romans, where he treats of this subject \ldblquote\lang1142 in extenso\lang1033 ,\rdblquote has for his main object to prove that as we are not justified or our own righteousness, so we are not sanctified by our own power, or by the mere objective power of the truth. The law, the revelation of the will of God, including everything which He has made known to man either as a rule of obedience or as exhibiting hiEs own attributes and purposes, was equally inadequate to secure justification and sanctification. As it demanded perfect obedience and pronounced accursed those who continue not in all things\cf3\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 written in the book of the law to do them, it can only condemn. It can never pronounce the sinner just. And as it was a mere outward presentation of the truth, it could no more change the heart than light could give sight to the blind. He winds up his discussions of the subject with the exclFamation, \ldblquote O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord.\rdblquote His deliverance was to be effected by God through Jesus Christ. We learn from the eighth chapter that he was fully confident of this deliverance, and we learn also the ground on which that confidence rested. It was not that he had in regeneration received strength to sanctify himself, or that by the force of his own will, or by the diligent use of natural oGr appointed means, the end was to be accomplished without further aid from God. On the contrary, his confidence was founded, (1.) On the fact that he had been delivered from the law, from its curse, and from its inexorable demand of perfect obedience. (2.) On the fact that he had received the Spirit as the source of a new, divine, and imperishable life. (3.) This life was not a mere state of mind, but the life of God, or the Spirit of God dwelling in the heart; which indwelling secured not only the continHuance of \ldblquote spiritual mindedness,\rdblquote but even the resurrection from the dead. \ldblquote For if,\rdblquote says he, \ldblquote the spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken (\cf4\f2\'e6\'f9\'ef\'f0\'ef\'e9\f3\u8053?\f2\'f3\'e5\'e9\cf0\f0 make alive with the life of Christ) your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.\rdblquote (4.) Being led by the Spirit of God as the controlling principle of theirI inward and outward life, believers are the sons of God. The Spirit of God which is in them being the Spirit of the Son, is in them the Spirit of sonship, \i i.e\i0 ., it produces in them the feelings of sons toward God, and assures them of their title to all the privileges of his children. (5.) The sanctification and ultimate salvation of believers are secured by the immutable decree of God. For those \ldblquote whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son; .\~.moJreover, whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.\rdblquote This last includes sanctification; the inward glory of the soul; the divine image as retraced by the Spirit of God, which to and in the believer is the Spirit of glory. (\cf2\ul 1Pe_4:14\cf0\ulnone .) The indwelling of the Spirit renders the believer glorious. (6.) The infinite and immutable love which induced God to give his own Son for our salvation, renders it certain that all other things shall be given necessary to keep them in the love and fellowship of God. Salvation, therefore, from beginning to end is of grace; not only as being gratuitous to the exclusion of all merit on the part of the saved, but also as being carried on by the continued operation of grace, or the supernatural power of the Spirit. Christ is our all. He is of God made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, sanctification and redemption.\par \pard\cf5\highlight6\f4\fs23\par } Lrgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~2. \i Wherein it consists.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 Admitting sanctifMication to be a supernatural work, the question still remains, What does it consist in? What is the nature of the effect produced? The truth which lies at the foundation of all the Scriptural representations of this subject is, that regeneration, the quickening, of which believers are the subject, while it involves the implanting, or communication of a new principle or form of life, does not effect the immediate and entire deliverance of the soul from all sin. A man raised from the dead may be and long coNntinue to be, in a very feeble, diseased, and suffering state. So the soul by nature dead in sin, may be quickened together with Christ, and not be rendered thereby perfect. The principle of life may be very feeble, it may have much in the soul uncongenial with its nature, and the conflict between the old and the new life may be protracted and painful. Such not only may be, but such in fact is the case in all the ordinary experience of the people of God. Here we find one of the characteristic and far-reacOhing differences between the Romish and Protestant systems of doctrine and religion. According to the Romish system, nothing of the nature of sin remains in the soul after regeneration as effected in baptism. From this the theology of the Church of Rome deduces its doctrine of the merit of good works; of perfection; of works of supererogation; and, indirectly, those of absolution and indulgences. But according to the Scriptures, the universal experience of Christians, and the undeniable evidence of historPy, regeneration does not remove all sin. The Bible is filled with the record of the inward conflicts of the most eminent of the servants of God, with their falls, their backslidings, their repentings, and their lamentations over their continued shortcomings. And not only this, but the nature of the conflict between good and evil in the heart of the renewed is fully described, the contending principles are distinguished and designated, and the necessity, difficulties, and perils of the struggle, well as thQe method of properly sustaining it, are set forth repeatedly and in detail. In the seventh chapter of the Epistle to the Romans we have an account of this conflict elaborately described by the Apostle as drawn from his own experience. And the same thing occurs in \cf1\ul Gal_5:16-17\cf0\ulnone . This I say then, \ldblquote Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the otheRr: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.\rdblquote Again, in \cf1\ul Eph_6:10-18\cf0\ulnone , in view of the conflict which the believer has to sustain with the evils of his own heart and with the powers of darkness, the Apostle exhorts his brethren to be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. \ldblquote Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.\rdblquote\par With the teachings of the Scriptures Sthe experience of Christians in all ages and in all parts of the Church agrees. Their writings are filled with the account of their struggles with the remains of sin in their own hearts; with confessions; with prayers for divine aid; and with longings after the final victory over all evil, which is to be experienced only in heaven. The great lights of the Latin Church, the Augustines and Bernards and F\'e9n\'e9lons, were humble, penitent, struggling believers, even to the last, and with Paul did not regarTd themselves as having already attained, or as being already perfect. And what the Bible and Christian experience prove to be true, history puts beyond dispute. Either there is no such thing as regeneration in the world, or regeneration does not remove all sin from those who are its subjects.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\i Putting off the Old, and putting on the New Man.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb18U0\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Such being the foundation of the Scriptural representations concerning sanctification, its nature is thereby determined. As all men since the fall are in a state of sin, not only sinners because guilty of specific acts of transgression, but also as depraved, their nature perverted and corrupted, regeneration is the infusion of a new principle of life in this corrupt nature. It is lVeaven introduced to diffuse its influence gradually through the whole mass. Sanctification, therefore, consists in two things: first, the removing more and more the principles of evil still infecting our nature, and destroying their power; and secondly, the growth of the principle of spiritual life until it controls the thoughts, feelings, and acts, and brings the soul into conformity to the image of Christ.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tWx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\i Paul details his own Experience in \cf1\ul\i0 Rom_7:7-25\cf2\ulnone .\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The classical passages of the New Testament on the nature of this work are the following, \emdash\cf1\ul Rom_7:7-25\cf0\ulnone . This is not the place to enter upon the discussion whether the Apostle in this passage is detailing his own experience Xor not. This is the interpretation given to it by Augustinians in all ages. It is enough to say here that the \ldblquote\lang1142 onus probandi\lang1033\rdblquote rests on those who take the opposite view of the passage. It must require very strong proof that the Apostle is not speaking of himself and giving his own experience as a Christian, when, \emdash\par 1. His object in the whole discussion throughout the sixth and seventh chapters, is to prove that the law, as it cannot justify, neither can it sYanctify; as it cannot deliver from the guilt, so neither can it free us from the power of sin. This is not the fault of the law, for it is spiritual, holy, just, and good. It commends itself to the reason and the conscience as being just what it ought to be; requiring neither more nor less than what it is right should be demanded, and threatening no penalty which want of conformity to its requirements does not justly merit. What is the effect of the objective presentation of the ideal standard of moral peZrfection to which we are bound to be conformed on the penalty of death? The Apostle tells us that the effects are, (\i a\i0 .) A great increase of knowledge. He had not known lust, had not the law said, Thou shalt not covet. (\i b\i0 .) A sense of moral pollution, and consequently of shame and self-loathing. (\i c\i0 .) A sense of guilt, or of just exposure to the penalty of the law of which our whole lives are a continued transgression. (\i d\i0 .) A sense of utter helplessness. The standard, although ho[ly, just, and good, is too high. We know we never can of ourselves conform to it; neither can we make satisfaction for past transgression. (\i e\i0 .) The result of the whole is despair. The law kills. It destroys not only all self-complacency, but all hope of ever being able to effect our own salvation. (\i f\i0 .) And thus it lead. the sinner to look out of himself for salvation; \i i.e\i0 ., for deliverance from the power, as well as the guilt of sin. The law is a schoolmaster to lead us to Christ. Why\ could not the Apostle say all this of himself? There is nothing here inconsistent with the character or experience of a true believer. It is as true of the Christian that he is not sanctified by moral suasion, by the objective presentation of truth, as it is of the unrenewed sinner, that he is not regenerated by any such outward influences. It is, therefore, perfectly pertinent to the Apostle\rquote s object that he should detail his own experience that sanctification could not be effected by the law.\pa]r 2. But in the second place, he uses the first person singular throughout. He says, \ldblquote I had not known sin,\rdblquote \ldblquote I died,\rdblquote \ldblquote The commandment which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death,\rdblquote \ldblquote I consent unto the law that it is good,\rdblquote \ldblquote I delight in the law of God after the inward man, but I see another law in my members,\rdblquote etc., etc. We are bound to understand the Apostle to speak of himself in the use of such^ language, unless there be something in the context, or m the nature of what is said, to render the reference to him impossible. It has been shown, however, that the context favours, if it does not absolutely demand the reference of what is said to the Apostle himself. And that there is nothing in the experience here detailed inconsistent with the experience of the true children of God, is evident from the fact that the same humility, the same sense of guilt, the same consciousness of indwelling sin, the _same conviction of helplessness, here expressed, are found in all the penitential portions of Scripture. Job, David, Isaiah, and Nehemiah, make the same confessions and lamentations that the Apostle here makes. The same is true of believers since the coming of Christ. There is no one of them, not even the holiest, who is not constrained to speak of himself as Paul here speaks, unless indeed he chooses to give the language of the Apostle a meaning which it was never intended to express.\par 3. While the p`assage contains nothing inconsistent with the experience of true believers, it is inconsistent with the experience of unrenewed men. They are not the subjects of the inward conflict here depicted. There is in them indeed often a struggle protracted and painful, between reason and conscience on the one side, and evil passion on the other. But there is not in the unrenewed that utter renunciation of self, that looking for help to God in Christ alone, and that delight in the law of God, of which the Apostle ahere speaks.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\i What Romans\i0 7:7-25\i teaches.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Assuming, then, that we have in this chapter an account of the experience of a true and even of an advanced Christian, we learn that in every Christian there is a mixturbe of good and evil; that the original corruption of nature is not entirely removed by regeneration; that although the believer is made a new creature,\cf3\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 is translated from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God\rquote s dear Son, he is but partially sanctified; that his selfishness pride, discontent, worldliness, still cleave to, and torment him, that they effectually prevent his \ldblquote doing what he would,\rdblquote they prevent his living without sin, they prevent hcis intercourse with God being as intimate and uninterrupted as he could and does desire. He finds not only that he is often, even daily, overcome so as to sin in thought, word, and deed, but also that his faith, love, zeal, and devotion are never such as to satisfy his own conscience; much less can they satisfy God. He therefore is daily called upon to confess, repent, and pray for forgiveness. The Apostle designates these conflicting principles which he found within himself, the one, indwelling sin; \ldbdlquote sin that dwelleth in me;\rdblquote or the \ldblquote law in my members;\rdblquote \ldblquote the law of sin;\rdblquote the other, \ldblquote the mind,\rdblquote \ldblquote the law of my mind,\rdblquote \ldblquote the inward man.\rdblquote His internal self, the Ego, was sometimes controlled by the one, and sometimes by the other.\par We learn, further, that the control of the evil principle is resisted, that subjection to it is regarded as a hateful bondage, that the good principle is in thee main victorious, and that through Christ it will ultimately be completely triumphant. Sanctification therefore, according to this representation, consists in the gradual triumph of the new nature implanted in regeneration over the evil that still remains after the heart is renewed. In other words, as elsewhere expressed, it is a dying unto sin and living unto righteousness. (\cf1\ul 1Pe_2:24\cf0\ulnone .)\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx1f0992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\ul Gal_5:16-26\cf0\ulnone .\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 Another passage of like import is \cf1\ul Gal_5:16-26\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not full the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things thgat ye would,\rdblquote etc., etc. The Scriptures teach that the Spirit of God dwells in his people, not only collectively as the Church, but individually in every believer, so that of every Christian it may be said, he is a temple of the Holy Ghost. God is said to dwell wherever He permanently manifests his presence, whether as of old in the temple, or in the hearts of his people, in the Church, or in heaven. And as the Spirit dwells in believers, He there manifests his life-giving, controlling power, anhd is in them the principle, or source, or controlling influence which determines their inward and outward life.\cf3\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 By the flesh, in the doctrinal portions of Scripture, is never, unless the word be limited by the context, meant merely our sensuous nature, but our fallen nature, \i i.e\i0 ., our nature as it is in itself, apart from the Spirit of God. As our Lord says (John 3:6), \ldblquote That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.\rdbliquote These then are the principles which \ldblquote are contrary the one to the other.\rdblquote No man can act independently of both. He must obey one or the other. He may sometimes obey the one, and sometimes the other; but one or the other must prevail. The Apostle says of believers that they have crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts. They have renounced the authority of the evil principle; they do not willingly, or of set purpose, or habitually yield to it. They struggle against it, anjd not only endeavour, but actually do crucify it, although it may die a long and painful death.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\ul Eph_4:22-24\cf0\ulnone .\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 In \cf1\ul Eph_4:22-24\cf0\ulnone , we are told: \ldblquote Put off concerning the former conversationk the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; and be renewed in the spirit of your mind; and\rdblquote put ye \ldblquote on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.\rdblquote By the old man is to be understood the former self with all the evils belonging to its natural state. This was to be laid aside as a worn and soiled garment, and a new, pure self, the new man, was to take its place. This change, although expressed in a figure borrowed from a chalnge of raiment, was a profound inward change produced by a creating process, by which the soul is new fashioned after the image of God in righteousness and holiness. It is a renewing as to the Spirit, \i i.e\i0 ., the interior life of the mind; or as Meyer and Ellicott, the best of modern commentators, both interpret the phrase, \ldblquote By the Spirit\rdblquote (the Holy Spirit) dwelling in the mind. This is a transformation in which believers are exhorted to cooperate; for which they are to labour, anmd which is therefore a protracted work. Sanctification, therefore, according to this representation, consists in the removal of the evils which belong to us in our natural condition, and in being made more and more conformed to the image of God through the gracious influence of the Spirit of God dwelling in us.\par It is not, however, merely in such passages as those above cited that the nature of sanctification is set forth. The Bible is full of exhortations and commands addressed to the people of God, nto\cf3\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 those recognized and assumed to be regenerate, requiring them, on the one hand, to resist their evil passions and propensities, to lay aside all malice, and wrath, and pride, and jealousy; and on the other, to cultivate all the graces of the Spirit, faith, love, hope, long-suffering, meekness, lowliness of mind, and brotherly kindness. At the same time they are reminded that it is God who worketh in them both to will and to do, and that therefore they are constantly to seek hios aid and to depend upon his assistance.\par It follows from this view of the subject that sanctification is not only, as before proved, a supernatural work, but also that it does not consist exclusively in a series of a new kind of acts. It is the making the tree good, in order that the fruit may be good. It involves an essential change of character. As regeneration is not an act of the subject of the work, but in the language of the Bible a new birth, a new creation, a quickening or communicating a new life, and in the language of the old Latin Church, the infusion of new habits of grace; so sanctification in its essential nature is not holy acts, but such a change in the state of the soul, that sinful acts become more infrequent, and holy acts more and more habitual and controlling. This view alone is consistent with the Scriptural representations, and with the account given in the Bible of the way in which this radical change of character is carried on and consummated.\par \pard\cf4\f2\fs23\par } YYd )-1.18.3. The Method of Sanctification{\rtf1\ansqA1.18.2. Wherein it consists{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fnil\fcharset0 GeoKri\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tsx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~3. \i The Method of Sanctification.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 It has already been shown that although sanctification does not exclude all cooperation on the part of its subjects, but, on the contrary, calls for their unremitting and strenuous exertion, it is nevertheless the work of God. It is not carried on as a mere process of moral culture by tmoral means; it is as truly supernatural in its method as in its nature. What the Bible teaches in answer to the question, How a soul by nature spiritually dead, being quickened by the mighty power of God, is gradually transformed into the image of Christ, is substantially as follows, \emdash\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i The Soul is led to exercise Faith.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1u832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 1. It is led to exercise faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, to receive Him as its Saviour, committing itself to Him to be by his merit and grace delivered from the guilt and power of sin. This is the first step, and secures all the rest, not because of its inherent virtue or efficacy, but because, according to the covenant of grace, or plan of salvation, which God has revealed and which He\cf2\f1\fvs16 7\cf0\f0\fs24 has pledged Himself to carry out, He becomes bound by his promise to accomplish the full salvation from sin of every one who believes.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i The Effect of Union with Christ.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 2. The soul by this act of faitwh becomes united to Christ. We are in Him by faith. The consequences of this union are, (\i a\i0 .) Participation in his merits. His perfect righteousness, agreeably to the stipulations of the covenant of redemption, is imputed to the believer. He is thereby justified. He is introduced into a state of favour or grace, and rejoices in hope of the glory of God. (\cf3\ul Rom_5:1-3\cf0\ulnone .) This is, as the Bible teaches, the essential preliminary condition of sanctification. While under the law we are unxder the curse. While under the curse we are the enemies of God and bring forth fruit unto death. It is only when delivered from the law by the body or death of Christ, and united to Him, that we bring forth fruit unto God. (\cf3\ul Rom_6:8\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Rom_7:4-6\cf0\ulnone .) Sin, therefore, says the Apostle, shall not reign over us, because we are not under the law. (\cf3\ul Rom_6:14\cf0\ulnone .) Deliverance from the law is the necessary condition of deliverance from sin. All the relations of thye believer are thus changed. He is translated from the kingdom of darkness and introduced into the glorious liberty of the sons of God. Instead of an outcast, a slave under condemnation, he becomes a child of God, assured of his love, of his tenderness, and of his care. He may come to Him with confidence. He is brought under all the influences which in their full effect constitute heaven. He therefore becomes a new creature. He has passed from death to life; from darkness to light, from hell (the kingdom zof Satan) to heaven. He sits with Christ in heavenly places. (\cf3\ul Eph_2:6\cf0\ulnone .) (\i b\i0 .) Another consequence of the union with Christ effected by faith, is the indwelling of the Spirit. Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law by being made a curse for us, in order that we might receive the promise of the Holy Ghost. (\cf3\ul Gal_3:13-14\cf0\ulnone .) It was not consistent with the perfections or purposes of God that the Spirit should be given to dwell with his saving influences in {the apostate children of men, until Christ had made a full satisfaction for the sins of the world. But as with God there are no distinctions of time, Christ was slain from the foundation of the world, and his death availed as fully for the salvation of those who lived before, as for that of those who have lived since his coming in the flesh. (\cf3\ul Rom_3:25-26\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Heb_9:15\cf0\ulnone .) The Spirit was given to the people of God from the beginning. But as our Lord says (\cf3\ul Joh_10:10|\cf0\ulnone ) that He came into the world not only that men might have life, but that they might have it more abundantly, the effusion, or copious communication of the Spirit is always represented as the great characteristic of the Messiah\rquote s advent. (\cf3\ul Joe_2:28-29\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Act_2:16-21\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Joh_7:38-39\cf0\ulnone .) Our Lord, therefore, in his last discourse to his disciples, said it was expedient for them that He went away, for \ldblquote if I go not away, the Comf}orter (the \cf4\f2\'d0\'e1\'f1\f3\u8049?\f2\'ea\'eb\'e7\'f4\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 , the helper) will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Joh_16:7\cf0\ulnone .) He was to supply the place of Christ as to his visible presence, carry on his work, gather in his people, transform them into the likeness of Christ, and communicate to them all the benefits of his redemption. Where the Spirit is, there Christ is; so that, the Spirit being with us, Christ is with us; and if th~e Spirit dwells in us, Christ dwells in us. (\cf3\ul Rom_8:9-11\cf0\ulnone .) In partaking, therefore, of the Holy Ghost, believers are partakers of the life of Christ. The Spirit was given to Him without measure, and from him flows down to all his members. This participation of the believer in the life of Christ, so that every believer may say with the Apostle, \ldblquote I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Gal_2:20\cf0\ulnone ), is prominently presented in the Word of God. (\cf3\ul Rom_6:5\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Rom_7:4\cf0\ulnone ;\cf3\ul Joh_14:19\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Col_3:3-4\cf0\ulnone .) The two great standing illustrations of this truth are the vine and the human body. The former is presented at length in \cf3\ul Joh_15:1-8\cf0\ulnone , the latter in \cf3\ul 1Co_12:11-27\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Rom_12:5\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Eph_1:22-23\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Eph_4:15-16\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Eph_5:30\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Col_1:18\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul Col_2:19\cf0\ulnone ; and frequently elsewhere. As the life of the vine is diffused through all the branches, sustaining and rendering them fruitful; and as the life of the head is diffused through all the members of the body making it one, and imparting life to all, so the life of Christ is diffused through all the members of his mystical body making them one body in Him; having a common life with their common head. This idea is urged specially in \cf3\ul Eph_4:15-16\cf0\ulnone , where it is said that it is from Christ that the whole body fitly joined together, through the spiritual influence granted to every part according to its measure, makes increase in love. It is true that this is spoken of the Church as a whole. But what is said of Christ\rquote s mystical body as a whole is true of all its members severally. He is the prophet, priest, and king of the Church; but He is also the prophet, priest, and king of every believer. Our relation to Him is individual and personal. The Church as a whole is the temple of God; but so is every believer. (\cf3\ul 1Co_3:16\cf0\ulnone ; \cf3\ul 1Co_6:19\cf0\ulnone .) The Church is the bride of Christ, but every believer is the object of that tender, peculiar love expressed in the use of that metaphor. The last verse of Paul Gerhardt\rquote s hymn, \ldblquote\lang1031 Ein L\'e4mmlein geht und tr\'e4gt die Schuld\lang1033 ,\rdblquote every true Christian may adopt as the expression of his own hopes: \emdash\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\ldblquote Wann endlich ich soll treten ein In deines Reiches Freuden, So soll diess Blut mein Purpur seyn, Ich will mich darein kielden; Es soll seyn meines Hauptes Kron\rquote In welcher ich will vor den Thron Des h\'f6chsten Vaters gehen, Und dir, dem er mich anvertraut, Als eine wohlgeschm\'fcckte Braut, An deiner Seiten stehen.\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i The Inward Work of the Spirit.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 3. The indwelling of the Holy Spirit thus secured by union with Christ becomes the source of a new spiritual life, which constantly increases in power until everything uncongenial with it is expelled, and the soul is perfectly transformed into the image of Christ. It is the office of the Spirit to enlighten the mind; or, as Paul expresses it, \ldblquote to enlighten the eyes of the understanding\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Eph_1:18\cf0\ulnone ), that we may know the things freely given to us of God (\cf3\ul 1Co_2:12\cf0\ulnone ); \i i.e\i0 ., the things which God has revealed; or, as they are called in v. 14, \ldblquote The things of the Spirit of God.\rdblquote These things, which the natural man cannot know, the Spirit enables the believer \ldblquote to discern,\rdblquote \i i.e\i0 ., to apprehend in their truth and excellence; and thus to experience their power. The Spirit, we are taught, especially opens the eyes to see the glory of Christ, to see that He is God manifest in the flesh; to discern not only his divine perfections, but his love to us, and his suitableness in all respects as our Saviour, so that those who have not seen Him, yet believing on Him, rejoice in Him with joy unspeakable and full of glory. This apprehension of Christ is transforming; the soul is thereby changed into his image, from glory to glory by the Spirit of the Lord. It was this inward revelation of Christ by which Paul on his way to Damascus was instantly converted from a blasphemer into a worshipper and self-sacrificing servant of the Lord Jesus.\par It is not, however, only one object which the opened eye of the believer is able to discern. The Spirit enables him to see the glory of God as revealed in his works and in his word; the holiness\cf2\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 and spirituality of the law; the exceeding sinfulness of sin; his own guilt, pollution, and helplessness; the length and breadth, the height and depth of the economy of redemption; and the reality glory, and infinite importance of the things unseen and eternal. The soul is thus raised above the world. It lives in a higher sphere. It becomes more and more heavenly in its character and desires. All the great doctrines of the Bible concerning God, Christ, and things spiritual and eternal, are so revealed by this inward teaching of the Spirit, as to be not only rightly discerned, but to exert, in a measure, their proper influence on the heart and life. Thus the prayer of Christ (\cf3\ul Joh_17:17\cf0\ulnone ), \ldblquote Sanctify them through thy truth,\rdblquote is answered in the experience of his people.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i God calls the Graces of his People into Exercise.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 4. The work of sanctification is carried on by God\rquote s giving constant occasion for the exercise of all the graces of the Spirit. Submission, confidence, self-denial, patience, and meekness, as well as faith, hope, and love, are called forth, or put to the test, more or less effectually every day the believer passes on earth. And by this constant exercise he grows in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. It is, however, principally by calling his people to labour and snffer for the advancement of the Redeemer\rquote s kingdom, and for the good of their fellow-men, that this salutary discipline is carried on. The best Christians are in general those who not merely from restless activity of natural disposition, but from love to Christ and zeal for his glory, labour most and suffer most in his service.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i The Church and Sacraments as means of Grace.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 5. One great end of the establishment of the Church on earth, as the communion of saints, is the edification of the people of God. The intellectual and social life of man is not developed in isolation and solitude. It is only in contact and collision with his fellow-men that his powers are called into exercise and his social virtues are cultivated. Thus also it is by the Church-life of believers, by their communion in the worship and service of God, and by their mutual good offices and fellowship, that the spiritual life of the soul is developed. Therefore the Apostle says, \ldblquote Let us consider one another, to provoke unto love and to good works: not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together. as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another; and so\cf2\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 much the more as ye see the day approaching.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Heb_10:24-25\cf0\ulnone .)\par 6. The Spirit renders the ordinances of God, the word, sacraments, and prayer, effectual means of promoting the sanctification of his people, and of securing their ultimate salvation. These, however, must be more fully considered in the sequel.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i The Kingly Office of Christ.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 7. In this connection, we are not to overlook or undervalue the constant exercise of the kingly office of Christ. He not only reigns over his people, but He subdues them to Himself, rules and defends them, and restrains and conquers all his and their enemies. These enemies are both inward and outward, both seen and unseen; they are the world, the flesh, and the devil. The strength of the believer in contending with these enemies, is not his own. He, is strong only in the Lord, and in the power of his might. (\cf3\ul Eph_6:10\cf0\ulnone .) The weapons, both offensive and defensive, are supplied by Him, and the disposition and the skill to use them are his gifts to be sought by praying without ceasing. He is an ever present helper. Whenever the Christian feels his weakness either in resisting temptation or in the discharge of duty, he looks to Christ, and seeks aid from Him. And all who seek find. When we fail, it is either from self-confidence, or from neglecting to call upon our ever present and almighty King, who is always ready to protect and deliver those who put their trust in Him. But there are dangers which we do not apprehend, enemies whom we do not see, and to which we would become an easy prey, were it not for the watchful care of Him who came into the world to destroy the works of the devil, and to bruise Satan under our feet. The Christian runs his race \ldblquote looking unto Jesus;\rdblquote the life he lives, he lives by faith in the Son of God; it is by the constant worship of Christ; by the constant exercise of love toward Him; by constant endeavours to do his will; and by constantly looking to Him for the supply of grace and for protection and aid, that he overcomes sin and finally attains the prize of the high-calling of God.\par \pard\cf5\f4\fs23\par } Fruits of Sanctification, or Good Works.\i0\par \cf1\b0\i Their Nature.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The fruits of sanctification are good works. Our Lord says \ldblquote A good tree bringeth not forth corrupt fruit; neither doth a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit, For every tree is known by his own fruit: for of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes.\rdblquote (Luke 6:43- 44.) By good works, in this connection, are meant not only the inward exercises of the religious life, but also outward acts, such as can be seen and appreciated by others.\par There are three senses in which works may be called good, \emdash\par 1. When as to the matter of them they are what the law prescribes. In this sense even the heathen perform good works; as the Apostle says, \cf2\ul Rom_2:14\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote The Gentiles do by nature the things contained in the law.\rdblquote That is, they perform acts of justice and mercy. No man on earth is so wicked as never, in this sense of the term, to be the author of some good works. This is what the theologians call civil goodness, whose sphere is the social relations of men.\par 2. In the second place, by good works are meant works which both in the matter of them, and in the design and motives of the agent, are what the law requires. In other words, a work is good, when there is nothing either in the agent or in the act which the law condemns. In this sense not even the works of the holiest of God\rquote s people are good. No man is ever, since the fall, in this life, in such an inward state that he can stand before God and be accepted on the ground of what he is or of what he does. All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags. (\cf2\ul Isa_64:6\cf0\ulnone .) Paul found to the last a law of sin in his members. He groaned under a body of death. In one of his latest epistles he says he had not attained, or was not already perfect, and all Christians are required to pray daily for the forgiveness of sin. What the Scriptures teach of the imperfection of the best works of the believer, is confirmed by the irrepressible testimony of consciousness. It matters not what the lips may say, every man\rquote s conscience telis him that he is always a sinner, that he never is free from moral defilement in the sight of an infinitely holy God. On this subject the Form of Concord says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Lex Dei credentibus bona opera ad eum modum pr\'e6scribit, ut simul, tanquam in speculo, nobis commonstret, ea omnia in nobis in hac vita adhuc imperfecta et impura esse\lang1033 ;\rdblquote and \ldblquote\lang1142 Credentes in hac vita non perfecte, completive vel consummative (ut veteres locuti sunt) renovantur. Et quamvis ipsorum peccata Christi obedientia absolutissima contecta sint, ut credentibus non ad damnationem imputentur, et per Spiritum Sanctum veteris Adami mortificatio et renovatio in spiritu mentis eorum inchoata sit: tamen vetus Adam in ipsa natura, omnibusque illius interioribus et exterioribus viribus adhuc semper inh\'e6ret.\lang1033\rdblquote Calvin says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Seligat ex tota sua vita sanctus Dei servus, quod in ejus cursu maxime eximium se putabit edidisse, bene revolvat singulas partes: deprehendet procul dubio alicubi quod carnis putredinem sapiat, quando numquam ea est nostra alacritas ad bene agendum qu\'e6 esse debet, sed in cursu retardando multa debilitas. Quanquam non obscuras esse maculas videmus, quibus respersa sint opera sanctorum, fac tamen minutissimos esse n\'e6vos duntaxat: sed an oculos Dei nihil offendent, coram quibus ne stell\'e6 quidem pur\'e6 sunt? Habemus, nec unum a sanctis exire opus, quod, si in se censeatur, non mereatur justam opprobrii mercedem.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Romish Doctrine on Good Works.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Against the doctrine that the best works of the believer are imperfect, the Romanists are especially denunciatory. And with good reason. It subverts their whole system, which is founded on the assumed merit of good works. If the best works of the saints merit \ldblquote\lang1142 justam opprobrii mercedem\lang1033\rdblquote (\i i.e\i0 ., condemnation), they cannot merit reward. Their argument on this subject is, that if the Protestant doctrine be true which declares the best works of the believer to be imperfect; then the fulfilment of the law is impossible; but if this be so, then the law is not binding; for God does not command impossibilities. To this it may be answered, first, that the objection is inconsistent with the doctrine of Romanists themselves. They teach that man in his natural state since the fall is unable to do anything good in the sight of God, until he receives the grace of God communicated in baptism. According to the principle on which the objection is founded, the law does not bind the unbaptized. And secondly, the objection assumes the fundamental principle of Pelagianism, namely that ability limits obligation; a principle which, in the sphere of morals, is contrary to Scripture, consciousness, and the common judgment of mankind. We cannot be required to do what is impossible because of the limitation of our nature as creatures, as to create a world, or raise the dead; but to love God perfectly does not exceed the power of man as he came from the hands of his maker. It is not absolutely, but only relatively impossible, that is, in relation of the thing commanded, to us not as men, but as sinners. Although it is essential to the Romish doctrine of merit, of indulgences, of works of supererogation, and of purgatory, that the renewed should be able perfectly to fulfil the demands of the law, nevertheless, Romanists themselves are compelled to admit the contrary. Thus Bellarmin says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Defectus charitatis, quod videlicet non faciamus opera nostra tanto fervore dilectionis, quanto faciemus in patria, defectus quidem est, sed culpa et peccatum non est Unde etiam charitas nostra, quamvis comparata ad charitatem beatorum sit imperfecta, tamen absolute perfecta dici potest.\lang1033\rdblquote That is, although our love is in fact imperfect, it may be called perfect. But calling it perfect, does not alter its nature. To the same effect another of the leading theologians of the Roman Church, Andradius, says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Peccata venalia per se tam esse minuta et levia, ut non adversentur perfectioni caritatis, nec impedire possint perfectam et absolutam legis obedientiam: utpote qu\'e6 non sint ira Dei et condemnatione, sed venia digna, etiamsi Deus cum illis in judicium intret.\lang1033\rdblquote That is, sins are not sins, because men choose to regard them as trivial.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Works of Supererogation.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 But if no work of man since the fall in this life is perfectly good, then it not only follows that the doctrine of merit must be given up, but still more obviously, all works of supererogation are impossible. Romanists teach that the renewed may not only completely satisfy all the demands of the law of God, which requires that we should love Him with all the heart, and all the mind, and all the strength, and our neighbour as ourselves; but that they can do more than the law demands, and thus acquire more merit than they need for their own salvation, which may be made available for those who lack.\par It is impossible that any man can hold such a doctrine, unless he first degrades the law of God by restricting its demands to very narrow limits. The Romanists represent our relation to God as analogous to a citizen\rquote s relation to the state. Civil laws are limited to a narrow sphere. They concern only our social and political obligations. It is easy for a man to be a good citizen; to fulfil perfectly all that the law of the land requires. Such a man, through love to his country, may do far more than the law can demand. He may not only pay tribute to whom tribute is due, custom to whom custom, and honour to whom honour; but he may\cf3\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 also devote his time, his talents, his whole fortune to the service of his country. Thus also, according to Romanists, men may not only do all that the law of God requires of men as men, but they may also through love, far exceed its demands. This M\'f6hler represents as a great superiority of Romish ethics over the Protestant system. The latter, according to him, limits man\rquote s obligations to his legal liabilities, to what in justice may be exacted from him on pain of punishment. Whereas the former rises to the higher sphere of love, and represents the believer cordially and freely rendering unto God what in strict justice could not be demanded of him. \ldblquote It is the nature of love, which stands far, even immeasurably higher than the demands of the law, never to be satisfied with its manifestation, and to become more and more sensitive, so that believers, who are animated with this love, often appear to men who stand on a lower level as fanatics or lunatics.\rdblquote But what if the law itself is love? What if the law demands all that love can render? What if the love which the law requires of every rational creature calls for the devotion of the whole soul, with all its powers to God as a living sacrifice? It is only by making sin to be no sin; by teaching men that they are perfect when even their own hearts condemn them; it is only by lowering the demands of the law which, being founded on the nature of God, of necessity requires perfect conformity to the divine image, that any man in this life can pretend to be perfect, or be so insane as to imagine that he can go beyond the demands of the law and perform works of supererogation.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Precepts and Counsels.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The distinction which Romanists make between precepts and counsels, rests upon the same low view of the divine law. By precepts are meant the specific commands of the law which bind all men, the observance of which secures a reward, and non-observance a penalty. Whereas counsels are not commands; they do not bind the conscience of any man, but are recommendations of things peculiarly acceptable to God, compliance with which merits a much higher reward than the mere observance of precepts. There are many such counsels in the Bible, the most important of which are said to be celibacy, monastic obedience, and poverty. No man is bound to remain unmarried, but if he voluntarily determines to do so for the glory of God, that is a great virtue. No one is bound to renounce the acquisition of property, but if he voluntarily embraces a life of absolute poverty, it is a great merit. Our Lord, however, demands everything. He saith, \ldblquote He that loveth father or mother more than me, is not worthy of me, and he that loveth son or daughter more than me, is not worthy of me.\rdblquote \ldblquote He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake, shall find it.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Mat_10:31-39\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Luk_14:26\cf0\ulnone .) The law of Christ demands entire devotion to Him. If his service requires that a man should remain unmarried, he is bound to live a life of celibacy; if it requires that he should give up all his property and take up his cross, and follow Christ, he is bound to do so; if it requires him to lay down his life for Christ\rquote s sake, he is bound to lay it down. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Nothing can go beyond this. There can be no sacrifice and no service which a man can make or render, which duty, or the law of Christ, does not demand when such sacrifice or service becomes necessary as the proof or fruit of love to Christ. There is no room, therefore, for this distinction between counsels and precepts, between what the law demands and what love is willing to render. And therefore the doctrine of works of supererogation is thoroughly anti-Christian.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i They Sense in which the Fruits of the Spirit in Believers are called Good.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 3. Although no work even of the true people of God, while they continue in this world, is absolutely perfect, nevertheless those inward exercises and outward acts which are the fruits of the Spirit are properly designated good, and are so called in Scripture. \cf2\ul Act_9:36\cf0\ulnone , it was said of Dorcas that she \ldblquote was full of good works.\rdblquote \cf2\ul Eph_2:10\cf0\ulnone , believers are said to be \ldblquote created in Christ Jesus unto good works.\rdblquote \cf2\ul 2Ti_3:17\cf0\ulnone , teaches that the man of God should be \ldblquote thoroughly furnished unto all good works.\rdblquote \cf2\ul Tit_2:14\cf0\ulnone , Christ gave Himself for us that He might \ldblquote purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.\rdblquote There is no contradiction in pronouncing the same work good and bad, because these terms are relative, and the relations intended may be different. Feeding the poor, viewed in relation to the nature of the act is a good work. Viewed in relation\cf3\f1\fs16 7\cf0\f0\fs24 to the motive which prompts it, it may be good or bad. If done to be seen of men, it is offensive in the sight of God. If done from natural benevolence, it is an act of ordinary morality. If done to a disciple in the name of a disciple, it is an act of Christian virtue. The works of the children of God, therefore, although stained by sin, are truly and properly good, because, (1.) They are, as to their nature or the thing done, commanded by God. (2.) Because, as to the motive, they are the fruits, not merely of right moral feeling, but of religious feeling, \i i.e\i0 ., of love to God; and (3.) Because they are performed with the purpose of complying with his will, of honouring Christ and of promoting the interests of his kingdom.\par It follows from the fundamental principle of Protestantism, that the Scriptures are the only rule of faith and practice, that no work can be regarded as good or obligatory on the conscience which the Scriptures do not enjoin. Of course it is not meant that the Bible commands in detail everything which the people of God are bound to do, but it prescribes the principles by which their conduct is to be regulated, and specifies the kind of acts which those principles require or forbid. It is enough that the Scriptures require children to obey their parents, citizens the magistrate, and believers to hear the Church, without enjoining every act which these injunctions render obligatory. In giving these general commands, the Bible gives all necessary limitations, so that neither parents, magistrates, nor Church can claim any authority not granted to them by God, nor impose anything on the conscience which He does not command. As some churches have enjoined a multitude of doctrines as articles of faith, which are not taught in Scripture, so they have enjoined a multitude of acts, which the Bible neither directly, nor by just or necessary inference requires. They have thus imposed upon those who recognize their authority as infallible in teaching, a yoke of bondage which no one is able to bear. After the example of the ancient Pharisees, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, and claim divine authority for human institutions. From this bondage it was one great design of the Reformation to free the people of God. This deliverance was effected by proclaiming the principle that nothing is sin but what the Bible forbids and nothing is morally obligatory but what the Bible enjoins.\par Such, however, is the disposition, on the one hand, to usurp authority, and, on the other, to yield to it, that it is only by the constant assertion and vindication of this principle, that the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free can be preserved.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\f1\fs16 238\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\cf4\f2\fs23\par } ((H!)u1.18.4. The Fruits of Sanctification{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~4. \i The f2\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~5. \i Necessity of Good Works.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 On this subject there has never been any real difference of opinion among Protestants, although there was in the early Lutheran Church some misunderstanding. First. It was universally admitted that good works are not necessary to our justification; that they are consequences and indirectly the fruits of justification, and, therefore, cannot be its ground. Secondly, it was also agreed that faith, by which the sinner is justified, is not as a work, the reason why God pronounces the sinner just. It is the act by which the sinner receives and rests upon the righteousness of Christ, the imputation of which renders him righteous in the sight of God. Thirdly, faith does not justify because it includes, or is the root or principle of good works; not as \ldblquote\lang1142 fides obsequiosa\lang1033 .\rdblquote Fourthly, it was agreed that it is only a living faith, \i i.e\i0 ., a faith which works by love and purifies the heart, that unites the soul to Christ and secures our reconciliation with God. Fifthly, it was universally admitted that an immoral life is inconsistent with a state of grace; that those who wilfully continue in the practice of sin shall not inherit the kingdom of God. The Protestants while rejecting the Romish doctrine of subjectve justification, strenuously insisted that no man is delivered from the guilt of sin who is not delivered from its reiguing power; that sanctification is inseparable from justification, and that the one is just as essential as the other.\par The controversy on this subject was due mainly to a misunderstanding, but in a measure also to a real difference of opinion as to the office of the law under the Gospel. Melancthon taught that repentance was the effect of the law and anterior to faith, and used forms of expression which were thought to imply that good works, or sanctification, although not the ground of justification, were nevertheless a \ldblquote\lang1142 causa sine qua non\lang1033\rdblquote of our acceptance with God. To this Luther objected, as true sanctification is the consequence, and in no sense the condition of the sinner\rquote s justification. We are not justified because we are holy; but being justified, we are rendered holy. Agricola (born in Eisleben, 1492, died 1566), a pupil of Luther, and greatly influential as a preacher, took extreme ground against Melancthon. He not only held that repentance was not due to the operation of the law, and was the fruit of faith, but also that the law should not be taught under the Gospel, and that good works are not necessary to salvation. The believer is entirely free from the law, is not under the law but under grace; and being accepted for what Christ did, it is of little consequence what he does. Luther denounced this perversion of the Gospel, which overlooked entirely the distinction between the law as a covenant of works demanding perfect obedience as the condition of justification, and the law as the revelation of the immutable will of God as to what rational creatures should be and do in character and conduct. He insisted that faith was the receiving of Christ, not only for the pardon of sin, but also as a saviour from its power; that its object was not merely the death, but also the obedience of Christ.\par The controversy was renewed not long after in another form, in consequence of the position taken by George Major, also a pupil of Luther and Melancthon, and for some years professor of theology and preacher at Wittenberg. He was accused of objecting to the proposition \ldblquote we are saved by faith alone\rdblquote and of teaching that good works were also necessary to salvation. This was understood as tantamount to saying that good works are necessary to justification. Major, indeed, denied the justice of this charge. He said he did not teach that good works were necessary as being meritorious, but simply as the necessary fruits of faith and part of our obedience to Christ; nevertheless, he maintained that no one could be saved without good works. How then can infants be saved? And how can this unconditional necessity of good works be consistent with Paul\rquote s doctrine that we are justified by faith without works? Whom God justifies He glorifies. Justification secures salvation; and, therefore, if faith alone, or faith without works, secures justification, it secures salvation. It is very evident that this was a dispute about words. Major admitted that the sinner was in a state of salvation the moment he believed, but held that if his faith did not produce good works it was not a saving faith. In his sermon \ldblquote On the Conversion of Paul,\rdblquote he said: \ldblquote As thou art now justified by faith alone, and hast become a child of God, and since Christ and the Holy Ghost through that faith dwell in thy heart, so are good works necessary, not to obtain salvation (which thou already hast as a matter of grace, without works, through faith alone on the Lord Jesus Christ), but to hold fast your salvation, that it be not lost, and also because if thou dost not produce good works, it is an evidence that thy faith is false and dead, a mere pretence or opinion.\rdblquote Amsdorf, the chief representative\cf1\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 of the extremists in this controversy, laid down his doctrine in the following propositions: \lang1142 (1.) Etsi h\'e6c oratio: bona opera sunt necessaria ad salutem in doctrina legis abstractive et de idea tolerari potest, tamen mult\'e6 sunt graves caus\'e6, propter quas vitanda, et fugienda est non minus, quam h\'e6c oratio: Christus est creatura. (2.) In foro justificationis h\'e6c propositio nullo modo ferenda est. (3.) In foro nov\'e6 obedienti\'e6 post reconciliationem nequaquam bona opera ad salutem, sed propter alias causas necessaria sunt. (4.) Sola fides justificat in principio, medio, et fine. (5.) Bona opera non sunt necessaria ad retinendam salutem. (6.) Synonyma sunt et \'e6quipollentia, seu termini convertibiles, justificatio et salvatio, nec ulla ratione distrahi aut possunt aut debent. (7.) Explodatur ergo ex ecclesia cothurnus papisticus propter scandala multiplicia, dissensiones innumerabiles et alias causas, de quibus Apostoli \cf2\ul Act_15:1\cf0\ulnone . loquuntur.\lang1033\rdblquote\par The \ldblquote Form of Concord,\rdblquote in which this and other controversies in the Lutheran Church were finally adjusted, took the true ground on this subject, midway between the two extreme views. It rejects the unqualified proposition that good works are necessary to salvation, as men may be saved who have no opportunity to testify to their faith by their works. On the other hand, it utterly condemns the unwarrantable declaration that good works are hurtful to salvation; which it pronounces to be pernicious and full of scandal. It teaches that \ldblquote\lang1142\i Fides vera nunquam sola est, quin caritatem et spem semper secum habeat.\lang1033\i0\rdblquote\par The same doctrine was clearly taught in the Lutheran Symbols from the beginning, so that the charge made by Romanists, that Protestants divorced morality from religion, was without foundation, either in their doctrine or practice. In the \ldblquote Apology for the Augsburg Confession\rdblquote it is said: \ldblquote\lang1142 Quia fides affert Spiritum Sanctum, et parit novam vitam in cordibus, necesse est, quod pariat spirituales motus in cordibus. Et qui sint illi motus, ostendit propheta, cum ait: \lquote Dabo legem meam in corda eorum.\rquote Postquam igitur fide justificati et renati sumus, incipimus Deum timere, diligere, petere, et expectare ab eo auxilium. Incipimus et diligere proximos, quia corda habent spirituales et sanctos motus. H\'e6c non possunt fieri, nisi postquam fide justificati sumus et renati accipimus Spiritum Sanctum.\~Profitemur igitur, quod necesse est, inchoari in nobis et subinde magis magisque fieri legem. Et complectimur simul utrumque videlicet spirituales motus et externa bona opera. Falso igitur\cf1\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 calumniantur nos adversarii, quod nostri non doceant bona opera, cum ea non solum requirant, sed etiam ostendant, quomodo fieri possint.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\i Antinomianism.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Antinomianism has never had any hold in the churches of the Reformation. There is no logical connection between the neglect of moral duties, and the system which teaches that Christ is a Saviour as well from the power as from the penalty of sin; that faith is the act by which the soul receives and rests on Him for sanctification as well as for justification; and that such is the nature of the union with Christ by faith and indwelling of the Spirit, that no one is, or can be partaker of the benefit of his death, who is not also partaker of the power of his life; which holds to the divine authority of the Scripture which declares that without holiness no man shall see the Lord (\cf2\ul Heb_12:14\cf0\ulnone ); and which, in the language of the great advocate of salvation by grace, warns all who call themselves Christians: \ldblquote Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of God.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul 1Co_6:9-10\cf0\ulnone .) It is not the system which regards sin as so great an evil that it requires the blood of the Son of God for its expiation, and the law as so immutable that it requires the perfect righteousness of Christ for the sinner\rquote s justification, which leads to loose views of moral obligation; these are reached by the system which teaches that the demands of the law have been lowered, that they can be more than met by the imperfect obedience of fallen men, and that sin can be pardoned by priestly intervention. This is what logic and history alike teach.\par \pard\cf4\f2\fs23\par } R"1.18.5. Necessity of Good Works{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~6. \i Relation of Good Works to Reward.\i0\par \cf1\b0\i Romish Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 On this subject the Romanists make a distinction between works done before, and those done after regeneration. Works as to the matter of them good, when performed from mere natural conscience, have no other merit than that of congruity. They are necessarily imperfect, and constitute no claim on the justice of God. But works performed under the control of gracious principles infused in baptism, are perfect; they have therefore real merit, \i i.e\i0 ., the merit of condignity. They give a claim for reward,\cf2\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 not merely on the ground of the divine promise, but also on the divine justice. To him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. (Rom 4:4.) On this subject the Council of Trent, says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Si quis dixerit, hominis justificati bona opera ita esse dona Dei, ut non sint etiam bona ipsius justificati merita; aut ipsum justificatum bonis operibus, qu\'e6 ab eo per Dei gratiam, et Jesu Christi meritum cujus vivum membrum est, fiunt, non vere mereri augmentum grati\'e6, vitam \'e6ternam, et ipsius vit\'e6 \'e6tern\'e6, si tamen in gratia decesserit, consecutionem, atque etiam glori\'e6 augmentum; anathema sit.\lang1033\rdblquote Bellarmin says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Habet communis catholicorum omnium sententia, opera bona justorum vere, ac proprie esse merita, et merita non cujuscunque premii, sed ipsius vit\'e6 \'e6tern\'e6.\lang1033\rdblquote\par The conditions of such meritorious works, according to Bellarmin, are: (1.) That they be good in their nature. (2.) Done in obedience to God. (3.) By a man in this life. (4.) That they be voluntary. (5.) That the agent be in a state of justification and favour with God. (6.) That they be prompted by love. (7.) That some divine promise be attached to them.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Refutation of this Romish Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 1. This whole doctrine of merit is founded on the assumption that justification, their term for regeneration, removes everything of the nature of sin from the soul; that works performed by the renewed being free from sin are perfect; that a renewed man can not only fulfil all the demands of the law, but also do more than the law requires. As these assumptions are contrary to Scripture, and to the experience of all Christians, the doctrine founded on them must be false.\par 2. The doctrine is inconsistent, not only with the express declarations of the word of God, but also with the whole nature and design of the Gospel. The immediate or proximate design of the plan of salvation, as the Scriptures abundantly teach, is the manifestation of the grace of God, and therefore it must be gratuitous in all its parts and provisions, to the entire exclusion of all merit. Unless salvation be of grace it is not a revelation of grace, and if of grace it is not of works.\par 3. The doctrine is so repugnant to the inward teachings of the Spirit, as well as to the teachings of his word, that it cannot be practically believed even by those who profess it. The children\cf2\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 of God, in spite of their theories and their creeds, do not trust for their salvation, either in whole or in part, to what they are or to what they do; but simply and exclusively to what Christ is and has done for them. In proof of this, appeal may be made to the written or recorded experience of all the great lights of the Latin Church. If every Christian is intimately convinced that he is unholy in the sight of God; that all his best acts are polluted; and that in no one thing and at no time does he come up to the standard of perfection; it is impossible that he can believe that he merits eternal life on the ground of his own works.\par 4. As the doctrine of merit is opposed to the nature and design of the Gospel, and to the express declarations of Scripture that we are not justified or saved by works, but gratuitously for Christ\rquote s sake, so it is derogatory to the honour of Christ as our Saviour. He gave Himself as a ransom; he offered Himself as a sacrifice; it is by his obedience we are constituted righteous; it is, therefore, only on the assumption that his ransom, sacrifice, and obedience are inadequate that the merit of our works can be needed or admitted. The Romanists attempt to evade the force of this objection by saying that we owe to Christ the grace or spiritual life by which we perform good works. Had He not died for our sins, God would not in baptism wash away our guilt and pollution and impart those \ldblquote habits of grace\rdblquote by which we are enabled to merit eternal life. This does not help the matter; for salvation remains a debt as a matter of justice on the ground of our good works. It is this which is so contrary to Scripture, to the intimate conviction of every Christian, and to the glory of Christ, to whom the whole honour of our salvation is due.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Doctrine of the older Protestant Divines.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The older theologians, in order the more effectually to refute the doctrine of merit, assumed that a work, to be meritorious, must be (1.) \ldblquote\lang1142 Indebitum\lang1033 ,\rdblquote \i i.e\i0 ., not due. Something which we are not bound to do. (2.) Our own. (3.) Absolutely perfect. (4.) Equal, or bearing a due proportion to the recompense. (5.) And, therefore, that the recompense should be due on the gound of justice, and not merely of promise or agreement. On these conditions, all merit on the part of creatures is impossible. It is, however, clearly recognized in Scripture that a labourer is worthy of his hire. To him that worketh, says the Apostle, the reward is not reckoned of grace, but of debt. It is something due in justice. This principle also is universally recognized among\cf2\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 men. Even on the theory of slavery, where the labourer himself his time, and strength, and all he has, are assumed to belong to his master, the servant has a claim to a proper recompense, which it would be unjust to withhold from him. And in every department of life it is recognized as a simple matter of justice, that the man who performs a stipulated work, earns his wages. The payment is not a matter of favour; it is not due simply because promised; but because it has been earned. It is a debt. So in the case of Adam, had he remained perfect, there would have been no ground in justice why he should die, or forfeit the favour of God; which favour is life.\par The passage in \cf3\ul Luk_17:10\cf0\ulnone , is relied upon as proving that a creature can in no case perform a meritorious act, \i i.e\i0 ., an act which lays a claim in justice for a reward. Our Lord there says, \ldblquote When ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, \lquote We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do.\rquote\rdblquote This does not teach that the labourer is not worthy of his hire. The passage is part of a parable in which our Lord says, that a master does not thank his servant for merely doing his duty. It does not call for gratitude. But it does not follow that it would be just to withhold the servant\rquote s wages, or to refuse to allow him to eat and drink. God is just, and being just, He rewards every man according to his works, so long as men are under the law. If not under the law, they are dealt with, not on the principles of law, but of grace.\par But although Protestants deny the merit of good works, and teach that salvation is entirely gratuitous, that the remission of sins, adoption into the family of God, and the gift of the Holy Spirit are granted to the believer, as well as admission into heaven, solely on the ground of the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ; they nevertheless teach that God does reward his people for their works. Having graciously promised for Christ s sake to overlook the imperfection of their best services, they have the assurance founded on that promise that he who gives to a disciple even a cup of cold water in the name of a disciple, shall in no wise lose his reward. The Scriptures also teach that the happiness or blessedness of believers in a future life, will be greater or less in proportion to their devotion to the service of Christ in this life. Those who love little, do little; and those who do little enjoy less. What a man sows that shall he also reap. As the rewards of heaven are given on the ground of the merits of Christ, and as He has a right to do what He will with his own, there\cf2\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 would be no injustice were the thief saved on the cross as highly exalted as the Apostle Paul. But the general drift of Scripture is in favour of the doctrine that a man shall reap what he sows; that God will reward every one according to, although not on account of his works.\par \pard\cf4\f2\fs23\par } $$mA1.18.7. Perfectionism{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttb߁#9e1.18.6. Relation of Good Works to Reward{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1l{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\froman\fcharset0 Gentium;}{\f4\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~7. \i Perfectionism.\i0\par \cf1\b0\i Protestant Doctrine.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The doctrine of Lutherans and Reformed, the two great branches of the Protestant Church, is, that sanctification is never perfected in this life; that sin is not in any case entirely subdued; so that the most advanced believer has need as long as he continues in the flesh, daily to pray for the forgiveness of sins.\par The question is not as to the duty of believers. All admit that we are bound to be perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect. Nor is it a question as to the command of God; for the first, original, and universally obligatory commandment is that we should love God with all our heart and our neighbour as ourselves. Nor does the question concern the provisions of the Gospel. It is admitted that the Gospel provides all that is needed for the complete sanctification and salvation of believers. What can we need more than we have in Christ, his Spirit, his word and his ordinances? Nor does it concern the promises of God; for all rejoice in the hope, founded on the divine promise, that we shall be ultimately delivered from all sin. God has in Christ made provision for the complete salvation of his people: that is, for their entire deliverance from the penalty of the law, from the power of sin, from all sorrow, pain, and death; and not only for mere negative deliverance, but for their being transformed into the image of Christ, filled with his Spirit, and glorified by the beauty of the Lord. It is, however, too plain that, unless sanctification be an exception, no one of these promises besides that which concerns justification, is perfectly fulfilled in this life. Justification does not admit of degrees. A man either is under condemnation, or he is not. And, therefore, from the nature of the case, justification is instantaneous and complete, as soon as the sinner believes. But the question is, whether, when God promises to make his people perfectly holy, perfectly happy, and perfectly glorious, He thereby promises to make them perfect in holiness in this life? If the promises of happiness and glory are not perfectly fulfilled in this life, why should the promise of sanctification be thus fulfilled? It is, however, a mere question of fact. All admit that God can render his people perfect before death as well as after it. The only question is, Has He promised, with regard to sanctification alone, that it shall be perfected on this side of the grave? and, Do we see cases in which the promise has been actually fulfilled? The answer given to these questions by the Church universal is in the negative. So long as the believer is in this world, he will need to pray for pardon.\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1 The grounds of this doctrine are, \emdash\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 1. The spirituality of the divine law and the immutability of its demands. It condemns as sinful any want of conformity to the standard of absolute perfection as exhibited in the Bible. Anything less than loving God constantly with all the heart, all the soul, all the mind, and all the strength, and our neighbour as ourselves, is sin.\par 2. The express declaration of Scripture that all men are sinners. This does not mean simply that all men have sinned, that all are guilty, but that all have sin cleaving to them. \ldblquote If,\rdblquote declares the Apostle, \ldblquote we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul 1Jo_1:8\cf0\ulnone .) As the wise man had said before him, \ldblquote There is not a just man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Ecc_7:20\cf0\ulnone .) And in \cf2\ul 1Ki_8:46\cf0\ulnone , it is said, \ldblquote There is no man that sinneth not.\rdblquote And the Apostle \cf2\ul Jam_3:2\cf0\ulnone , says: \ldblquote In many things we offend all.\rdblquote It is a manifest perversion of the simple grammatical meaning of the words to make \cf3\f1\u7937?\f2\'ec\'e1\'f1\'f4\f1\u8055?\f2\'e1\'ed\f3 \f2\'ef\f1\u8016?\f2\'ea\f3 \f1\u7956?\f2\'f7\'ef\'ec\'e5\'ed\cf0\f0 to refer to the past. The verb is in the present tense. The truth is not in us, says the Apostle, if we say we have no sin, \i i.e\i0 ., that we are not now polluted by sin. In the context he sets forth Christ as the \ldblquote Word of Life,\rdblquote as having life in Himself, and as being the source of life to us. Having fellowship with Him, we have fellowship with God. But God is light, \i i.e\i0 ., is pure, holy, and blessed; if, therefore, we walk in darkness, \i i.e\i0 ., in ignorance and sin, we can have no fellowship with Him. But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, and do not need now and at all times the cleansing power of Christ\rquote s blood, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Argument from the General Representations of Scripture.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The declarations of Scripture, which are so abundant, that there is none righteous, no not one; that all have sinned and\cf4\f4\fs16 7\cf0\f0\fs24 come short of the glory of God; that no flesh living is just in the sight of God; and that every one must lay his hand upon his mouth, and his mouth in the dust in the sight of the infinitely holy God, who accuses his angels of folly, refer to all men without exception; to Jews and Gentiles; to the renewed and unrenewed; to babes in Christ and to mature Christians. All feel, and all are bound to acknowledge that they are sinners whenever they present themselves before God; all know that they need constantly the intervention of Christ, and the application of his blood, to secure fellowship with the Holy One. As portrayed in Scripture, the inward life of the people of God to the end of their course in this world, is a repetition of conversion. It is a continued turning unto God; a constant renewal of confession, repentance, and faith; a dying unto sin, and living unto righteousness. This is true of all the saints, patriarchs, prophets, and apostles of whose inward experience the Bible gives us any account.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Passages which describe the Conflict between the Flesh and the Spirit.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 3. More definitely is this truth taught in those passages which describe the conflict in the believer between the flesh and the Spirit. To this reference has already been made. That the seventh chapter of Paul\rquote s Epistle to the Romans is an account of his own inward life at the time of writing that Epistle, has already, as it is believed, been sufficiently proved; and such has been the belief of the great body of evangelical Christians in all ages of the Church. If this be the correct interpretation of that passage, then it proves that Paul, at least, was not free from sin; that he had to contend with a law in his members, warring against the law of his mind; that he groaned constantly under the burden of indwelling sin. At a still later period of his life, when he was just ready to be offered up, he says to the \cf2\ul Phi_3:12-14\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.\rdblquote This is an unmistakable declaration on the part of the Apostle that even at this late period of his life he was not yet perfect; he had\cf4\f4\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 not attained the end of perfect conformity to Christ, but was pressing forward, as one in a race, with all earnestness that he might reach the end of his calling. To answer this, as has been done by some distinguished advocates of perfectionism, by saying that Paul\rquote s not being perfect, is no proof that other men may not be is not very satisfactory.\par The parallel passage in \cf2\ul Gal_5:16-26\cf0\ulnone , is addressed to Christians generally. It recognizes the fact that they are imperfectly sanctified; that in them the renewed principle, the Spirit as the source of spiritual life, is in couffict with the flesh, the remains of their corrupt nature. It exhorts them to mortify the flesh (not the body, but their corrupt nature), and to strive constantly to walk under the controlling influence of the Spirit. The characteristic difference between the unrenewed and the renewed is not that the former are entirely sinful, and the latter perfectly holy; but that the former are wholly under the control of their fallen nature, while the latter have the Spirit of God dwelling in them, which leads them to crucify the flesh, and to strive after complete conformity to the image of God. There was nothing in the character of the Galatian Christians to render this exhortation applicable to them alone. What the Scriptures teach concerning faith, repentance, and justification, is intended for all Christians; and so what is taught of sanctification suits the case of all believers. Indeed, if a man thinks himself perfect, and apprehends that he has already attained what his fellow believers are only striving for, a great part of the Bible must for him lose its value. What use can he make of the Psalms, the vehicle through which the people of God for millenniums have poured out their hearts? How can such a man sympathize with Ezra, Nehemiah, or any of the prophets? How strange to him must be the language of Isaiah, \ldblquote Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the \scaps Lord\scaps0 of hosts.\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Argument from the Lord\rquote s Prayer.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 4. Not only do the holy men of God throughout the Scriptures in coming into his presence, come with the confession of sin and imperfection, praying for mercy, not only for what they were but also for what they are, but our Lord has taught all his disciples whenever they address their Father in heaven to say, \ldblquote Forgive as our trespasses.\rdblquote This injunction has ever been a stumbling block in the way of the advocates of perfection from Pelagius to the present day. It was urged by Augustine in his argument against the doctrine of his great opponent that men could be entirely free from sin in the present life. The answer given to the argument from this source has been substantially the same as that given by Pelagius. It is presented in its best form by the Rev. Richard Watson. That writer says, \ldblquote (1.) That it would be absurd to suppose that any person is placed under the necessity of trespassing, in order that a general prayer designed for men in a mixed condition might retain its aptness to every particular ease. (2.) That trespassing of every kind and degree is not supposed by this prayer to be continued, in order that it might be used always in the same import, or otherwise it might be pleaded against the renunciation of any trespass or transgression whatever. (3.) That this petition is still relevant to the case of the entirely sanctified and the evangelically perfect, since neither the perfection of the first man nor that of angels is in question; that is, a perfection measured by the perfect law, which in its obligation, contemplates all creatures as having sustained no injury by moral lapse, and admits, therefore, of no excuse from infirmities and mistakes of judgment; nor of any degree of obedience below that which beings created naturally perfect, were capable of rendering. There may, however, be an entire sanctification of a being rendered naturally weak and imperfect, and so liable to mistake and infirmity, as well as to defect as to the degree of that absolute obedience and service which the law of God, never bent to human weakness, demands from all. These defects, and mistakes, and infirmities, may be quite consistent with the entire sanctification of the soul and the moral maturity of a being still naturally infirm and imperfect.\rdblquote\par The first and second of these answers do not touch the point. No one pretends that men are placed under the necessity of sinning, \ldblquote in order that\rdblquote they may be able to repeat the Lord\rquote s prayer. This would indeed be absurd. The argument is this. If a man prays to be forgiven, he confesses that he is a sinner, and if a sinner, he is not free from sin or perfect. And therefore, the use of the Lord\rquote s prayer by all Christians, is an acknowledgment that no Christian in this life is perfect. The third answer which is the one principally relied upon and constantly repeated, involves a contradiction. It assumes that what is not sin requires to be forgiven. Mr. Watson says the petition, \ldblquote Forgive us our trespasses,\rdblquote may be properly used by those who are free from sin. This is saying that sin is not sin. The argument by which this position is sustained also involves a contradiction. Our \ldblquote infirmities\rdblquote are sins if judged by \ldblquote the perfect law\rdblquote ; but not if judged by \ldblquote the evangelical law.\rdblquote As we are not to be judged by the former, but by the latter, want of conformity tc the law is not sin. The only inability under which men, since the fall, labour, arises from their sinfulness, and therefore is no excuse for want of conformity to that law which it is said, and said rightly, is \ldblquote never bent to human weakness.\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Argument from the Experience of Christians.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 5. Appeal may be made on this subject to the testimony of the Church universal. There are no forms of worship, no formulas for private devotion, in any age or part of the Church, which do not contain confession of sin and prayer for forgiveness. The whole Christian Church with all its members prostrates itself before God, saying, \ldblquote Have mercy upon us miserable sinners.\rdblquote If here and there one and another among this prostrate multitude refuse to bow and join in this confession, they are to be wondered at and pitied. They are, however, not to he found. Consciousness is too strong for theory, and therefore,\par 6. We may appeal to the conscience of every believer. He knows that he is a sinner. He never is in a state which satisfies his own conviction as to what he ought to be. He may call his deficiencies infirmities, weaknesses, and errors, and may refuse to call them sins. But this does not alter the case. Whatever they are called, it is admitted that they need God\rquote s pardoning mercy.\par \pard\cf5\f5\fs23\par }  Perfectionism.\i0\par \cf1\b0\i Pelagian Theory.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The two radical principles of Pelagianism are, first, that the nature of man is uninjured by the fall, so that men are free from sin until by voluntary transgression they incur guilt. Secondly, that our natural powers, since, as well as before the fall, are fully competent to render complete obedience to the law.\par From these principles Pelagius inferred, (1.) That a man (even among the heathen) might live from birth to death free from all sin, although he did not assert that any man ever had so lived. (2.) That when converted, men might, and numbers of men did, live without sin; perfectly obeying the law. (3) That this obedience was rendered in the exercise of their ability, assisted by the grace of God.\par By grace, Pelagius says that we are to understand, (1.) The goodness of God in so constituting our nature that we can completely obey the law in virtue of our free agency. (2.) The revelation, precepts, and example of Christ. (3.) The pardon of sins committed before conversion. (4.) The moral influences of the truth and of the circumstances in which we are placed. The effect of grace thus understood, is simply to render obedience more easy.\par In the Council of Carthage, \scaps A.D.\scaps0 418, the Pelagians were condemned, among other things, for teaching, (1.) That the effect of grace was merely to render obedience more easy. (2.) That the declaration of the Apostle John, \ldblquote If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us,\rdblquote is, as to some, a mere expression of humility. (3.) That the petition in the Lord\rquote s prayer, \ldblquote Forgive us our trespasses,\rdblquote is not suited to the saints. They use it only as expressing the desire and necessity of others.\par According to the Pelagian theory, therefore, (1.) The sin from which the believer may be perfectly free is the voluntary transgression of known law. Nothing else is of the nature of sin. (2.) The law to which perfect conformity in this life is possible, and in many cases actual, is the moral law in all its strictness. (3.) This obedience may be rendered without any supernatural influence of the Holy Spirit.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Romish Theory.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Romanists teach, (1.) That by the infusion of grace in justification as effected by or in baptism, everything of the nature of sin is removed from the soul. (2.) That good works performed in a state of grace are free from the taint of sin, and are perfect. \ldblquote\lang1142 Si quis in quolibet bono opere justum saltem venaliter peccare dixerit. anathema sit.\lang1033\rdblquote (3.) That the law may be and often is, perfectly obeyed by the children of God in this life. (4.) That men may not only do all that the law requires, but may even go beyond its demands. (5.) Nevertheless, as there is in higher law than that by which men are to be judged, no man is entirely free from venial sins, \i i.e\i0 ., sins which do not bring the soul under condemnation, and therefore all men in this life have need to say, \ldblquote Forgive us our trespasses.\rdblquote\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\f1\fs16 252\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1 From this statement it appears,\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 1. That by sin from which advanced believers are sa id to be free, is meant only what merits condemnation, and in itself deserves the forfeiture of grace or divine favour. It is admitted that \ldblquote concupiscence,\rdblquote or the remains of original sin, is not removed by baptism, but it is not of the nature of sin, in the sense just stated. Neither are venial sins, \i i.e\i0 ., sins which do not forfeit grace, properly sins, if judged by the law under which believers are now placed. So far, therefore, as the negative part of perfection, or freedom f rom sin is concerned, the Romanists do not mean freedom from moral faults, but simply freedom from what incurs the sentence of the law. It is perfection as judged by a lower standard of judgment.\par 2. The law to which we are now subject, and the demands of which Romanists say are satisfied by the obedience of the saints, is not the moral law in its original strictness, but the sum of that which is due from man in his present circumstances; in other words, the demands of the law are accommodated to the  condition of men in this life. This is evident, because they say that the saints obey the law so far as it is now binding, and because they admit that saints commit venial sins, which can only mean sins which, under a stricter rule of judgment, would merit condemnation.\par 3. As stated above, they distinguish between the law and love. The former is that which all men, and especially Christians, are bound to observe, but love is a higher principle which prompts to doing more than the law or justice deman ds. Consequently, the positive part of perfection, or conformity to the law, does not imply the highest degree of moral excellence of which our nature is susceptible, but only such as answers to the lower demands of the law to which we are now subject. In a passage already quoted, Bellarmin says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Defectus charitatis, quod videlicet non faciamus opera nostra tanto fervore dilectionis, quanto faciemus in patria, defectus quidem est, sed culpa, et peccatum non est. Unde etiam charitas nos tra, quamvis comparata ad charitatem beatorum sit imperfecta, tamen absolute perfecta dici potest.\lang1033\rdblquote In like manner Moehler says, \ldblquote In modern times the attempt has been made to sustain the old orthodox doctrine by assuming that the moral law makes ideal demands, which, as every other ideal, must remain unattainable. If this be true, then the man who\cf2\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 falls short of this ideal is as little responsible, and as little deserving of punishment, as an epic poet who should fall short of the Iliad of Homer.\rdblquote\par The Romish theory is consistent. In baptism all sin is washed away. By the infusion of grace full ability is given to do all that is required of us. Nothing can be required beyond what we are able to perform, and, therefore, the demands of the law are suited to our present state. By obedience to this modified law, we merit increased supplies of grace and eternal life.\par The perfection, therefore, which Romanists insist upon is merely relative; not an entire freedom from sin, but only from such sins as merit condemnation; not holiness which is absolutely perfect, but perfect only relatively to the law under which we are now placed. It is clear that there is a radical difference between Romanists and Protestants as to the nature of sin and the limits of moral obligation. If they were to adopt our definition of sin, they would not pretend to any perfection in the present life.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i The Arminian Theory.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The perfection which the Arminians teach is attainable, and which, in many cases, they say is actually attained in this life, is declared to be complete conformity to the law; including freedom from sin, and the proper exercise of all right affections and the discharge of all duties.\par Episcopius defines it to be, keeping the commandments of God with a perfect fulfilment; or loving God as much as we ought to love Hun, according to the requirements of the Gospel; or according to the covenant of grace. \ldblquote By a perfection of degrees is meant that highest perfection which consists in the highest exertion of human strength assisted by grace.\rdblquote \ldblquote This perfection includes two things, (1.) A perfection proportioned to the powers of each individual; (2.) A desire of making continual progress, and of increasing one s strength more and more.\rdblquote\par Limborch defines it as \ldblquote keeping the precepts of the Gospel after such manner, and in such degree of perfection as God requires of us under the denunciation of eternal damnation.\rdblquote This obedience is \ldblquote perfect as being correspondent to the stipulations contained in the divine covenant.\rdblquote \ldblquote It is not a sinless or absolutely perfect obedience, but such as consists in a sincere love and habit of piety, which excludes all habit of sin, with all enormous and deliberate actions.\rdblquote This perfection has three degrees\cf2\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 (1.) That of beginners. (2.) That of proficients. (3.) That of the truly perfect, who have subdued the habit of sin, and take delight in the practice of virtue.\par Wesley says; \ldblquote Perfection is the loving God with all the heart, mind, soul, and strength. This implies that no wrong temper, none contrary to love, remains in the soul; and that all the thoughts, words, and actions, are governed by love.\rdblquote Dr. Peck says that it is \ldblquote a state of holiness which fully meets the requirements of the Gospel.\rdblquote\par Although these definitions differ in some respects, they agree in the general idea that perfection consists in entire conformity to the law to which we are now subject, and by which we are to be judged.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i The Law to which Believers are subject.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 What, according to the Arminian theory, is that law? The answer to that question is given in a negative, and in a positive form. Negatively, it is said by Dr. Peck not to be the Adamic law, or the law originally given to Adam. Fletcher says: \ldblquote With respect to the Christless law of paradisiacal obedience, we utterly disclaim sinless perfection.\rdblquote \ldblquote We shall not be judged by that law; but by a law adapted to our present state and circumstances, called the law of Christ.\rdblquote \ldblquote Our Heavenly Father never expects of us, in our debilitated state, the obedience of immortal Adam in paradise.\rdblquote The positive statements are, \ldblquote It is the law of Christ.\rdblquote \ldblquote The Gospel.\rdblquote \ldblquote The standard of character set up in the Gospel must be such as is practicable by man, fallen as he is. Coming up to this standard is what we call Christian perfection.\rdblquote\par From this it appears that the law according to which men are pronounced perfect, is not the original moral law, but the mitigated law suited to the debilitated state of man since the fall. The sin from which the believer may be entirely free, is not all moral imperfection which in itself deserves punishment, but only such delinquencies as are inconsistent with the mitigated law of the Gospel.\par On this point the language of Limborch above quoted, is explicit. It is not \ldblquote an absolutely sinless perfection\rdblquote that is asserted. And Fletcher says, We utterly disclaim \ldblquote sinless perfection\rdblquote according to the paradisiacal law. Wesley says, By sin is meant\cf2\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 (1.) Voluntary transgression of known law. In this sense all who are born of God are free from sin. (2.)It means all unholy tempers, self-will, pride, anger, sinful thoughts. From these the perfect are free. (3.) But mistakes and infirmities are not sins. \ldblquote These are,\rdblquote indeed, \ldblquote deviations from the perfect law, and consequently need atonement. Yet they are not properly sins.\rdblquote \ldblquote A person filled with the love of God is still liable to these involuntary transgressions. Such transgressions you may call sins, if you please, I do not.\rdblquote The question, however, is not what Wesley or any other man chooses to call sin; but what does the law of God condemn. Nothing which the law does not condemn can need expiation. If these transgressions, therefore, need atonement, they are sins in the sight of God. Our refusing to recognize them as such does not alter their nature, or remove their guilt.\par According to the Arminian system, especially as held by the Wesleyans, this perfection is not due to the native ability, or free will of man, but to the grace of God, or supernatural influence of the Spirit. Perfection is a matter of grace, (1.) Because it is solely on account of the work of Christ that God lowers the demands of the law, and accepts as perfect the obedience which the milder law of the Gospel demands. (2.) Because the ability to render this obedience is due to the gracious influence of the Holy Spirit. (3.) Because believers constantly need the intercession of Christ as our High Priest, to secure them from condemnation for involuntary transgressions, which, judged by the law, would incur its penalty.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Oberlin Theory.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 This theory is so called because its prominent advocates are the officers of the Oberlin University in Ohio. President Mahan says, perfection in holiness implies a full and perfect discharge of our entire duty; of all existing obligations in respect of God and all other beings. It is loving God with all the heart, soul, mind, and strength. It implies the entire absence of selfishness and the perpetual presence and all pervading influence of pure and perfect love.\par Professor Finney says: \ldblquote By entire sanctification, I understand the consecration of the whole being to God. In other words, it is the state of devotedness to God and his service required by the moral law. The law is perfect. It requires just what is right, all that is right, and nothing more. Nothing more nor less can\cf2\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 possibly be perfection or entire sanctification than obedience to the law. Obedience to the law of God in an infant, a man, an angel, and in God himself, is perfection in each of them. And nothing can possibly be perfection in any being short of this; nor can there possibly be anything above it.\rdblquote\par The law which now binds men and to which they are bound to be perfectly conformed, is the original moral law given to Adam. But that law demands nothing more and nothing less than what every man in his inward state and outward circumstances is able to render. The law meets man at every step of his ascending or descending progress. The more grace, knowledge, or strength he has, the more does the law demand. On the other hand, the less of knowledge, culture, moral susceptibility, or strength he possesses, the less does the law require of him.\par Presi dent Mahan says, Perfection does not imply that we love God as the saints do in heaven, but merely that we love Him as far as practicable with our present powers.\par Professor Finney says, The law does not require that we should love God as we might do, had we always improved our time, or had we never sinned. It does not suppose that our powers are in a perfect state. The service required is regulated by our ability.\par The principle of this perfect obedience is our own natural ability. A free moral a!gent must be able to be and to do all that the law can justly demand. Moral ability, natural ability, gracious ability, are distinctions which Professor Finney pronounces perfectly nonsensical. \ldblquote It is,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote a first truth of reason that moral obligation implies the possession of every kind of ability which is required to render the required act possible.\rdblquote\par The Oberlin theory of perfection is founded on the following principles: \emdash\par 1. Holiness consi"sts in disinterested benevolence, \i i.e\i0 ., a perfect willingness that God should do whatever the highest good of the universe demands. A man either has, or has not, this willingness. If he has, he has all that is required of him. He is perfect. If he has not this willingness he is in rebellion against God. Therefore it is said, \ldblquote Perfection, as implied in the action of our voluntary powers in full harmony with our present convictions of duty is an irreversible condition of eternal life.\rdblq#uote\par 2. There is no sin but in the voluntary transgression of known law.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\f1\fs16 257\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 3. There is no moral character in anything but generic volitions, or those purposes which terminate on an ultimate end. There is no$ moral character in feeling, and much less in states of mind not determined by the will. When a man\rquote s purpose is to promote the happiness of the universe he is perfectly holy; when it is anything else, he is perfectly sinful.\par 4. Every man, in virtue of being a free agent, has plenary ability to fulfil all his obligations. This principle, though mentioned last, is the root of the whole system.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx109%92\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i The Relation between these Theories of Perfection.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The Pelagian and the Oberlin theories agree as to their views of the nature of sin; the ability of man; and the extent of the obligation of the law.\par They differ as to their views of the nature of virtue or holiness. The Pelagian system does not assume that disint&erested benevolence, or the purpose to promote the highest good of the universe, is the sum of all virtue; \i i.e\i0 ., it does not put the universe in the place of God, as that to which our allegiance is due. They differ also in that, while the Oberlin divines maintain the plenary ability of man, they give more importance to the work of the Holy Spirit; and in that, it is generally admitted that although men have the ability to do their whole duty, yet that they will not exert it aright unless influenced' by the grace of God.\par The Romish and Arminian theories agree, (1.) In that both teach that the law to which we are bound to be conformed is not \ldblquote ideal excellence;\rdblquote not the Adamic law; not the moral law in its original strictness; but a milder law suited to our condition since the fall. (2.) That by freedom from sin is not meant freedom from what the law in its strictness condemns, and what in its nature needs expiation and pardon, but from everything which the milder law, \ldblquo(te the law of Christ,\rdblquote condemns. (3.) They agree in denying to men since the fall ability perfectly to keep the commandments of God, but attribute the ability and disposition to obey to the grace of God; or the supernatural influence of the Holy Spirit.\par They differ as to the mode in which this grace is communicated, in that the Romanists say that it is only through the sacraments, whereas Arminians say that sufficient grace is given to all men, which, if duly improved, secures such larger m)easures of grace as will enable the believer to become perfect. They differ also as to the nature of good works in so far as Romanists include under that category many things not commanded in the Scriptures; and\cf2\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 as they teach the possibility of performing works of supererogation, which the Arminians deny. The Romanists also teach that good works merit eternal life, which evangelical Arminians do not.\par These theories, however, all agree in teaching that the law of God has been* lowered in so far that its demands are satisfied by a less degree of obedience than was required of Adam, or of man in his normal state; and therefore in calling that perfection which in fact is not perfection, either in the sight of God or of an enlightened conscience. It is a contradiction to say that a man is perfect whose acts and shortcomings need expiation and the pardoning mercy of God.\par It may be safely assumed that no man living has ever seen a fellow-man whom, even in the imperfect light in which a man reveals himself to his fellows, he deems perfect. And no sound minded man can regard himself as perfect, unless he lowers the standard of judgment to suit his case. And here lies one of the special dangers of the whole system. If the law of God can be relaxed in its demands to suit the state of its subjects, then there is no limit to be assigned to its condescension. Thus perfectionism has sometimes, although not among the Methodists, lapsed into antinomianism.\par \pard\cf3\f2\fs23\par } JJ%u1.18.8. Theories of Perfectionism{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~8. \i Theories offcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red255\green192\blue128;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\stylesheet{ Normal;}{\s1 heading 1;}{\s2 heading 2;}{\s3 heading 3;}} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\s3\sb180\sa100\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\highlight1\lang1033\b\f0\fs48\par \par \par \highlight2 THE LAW\par \pard\cf3\highlight0\b0\f1\fs23\par } #g#x( u1.19.10. The Sixth Commandment{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\ansicpg1252\defy'}1.19.1. Preliminary Principles{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f3\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;.&y51.19.0. CHAPTER XIX THE LAW{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\,/}Arial Greek;}{\f4\froman\fprq2\fcharset177 Times New Roman;}{\f5\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~1. \i Preliminary Principles.\i0\par \cf1\b0\i The Personality of God involved 0in the Idea of Law; and, therefore, all Morality is founded on Religion.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The principal meanings of the word law are, (1.) An established order in the sequence of events. A law, in this sense, is a mere fact. That the planets are distant from the sun according to a determined proportion; that the leaves of a plant are arranged in a regular spiral aroun1d the stem; and that one idea by association suggests another, are simple facts. Yet they are properly called laws, in the sense of established orders of sequence or relation. So also what are called the laws of light, of sound, and of chemical affinity, are, for the most part, mere facts. (2.) A uniformly acting force which determines the regular sequence of events. In this sense the physical forces which we see in operation around us, are called the laws of nature. Gravitation, light, heat, electricity,2 and magnetism, are such forces. The fact that they act uniformly gives them the character of laws. Thus the Apostle speaks also of a law of sin in his members which wars against the law of the mind. (3.) Law is that which binds the conscience. It imposes the obligation of conformity to its demands upon all rational creatures. This is true of the moral law in its widest sense. It is also true of human laws within the sphere of their legitimate operation.\par In all these senses of the word, law implies a3 law-giver; that is, an intelligence acting voluntarily for the attainment of an end. The irregular, or unregulated action of physical forces produces chaos; their ordered action produces the cosmos. But ordered action is action pre\'ebstablished, sustained, and directed for the accomplishment of a purpose.\par This is still more obviously true with regard to moral laws. The slightest analysis of our feelings is sufficient to show that moral obligation is the obligation to conform our character and condu4ct to the will of an infinitely perfect Being, who has the\cf2\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 authority to make his will imperative, and who has the power and the right to punish disobedience. The sense of guilt especially resolves itself into a consciousness of being amenable to a moral governor. The moral law, therefore, is in its nature the revelation of the will of God so far as that will concerns the conduct of his creatures. It has no other authority and no other sanction than that which it derives from Him.5\par The same is true with regard to the laws of men. They have no power or authority unless they have a moral foundation. And if they have a moral basis, so that they bind the conscience, that basis must be the divine will. The authority of civil rulers, the rights of property, of marriage, and all other civil rights, do not rest on abstractions, nor on general principles of expediency. They might be disregarded without guilt, were they not sustained by the authority of God. All moral obligation, theref6ore, resolves itself into the obligation of conformity to the will of God. And all human rights are founded on the ordinance of God. So that theism is the basis of jurisprudence as well as of morality. This doctrine is taught by Stahl, perhaps the greatest living authority on the philosophy of law. \ldblquote Every philosophical science,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote must begin with the first principle of all things, that is, with the Absolute. It must, therefore, decide between Theism and Pantheism, bet7ween the doctrine that the first cause or principle is the personal, extramundane, self-revealing God, and the doctrine that the first principle is an impersonal power immanent in the world.\rdblquote It is not pantheism, but fetichism to make all things God. The real question is, Whether the Absolute has personality and self-consciousness or not? Stahl had previously said to the same effect, that every philosophy, and every religion, and especially the Christian, must proceed on a theory of the universe8 (a Weltanschauung). It is the Christian doctrine of God and of this relation to the world, that he makes the foundation of legal and political science (of Rechts- und Staatslehre). He therefore calls his system \ldblquote theological\rdblquote in so far as it makes the nature and will of God the foundation of all duties and the source of all rights.\par He recognizes, however, the distinction between morality and religion. \ldblquote Morality,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote is the perfection (\lang10319 Vollendung\lang1033 ) of man in himself (so far as the will is concerned); or the revelation\cf2\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 of the divine being in man. Man is the image of God, and therefore in his nature is like God, perfect or complete in himself; and conformity to the divine image is for him the goal and command. (\cf3\ul Mat_5:45\cf0\ulnone ). Religion, on the other hand, is the bond between man and God, or what binds men to God, so that we should know and will only in Hun, refer everything to Him, entire: consecration, the personal union with God. Thus, love of our neighbour, courage, spirituality (the opposite of sensuality), may be simply moral virtues; whereas faith and the love of God are purely religious. The courage of Napoleon\rquote s guard was a moral virtue (a state of the will); the courage of Luther was religious (a power derived from his relation to God).\rdblquote\par Religion and morality, although thus different, are not independent. They are but different phases of our relation to God. S;tahl, therefore, controverts the doctrine of Grotius, that there would be a \lang1142\i jus naturale\lang1033\i0 if there were no God; which is really equivalent to saying that there would be an obligation to goodness if there were no such thing as goodness. Moral excellence is of the very essence of God. He is concrete goodness; infinite reason, excellence, knowledge, and power in a personal form; so that there can be no obligation to virtue which does not involve obligation to God. Wolf carried out the< doctrine of Grotius to the length of saying that an Atheist, if consistent, would act just as the Christian acts. This principle of Grotius, says Stahl, contained the germ of separation from religion, which unfolded itself with Kant into an ignoring, and, with those who followed him, into the denial of God.\par \ldblquote The primary idea of goodness, is the essential, not the creative, will of God. The divine will in its essence is infinite love, mercy, patience, truth, faithfulness, rectitude, spiritu=ality, and all that is included in holiness, which constitutes the inmost nature of sod. The holiness of God, therefore, neither precedes his will \lquote\lang1142 sanctitas antecedens voluntatem\lang1033\rquote of the Schoolmen), nor follows it, but is his will itself. The good is not a law for the divine will (so that God wills it because it is good); neither is it a creation of his will (so that it becomes good because He wills it); but it is the nature (\lang1031 das Urwollen\lang1033 ) of God from e>verlasting to everlasting.\rdblquote Again it is said, \ldblquote Hence it follows that moral goodness is concrete, specific, absolute, original, as little determined by logical laws as by a relation to external ends. This is not the doctrine of modern ethics. According to the eudaimonistic view adopted by the English philosophers, by Thomasius, and others, the good is good because it tends to produce happiness. According to the rationalists, the good is conformity with the laws of thought (\lang1031 Den?krichtigkeit\lang1033 ). This was the real doctrine of Wolf, who made morality to consist in order (\lang1031 Regelm\'e4ssigkeit\lang1033 ); still more decidedly was it the doctrine of Kant, with whom the moral law is a consequence of the laws of thought. He says, expressly, that the idea of moral good must be derived from preceding law, that is, the law of reason.\rdblquote\par These two principles, then, are to be taken for granted; first, that moral good is good in its own nature, and not because of i@ts tendencies, or because of its conformity to the laws of reason and, second, that all law has its foundation in the nature and will of God. These principles are very comprehensive. They are of special importance in the exposition of the law in its aspect as the revealed will of God designed to regulate human character and conduct.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Protestant Principles limAiting Obedience to Human Laws.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 There is another principle regarded as fundamental by all Protestants, and that is, that the Bible contains the whole rule of duty for men in their present state of existence. Nothing can legitimately bind the conscience that is not commanded or forbidden by the Word of God. This principle is the safeguard of that libertBy wherewith Christ has made his people free. If it be renounced, we are at the mercy of the external Church, of the State, or of public opinion. This is simply the principle that it is right to obey God rather than man. Our obligation to render obedience to human enactments in any form, rests upon our obligation to obey God; and, therefore, whenever human laws are in conflict with the law of God we are bound to disobey them. When heathen emperors commanded Christians to worship idols, tne martyrs refused.C When popes and councils commanded Protestants to worship the Virgin Mary, and to acknowledge the supremacy of the bishop of Rome, the Protestant martyrs refused. When the Presbyterians of Scotland were required by their rulers in Church and State to submit themselves to the authority of prelatical bishops, they refused. When the Puritans of England were called upon to recognize the doctrine of \ldblquote passive obedience,\rdblquote they again refused. And it is to the stand thus taken\cf2\f1\fs16 3\cf0D\f0\fs24 by those martyrs and confessors that the world is indebted for all of the religious and civil liberty it now enjoys.\par Whether any enactment of the Church or State conflicts with the truth or law of God, is a question which every man must decide for himself. On him individually rests the responsibility, and therefore to him, as an individual, belongs the right of judgment.\par Although these principles, when stated in \lang1142\i in thesi\lang1033\i0 , are universally recognized among ProtestEants, they are nevertheless very frequently disregarded. This is true not only of the past when the Church and State both openly claimed the right to make laws to bind the conscience. It is true at the present time. Men still insist on the right of making that sin which God does not forbid; and that obligatory which God has not commanded. They proscribe rules of conduct and terms of church fellowship, which have no sanction in the Word of God. It is just as much a duty for the people of God to resist suchF usurpations, as it was for the early Christians to resist the authority of the Roman Emperors in matters of religion, or for the early Protestants to refuse to recognize the right of the Pope to determine for them what they were to believe, and what they were to do. The essence of infidelity consists in a man\rquote s putting his own convictions on matters of truth and duty above the Bible. This may be done by fanatics in the cause of benevolence, as well as by fanatics in any other cause. It is infideliGty in either case. And as such it should be denounced and resisted unless we are willing to renounce our allegiance to God, and make ourselves the servants of men.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Christian Liberty in Matters of Indifference.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx146H56\cf0 It is perfectly consistent with the principle above stated, that a thing may be right or wrong according to circumstances, and, therefore, it may often be wrong for a man to do what the Bible does not condemn. Paul himself circumcised Timothy; yet he told the Galatians that if they allowed themselves to be circumcised, Christ would profit them nothing. Eating meat offered in sacrifice to idols was a matter of indifference. Yet the Apostle said, \ldblquote If meat make my brother to offend, I will eIat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to offend.\rdblquote\par There are two important principles involved in these Scriptural facts. The first is, that a thing indifferent in itself may become even fatally wrong if done with a wrong intention. Circumcision was nothing, and uncircumcision was nothing. It mattered little\cf2\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 whether a man was circumcised or not. But if any one submitted to circumcision as an act of legal obedience, and as the necessary conditioJn of his justification before God, he thereby rejected the Gospel, or, as the Apostle expressed it, he fell from grace. He renounced the gratuitous method of justification, and Christ became of no effect to him. In like manner, eating meat which had been offered in sacrifice to an idol, was a matter of indifference. \ldblquote Meat,\rdblquote says Paul, \ldblquote commendeth us not to God: for neither, if we eat, are we the better; neither, if we eat not, are we the worse.\rdblquote Yet if a man ate sucKh meat as an act of reverence to the idol, or under circumstances which implied that it was an act of worship, he was guilty of idolatry. And, therefore, the Apostle taught that participation in feasts held within the precincts of an idol\rquote s temple, was idolatry.\par The other principle is that, no matter what our intention may be, we sin against Christ when we make such use of our liberty, in matters of indifference, as causes others to offend. In the first of these cases the sin was not in being Lcircumcised, but in making circumcision a condition of our justification. In the second case, the idolatry consisted not in eating meat offered in sacrifice to idols, but in eating it as an act of worship to the idol. And in the third case, the sin was not in asserting our liberty in matters of indifference, but in causing others to offend.\par The rules which the Scriptures clearly lay down on this subject are: (1.) That no man or body of men has the right to pronounce that to be sinful which God does nMot forbid. There was no sin in being circumcised, or in eating meat, or in keeping the sacred days of the Hebrews. (2.) That it is a violation of the law of love, and therefore a sin against Christ, to make such use of our liberty as to cause others to sin. \ldblquote Take heed,\rdblquote says the Apostle, \ldblquote lest by any means this liberty of yours become a stumbling block to them that are weak.\rdblquote \ldblquote When ye sin so against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, ye sin agaNinst Christ.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul 1Co_8:9-12\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote It is good (\i i.e\i0 ., morally obligatory) neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor any thing whereby thy brother stumbleth, or is offended, or is made weak.\rdblquote \ldblquote All things indeed are pure, but it is evil for that man who eateth with offence. (\cf3\ul Rom_14:21-20\cf0\ulnone .) (3). Nothing in itself indifferent can be made the ground of permanent and universal obligation. Because it was wrong in Galatia to submitO to circumcision, it does not follow that it was wrong in Paul to circumcise Timothy. Because it was wrong in Corinth to eat meat, it does not follow that it is wrong\cf2\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 always and everywhere. An obligation arising out of circumstances must vary with circumstances. (4.) When it is obligatory to abstain from the use of things indifferent, is a matter of private judgment. No man has the right to decide that question for other men. No bishop, priest, or church court has the right to dePcide it. Otherwise it would not be a matter of liberty. Paul constantly recognized the right (\cf4\f2\u7952?\f3\'ee\'ef\'f5\'f3\f2\u8055?\f3\'e1\cf0\f0 ) of Christians to judge in such cases for themselves. He does this not by implication only, but he also expressly asserts it, and condemns those who would call it in question. \ldblquote Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth: for God hath received him. Who art thou that judgest another Qman\rquote s servant? to his own master he standeth or falleth.\rdblquote \ldblquote One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.\rdblquote (\cf3\ul Rom_14:3-5\cf0\ulnone .) It is a common saying that every man has a pope in his own bosom. That is, the disposition to lord it over God\rquote s heritage is almost universal. Men wish to have their opinions on moral questions made into laws to bind the consciences of their bretRhren. This is just as much a usurpation of a divine prerogative when done by a private Christian or by a church court, as when done by the Bishop of Rome. We are as much bound to resist it in the one case as in the other. (5.) It is involved in what has been said that the use which a man makes of his Christian liberty can never be legitimately made the ground of church censure, or a term of Christian communion.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160S\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Scriptural Usage of the Word Law.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The Scriptures uniformly understand by law a manifestation of the will of God. All the operations of nature are ordered by laws of his appointment. And his will is represented as the ultimate foundation of moral obligation. In Hebrew it is called \lang1037\f4\rtlcTh\fs27\'fa\'cc\'e5\'c9\'f8\'c8\'e4\lang1033\f0\ltrch\fs24 , instruction, because it is, as the Apostle says, \ldblquote the form of knowledge and of the truth.\rdblquote It is the standard of right and wrong. In Greek it is called \cf4\f3\'ed\f2\u8057?\f3\'ec\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 , custom, and then, as custom or usage regulates the conduct of men, whatever has that authority does in fact control action, is called \cf4\f3\'ed\f2\u8057?\f3\'ec\'ef\'f2\cf0\f0 . In the New Testament it is constantly used in this wUide sense. It is sometimes applied to a rule of conduct however revealed; sometimes to the Scriptures as the supernaturally revealed will of God, as the rule of faith and practice; sometimes to the Pentateuch or Law of Moses; and sometimes specifically to the moral law. It\cf2\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 is here to be taken to mean that revelation of the will of God which is designed to bind the conscience and to regulate the conduct of men.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\txV6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i How the Law is revealed.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 This law is revealed in the constitution of our nature, and more fully and clearly in the written Word of God. That there is a binding revelation of the law, independently of any supernatural external revelation, is expressly taught in the Bible. PWaul says of the heathen that they are a law unto themselves. They have the law written on their hearts. This is proved, he tells us, because they do, \cf4\f3\'f6\f2\u8059?\f3\'f3\'e5\'e9\cf0\f0 , by nature, \i i.e\i0 ., in virtue of the constitution of their nature, the things of the law. The same moral acts which the written law prescribes, the conduct of the heathen shows that they know to be obligatory. Hence their conscience approves or disapproves, as they obey or disobey this inwardly revealed law. XWhat is thus taught in Scripture is confirmed by consciousness and experience. Every man is conscious of a knowledge of right and wrong, and of a sense of obligation, which are independent of all external revelation. He may be unable to determine whence that knowledge comes. He knows, however, that it has been in him coeval with the dawn of reason, and has enlarged and strengthened just as his reason unfolded. His consciousness tells him that the rule is within, and would be there though no positive or exYternal revelation of duty existed. In other words, we do not refer the sense of moral obligation to an externally revealed law, as its source, but to the constitution of our nature. This is not the experience of any class of men exclusively, but the common experience of the race. Wherever there are men, there is the sense of moral obligation, and a knowledge of right and wrong.\par It is frequently objected to this doctrine that men differ widely in their moral judgments. What men of one age or country rZegard as virtues, men of other ages or countries denounce as crimes. But this very diversity proves the existence of the moral sense. Men could not differ in judgments about beauty, if the \'e6sthetic element did not belong to their nature. Neither could they differ on questions of morality unless the sense of right and wrong were innate and universal. The diversity in question is not greater than in regard to rational truths. That men differ in their judgments as to what is true, is no proof that reason [is not a natural and essential element of their constitution. As there are certain truths of the reason which are intuitive and perceived\cf2\f1\fs16 7\cf0\f0\fs24 by all men, so there are moral truths so simple that they are universally recognized. As beyond these narrow limits there is diversity of knowledge, so there must be diversity of judgment. But this is not inconsistent with the Scriptural doctrine that even the most degraded heathen are a law unto themselves, and show the work of the law written\ on their hearts. As the revelation which God has made of his eternal power and Godhead in his works is true and trustworthy, and sufficient to render ignorance or denial of his existence inexcusable, while it does not supersede the necessity of a clearer revelation in his word; so there is an imperfect revelation of the law made in the very constitution of our nature, by which those who have no other revelation are to be judged, but which does not render unnecessary the clearer teachings of the Scripture]s.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Different Kinds of Laws.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 In looking into the Bible as containing a revelation of the will of God, the first thing which arrests attention is the great diversity of precepts therein contained. This dif^ference concerns the nature of the precepts, and the ground on which they rest, or the reason why they are obligatory.\par 1. There are laws which are founded on the nature of God. To this class belong the command to love God supremely, to be just, merciful, and kind. Love must everywhere and always be obligatory. Pride, envy, and malice must everywhere and always be evil. Such laws bind all rational creatures, angels as well as men. The criterion of these laws is that they are absolutely immutable and i_ndispensable. Any change in them would imply, not merely a change in the relations of men, but in the very nature of God.\par 2. A second class of laws includes those which are founded on the permanent relations of men in their present state of existence. Such are the moral, as opposed to mere statute laws, concerning property, marriage, and the duties of parents and children, or superiors and inferiors. Such laws concern men only in their present state of being. They are, however, permanent so long as t`he relations which they contemplate continue. Some of these laws bind men as men; others husbands as husbands, wives as wives, and parents and children as such, and consequently they bind all men who sustain these several relations. They are founded on the nature of things, as it is called; that is, upon the institution which God has seen fit to ordain. This constitution\cf2\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 might have been different, and then these laws would have had no place. The right of property need not have exaisted. God might have made all things as common as sun-light or air. Men might have been as angels, neither marrying nor giving in marriage. Under such a constitution there would be no room for a multitude of laws which are now of universal and necessary obligation.\par 3. A third class of laws have their foundation in certain temporary relations of men, or conditions of society, and are enforced by the authority of God. To this class belong many of the judicial or civil laws of the ancient theocracy; labws regulating the distribution of property, the duties of husbands and wives, the punishment of crimes, etc. These laws were the application of general principles of justice and right to the peculiar circumstances of the Hebrew people. Such enactments bind only those who are in the circumstances contemplated, and cease to be obligatory when those circumstances change. It is always and everywhere right that crime should be punished, but the kind or degree of punishment may vary with the varying condition ocf society. It is always right that the poor should be supported, but one mode of discharging that duty may be proper in one age and country, and another preferable in other times and places. All those laws, therefore, in the Old Testament, which had their foundation in the peculiar circumstances of the Hebrews, ceased to be binding when the old dispensation passed away.\par It is often difficult to determine to which of the last two classes certain laws of the Old Testament belong; and therefore, to decidde whether they are still obligatory or not. Deplorable evils have flowed from mistakes as to this point. The theories of the union of Church and State, of the right of the magistrate to interfere authoritatively in matters of religion, and of the duty of persecution, so far as Scriptural authority is concerned, rest on the transfer of laws founded on the temporary relations of the Hebrews to the altered relations of Christians. Because the Hebrew kings were the guardians of both tables of the Law, and weere required to suppress idolatry and all false religion, it was inferred that such is still the duty of the Christian magistrate. Because Samuel hewed Agag to pieces, it was inferred to be right to deal in like manner with heretics. No one can read the history of the Church without being impressed with the dreadful evils which have flowed from this mistake. On the other hand, there are some of the judicial laws of the Old Testament which were really\cf2\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 founded on the permanent relatfions of men, and therefore, were intended to be of perpetual obligation, which many have repudiated as peculiar to the old dispensation. Such are some of the laws relating to marriage, and to the infliction of capital punishment for the crime of murder. lf it be asked, How are we to determine whether any judicial law of the Old Testament is still in force? the answer is first, When the continued authority of such law is recognized in the New Testament. That for Christians is decisive. And secondly, If theg reason or ground for a given law is permanent, the law itself is permanent.\par 4. The fourth class of laws are those called positive, which derive all their authority from the explicit command of God. Such are external rites and ceremonies, as circumcision, sacrifices, and the distinction between clean and unclean meats, and between months, days, and years. The criterion of such laws is that they would not be binding unless positively enacted; and that they bind those only to whom they are given, and ohnly so long as they continue in force by the appointment of God. Such laws may have answered important ends, and valid reasons doubtless existed why they were imposed; still they are specifically different from those commands which are in their own nature morally obligatory. The obligation to obey such laws does not arise from their fitness for the end for which they have been given, but solely from the divine command.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx824i4\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i How far may the Laws contained in the Bible be dispensed with?\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 This is a question much discussed between Protestants and Romanists. Protestants contended that the Church had not the power claimed by Romanists, to relieve men from the obligation of an oath, and to render marriages lawful whjich without the sanction of the Church would be invalid. The Church has neither the authority to set aside any law of God, nor to decide the circumstances under which a divine law ceases to be obligatory, so that it continues in force until the Church declares the parties free frum its obligation. On this subject it is plain, (1.) That none but God can free men from the obligation of any divine law, which He has imposed upon them. (2.) That with regard to the positive laws of the Old Testament, and such jkudicial enactments as were designed exclusively for the Hebrews living under the theocracy, they were all abolished by the introduction of the new dispensation. We are no longer under obligation to circumcise our children, to keep the Passover, or feast of tabernacles or to go up \cf2\f1\fs16 270\cf0\f0\fs24 three times in the year to Jerusalem, or to exact an eye for an eye, or a tooth for a tooth. (3.) With regard to those laws which are founded on the permanent relations of men, such as the laws of prolperty, of marriage, and of obedience to parents, they can be set aside by the authority of God. It was not wrong for the Hebrews to spoil the Egyptians or to dispossess the Canaanites, because He whose is the earth and the fulness thereof, authorized those acts. He had a right to take the property of one people and give it to another. The extermination of the idolatrous inhabitants of the promised land at the command of Joshua, was as much an act of God as though it had been effected by pestilence or famimne. It was a judicial execution by the Supreme Ruler. In like manner, although marriage as instituted by God was and is an indissoluble covenant between one man and one woman, yet He saw fit to allow, under the Mosaic Law, within certain limitations, both polygamy and divorce. While that permission continued, those things were lawful; when it was withdrawn, they ceased to be allowable.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tnx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i When one Divine Law is superseded by another.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The above classification of the divine laws, which is the one usually adopted, shows that they differ in their relative dignity and importance. Hence when they come into conflict the lower must yield to the higher. This we are taught when God says, \ldblquote I will have mercy,o and not sacrifice.\rdblquote And our Lord also says, \ldblquote The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath,\rdblquote and, therefore, the Sabbath might be violated when the duties of mercy rendered it necessary. Throughout the Scriptures we find positive laws subordinated to those of moral obligation. Christ approved of the lawyer who said that to love God with all the heart, and our neighbour as ourselves, \ldblquote is more than all whole burnt-offerings and sacrifices.\rdblquote\par p\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Perfection of the Law.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The perfection of the moral law as revealed in the Scriptures, includes the points already considered, \emdash (1.) That everything that the Bible pronounces to be wrong, is wrong; thaqt everything which it declares to be right, is right. (2.) That nothing is sinful which the Bible does not condemn; and nothing is obligatory on the conscience which it does not enjoin. (3.) That the Scriptures are a complete rule of duty, not only in the sense just stated, but also in the sense that there is and can be no higher standard of\cf2\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 moral excellence. Romanists, on the contrary, teach that a man can do more than the law requires. There are certain things which are commandred, and therefore absolutely obligatory; and others which are recommended, but not enjoined, such as voluntary poverty, celibacy, and monastic obedience. These are held to be virtues of a higher grade than obedience to explicit commands. This doctrine is founded on the erroneous views of the Church of Rome on the nature of sin, and the grounds of moral obligation. If nothing is sinful but voluntary, \i i.e\i0 ., deliberate transgression of known law; and if the law is satisfied by voluntary action in thiss sense of the terms, then it is conceivable that a man may in this life render perfect obedience to the law, and even go beyond its demands. This is also connected with the distinction which Romanists make between mortal and venial sins. The former are those which forfeit baptismal grace, and reduce the soul to its original state of spiritual death and condemnation. The latter are sins which have not this deadly effect, but can be fully atoned for by confession and penance. But if the law of God be spirittual, extending to the thoughts and feelings whether impulsive or cherished; and if it demands all kinds and degrees of moral excellence, or complete congeniality with God, and conformity to his image, then there is no room for these distinctions, and no higher rule of moral conduct. The law of the Lord, therefore, is perfect in every sense of the word.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i The Duecalogue.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The question whether the decalogue is a perfect rule of duty is, in one sense, to be answered in the affirmative. (1.) Because it enjoins love to God and man, which, our Saviour teaches, includes every other duty. (2.) Because our Lord held it up as a perfect code, when he said to the young man in the Gospel, \ldblquote This do and thou shalvt live.\rdblquote (3.) Every specific command elsewhere recorded may be referred to some one of its several commands. So that perfect obedience to the decalogue in its spirit, would be perfect obedience to the law. Nevertheless, there are many things obligatory on us, which without a further revelation of the will of God than is contained in the decalogue, we never should have known to be obligatory. The great duty of men under the Gospel, is faith in Christ. This our Lord teaches when He says, \ldblquotwe This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath went.\rdblquote This comprehends or produces all that is required of us either as to faith or practice. Hence he that believeth shall be saved.\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf2\f1\fs16 272\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\txx14656\cf1\i Rules of Interpretation.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Theologians are accustomed to lay down numerous rules for the proper interpretation of the divine law, such as that negative precepts are to be understood as including positive, and positive, negative; that, in forbidding an act, everything which naturally leads to it is comprehended; that, in condemning one offence, all others of a like kind are forbidden, and the like. All such rules resolve themselves into one. The decalogue is not to be interpreted as the laws of men, which take cognizance only of external acts, but as the law of God, which extends to the thoughts and intents of the heart. In all cases it will be found that the several commandments contain some comprehensive principle of duty, under which a multitude of subordinate specific duties are included.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf5\highlight2\f5\fs23\par } zf0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~10.\i The Sixth Commandment.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx{3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\b0\i Its Design.\cf0\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 This commandment, as expounded by our Lord (\cf2\ul Mat_5:21-22\cf0\ulnone ), forbids malice in all its degrees and in all its manifestations. The Bible recognizes the distinction between anger and malice. The former is on due occasion a|llowable; the other is in its nature, and therefore always, evil. The one is a natural or constitutional emotion arising out of the experience or perception of wrong, and includes not only disapprobation but also indignation, and a desire in some way to redress or punish the wrong inflicted. The other includes hatred and the desire to inflict evil to gratify that evil passion. Our Lord is said to have been angry; but in Him there was no malice or resentment. He was the Lamb of God; when He was reviled, He} reviled not again; when He suffered, He threatened not; He prayed for his enemies even on the cross.\par In the several commandments of the decalogue, the highest manifestation of any evil is selected for prohibition, with the intention of including all lesser forms of the same evil. In forbidding murder, all degrees and manifestations of malicious feeling are forbidden. The Bible assigns special value to the life of man, first, because he was created in the image of God. He is not only like God in the ~essential elements of his nature, but he s also God\rquote s representative on earth. An indignity or injury inflicted on him, is an act of irreverence toward God. And secondly, all men are brethren. They are of one blood; children of a common father. On these grounds we are bound to love and respect all men as men; and to do all we can not only to protect\cf3\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 their lives but also to promote their well-being. Murder therefore, is the highest crime which a man can commit against a fellow-man.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Capital Punishment.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 As the sixth commandment forbids malicious homicide, it is plain that the infliction of capital punishment is not included in the prohibition. Such punishment is not inflicted to gratify revenge, but to satisfy justice and for the preservation of society. As these are legitimate and most important ends, it follows that the capital punishment of murder is also legitimate. Such punishment, in the case of murder, is not only lawful, but also obligatory.\par 1. Because it is expressly declared in the Bible, \ldblquote Whoso sheddeth man\rquote s blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Gen_9:6\cf0\ulnone .) That this is of perpetual obligation is clear, because it was given to Noah, the second head of the human race. It was, therefore, not intended for any particular age or nation. It is the announcement of a general principle of justice; a revelation of the will of God. Moreover the reason assigned for the law is a permanent reason. Man was created in the image of God; and, therefore, whoso sheds his blood, by man shall his blood be shed. This reason has as much force at one time or place as at any other. Rosenm\'fcller\rquote s comment on this clause is, \ldblquote\lang1142 Cum homo ad Dei imaginem sit factus, \'e6quum est, ut, qui Dei imaginem violavit et destruxit, occidatur, cum Dei imagini injuriam faciens, ipsum Deum, illius auctorem, petierit.\lang1033\rdblquote This is a very solemn consideration, and one of wide application. It applies not only to murder and other injuries infficted on the persons of men, but also to anything which tends to degrade or to defile them. The Apostle applies it even to evil words, or the suggestion of corrupt thoughts. If it is an outrage to defile the statue or portrait of a great and good man, or of a father or mother, how much greater is the outrage when we defile the imperishable image of God impressed on the immortal soul of man. We find the injunction, that the murderer should surely be put to death, repeated over and over in the Mosaic law. (\cf2\ul Exo_21:12-14\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Lev_24:17\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Num_35:21\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Deu_19:11-13\cf0\ulnone .)\par There are clear recognitions in the New Testament of the continued obligation of the divine law that murder should be punished with death. In \cf2\ul Rom_13:4\cf0\ulnone , the Apostle says that the\cf3\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 magistrate \ldblquote beareth not the sword in vain.\rdblquote The sword was worn as the symbol of the power of capital punishment. Even by profane writers, says Meyer, \ldblquote bearing the sword\rdblquote by a magistrate was the emblem of the power over life and death. The same Apostle said (\cf2\ul Act_25:11\cf0\ulnone ): \ldblquote If I be an offender, or have committed anything worthy of death, I refuse not to die;\rdblquote which clearly implies that, in his judgment, there were offenses, for which the appropriate penalty is death.\par 2. Besides these arguments from Scripture, there are others drawn from natural justice. It is a dictate of our moral nature that crime should be punished; that there should be a just proportion between the offence and the penalty; and that death, the highest penalty, was the proper punishment for the greatest of all crimes. That such is the instinctive judgment of men is proved by the difficulty often experienced in restraining the people from taking summary vengeance in cases of atrocious murder. So strong is this sentiment that a species of wild justice is sure to step in to supply the place of judicial remissness. Such justice, from being lawless and impulsive, is too often misguided and erroneous, and, in a settled state of society, is always criminal. It being the nature of men, that if the regular, lawful infliction of death as a judicial penalty be abolished, it will be inflicted by the avenger of blood, or by tumultuous assemblies of the people, society has to choose between securing to the homicide a fair trial by the constituted authorities, and giving him up to the blind spirit of revenge.\par 3. Experience teaches that where human life is undervalued, it is insecure; that where the murderer escapes with impunity or is inadequately punished, homicides are fearfully multiplied. The practical question, therefore, is, Who is to die? the innocent man or the murderer?\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Homicide in Self-Defence.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 That homicide in self-defence is not forbidden by the sixth commandment, is plain, (1.) Because such homicide is not malicious, and, therefore, does not come within the scope of the prohibition. (2.) Because sell-preservation is an instinct of our nature, and therefore, a revelation of the will of God. (3.) Because it is a dictate of reason and of natural justice that if of two persons we must die, it should be the aggressor and not the aggrieved. (4.) Because the universal judgment of men, and the Word of God, pronounce the man innocent who kills another in defence of his own life or that of his neighbor.\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\f1\fs16 365\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i War.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 It is conceded that war is one of the most dreadful evils that can be inflicted on a people; that it involves the destruction of property and life; that it demoralizes both the victors and the vanquished; that it visits thousands of non-combatants with all the miseries of poverty, widowhood, and orphanage; and that it tends to arrest the progress of society in everything that is good and desirable. God overrules wars in many cases, as He does the tornado and the earthquake, to the accomplishment of his benevolent purposes, but this does not prove that war in itself is not a great evil. He makes the wrath of man to praise Him. It is conceded that wars undertaken to gratify the ambition, cupidity, or resentment of rulers or people, are unchristian and wicked. It is also conceded that the vast majority of the wars which have desolated the world have been unjustifiable in the sight of God and man. Nevertheless it does not follow from this that war in all cases is to be condemned.\par 1. This is proved because the right of self-defence belongs to nations as well as to individuals. Nations are bound to protect the lives and property of their citizens. If these are assailed by force, force may be rightfully used in their protection. Nations also have the right to defend their own existence. If that be endangered by the conduct of other nations, they have the natural right of self-protection. A war may be defensive and yet in one sense aggressive. In other words, self-defence may dictate and render necessary the first assault. A man is not bound to wait until a murderer actually strikes his blow. It is enough that he sees undeniable manifestations of a hostile purpose. So a nation is not bound to wait until its territories are actually invaded and its citizens murdered, before it appeals to arms. It is enough that there is clear evidence on the part of another nation of an intention to commence hostilities. While it is easy to lay down the principle that war is justifiable only as a means of self-defence, the practical application of this principle is beset with difficulties. The least aggression on national property, or the slightest infringement of national rights, may be regarded as the first step toward national extinction, and therefore justify the most extreme measures of redress. A nation may think that a certain enlargement of territory is necessary to its security, and, therefore, that it has the right to go to war to secure it. So a man may say that a portion of his neighbour\rquote s farm is necessary to the full enjoyment of his own property, and therefore that he has the right to appropriate it to himself. It is to be remembered that nations are as much bound by the moral law as individual men; and therefore that what a man may not do in the protection of his own rights, and on the plea of self-defence, a nation may not do. A nation therefore is bound to exercise great forbearance, and to adopt every other available means of redressing wrongs, before it plunges itself and others into all the demoralizing miseries of war.\par 2. The lawfulness of defensive war, however, does not rest exclusively on these general principles of justice; it is distinctly recognized in Scripture. In numerous cases, under the Old Testament, such wars were commanded. God endowed men with special qualifications as warriors. He answered when consulted through the Urim and Thummim, or by the prophets, as to the propriety of military enterprises (\cf2\ul Jdg_20:27\cf0\ulnone f., \cf2\ul 1Sa_14:37\cf0\ulnone , \cf2\ul 1Sa_23:2-4\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul 1Ki_22:6\cf0\ulnone ff.); and He often interfered miraculously in behalf of his people when they were engaged in battle. Many of the Psalms of David, dictated by the Spirit, are either prayers for divine assistance in war or thanksgivings for victory. It is very plain, therefore, that the God whom the patriarchs and prophets worshipped did not condemn war, when the choice was between war and annihilation. It is a very clear case that if the Israelites had not been allowed to defend themselves against their heathen neighbours they would have soon been extirpated, and their religion would have perished with them.\par As the essential principles of morals do not change, what was permitted or commanded under one dispensation, cannot be unlawful under another, unless forbidden by a new revelation. The New Testament, however, contains no such revelation. It does not say, as in the case of divorce, that war was permitted to the Hebrews because of the hardness of their hearts, but that under the Gospel a new law was to prevail. This very silence of the New Testament leaves the Old Testament rule of duty on this subject still in force. Accordingly, although there is no express declaration on the subject, as none was needed, we find the lawfulness of war quietly assumed. When the soldiers inquired of John the Baptist what they should do to prepare for the kingdom of God, he did not tell them that they must forsake the profession of arms. The centurion, whose faith our Lord so highly commended (\cf2\ul Mat_8:5-13\cf0\ulnone ), was not censured for being a soldier. So also the centurion, a devout man, whom God in a vision commanded to send for Peter, and on whom, and his associates, according to the record in the tenth chapter of Acts, the Holy Ghost came with miraculous gifts, was allowed to remain in the army of even a heathen emperor. If magistrates, as we learn from the thirteenth chapter of Romans, are armed with a right or power of life and death over their own citizens, they certainly have the right to declare war in self-defence.\par In the early ages of the Church there was a great disinclination to engage in military service, and the fathers at times justified this reluctance by calling the lawfulness of all wars into question. But the real sources of this opposition of Christians to entering the army, were that they thereby gave themselves up to the service of a power which persecuted their religion; and that idolatrous usages were inseparably connected with military duties. When the Roman empire became Christian, and the cross was substituted for the eagle on the standards of the army, this opposition died away, till at length we hear of fighting prelates, and of military orders of monks.\par No historical Christian Church has pronounced all war to be unlawful. The Augsburg Confession expressly says that it is proper for Christians to act as magistrates, and among other things \ldblquote\lang1142 jure bellare, militare\lang1033 ,\rdblquote etc. And Presbyterians especially have shown that it is not against their consciences to contend to the death for their rights and liberties.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Suicide.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 It is conceivable that men who do not believe in God or in a future state of existence, should think it allowable to take refuge in annihilation from the miseries of this life. But it is unaccountable, except on the assumption of temporary or permanent insanity, that any man should rush uncalled into the retributions of eternity. Suicide, therefore, is most frequent among those who have lost all faith in religion. It is a very complicated crime; our life is not our own; we have no more right to destroy our life than we have to destroy the life of a fellow-man. Suicide is, therefore, self murder. It is the desertion of the post which God has assigned us; it is a deliberate refusal to submit to his will; it is a crime which admits of no repentance, and consequently involves the loss of the soul.\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\f1\fs16 368\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Duelling.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Duelling is another violation of the sixth commandment. Its advocates defend it on the same principle on which international war is defended. As independent nations have no common tribunal to which they can resort for the redress of injuries, they are justifiable, on the principle of self-defence, in appealing to arms for the protection of their rights. In like manner, it is said, there are offences for which the law of the land affords no redress, and therefore, the individual must be allowed to seek redress for himself. But (1.) There is no evil for which the law does not, or should not, afford redress. (2.) The redress sought in the duel is unjustifiable. No one has the right to kill a man for a slight or an insult. Taking a man\rquote s life for a hasty word, or even for a serious injury, is murder in the sight of God, who has ordained the penalty of death as the punishment for only the most atrocious crimes. (3.) The remedy is preposterous; for most frequently it is the aggrieved party who loses his life. (4.) Duelling is the cause of the greatest suffering to innocent parties, which no man has a right to inflict to gratify his pride or resentment. (5.) The survivor in a fatal duel entails on himself, unless his heart and conscience be seared, a life of misery.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf4\f2\fs23\par } }Times New Roman Greek;}{\f4\froman\fcharset0 Gentium;}{\f5\froman\fprq2\fcharset163 Times New Roman;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red0\green128\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red153\green51\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~11.\i The Seventh Commandment.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 This commandment, as we learn from our Lord\rquote s exposition of it, given in his sermon on the mount, forbids all impurity in thought, speech, and behaviour. As the social organization of society is founded on the distinction of the sexes, and as the well-being of the state and the purity and prosperity of the Church rest on the sanctity of the family relation, it is of the last importance that the normal, or divinely constituted relation of the sexes be preserved in its integrity.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Celibacy.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Among the important questions to be considered under the head of this commandment, the first is, Whether the Bible teaches that there is any special virtue in a life of celibacy? This is really a question, whether there was an error in the creation of man.\par 1. The very fact that God created man, male and female, declaring that it was not good for either to be alone, and constituted marriage in paradise, should be decisive on this subject. The doctrine which degrades marriage by making it a less holy state, has its foundation in Manicheeism or Gnosticism. It assumes that evil is essentially connected with matter; that sin has its seat and source in the body; that holiness is attainable only through asceticism and \ldblquote neglecting of the body;\rdblquote that because the \ldblquote\lang1142 vita angelica\lang1033\rdblquote is a higher form of life than that of men here on earth, therefore marriage is a degradation. The doctrine of the Romish Church on this subject, therefore, is thoroughly anti-Christian. It rests on principles derived from the philosophy of the heathen. It presupposes that God is not the author of matter; and that He did not make man pure, when He invested him with a body.\par 2. Throughout the Old Testament Scriptures marriage is represented as the normal state of man. The command to our first parents before the fall was, \ldblquote Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.\rdblquote Without marriage the purpose of God in regard to our world could not be carried out; it is, therefore, contradictory to the Scriptures to assume that marriage is less holy, or less acceptable to God than celibacy. To be unmarried, was regarded under the old dispensation as a calamity and a disgrace. (\cf2\ul Jdg_11:37\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Psa_78:63\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Isa_4:1\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Isa_8:12\cf0\ulnone .) The highest earthly destiny of a woman, according to the Old Testament Scriptures, which are the word of God, was not to be a nun, but to be the mistress of a family, and a mother of children. (\cf2\ul Gen_30:1\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Psa_113:9\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Psa_127:3\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Psa_128:3-4\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Pro_18:22\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Pro_31:10-28\cf0\ulnone .)\par 3. The same high estimate of marriage, characterizes the teachings of the New Testament. Marriage is declared to be \ldblquote honourable in all.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Heb_13:4\cf0\ulnone .) Paul says, \rdblquote Let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul 1Co_7:2\cf0\ulnone .) In \cf2\ul 1Ti_5:14\cf0\ulnone , he says: \ldblquote I will, that the younger women marry.\rdblquote  In \cf2\ul 1Ti_4:3\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote forbidding to marry\rdblquote is included among the doctrines of devils. As the truth comes from the Holy Spirit, so false doctrines, according to the Apostle\rquote s mode of thinking, come from Satan, and his agents, the demons; they are \ldblquote the seducing spirits\rdblquote spoken of in the same verse. Our Lord more than once (\cf2\ul Mat_19:5\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Mar_10:7\cf0\ulnone ) \cf3\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 quotes and enforces the original law given in \cf2\ul Gen_2:24\cf0\ulnone , that man shall \ldblquote leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh.\rdblquote The same passage is quoted by the Apostle as containing a great and symbolical truth. (\cf2\ul Eph_5:31\cf0\ulnone .) It is thus taught that the marriage relation is the most intimate and sacred that can exist on earth, to which all other human relations must be sacrificed. We accordingly find that from the beginning, with rare exceptions, patriarchs, prophets, apostles, confessors, and martyrs, have been married men. If marriage was not a degradation to them, surely it cannot be to monks and priests.\par The strongest proof of the sanctity of the marriage relation in the sight of God, is to be found in the fact that both in the Old and in the New Testaments, it is made the symbol of the relation between God and his people. \ldblquote Thy Maker is thy husband,\rdblquote are the words of God, and contain a world of truth, of grace, and of love. The departure of the people from God, is illustrated by a reference to a wife forsaking her husband; while God\rquote s forbearance, tenderness, and love, area compared to those of a faithful husband to his wife. \ldblquote As the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Isa_62:5\cf0\ulnone .) In the New Testament, this reference to the marriage relation, to illustrate the union between Christ and the Church, is frequent and instructive. The Church is called \ldblquote the Bride, the Lamb\rquote s wife.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rev_21:9\cf0\ulnone .) And the consummation of the work of salvation is set forth as the marriage, or the marriage-supper of the Lamb. (\cf2\ul Rev_19:7-9\cf0\ulnone .) In \cf2\ul Eph_5:22-33\cf0\ulnone , the union between husbands and wives, and the duties thence resulting, are set forth as so analogous to the union between Christ and his Church, that in some cases it is hard to determine to which union the language of the Apostle is to be applied. It is a matter of astonishment, in view of all these facts, that marriage has so extensively and persistently been regarded as something degrading, and celibacy or perpetual virginity as a special and peculiar virtue. No more striking evidence of the influence of a false philosophy in perverting the minds of even good men, is afforded in the whole history of the Church. Even the Reformers did not escape altogether from its influence. They often speak of marriage as the less of two evils; not as in itself a good; and not as the normal and appropriate state in which men and women should live, as designed\cf3\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 by God in the very constitution of their nature, and as the best adapted to the exercise and development of all social and Christian virtues. Thus Calvin says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Unde constat et aliam quamlibet, extra conjugium, societatem coram ipso [Deo] maledictam esse; et illam ipsam conjugalem in necessitatis remedium esse ordinatam, ne in effrenem libidinem proruamus.\~.Jam quum per natur\'e6 conditionem et accensa post lapsum libidine, mulieris consortio bis obnoxii simus, nisi quos singulari gratia Deus inde exemit; videant singuli quid sibi datum sit. Virginitas, fateor, virtus est non contemnenda: sed quoniam aliis negata est, allis nonnisi ad tempus concessa, qui ab incontinentia vexantur, et superiores in certamine esse nequeunt ad matrimonii subsidium se conferant, ut ita in su\'e6 vocationis gradu castitatem colant.\lang1033\rdblquote That is, virginity is a virtue. Celibacy is a higher state than marriage. Those who cannot live in that state, should descend to the lower platform of married life. With such dregs of Manichean philosophy was the pure truth of the Bible contaminated, even as held by the most illustrious Reformers.\par 4. The teaching of Scripture as to the sanctity of marriage is confirmed by the experience of the world. It is only in the marriage state that some of the purest, most disinterested, and most elevated principles of our nature are called into exercise. All that concerns filial piety, and parental and especially maternal affection, depends on marriage for its very existence. Yet on the purifying and restraining influence of these affections the well-being of human society is in a large measure dependent. It is in the bosom of the family that there is a constant call for acts of kindness, of sell-denial, of forbearance, and of love. The family, therefore, is the sphere the best adapted for the development of all the social virtues; and it may be safely said that there is far more of moral excellence and of true religion to be found in Christian households, than in the desolate homes of priests, or in the gloomy cells of monks and nuns. A man with his children or grandchildren on his knees, is an object of higher reverence than any emaciated anchorite in his cave.\par 5. Our Lord teaches that a tree is known by its fruits. There has been no more prolific source of evil to the Church than the unscriptural notion of the special virtue of virginity and the enforced celibacy of the clergy and monastic vows, to which that action has given rise. This is the teaching of history. On this point the testimony of Romanists as well as of Protestants is decisive\cf3\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 and overwhelming. It may be admitted that the Catholic clergy in this and in some other countries are as decorous in their lives, as the clergy of other denominations, without invalidating the testimony of history as to the evils of vows of celibacy.\par Protestants, while asserting the sanctity of marriage and denying the superior virtue of a life of celibacy, do not deny that there are times and circumstances in which celibacy is a virtue: \i i.e\i0 ., that a man may perform a virtuous act in resolving never to marry. The Church often has work to do, for which single men are the only proper agents. The cares of a family, in other words, would unfit a man for the execution of the task assigned. This, however, does not suppose that celibacy is in itself a virtue. It may also happen that a rich man may be called upon to undertake a work which would necessitate his disencumbering himself of the care of his estate, and subjecting himself to a life of poverty. The same is true of the state. In fact military service, for the great majority of the rank and file of an army, is an estate of forced celibacy so long as the service continues. And even with regard to the officers, the liberty to marry is very much restricted in the standing armies of Europe. There are times when marriage is inexpedient. Our Lord in foretelling the destruction of Jerusalem said, \ldblquote Woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days.\rdblquote It is the part of wisdom to escape such woes. When Christians had no security for life or home; when they were liable to be torn away from their families, or to have all means of providing for their wants taken out of their hands, it was better for them not to marry. It is in reference to such times and circumstances that the words of Christ, in the nineteenth chapter of Matthew, were uttered, and the advice of the Apostle, in the seventh chapter of First Corinthians was given. The Pharisees asked our Lord whether a man could put away his wife at pleasure. He referred them to the original institution of marriage, as showing that it was intended to be an indissoluble connection. His disciples said, In that case it is better that a man should not marry. Our Lord replied: Whether it is better for a man to marry or not, is not a question for every man to decide for himself. \ldblquote That the unmarried state is better, is a saying not for every one, and indeed only for such as it is divinely intended for.\rdblquote That is, those to whom the requisite\cf3\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 grace is given, \ldblquote\lang1142 Omnes hujus dicti capaces esse negans, significat electionem non esse positam in manu nostra, acsi de re nobis subjecta esset consultatio. Si quis utile sibi esse putat uxore carere, atque ita nullo examine habito, c\'9clibatus legem sibi edicit, longe fallitur. Deus enim, qui pronuntiavit bonum esse, ut viro adjutrix sit mulier, contempti sui ordinis p\'9cnam exiget: quia nimium sibi arrogant mortales, dum se a c\'9clesti vocatione eximere tentant. Porro non esse omnibus liberum, eligere utrum libuerit, inde probat Christus, quia speciale sit continenti\'e6 donum: nam quum dicit, non omnes esse capaces, sed quibus datum est, clare demonstrat non omnibus esse datum.\lang1033\rdblquote Those to whom it is given to lead an unmarried life, as our Lord teaches (\cf2\ul Mat_19:10\cf0\ulnone ), are not only those who by their natural constitution are unfit for the marriage state, but those whom God calls to special service in his Church and whom He fits for that work.\par The doctrine which Paul teaches on this subject is perfectly coincident with the teachings of our Lord. He recognizes marriage as a divine institution; as in itself good; as the normal and proper state in which men and women should live; but as it is necessarily attended by many cares and distractions, it was expedient in times of trouble, to remain unmarried. This is the purport of Paul\rquote s teachings in First \cf2\ul 1Co_2:1\cf0\ulnone . No one of the sacred writers, whether in the Old or in the New Testament, so exalts and glorifies marriage as does this Apostle in his Epistle to the Ephesians. He, therefore, is not the man, guided as he was in all his teachings by the Spirit of God, to depreciate or undervalue it, as only the less of two evils. It is a positive good: the union of two human persons to supplement and complement the one the other in a way which is necessary to the perfection or full development of both. The wife is to her husband what the Church is to Christ. Nothing higher than this can possibly be said.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\f1\fs16 374\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i History.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 No one can read the Epistles of Paul, especially those to the Ephesians and Colossians, without seeing clear indications of the prevalence, even in the apostolic churches, of the principles of that philosophy which held that matter was contaminating; and which inculcated asceticism as the most efficacious means of the purification of the soul. This doctrine had already been adopted and reduced to practice by the Essenes among the Jews. Farther East, under a somewhat different form, it had prevailed for ages before the Christian era, and still maintains its ground. According to the Brahminical philosophy the individuality of man depends on the body. Complete emancipation from the body, therefore, secures the merging of the finite into the infinite. The drop is lost in the ocean, and this is the highest and ultimate destiny of man. It is not therefore to be wondered at, that the early fathers came more or less under the influence of these principles, or that asceticism gained so rapidly and maintained so long its ascendancy in the Church. The depreciation of the divine institution of marriage, and the exaltation of virginity into the first place among Christian virtues, was the natural and necessary consequence of this spirit. Ignatius called voluntary virgins \ldblquote the jewels of Christ.\rdblquote Justin Martyr desired celibacy to prevail to the \ldblquote greatest possible extent.\rdblquote Tatian regarded marriage as inconsistent with spiritual worship. Origen \ldblquote disabled himself in his youth\rdblquote and regarded marriage as a pollution. Hieracas made \ldblquote virginity a condition of salvation.\rdblquote Tertullian denounced second marriage as criminal, and represented celibacy as the ideal of Christian life, not only for the clergy, but also for the laity. Second marriage was early prohibited so far as the clergy were concerned, and soon came in their case the prohibition of marriage altogether. The Apostolical Constitutions prohibited priests from contracting marriage after consecration. The Council of Ancyra, \scaps A.D.\scaps0 314, allowed deacons to marry, provided they stipulated for the privilege before ordination. The Council of Elvira, \scaps A.D.\scaps0 305, forbade the continuance of the marriage relation (according to the common interpretation of its canons) to bishops, presbyters, and deacons on pain of deposition. Jerome was fanatical in his denunciation of marriage; and even Augustine was carried away by the spirit of the age. In answer to the objection that if men acted on his principles the world would be depopulated, he answered So much the better, for in that case Christ would come the sooner. Siricius, Bishop of Rome \scaps A.D.\scaps0 385, decided that marriage was inconsistent with the clerical office; and was followed in this view by his successors. Great opposition, however, was experienced in enforcing celibacy, and it required all the energy of Gregory VII. to have the decisions of councils carried into effect. Ultimately, however, the rule, so far as the clergy are concerned, was acquiesced in, and received the authoritative sanction of the Council of Trent. That Council decided, \ldblquote\lang1142 Si quis dixerit, statum conjugalem anteponendum esse statui virginitatis, vel c\'9clibatus, et non esse melius, et beatius manere in virginitate aut c\'9clibatu, quam jungi matrimonio: anathema sit.\lang1033\rdblquote On this assumed higher virtue of celibacy, in the preceding canon it was ordered: \ldblquote\lang1142 Si quis dixerit, clericos in sacris ordinibus constitutos, vel regulares, castitatem solemniter professos, posse matrimonium contrahere, contractumque validum esse, non obstante lege ecclesiastica, vel voto: et oppositum nil aliud esse, quam damnare matrimonium; posseque omnes contrahere matrimonium, qui non sentiunt se castitatis, etiam si eam voterint, habere donum; anathema sit; cum Deus id recte petentibus non deneget, nec patiatur nos supra id, quod possumus, tentari.\lang1033\rdblquote\par Although the doctrine that virginity, as the Roman Catechism expresses it, \ldblquote\lang1142 summopere commendatur\lang1033 ,\rdblquote as being better, and more perfect and holy than a state of marriage, is made the ostensible ground of the enforced celibacy of the clergy, it is manifest that hierarchical reasons had much to do in making the Romish Church so strenuous in insisting that its clergy should be unmarried. This Gregory VII. avows when he says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Non liberari potest ecclesia a servitute laicorum, nisi liberentur clerici ab uxoribus.\lang1033\rdblquote And Melancthon felt authorized to say in reference to the celibacy of the clergy in the Church of Rome, \ldblquote\lang1142 Una est vera et sola causa tuendi c\'9clibatus, ut opes commodius administrentur et splendor ordinis retineatur.\lang1033\rdblquote\par As the Reformation was a return to the Scriptures as the only infallible rule of faith and practice; and as in the Scriptures marriage is exalted as a holy state, and no preeminence in excellence is assigned to celibacy or virginity; and as the Reformers denied the authority of the Church to make laws to bind the conscience or to curtail the liberty with which Christ had made his people\cf3\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 free, Protestants pronounced with one voice against the obligation of monastic vows and of the celibacy of the clergy.\par The Greek Church petrified at an early date. It assumed the form which it still retains, before the doctrine of the special sanctity of celibacy had gained ascendancy. It abides therefore by the decisions of the Council of Chalcedon, \scaps A.D.\scaps0 451, and of Trullo, \scaps A.D.\scaps0 692, which permitted marriage to priests and deacons. Those Greeks who are in communion with the Church of Rome enjoy the same liberty. Benedict XIV. declared in reference to them, \ldblquote\lang1142 Etsi expetendum quam maxime esset, ut Gr\'e6ci, qui sunt in sacris ordinibus constituti, castitatem non secus ac Latini servarent. Nihilominus, ut eorum clerici, subdiaconi, diaconi et presbyteri uxores in eorum ministerio retineant, dummodo ante sacros ordines, virgines, non viduas, neque corruptas duxerint, Romana non prohibet Ecclesia. Eos autem, qui viduam vel corruptam duxerunt, vel ad secunda vota, prima uxore mortua, convolarunt, ad subdiaconatum, diaconatum et presbyteratum promoveri omnino prohibemus.\lang1033\rdblquote In the Russian Church the priests are required to be married men; but second marriages are forthem prohibited. The bishops are chosen from the monks and must be unmarried.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Marriage a Divine Institution.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Marriage is a divine institution. (1.) Because founded on the nature of man as constituted by God. He made man male and female, and ordained marriage as the indispensable condition of the continuance of the race. (2.) Marriage was instituted before the existence of civil society, and therefore cannot in its essential nature be a civil institution. As Adam and Eve were man led not in virtue of any civil law, or by the intervention of a civil magistrate, so any man and woman cast together on a desert island, could lawfully take each other as husband and wife, It is a degradation of the institution to make it a mere civil contract. (3.) God commanded men to marry, when He commanded them to increase, and multiply and replenish the earth. (4.) God in his word has prescribed the duties belonging to the marriage relation; He has made known his will as to the parties who may lawfully be united in marriage; He has determined the continuance of the relation; and the causes which alone justify its dissolution. These matters are not subject to the will of the parties, or to the authority of the State. (5.) The vow of mutual fidelity made by husband and wife, is not made exclusively by each one to the other, but by each to God. When a man connects himself with a Christian Church he enters into covenant with his brethren in the Lord; mutual obligations are assumed; but nevertheless the covenant is made with God. He joins the Church in obedience to the will of God; he promises to regulate his faith and practice by the divine word; and the vow of fidelity is made to God. It is the same in marriage. It is a voluntary, mutual compact between husband and wife. They promise to be faithful to each other; but nevertheless they act in obedience to God, and promise to Him that they will live together as man and wife, according to his word. Any violation of the compact is, therefore, a violation of a vow made to God.\par Marriage is not a sacrament in the sense in which baptism and the Lord\rquote s Supper are sacraments, nor in the sense of the Romish Church; but it is none the less a sacred institution. Its solemnization is an office of religion. It should, therefore, be entered upon with due solemnity and in the fear of God; and should be celebrated, \i i.e\i0 ., the ceremony should be performed by a minister of Christ. He alone is authorized to see to it that the law of God is adhered to; and he alone can receive and register the marriage vows as made to God. The civil magistrate can only witness it as a civil contract, and it is consequently to ignore its religious character and sanction to have it celebrated by a civil officer. As the essence of the marriage contract is the mutual compact of the parties in the sight of God and in the presence of witnesses, it is not absolutely necessary that it should be celebrated by a minister of religion or even by a civil magistrate. It may be lawfully solemnized, as among the Quakers, without the intervention of either. Nevertheless as it is of the greatest importance that the religious nature of the institution should be kept in view, it is incumbent on Christians, so far as they themselves are concerned, to insist that it should be solemnized as a religious service.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Marriage as a Civil Institution.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 As a man\rquote s being a servant of God and bound to make his word the rule of his faith and practice, is not inconsistent with his\cf3\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 being a servant of the state, and bound to render obedience to its laws; so it is not inconsistent with the fact that marriage is an ordinance of God, that it should be, in another aspect, a civil institution. It is so implicated in the social and civil relations of men that it of necessity comes under the cognizance of the state. It is therefore a civil institution. (1.) In so far as it is, and must be, recognized and enforced by the state. (2.) It imposes civil obligations which the state has the right to enforce. The husband is bound to sustain his wife, for example, and he is constrained by the civil law to the performance of this duty. (3.) Marriage also involves, on both sides, rights to property; and the claims of children born in wedlock to the property of their parents. All these questions concerning property fall legitimately under the control of the civil law. In many countries not only property, but rank, title, and political prerogatives are implicated with the question of marriage. (4.) It belongs to the state, therefore, as the guardian of these rights, to determine what marriages are lawful and what unlawful; how the contract is to be solemnized and authenticated; and what shall be its legal consequences. All these laws Christians are bound to obey, so far as obedience to them is consistent with a good conscience.\par The legitimate power of the state in all these matters is limited by the revealed will of God. It can make nothing an impediment to marriage which the Scriptures do not declare to be a bar to that union. It can make nothing a ground of dissolving the marriage contract which the Bible does not make a valid ground of divorce. And the state can attach none other than civil pains and penalty to the violation of its laws concerning marriage. This is only saying that a Christian government is bound to respect the conscientious convictions of the people. It is a violation of the principles of civil and religious liberty for the state to make its will paramount to the will of God. Plain as this principle seems to be, it is nevertheless constantly disregarded in almost all Christian nations, whether Catholic or Protestant. In England, for example, it is still the law, that no member of the royal family can marry without the consent of the reigning sovereign. If this meant nothing more than that any member of the royal family thus marrying, should forfeit for himself and his children all right of succession to the crown, it might be all right. But the real meaning is that such a marriage is null and void that parties otherwise lawfully married and whom God has joined together as man and wife, are not man and wife. This is to\cf3\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 bring the law of man and the law of God into direct collision, and make the human supersede the divine. In Prussia a subordinate officer of the army cannot marry without the consent of his commander. If he should marry without that consent, it might be right to make him throw up his commission; but to say that his wife is not a wife, is not only untrue, but it is a monstrous injustice and cruelty. In England, until of late years, no marriage was valid unless solemnized in church, within canonical hours, and by a man in priest\rquote s orders. This law was designed specially for the protection of heiresses from the wiles of fortune-hunters. It might be just to determine that no marriage not thus solemnized should convey any right to property; but to say that parties married five minutes after twelve o\rquote clock, noon, are not married at all, whereas had the ceremony been performed ten minutes sooner, they would be truly man and wife, shocks the conscience and common sense of men. So in this country before the abolition of slavery, according to the laws of our Southern States, no slave could marry. A young white man married a young woman, whom no one in the community supposed had a drop of African blood in her veins. It was proved, however, that she was a slave. Her husband purchased her, manumitted her, repudiated her, married another woman, and was received into the communion of a Presbyterian Church. The law of God was thus regarded as a mere nullity.\par Because marriage is in some of its aspects a civil institution, to be regulated within certain limits, by the civil law, men have treated it as though it were a mere business engagement. They ignore its character as a divine institution, regulated and controlled by divine laws. Civil legislatures should remember that they can no more annul the laws of God than the laws of nature. If they pronounce those not to be married who, by the divine law, are married; or if they separate those whom God hath joined together, their laws are absolute nullities at the bar of conscience and in the sight of God.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\f1\fs16 380\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Monogamy.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Marriage is a compact between one man and one woman to live together, as man and wife, until separated by death. According to this definition, first, the marriage relation can subsist only between one man and one woman; secondly, the union is permanent, \i i.e\i0 ., it can be dissolved only by the death of one or both of the parties, except for reasons specified in the word of God; and thirdly, the death of one of the parties dissolves the union, so that it is lawful for the survivor to marry again.\par As to the first of these points, or that the Scriptural doctrine of marriage is opposed to and condemns polygamy, it is to be remarked, \emdash\par 1. That such has been the doctrine of the Christian Church in all ages and in every part of the world. There has never been a church calling itself Christian which tolerated a plurality cf wives among its members. There could hardly be a stronger proof than this fact that such is the law of Christ. It is morally certain that the whole Church cannot have mistaken, on such a subject as this, the mind and will of its divine Head and Master.\par 2. Marriage as originally constituted and ordained by God was between one man and one woman. And the language of Adam when he received Eve from the hands of her Maker, proves that such was the essential nature of the relation: \ldblquote And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife and they shall be one flesh.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Gen_2:23-24\cf0\ulnone .) Or, as our Lord quotes and expounds the passage, \ldblquote They twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Mar_10:8\cf0\ulnone .) \ldblquote The two,\rdblquote and no more than two, become one. This was not only the language of unfallen Adam in Paradise, but the language of God uttered through the lips of Adam, as appears not only from the circumstances of the case, but also from our Lord\rquote s attributing to them divine authority, as He evidently does in the passage just quoted. Thus the law of marriage as originally instituted by God, required that the union should be between one man and one woman. This law could be changed only by the authority by which it was originally enacted. Delitzsch remarks on this passage: \ldblquote In these words not only the deepest spiritual union, but a union comprehending the whole nature of man, an all comprehending personal communion, is represented\cf3\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 as the essence of marriage; and monogamy is set forth as its natural and divinely appointed form.\rdblquote\par 3. Although this original law was partially disregarded in later times it was never abrogated. Polygamy and divorce were in a measure tolerated under the Mosaic law, yet in all ages among the Hebrews, monogamy was the rule, and polygamy the exception, as it was among other civilized nations of antiquity. Polygamy first appears among the descendants of Cain. (\cf2\ul Gen_4:19\cf0\ulnone .) Noah and his sons had each but one wife. Abraham had but one wife, until the impatience of Sarah for children led him to take Hagar as a concubine. The same rule of marriage was observed by the prophets as a class. Polygamy was confined in a great measure to kings and princes. There was also an honourable distinction made between the wife and the concubine. The former retained her preeminence as the head of the family. Numerous passages of the Old Testament go to prove that monogamy was considered as the law of marriage, from which plurality of wives was a departure. Throughout the Proverbs, for example, it is the blessing of a good wife, not of wives, that is continually set forth. (\cf2\ul Pro_12:4\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Psa_19:14\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Psa_31:10\cf0\ulnone ff.) The apocryphal books contain clear evidence that after the exile monogamy was almost universal among the Jews; and it may be inferred from such passages as \cf2\ul Luk_1:5\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Act_5:1\cf0\ulnone , and many others, that the same was true at the time of the advent of Christ.\par With regard to the toleration of polygamy under the Mosaic law, it is to be remembered that the seventh commandment belongs to the same category as the sixth and eighth. These laws are not founded on the essential nature of God, and therefore are not immutable. They are founded on the permanent relations of men in their present state of existence. From this it follows, (1.) That they bind men only in their present state. The laws of property and marriage can have no application, so far as we know, to the future world, where men shall be as angels, neither marrying nor giving in marriage. (2.) These laws being founded on the permanent and natural relations of men, cannot be set aside by human authority, because those relations are not subject to the will or ordinance of men. (3.) They may however be dispensed with by God. He commanded the Israelites to despoil the Egyptians and to dispossess the Canaanites, but this does not prove that one nation may, of its own motion, seize on the inheritance of another people. If God, therefore, at any time said to any people granted permission to practise polygamy, then\cf3\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 so long as that permission lasted and for those to whom it was given, polygamy was lawful, and at all other times and for all other persons it was unlawful. This principle is clearly recognized in what our Saviour teaches concerning divorce. It was permitted the Jews under the Mosaic law to put away their wives; as soon as that law was abolished, the right of divorce ceased.\par 4. Monogamy, however, does not rest exclusively on the original institution of marriage, or upon the general drift of the Old Testament teaching, but mainly on the clearly revealed will of Christ. His will is the supreme law for all Christians, and rightfully for all men. When the Pharisees came to Him and asked Him whether a man could lawfully put away his wife, He answered, that marriage as instituted by God was an indissoluble union between one man and one woman; and, therefore, that those whom God had joined together no man could put asunder. This is the doctrine clearly taught in \cf2\ul Mat_19:4-9\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Mar_10:4-9\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Luk_16:18\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Mat_5:32\cf0\ulnone . In these passages our Lord expressly declares that if a man marries while his first wife is living he commits adultery. The exception which Christ himself makes to this rule, will be considered under the head of divorce.\par The Apostle teaches the same doctrine in \cf2\ul Rom_7:2-3\cf0\ulnone : \ldblquote The woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband, so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. So then, if while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man.\rdblquote The doctrine of this passage is that marriage is a compact between one man and one woman, which can be dissolved only by the death of one of the parties. So in \cf2\ul 1Co_7:2\cf0\ulnone : \ldblquote Let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband,\rdblquote it is taken for granted that, in the Christian Church, a plurality of wives is as much out of the question as a plurality of husbands. This assumption runs through the whole New Testament. We not only never read of a Christian\rquote s having two or more wives; but whenever the duty of the marriage relation is spoken of, it is always of the husband to his wife, and of the wife to her husband. In the judgment, therefore, of the whole Christian Church, marriage is a covenant between one man and one woman to live together as husband and wife until separated by death.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\f1\fs16 383\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 5. This Scriptural law is confirmed by the providential law which secures the numerical equality of the sexes. Had polygamy been according to the divine purpose, we should naturally expect that more women would be born than men. But the reverse is the fact. There are more men than women born into the world. The excess, however, is only sufficient to provide for the greater peril to life to which men are exposed. The law of providence is the numerical equality of the sexes; and this is a clear intimation of the will of God that every man should have his own wife, and every woman her own husband. Such being the will of God, as revealed both in his word and in his providence, everything which tends to counteract it must be evil in its nature and consequences. The doctrine which depreciated marriage, and made celibacy a virtue, flooded the Church with corruption. And everything in our modern civilization and modes of living which renders marriage difficult, and consequently infrequent, is to be deprecated, and if possible removed. That every man should have his own wife and every woman her own husband, is the divinely appointed preventive of the \ldblquote Social Evil\rdblquote with all its unutterable horrors. Every other preventive is human and worthless. Rather than that the present state of things should continue, it would be better to return to the old patriarchal usage, and let parents give their sons and daughters in marriage as soon as they attained the proper age, on the best terms they can.\par 6. As all the permanently obligatory laws of God are founded on the nature of his creatures, it follows that if He has ordained that marriage must be the union of one man and one woman, there must be a reason for this in the very constitution of man and in the nature of the marriage relation. That relation must be such that it cannot subsist between one and many; between one man and more than one woman. This is plain, first, from the nature of the love which it involves; and secondly, from the nature of the union which it constitutes. First, conjugal love is peculiar and exclusive. It can have but one object. As the love of a mother for a child is peculiar, and can have no other object than her own child, so the love of a husband can have no other object than his wife, and the love of a wife no other object than her husband. It is a love not only of complacency and delight, but also of possession, of property, and of rightful ownership. This is the reason why jealousy in man or woman is the fiercest of all \cf3\f1\fs16 384\cf0\f0\fs24 human passions. It involves a sense of injury; of the violation of the most sacred rights; more sacred even than the rights of property or life. Conjugal love, therefore, cannot by possibility exist except between one man and one woman. Monogamy has its foundation in the very constitution of our nature. Polygamy is unnatural, and necessarily destructive of the normal, or divinely constituted relation between husband and wife.\par Secondly, in another aspect, the union involved in marriage cannot exist except between one man and one woman. It is not merely a union of feeling and of interests. It is such a union as to produce, in some sense, identity. The two become one. Such is the declaration of our Lord. Husband and wife are one, in a sense which justified the Apostle in saying as he does, in Ephesians 5:30, that the wife is bone of her husband\rquote s bone, and flesh of his flesh. She is his body. She is himself (v. 28). Such is this union that \ldblquote\lang1142 Qui uxorem repudiat, quasi dimidiam sui partem a seipso avellit. Hoc autem minime patitur natura, ut corpus suum quisque discerpat.\lang1033\rdblquote What all this means it may be hard for us to understand. It is certain, \emdash (1.) That it does not refer to anything material, or to any identification of substance. When Adam said of Eve, \ldblquote This is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh,\rdblquote he doubtless referred to her being formed out of his body. But as these words are used by the Apostle to express the relation of all wives to their husbands, they must be understood of something else than identity of substance. (2.) The oneness of man and wife, of which the Scriptures speak cannot be understood in any sense inconsistent with their distinct subsistence or personality. They may be very different in character and destiny. The one may be saved, the other lost. (3.) It is evident, however, that the meaning of the strong language of Scripture on this subject is not exhausted, by representing the marriage union as being merely one of affection; or by saying that the husband is the complement of the wife and the wife of the husband; that is, that the marriage relation is necessary to the completeness of our nature and to its full development in the present state of existence; that there are capacities, feelings, and virtues which are not otherwise or elsewhere called into exercise. All this may be true, but it is not the whole truth. (4.) There is, in a certain sense, a community of life between husband and wife. We are accustomed to say, and to say truly, that the life of parents is communicated to their children. Each nation and every historical family has a form of life by which it is distinguished. As, therefore, the\cf3\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 life of a father and the life of his son are the same, in that the blood (\i i.e\i0 ., the life) of the parent flows in the veins of his children; so in an analogous sense the life of the husband and wife is one. They have a common life, and that common or joint life is transmitted to their offspring. This is the doctrine of the early Church. The Apostolical Constitutions say: \cf4\f2\u7969?\lang1032\f3 \'e3\'f5\'ed\lang1033\f2\u8052?\lang1032\f3 \'ea\'ef\'e9\'ed\'f9\'ed\lang1033\f2\u8057?\lang1032\f3\'f2\lang1033\f4 \f2\u7952?\lang1032\f3\'f3\'f4\'e9 \'e2\lang1033\f2\u8055?\lang1032\f3\'ef\'f5, \lang1033\f2\u7952?\lang1032\f3\'ed\'ef\'f5\'ec\lang1033\f2\u8051?\lang1032\f3\'ed\'e7 \'e5\lang1033\f2\u7984?\lang1032\f3\'f2 \lang1033\f2\u7957?\lang1032\f3\'ed\lang1033\f4 \f3\'f3\f2\u8182?\lang1032\f3\'ec\'e1 \lang1033\f2\u7952?\lang1032\f3\'ea \'e4\lang1033\f2\u8059?\lang1032\f3\'ef \'f0\'e1\'f1\lang1033\f2\u8048?\lang1032\f3 \'c8\'e5\'ef\lang1033\f2\u8166?\cf0\f0 .\par The analogy which the Apostle traces out in Ephesians 5:22-33, between the conjugal relation and the union between Christ and his Church, brings out the Scriptural doctrine of marriage more clearly than perhaps any other passage in the Bible. No analogy is expected to answer in all respects, and no illustration borrowed from earthly relations can bring out all the fulness of the things of God. The relation, therefore, between a husband and his wife, is only an adumbration of the relation of Christ to his Church. Still there is an analogy between the two, (1.) As the Apostle teaches, the love of Christ to his Church is peculiar and exclusive. It is such as He has for no other class or body of rational creatures in the universe. So the love of the husband for his wife is peculiar and exclusive. It is such as he has for no other object; a love in which no one can participate. (2.) Christ\rquote s love for his Church is self-sacrificing. He gave himself for it. He purchased the Church with his blood. So the husband should, and when true, does, in all things sacrifice himself for his wife. (3.) Christ and his Church are one; one in the sense that the Church is his body. So the husband and wife are in such a sense one, that a man in loving his wife loves himself. (4.) Christ\rquote s life is communicated to the Church. As the life of the head is communicated to the members of the human body; and the life of the vine to the branches, so there is, in a mysterious sense, a community of life between Christ and his Church. In like manner, in a sense no less truly mysterious, there is a community of life between husband and wife.\par From all this it follows that as it would be utterly incongruous and impossible that Christ should have two bodies, two brides, two churches, so it is no less incongruous and impossible that a man should have two wives. That is, the conjugal relation, as it is set forth in Scripture, cannot by possibility subsist, except between one man and one woman.\par \pard\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\f1\fs16 386\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Conclusions.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 1. If such be the true doctrine of marriage, it follows, as just stated, that polygamy destroys its very nature. It is founded on a wrong view of the nature of woman; places her in a false and degrading position; dethrones and despoils her; and is productive of innumerable evils.\par 2. It follows that the marriage relation is permanent and indissoluble. A limb may be violently severed from the body, and lose all vital connection with it; and husband and wife may be thus violently separated, and their conjugal relation annulled; but in both cases the normal connection is permanent.\par 3. It follows that the state can neither constitute nor dissolve the marriage relation. It can no more free a husband or wife \ldblquote\lang1142 a vinculo matrimonii\lang1033 ,\rdblquote than it can free a father \ldblquote\lang1142 a vinculo paternitatis\lang1033 .\rdblquote It may protect a child from the injustice or cruelty of its father, or even, for due cause, remove him from all parental control, and it may legislate about its property, but the natural bond between parents and children is beyond its control. So the state may legislate about marriage, and determine its accidents and legal consequences; it may decide who, in the sight of the law, shall be regarded as husband and wife, and when, or under what circumstances, the legal or civil rights and privileges arising out of the relation shall cease to be enforced; and it may protect the person and rights of the wife, and, if necessary, remove her from the control of her husband, but the conjugal bond it cannot dissolve. All decrees of divorce \ldblquote\lang1142 a vinculo matrimonii\lang1033 ,\rdblquote issued by civil or ecclesiastical authorities, so far as the conscience is concerned, are perfectly inoperative, unless antecedently to such decree and by the law of God, the conjugal relation has ceased to exist.\par 4. It follows from the Scriptural doctrine of marriage that all laws are evil which tend to make those two whom God pronounces to be one; such laws, for example, as give to the wife the right to conduct business, contract debts, and sue and be sued, in her own name. This is attempting to correct one class of evils at the cost of incurring others a hundred-fold greater. The Word of God is the only sure guide of legislative action as well as of individual conduct.\par 5. It need hardly be remarked that it follows from the nature of marriage, that next to murder, adultery is the greatest of all social crimes, under the Old Dispensation it was punishable\cf3\f1\fs16 7\cf0\f0\fs24 with death. And even now it is practically impossible to convict a husband of murder who kills the man who has committed adultery with his wife. This comes from human laws being in conflict with the laws of nature and of God. The law of God regards marriage as identifying a man and his wife; the laws of the state too often regard it as merely a civil contract, and give an injured husband no redress but a suit for damages for the pecuniary loss he has sustained by being deprived of the services of his wife. The penalty for adultery, to be in any due proportion to the magnitude of the crime, should be severe and degrading.\par 6. The relative duties of husband and wife arising out of their relation, may be expressed in a few comprehensive words. The husband is to love, protect, and cherish his wife as himself, \i i.e\i0 ., as being to him another self. The duties of the wife are set forth in the time-honoured Christian formula, \ldblquote love, honour, and obey.\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Converted Polygamists.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The question has been mooted, Whether a polygamist, when converted to Christianity, should be required to repudiate all his wives but one, as a condition of his admission into the Christian Church? The answer to this question has been sought from three sources: First, the Scriptural doctrine of marriage; secondly, the example of the Apostles when dealing with such cases; and thirdly, from a consideration of the effects which would follow from making monogamy an indispensable condition of admission to the Church.\par As to the first point, it is admitted by all Christians, that it ie the law of God, the law of Christ, and consequently the law of the Christian Church that polygamy is sinful, being a violation of the original and permanently obligatory law of marriage. As every man who enters the Church professes to be a Christian, and as every Christian is bound to obey the law of Christ, it seems plain that no man should be received into the communion of the Church who does not conform to the law of Christ concerning marriage. The only question is, Whether Christ has made a special exception in favour of those who in the times of their ignorance, contracted the obligations of marriage with more than one woman? It is of course possible that such an exception might have been made. It would be analogous to the temporary suspension of the original law of marriage in favour of the hardhearted Jews. Has then such an exception been made? This is the second point to be considered. It concerns a matter of fact. Those who assume that such an exception has been made, are bound to produce the clearest evidence of the fact. This is necessary not only to satisfy the consciences of the parties concerned, but also to justify a departure from a plainly revealed law of God. It would be a very serious matter to set up in a heathen country, a church not conformed in this matter to the usual law of Christendom. Missionaries are sent forth to teach not only Christian doctrines but Christian morals. And the churches which they found, profess to be witnesses for Christ as to what He would have men to believe, and as to what He would have them to do. They ought not to be allowed to bear false testimony. It is certain that there is no clear and definite expression of the will of Christ, recorded in the New Testament, that the case contemplated should be an exception to the Scriptural law of marriage. There is no instance recorded in the New Testament, of the admission of a polygamist to the Christian Church. It has, indeed, been inferred from \cf2\ul 1Ti_3:2\cf0\ulnone , where the Apostle says, a bishop mu st be \ldblquote the husband of one wife,\rdblquote that a private member of the Church might have more wives than one. But this is in itself a very precarious inference; and being inconsistent with Christ\rquote s express prohibition, it is altogether inadmissible. The meaning of the passage has been much disputed. What the Apostle requires is that a bishop should be in all respects an exemplary man: not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; the husband of one wife, \i i.e\i0 ., not a p olygamist. This no more implies that other men may be polygamists, than his saying that a bishop must not be greedy of filthy lucre and not a brawler, implies that other men may be covetous or contentious. According to another and widely accepted interpreation of the passage in \cf2\ul 1Ti_3:2\cf0\ulnone , and the corresponding passage in Titus i. 6, the injunction of the Apostle is that a man who has been married more than once, must not be appointed a bishop or presbyter. If this be the true meaning of  the Apostle, his language affords still less ground for the argument drawn from it in favour of the lawfulness of polygamy in church members. If even second marriage was forbidden to presbyters, \i a fortiori\i0 must polygamy be regarded as inconsistent with the law of Christ.\par This interpretation was very generally adopted in the early Church, during the Middle Ages, and by Romanists, and is sustained by many of the recent commentators. Bishop Ellicott decides in favour of this interpretation. His r easons are, \emdash (1.) The opinion of the early writers and of some councils. (2.) The special respect paid among pagans to a woman who was \ldblquote\lang1142 univira\lang1033 .\rdblquote (3.) The propriety, in the case of \cf4\f2\u7952?\lang1032\f3\'f0\lang1033\f2\u8055?\lang1032\f3\'f3\'ea\'ef\'f0\'ef\'e9\cf0\lang1033\f0 and \cf4\f3\'e4\'e9\f2\u8049?\lang1032\f3\'ea\'ef\'ed\'ef\'e9\cf0\lang1033\f0 , of a greater temperance. (4.) And the manifestation of a greater sanctity (\cf4\f3\'f3\'e5\'ec\'ed\ f2\u8057?\lang1032\f3\'f4\'e7\'f2\cf0\lang1033\f0 ) of a single marriage, which he thinks is indicated even in Scripture (\cf2\ul Luk_2:36-37\cf0\ulnone ). The objections to it are, In the first place, that it rests on an unscriptural view of marriage. According to the Bible, marriage is a better, higher, and holier, because the normal state, than celibacy. It was only in the interest of the doctrine of the peculiar sanctity of celibacy, that this interpretation was adopted by the fathers.\par In the second place, it rests on the no less unscriptural assumption of the superior holiness of the clergy. No higher degree of moral purity is required of them than of other men, for the simple reason that every man is required to be perfectly holy in heart and life. The interpretation in question gained the stronger hold of the Church as the doctrine of \ldblquote the grace of orders,\rdblquote and of the priesthood of the clergy gained ascendancy. When the Reformation came and swept away these two doctrines, it removed the two principal supports of the interpretation in question. It is not to be admitted that there can be anything unholy in second marriages, which an infinitely holy God declares to be lawful (\cf2\ul Rom_7:3\cf0\ulnone ), nor can it be conceded that the clergy are holier than other believers, seeing that the only priesthood in the Church on earth is the priesthood common to all believers.\par In the third place, the interpretation which makes the Apostle interdict second marriages to bishops and deacons, is contrary to the natural meaning of the words. The parallel passage in \cf2\ul Tit_1:5-6\cf0\ulnone , reads thus: \ldblquote That thou shouldest, ordain elders in every city, as I had appointed thee: if any be blameless, the husband of one wife, etc;\rdblquote \cf4\f3\'e5\'e9\f2\u787?\lang1032\f5\'ec \f3\'f4\'e9\'f2 \lang1033\f2\u7952?\lang1032\f3\'f3\'f4\lang1033\f2\u8054?\lang1032\f3\'ed\~.\lang1033\f4 \f3\'ec\'e9\f2\u8118?\lang1032\f3\'f2 \'e3\'f5\'ed\'e1\'e9\'ea\lang1033\f2\u8056?\lang1032\f3\'f2, \lang1033\f2\u7936?\lang1032\f3\'ed\lang1033\f2\u8053?\lang1032\f3\'f1\cf0\lang1033\f0 , \lquote if any one is at this present time the husband of one wife.\rquote It is the present state and character of the man that are to be taken into the account. He might before have been unmarried, or even a polygamist, but when ordained, he must, if married at all, be the husband of but one woman. \ldblquote\lang1142 Qui sit: non autem, Qui fuerit\lang1033 ,\rdblquote says Calvin in his comment on \cf2\ul 1Ti_3:2\cf0\ulnone . And on \cf2\ul Tit_1:6\cf0\ulnone he says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Qui defuncta uxore alteram jam c\'9clebs inducit, nihilominus unius uxoris maritus censeri debet. Non enim eligendum docet qui fuerit maritus unius uxoris, sed qui sit.\lang1033\rdblquote Whichever of these interpretations of \cf2\ul 1Ti_3:2\cf0\ulnone , be adopted, whether we understand the Apostle to forbid that a polygamist, or that a man twice married, should be admitted to the ministry, in neither case does the passage give authority to receive a polygamist into the fellowship of the Church. Considering, then, that monogamy is the undoubted law of Christ; considering that we have no evidence that He made an exception in favour of heathen converts; and considering the great importance that churches, founded in heathen lands, should bear true witness of the doctrines and precepts of Christianity, it would seem clear that no man having more than one wife should be admitted to Christian fellowship.\par The third aspect of this question concerns the effects of enforcing the Christian law of marriage in heathen lands. It is urged that this would result in great cruelty and injustice. For a man to cast off women whom he had engaged to protect and cherish, to abandon not only them but their children, it is said, cannot be reconciled with any right principle. To this it may be replied, (1.) That in many heathen countries it is not the husband who supports the wives, but the wives who support the husband. They are his slaves, and sustain him by their labour. There would be no great hardship in his setting them free. (2.) But when this is not the case, it does not follow that because a man ceases to regard several women as his wives, he should cease to provide for them, and for the welfare of his children. This in any event, as a Christian, he is bound to do.\par It is also suggested, as a difficulty in this matter, that it is hard to determine which of his several wives a converted polygamist should retain. Some say, that it is the one first married; others say, that he should be allowed to make his own selection. If marriage among the heathen were what it is in Christian countries, there would be no room for doubt on this subject. Then the first contract would be the only binding one, and all the rest null and void. But in the Christian sense of the word there has been no marriage in any case. There has been no promise and vow of mutual fidelity. The relation of a heathen polygamist to the women of his harem, is more analogous to concubinage than to Christian marriage. The relation of a heathen polygamist to his numerous wives, is so different from the conjugal relation as contemplated in Scripture, as to render it at least doubtful whether the husband s obligation is exclusively, or preeminently, to the woman first chosen. This is a point of casuistry to which those who expect to labour in heathen countries should direct their attention. The Romish Church decides\cf3\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 in favour of the first wife. The Roman Catechism says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Atque ob eam rem fieri intelligimus, ut, si infidels quispiam, gentis su\'e6 more et consuetudine, plures uxores duxisset, cum ad veram religionem conversus fuerit, jubeat eum Ecclesia ceteras omnes relinquere, ac priorem tantum just\'e6 et legitim\'e6 uxoris loco habere.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Divorce.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The questions which call for, at least a brief consideration, under this head are, (1.) What is divorce, and what are its legitimate effects? (2.) What are the Scriptural grounds of divorce? (3.) What are the Romish doctrine, and practice on this subject? (4.) What are the doctrine and practice of Protestant Churches and countries? (5.) What is the duty of the Church and of its officers in cases where the laws of the state on this subject are in conflict with the law of God? Works on civil and canon law, when treating of divorce, take a much wider range than this, but the points above indicated seem to include those of most interest and importance to the theologian.\par \pard\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\i Divorce; its Nature and Effects.\i0\par \pard\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Divorce is not a mere separation, whether temporary or permanent, \ldblquote\lang1142 a mensa et thoro\lang1033 .\rdblquote It is not such a separation as leaves the parties in the relation of husband and wife, and simply relieves them from the obligation of their relative duties. Divorce annuls the \ldblquote\lang1142 vinculum matrimonii\lang1033 ,\rdblquote so that the parties are no longer man and wife. They stand henceforth to each other in the same relation as they were before marriage. That this is the true idea of divorce is plain from the fact that under the old dispensation if a man put away his wife, she was at liberty to marry again. (\cf2\ul Deu_24:1-2\cf0\ulnone .) This of course supposes that the marriage relation to her former husband was effectually dissolved. Our Lord teaches the same doctrine. The passages in the Gospels, referring to this subject, are \cf2\ul Mat_5:31-32\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Mat_19:3-9\cf0\ulnone ; \cf2\ul Mar_10:2-12\cf0\ulnone ; and \cf2\ul Luk_16:18\cf0\ulnone . The simple meaning of these passages seems to be, that marriage is a permanent compact, which cannot be dissolved at the will of either of the parties. If, therefore, a man arbitrarily puts away his wife and marries another, he commits adultery. If he repudiates her on just grounds and marries another, he commits no offence. Our Lord makes the guilt of marrying after separation to depend on the ground of the separation. Saying, \lquote that if a man puts\cf3\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 away his wife for any cause save fornication, and marries another, he commits adultery\rquote ; is saying that \lquote the offence is not committed if the specified ground of divorce exists.\rquote And this is saying that divorce, when justifiable, dissolves the marriage tie.\par Although this seems so plainly to be the doctrine of the Scriptures, the opposite doctrine prevailed early in the Church, and soon gained the ascendancy. Augustine himself taught in his work \ldblquote De Conjugiis Adulterinis,\rdblquote and elsewhere, that neither of the parties after divorce could contract a new marriage. In his \ldblquote Retractions,\rdblquote however, he expresses doubt on the subject. It passed, however, into the canon law, and received the authoritative sanction of the Council of Trent, which says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Si quis dixerit, ecclesiam errare, cum docuit et docet, juxta evangelicam et apostolicam doctrinam,  propter adulterium alterius conjugum matrimonii vinculum non posse dissolvi; et utrumque, vel etiam innocentem, qui causam adulterio non dedit, non posse, altero conjuge vivente, aliud matrimonium contrahere; m\'9ccharique eum, qui, dimissa adultera, aliam duxerit, et eam, qu\'e6, dimisso adultero, alii nupserit; anathema sit.\lang1033\rdblquote This is the necessary consequence of the doctrine, that the marriage relation can be dissolved only by death. The indisposition of the medi\'e6val and Romish Chu!rch to admit of remarriages after divorce, is no doubt to be attributed in part to the low idea of the marriage state prevailing in the Latin Church. It had its ground, however, in the interpretation given to certain passages of Scripture. In \cf2\ul Mar_10:11-12\cf0\ulnone , and in \cf2\ul Luk_16:18\cf0\ulnone , our Lord says without any qualification: \ldblquote Whosoever putteth away his wife, and marrieth another, committeth adultery; and whosoever marrieth her that is put away from her husband, commi"tteth adultery.\rdblquote This was taken as the law on the subject, without regard to what is said in \cf2\ul Mat_5:31-32\cf0\ulnone , and \cf2\ul Mat_19:3-9\cf0\ulnone . As, however, there is no doubt of the genuineness of the passages in Matthew, they cannot be overlooked. One expression of the will of Christ is as authoritative and as satisfactory as a thousand repetitions could make it. The exception stated in Matthew, therefore, must stand. The reason for the omission in Mark and Luke may be account#ed for in different ways. It is said by some that the exception was of necessity understood from its very nature, whether mentioned or not. Or having been stated twice, its repetition was unnecessary. Or what perhaps is most probable, as our Lord was speaking\cf3\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 to Pharisees, who held that a man might put away his wife when he pleased, it was enough to say that such divorces as they were accustomed to, did not dissolve the bonds of marriage, and that the parties remained as much man$ and wife as they were before. Under the Old Testament, divorce on the ground of adultery, was out of the question, because adultery was punished by death. And, therefore, it was only when Christ was laying down the law of his own kingdom, under which the death penalty for adultery was to be abolished, that it was necessary to make any reference to that crime.\par It has been earnestly objected to the doctrine that adultery dissolves the marriage bond, that both parties, the guilty as well the innocent b%ecome free, and either may contract a new marriage. If this be so, it is said, that all that a man, who wishes to get rid of his wife, has to do, is to commit that offence. He will then be at liberty to marry whom he chooses. To this it might be a sufficient answer to say that the objection bears rather against the wisdom of the law, than against the fact that it is the law; or in other words, the objection is against the plain meaning of the words of Christ. But it is to be remembered, that adultery is a crime in the sight of man as well as in the sight of God, and as such it ought to be punished. Under the old dispensation it was punished by death; under the new, it may be punished by imprisonment, or by prohibition of any future marriage. Christ leaves the punishment of this, as of other crimes, to be determined by his disciples in their civil capacity. All He does is to teach what its effects are, \ldblquote\lang1142 in foro conscienti\lang1033\'e6,\rdblquote as to the marriage bond.\par \i\par } ""2)a1.19.11.A.The Seventh Commandment{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f3\froman\fprq2\fcharset161{\*\fname Times New Roman;(40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\i\f0\fs24 Grounds of Divorce.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 As already stated, marriage is an indissoluble compact between one man and one woman. It cannot be dissolved by any voluntary act of repudiation on )the part of the contracting parties; nor by any act of the Church or State. \ldblquote Those whom God has joined together, no man can put asunder.\rdblquote The compact may, however, be dissolved, although by no legitimate act of man. It is dissolved by death. It is dissolved by adultery; and as Protestants teach, by wilful desertion. In other words, there are certain things which from their nature work a dissolution of the marriage bond. All the legitimate authority the state has in the premises is to t*ake cognizance of the fact that the marriage is dissolved; officially to announce it, and to make suitable provision for the altered relation of the parties.\par Under the preceding head it has already been shown that according to the plain teaching of our Saviour the marriage bond is annulled by the crime of adultery. The reason of this is, that the parties are no longer one, in the mysterious sense in which the Bible declares a man and his wife to be one. The Apostle teaches on this subject the same do+ctrine that Christ had taught. The seventh chapter of his First Epistle to the Corinthians is devoted to the subject of marriage, in reference to which several questions had been proposed to him.\par He first lays down the general principle, founded on the Word of God and the nature of man, that it is best that every man should have his own wife and every wife her own husband; but in view of the \ldblquote present (or imminent) distress,\rdblquote he advises his readers not to marry. He writes to the Co,rinthians as a man would write to an army about to enter on a most unequal conflict in an enemy\rquote s country, and for a protracted period. He tells them: \lquote This is no time for you to think of marriage. You have a right to marry. And in general it is best that all men should marry. But in your circumstances marriage can only lead to embarrassment and increase of suffering.\rquote This limitation of his advice not to marry, to men in the circumstances of those to whom the advice is given, is not -only stated in so many words in verse 26, but it is the only way in which Paul can be reconciled with himself or with the general teaching of the Bible. It has already been remarked, that no one of the sacred writers speaks in more exalted terms of marriage than this Apostle. He represents it as a most ennobling spiritual union, which raises a man out of himself and makes him live for another; a union so elevated and refining as to render it a fit symbol of the union between Christ and his Church. Marriag.e, according to this Apostle, does for man in the sphere of nature, what union with Christ does for him in the sphere of grace.\par Having thus given it as a matter of advice that it was best, under existing circumstances, for Christians not to marry, he\cf1\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 proceeds to give directions to those who were already married. Of these here were two classes: first, those where both husband and wife were Christians; and secondly, those where one of the parties was a believer and the other a/n unbeliever, \i i.e\i0 ., a Jew or a heathen. With regard to the former he says, that as according to the law of Christ the marriage is indissoluble, neither party had the right to repudiate the other. But if, in violation of the law of Christ, a wife had deserted her husband, she was bound either to remain unmarried, or to be reconciled to her husband. The Apostle thus impliedly recognizes the principle that there may be causes which justify a woman\rquote s leaving her husband, which do not justify a d0issolution of the marriage bond.\par With regard to those cases in which one of the parties was a Christian and the other an unbeliever, he teaches, first, that such marriages are lawful, and, therefore, ought not to be dissolved. But, secondly, that if the unbelieving partner depart, \i i.e\i0 ., repudiates the marriage, the believing partner is not bound; \i i.e\i0 ., is no longer bound by the marriage compact. This seems to be the plain meaning. If the unbelieving partner is willing to continue in the1 marriage relation, the believing party is bound; bound, that is, to be faithful to the marriage compact. If the unbeliever is not willing to remain, the believer in that case is not bound; \i i.e\i0 ., bound by the marriage compact. In other words, the marriage is thereby dissolved. This passage is parallel to \cf2\ul Rom_7:2\cf0\ulnone . The Apostle there says, a wife \ldblquote is bound by the law to her husband, so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husban2d.\rdblquote So here he says, \lquote A wife is bound to her husband if he is willing to remain with her; but if he deserts her, she is free from him.\rquote That is, wilful desertion annuls the marriage bond. This desertion, however, must be deliberate and final. This is implied in the whole context. The case contemplated is where the unbelieving husband refuses any longer to regard his believing partner as his wife.\par This interpretation of the passage is given not only by the older Protestant inte3rpreters, but also by the leading modern commentators, as De Wette, Meyer, Alford, and Wordsworth, and in the Confessions of the Lutheran and Reformed Churches. Even the Romanists take the same view. They hold, indeed, that among Christians marriage is absolutely indissoluble except by the death of one of the parties. But if one of the partners be an unbeliever, then they hold that desertion annuls the marriage contract. On this point Cornelius \'e0 Lapide, of Louvain and Rome,\cf1\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 s4ays, \ldblquote\lang1142 Nota, Apostolum permittere hoc casu non tantum thori divortium sed etiam matrimonii; ita ut possit conjux fidelis aliud matrimonium inire.\lang1033\rdblquote Lapide refers to Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and Ambrose in support of this opinion. The Canon Law, under the title \ldblquote\lang1142 Divortiis\lang1033\rdblquote teaches the same doctrine. Wordsworth\rquote s comment on the passage is, \ldblquote Although a Christian may not put away his wife, being an unbeliever, yet if 5the wife desert her husband (\cf3\f2\'f7\'f9\'f1\f3\u8055?\f2\'e6\'e5\'f4\'e1\'e9\cf0\f0 ) he may contract a second marriage.\rdblquote\par The Romanists indeed rest their sanction to remarriage in the case supposed, on the ground that there is an essential difference between marriage where one or both the parties are heathen, and marriage where both parties are Christians. This, however, makes no difference. Paul had just said that such unequal marriages were lawful and valid. Neither party could legiti6mately repudiate or leave the other. The ground of divorce indicated is not difference of religion, but desertion.\par There is a middle ground taken by many, both ancients and moderns, in the interpretation of this passage. They admit that desertion justifies divorce, but not the remarriage of the party deserted. To this it may be objected, \emdash\par 1. That this is inconsistent with the nature of divorce. We have already seen that divorce among the Jews, as explained by Christ, and as understood in 7the apostolic Church, was such a separation of man and wife as dissolved the marriage bond. This idea was expressed in the use of the words \cf3\f3\u7936?\f2\'f0\'ef\'eb\f3\u8059?\f2\'e5\'e9\'ed\f4 , \f3\u7936?\f2\'f6\'e9\f3\u8051?\f2\'ed\'e1\'e9\f4 , \f2\'f7\'f9\'f1\f3\u8055?\f2\'e6\'e5\'e9\'ed\cf0\f0 and these are the words here used.\par 2. This interpretation is inconsistent with the context and with the design of the Apostle. Among the questions submitted to his decision, was this, \lquote Is it la8wful for a Christian to remain in the marriage relation with an unbeliever?\rquote Paul answers, \lquote Yes; such marriages are lawful and valid. Therefore if the unbeliever is willing to continue the marriage relation, the believer remains bound; but if the unbeliever refuses to continue the marriage, the believer is no longer bound by it.\rquote To say that the believer is no longer bound to give up his or her religions which seems to be Neander\rquote s idea, or is not bound to force himself or hers9elf upon an unwilling partner, would be nothing to the point. No Christian could think himself bound to give up his religion, and no one could think it possible that married life could be continued without the consent of the parties. The question, in this sense, was not worth either asking or answering.\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\f1\fs16 397\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\t:x1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 3. Desertion, from the nature of the offence, is a dissolution of the marriage bond. Why does death dissolve a marriage? It is because it is a final separation. So is desertion. Incompatibility of temper, cruelty, disease, crime, insanity, etc., which human laws often make grounds of divorce, are not inconsistent with the marriage relation. A woman may have a disagreeable, a cruel, or a wicked hus;band, but a man in his grave, or one who refuses to recognize her as his wife, cannot be her husband.\par It is said, indeed, that this doctrine makes marriage depend on the option of the parties. Either may desert the other; and then the marriage is dissolved. The same objection was made to our Lord\rquote s doctrine that adultery destroys the marriage bond. It was maid that if this be so, either party might dissolve the marriage, by committing that crime. As the objections are the same, the answer is tinter legitimas personas\lang1033 ,\rdblquote is explained by saying, \ldblquote\lang1142 Qui a nuptiarum conjunctione legibus omnino exclusi sunt, ii matrimonium inire non possunt; neque, si ineant, ratum est, exempli enim gratia: qui intra quartum gradum propinquitate conjuncti sunt, puerque ante decimum quartum annum, aut puella ante duodecimum, qu\'e6 \'e6tas legibus constituta est, ad matrimonii justa f\'9cdera ineunda apti esse non possunt.\lang1033\rdblquote The clause, \lang1142\ldblquote Indivi?duam vit\'e6 consuetudinem retinens,\rdblquote it is said, \ldblquote indissolubilis vinculi naturam declarat quo vir, et uxor colligantur.\rdblquote\lang1033\par Marriage is to be contemplated under two aspects. It is an institution founded in nature, and therefore exists wherever men\cf1\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 exist. It is a lawful institution among the heathen as well as among Christians. But as it is an ordinance of God it has a character among those who know the true God and thus regard it, far high@er than it has for those who are the worshippers of false gods. And, therefore, marriage, under the old dispensation, had a much higher character than it had among the heathen. Nevertheless, among Christians marriage is something far more sacred than it was under the Mosaic economy. Christ had raised it te the dignity of a sacrament.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Marriage a Sacrament.\i0A\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The word sacrament is one of vague and various meaning. Sometimes it means that which is sacred or consecrated; sometimes that which has, or is intended to have a sacred meaning; \i i.e\i0 ., an external sign of some religious truth or grace; sometimes a divinely appointed external rite instituted to be a means of grace; and sometimes a divinely appointBed external sign that contains and conveys the grace which it signifies. It is in this last sense that the word is used by Romanists; and it is in this sense they teach that marriage is a sacrament. The principal Scriptural authority for this doctrine they find in \cf2\ul Eph_5:32\cf0\ulnone , where, as they understand the passage, the words \cf3\f2\'f4\f3\u8056?\f4 \f2\'ec\'f5\'f3\'f4\f3\u8053?\f2\'f1\'e9\'ef\'ed\f4 \f2\'f4\'ef\f3\u8166?\f2\'f4\'ef\f4 \f2\'ec\f3\u8051?\f2\'e3\'e1\f4 \f3\u7952?\f2\'f3C\'f4\f3\u8055?\f2\'ed\cf0\f0 , rendered in the Vulgate, \ldblquote\lang1142 Sacramentum hoc magnum est\lang1033 ,\rdblquote are spoken of marriage. According to this version and interpretation, the Apostle does indeed directly assert that marriage is a mystery. But (1.) The words do not refer to marriage, but to the mystical union between Christ and his people as appears from the Apostle\rquote s own explanation in the following clause: \ldblquote I speak concerning Christ and the Church.\rdblquote The Dtwo subjects, the union of husband and wife and the union between Christ and his people, had been so combined and interwoven in the preceding verses, that it would have been difficult to determine to which the words, \ldblquote This is a great mystery,\rdblquote were intended to refer, had not the Apostle himself told us. But (2.) Even if the Apostle does say that the marriage union is a great mystery, which in one sense it clearly is, that would not prove that it is a sacrament. The word \ldblquote mystEery,\rdblquote as used in the Bible, means something hidden or unknown; something which can be known only by divine revelation. Thus the Gospel itself is repeatedly said to be a mystery (\cf2\ul Eph_3:3-9\cf0\ulnone ); the future conversion of the Jews is said to be a mystery (\cf2\ul Rom_11:25\cf0\ulnone ); the incarnation is\cf1\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 said to be the great mystery of godliness (\cf2\ul 1Ti_3:16\cf0\ulnone ); and anything obscure or enigmatical is called a mystery (\cf2\ul Rev_17:6\cf0\ulFnone ); thus the mystery of the seven candlesticks is their secret meaning. If, therefore, Paul says that marriage is a great mystery in the sense that no one can fully understand what is meant when God says that husband and wife are one, or even in the sense that marriage has a sacred import, that it is a symbol of a great religious truth, this is what all Protestants admit and what is clearly taught in Scripture. Paul had himself just set forth marriage as the great analogue of the mystical union of ChrGist and the Church. (3.) Admitting still further that marriage was properly called \ldblquote\lang1142 sacramentum\lang1033 ,\rdblquote that would prove nothing to the purpose. That Latin word had not the sense attached to it by Romanists until long after the apostolic age. It has not that sense even in the Vulgate. In \cf2\ul 1Ti_3:16\cf0\ulnone , the manifestation of God in the flesh is declared to be the \ldblquote great mystery of godliness,\rdblquote which the Vulgate translates \ldblquote\lang1142H magnum pietatis sacramentum\lang1033 ;\rdblquote but Romanists do not hold that the incarnation is a sacrament in the ecclesiastical sense of that term. The Latin Church, however, having gradually come to attach to the word the idea of a divinely appointed rite or ceremony, which signifies, contains, and conveys grace, and finding, as the words were understood, marriage declared in \cf2\ul Eph_5:32\cf0\ulnone to be a \ldblquote\lang1142 sacramentum\lang1033 ,\rdblquote it came to teach that it was a sIacrament in the same sense as baptism and the Lord\rquote s Supper.\par Romanists then teach that marriage is a sacrament not merely because it is the sign or symbol of the union of Christ and his Church. The Roman Catechism says, (1). That no one should doubt \ldblquote\lang1142 quod scilicet viri, et mulieris conjunctio, cujus Deus auctor est, sanctissimi illius vinculi, quo Christus dominus cum Ecclesia conjungitur, sacramentum, id est, sacrum signum sit.\lang1033\rdblquote If this were all, no ProteJstant could object. (2). But Romanists teach that marriage is a sacrament because it not only signifies but also confers grace. The ceremony, including the consent of the parties, the benediction, and the intention of the priest, renders the bride and groom holy. It sanctifies them. \ldblquote\lang1142 Ex opere operato\lang1033 ,\rdblquote it transforms mere natural human love into that holy spiritual affection which renders their union a fit emblem of the union of Christ and the Church. On this point thKe Council of Trent says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Gratiam, vero, qu\'e6 naturalem illum amorem perficeret,\cf1\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 et indissolubilem unitatem confirmaret, conjugesque sanctificaret, ipse Christus, venerabilium sacramentorum institutor, atque perfector, sua nobis passione promeruit.\lang1033\rdblquote It would be a great blessing if this were so. Facts, however, prove that the sacramental efficacy of matrimony no more so sanctifies husbands and wives as to make their mutual love like the holyL love of Christ for his Church, than baptism confers (to those not opposing an obstacle) all the benefits, subjective and objective, of the redemption of Christ. If the sacramentarian theory were true, all Christians would be perfect and Christendom would be paradisaical.\par Marriage between Christians, according to Romanists, is indissoluble. Neither adultery nor desertion justifies divorce. Death alone can sever the bond. It is not to be inferred from this, however, that marriage is a more sacred instMitution among Romanists than among Protestants. Any departure from Scriptural rules is sure to work evil. The denial that adultery destroys the marriage bond, leads naturally, and in fact has led, not only to render that crime more frequent, but also to unscriptural devices to remedy the injustice of forcing a husband or wife to maintain the conjugal relation with a guilty partner. One of these devices is the multiplication of the causes of separation \ldblquote\lang1142 a mensa et thoro\lang1033\rdblquotNe ; and another still more unscriptural, is the multiplying the reasons which render marriage null and void \ldblquote\lang1142 ab initio\lang1033 .\rdblquote No less than sixteen causes which render marriages null are enumerated by Romish theologians.\par The causes which justify separation without divorce, are vows, adultery, apostasy, and crimes. Under the last head they include cruelty and prodigality. If the parties had not been baptized, divorce \ldblquote\lang1142 a vinculo\lang1033\rdblquote waOs allowed when one of the partners became a Romanist and the other refused to, and also for any serious crime. The whole matter is in the hands of the Church, which claims the right of making and unmaking impediments to marriage at pleasure. \ldblquote\lang1142 Si quis dixerit Ecclesiam non potuisse constituere impedimenta, matrimonium dirimentia, vel in iis constituendis errasse; anathema sit.\lang1033\rdblquote At one period the \cf1\f1\fs16 401\cf0\f0\fs24 Church of Rome made consanguinity within the Pseventh degree an impediment to marriage; at present it forbids marriage within the fourth degree inclusive. \ldblquote The old Catholic theory of marriage,\rdblquote says President Woolsey, \ldblquote was practically a failure in all its parts, in its ascetic frown on marriage, in its demand from the clergy of an abstinence not required from the Christian laity, in teaching that nothing but death could release the married pair from their obligations. When it sought for impracticable virtue, and forbade Qto some what God had allowed to all, it opened a fountain of vice with the smallest incitement to virtue.\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Laws of Protestant Countries concerning Divorce.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 It has already been shown that ProtestRants, making the Scriptures their guide, taught that the dissolution of the bond of marriage was allowable only for the two offences of adultery and wilful desertion. So far as the churches and their confessions are concerned, this is still the doctrine of almost all Protestant denominations. When, however, marriage came to be regarded as essentially a civil contract, it gradually fell under the jurisdiction of the state, and laws were passed varying in different countries, as legislators were influenced Sby mere views of justice or expediency. The legislation of all European nations was greatly influenced by the old Roman law; and, therefore, when marriage was removed from the exclusive jurisdiction of the Church, the laws concerning it were more or less adopted from the ancient code. The Roman laws concerning divorce were very lax. Mutual consent was, even after the Roman emperors became Christian, regarded as a sufficient reason for dissolving the bond of marriage. When the Church gained the ascendancy Tover the State, and the pope became the virtual legislator of Christendom, divorce for any reason was forbidden; and when and where the pope in his turn was dethroned, there was a general tendency to return to the laxity of the Roman legislation.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i England.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160U\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 England was an exception to this rule. It discarded less of popish usages than any other Protestant nation. For a long time after the Reformation no special law concerning divorce was passed. The ecclesiastical courts could decree separation \ldblquote\lang1142 a mensa et thoro\lang1033 ,\rdblquote but a full divorce \ldblquote\lang1142 a vinculo\lang1033\rdblquote could be\cf1\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 obtained only by a special act of Parliament. Under Vthe reign of the present sovereign all such questions were removed from the ecclesiastical courts and remitted to a civil tribunal. That tribunal is authorized to grant judicial separation \ldblquote\lang1142 a mensa et thoro\lang1033\rdblquote on the ground of adultery, or cruelty, or desertion without just cause for two years and upward; and dissolution of marriage on account of simple adultery on the part of the wife, or aggravated adultery on the part of the husband. Such divorce gives both parties lWiberty to contract a new marriage. \ldblquote On the whole, with serious defects,\rdblquote says President Woolsey, \ldblquote it seems to us to be an excellent law. It does honour to the Christian country where it is in force, and it is certainly a great improvement on the former mode of regulating divorce in England.\rdblquote It may be a good law in comparison with the lawlessness that preceded it, and in comparison with the lax legislation of other Protestant nations, but it is not good so far as itX is not conformed to the Scriptures. The New Testament makes no such distinction as is made in this law, between adultery on the part of the wife and the same offence on the part of the husband. And it is not good in not allowing wilful desertion to be a legitimate ground of divorce, if, as Protestants almost universally believe, the Bible teaches the contrary.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cfY4\i France.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 In France the laws of the Romish Church were in force until the Revolution. That event threw everything into confusion, and the sanctity of marriage was in a great degree disregarded. Under the empire of the first Napoleon, the civil code allowed divorce, (1.) for simple adultery on the part of the wife; (2.) for aggravated adultery on theZ part of the husband; (3.) for outrages and cruelty; (4.) for the condemnation of either party to an infamous punishment; and (5.) for mutual persistent consent. The restoration of the Bourbons put an end to these laws and led to the entire prohibition of divorce.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\i Germany.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328[\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 Among the Protestants of Germany, the views of the Reformers, as a general thing, controlled the action of the several states on this subject until about the middle of the eighteenth century, when the laws of marriage were greatly relaxed. G\'f6schen attributes this change in a great measure to the influence of Thomasius\cf1\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 (\'86 1728), who regarded marriage as merely a civil institution designed for the purposes of the \state, and which, therefore, might be set aside whenever it failed to answer the desired end. The present law of Prussia, although an improvement on the previous legislation, is far below the Scriptural standard. Besides adultery and wilful desertion, it makes many other offences grounds of divorce, for example, plots endangering the life or health of the other party; gross injuries; dangerous incompatibility of temper; crimes entailing an infamous punishment; habitual drunkenness and extravagance; and de]liberate mutual consent, if there be no children fruit of the marriage to be dissolved.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i The United States.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The laws of the several states of this Union on the subject of divorce vary from the extreme of ^strictness to the extreme of laxness. In South Carolina no divorce has ever been given. The effect of refusing to regard adultery as a dissolution of the marriage bond is, as proved by the experience of Catholic countries, to lead the people to regard that crime as a pardonable offence. It was indictable. In New York adultery is the only ground of divorce; but separation from bed and board is granted for cruelty, desertion, and refusal on the part of the husband to make provision for the support of the wi_fe. In several of the other states, besides adultery and desertion, many other grounds are made sufficient to justify divorce; of these grounds the following are the principal: imprisonment, neglect to provide for the maintenance of the wife, habitual drunkenness, and cruelty. In some states the whole matter is left to the discretion of the courts. In the laws of Maine it is said that divorce \ldblquote\lang1142 a vinculo\lang1033\rdblquote may be granted by any justice of the Supreme Court, \ldblquote w`hen in the exercise of a sound discretion, he deems it reasonable and proper, conducive to domestic harmony, and consistent with the peace and morality of society.\rdblquote The law of Indiana says divorce may be granted for any cause for which the court deems it proper. In Rhode Island to the enumeration of specific causes is added, \ldblquote and for any other gross misbehaviour and wickedness in either of the parties, repugnant to and in violation of the marriage covenant.\rdblquote In Connecticut thae statute passed in 1849 allows divorce for \ldblquote any such\cf1\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 misconduct as permanently destroys the happiness of the petitioner and defeats the purpose of the conjugal relation.\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Duty of the Church and of its Officers.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx916b0\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 There are certain principles bearing on this subject which will be generally conceded, (1.) Every legislative body is bound to conform its enactments to the moral law. This may be assumed as a self-evident proposition. (2.) Every Christian legislature is bound to conform its action to the laws of Christianity. By a Christian legislature is meant one which makes laws for a Christian people. It is not necessary that it should represent them as Christiansc, to be their agents in teaching, propagating, or enforcing the principles of the Christian religion. It is enough to constitute it a Christian legislature that the great body of its constituents who are bound to obey its laws are Christians. No one hesitates to say that Italy, Spain, and France are Catholic countries; or that England, Sweden, and Prussia are Protestant. As all the powers of legislatures are derived from the people, it is irrational to suppose that the people would delegate to their repredsentatives authority to violate their religion. No legislature of a Christian state, therefore, can have the right to make laws inconsistent with the Christian religion. This principle, so reasonable and obvious, is conceded in the abstract. No state in this Union would dare to legalize adultery or bigamy. Before the Reformation all questions concerning marriage were under the jurisdiction of the Church; after that event they were, in Protestant countries, referred to the authorities of the state. \ldblqueote It never, however,\rdblquote says Stahl, \ldblquote entered the minds of the Reformers, to assert that marriage was purely a civil institution, to be determined by civil, and not religious laws, or that the testimony of the Church as to the divine laws of marriage was not a binding rule for the legislation of the state.\rdblquote And in still more general terms he declares that \ldblquote What the Church as such [the body of Christians] testifies to be an unchangeable divine law, \lquote\lang1142 jufs divinum\lang1033 ,\rquote and upholds within its sphere, is the impassable rule and limit for the legislation of a Christian state.\rdblquote\par 3. No act of any human legislature contrary to the moral law can bind any man, and no such act contrary to the law of Christ can bind any Christian. If, therefore, a human tribunal annuls\cf1\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 a marriage for any reason other than those assigned in the Bible, the marriage is not thereby dissolved. In the judgment of Christians it remains gin full force; and they are bound so to regard it. And on the other hand, if the state pronounces a marriage valid, which the Bible declares to be invalid, in the view of Christians it is invalid. There is no help for this. Christians cannot give up their convictions; nor can they renounce their allegiance to Christ. This state of conflict between the laws and the conscience of the people, is the necessary consequence, if a body making laws for a Christian people disregards an authority which the people rhecognize as divine.\par 4. The laws of many of the states of this Union, on the matter of divorce, are unscriptural and immoral. If the former, they are the latter in the view of all who believe in the divine authority of the Bible. If the Scriptures be the only infallible rule of faith and practice, they contain the only standard of right and wrong. The moral law is not something self-imposed. It is not what any man or body of men may think right or expedient. It is the revealed will of God as to human iconduct; and whatever is contrary to that will is morally wrong. If this be so, then there can be no doubt that the divorce laws of many of our states are immoral. They contravene the law of God. They annul marriages for other reasons than those allowed in Scripture, and even, in some cases, at the discretion of the courts. They pronounce persons not to be man and wife, who by the law of God are man and wife. They pronounce those to be legally married, whose union Christ declares to be adulterous. That isj, they legalize adultery. This is a conclusion which cannot be avoided, except by denying either the authority of the Bible, or that it legislates on the subject of marriage. If marriage were a mere civil compact, with regard to which the Scriptures gave no special directions, it might be regulated by the state according to its news of wisdom or expediency. But if it be an ordinance of God; if He has revealed his will as to who may, and who may not intermarry, and who, when married, may or may not be relekased from the marriage bond, then the state has no more right to alter these laws than it has to alter the decalogue, and to legalize idolatry or blasphemy. There is no use in covering this matter over. It is wrong to regard anti-Christian laws as matters of small importance.\par The action of the state in this matter is not merely negative. It does not simply overlook or refuse to punish the violation of the Scriptural law of divorce, but it intervenes by its positive action, and declares that certain plarties are not man and wife, between whom, according to the law of God, the bond of marriage still subsists. It condemns bigamy, but it sanctions what the Bible pronounces bigamy. The law of the state and the law of God, in this regard, are so opposed to each other, that he who obeys the one violates the other.\par 5. As the Church and its officers are under the highest obligations to obey the law of Christ, it follows that where the action of the state conflicts with that law, such action must be disregmarded. If a person be divorced on other than Scriptural grounds and marries again, such person cannot consistently be received to the fellowship of the Church. If a minister be called upon to solemnize the marriage of a person improperly divorced, he cannot, in consistency with his allegiance to Christ, perform the service. This conflict between the civil and divine law is a great evil, and has often, especially in Prussia, given rise to great difficulty.\par As all denominations of Christians, Romanistsn and Protestants, are of one mind on this subject, it is matter of astonishment that these objectionable divorce laws are allowed to stand on the statute-books of so many of our states. This fact proves either that public attention has not to a sufficient degree been called to the subject, or that the public conscience is lamentably blinded or seared. The remedy is with the Church, which is the witness of God on earth, bound to testify to his truth and to uphold his law. If Christians, in their individualo capacity and in their Church courts, would unite in their efforts to arouse and guide public sentiment on this subject, there is little doubt that these objectionable laws would be repealed.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i The Social Evil.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx1465p6\cf0 This is not a subject to be discussed in these pages; a few remarks, however, in reference to it may not be out of place.\par 1. It is obviously Utopian to expect that all violations of the seventh commandment can be prevented, any more than that the laws against theft or falsehood should never be disregarded.\par 2. The history of the world shows that the instinct which leads to the evil in question can never be kept within proper limits, except by moral principle, or by marriage.\par 3. To thesqe two means of correction, therefore, the efforts of the friends of virtue should be principally directed. There can be no efficient moral culture without religious training. If we would reform our fellow-men, we must bring and keep them from the beginning to the end of their lives under the influence of the truth and ordinances of God; to accomplish this work is the duty assigned to the Church. Besides this general moral culture, there is needed special effort to produce a proper public sentiment with rergard to this special evil. So long as the seventh commandment can be violated without any serious loss of self-respect or of public confidence, one of the strongest barriers against vice is broken down. If loss of character as certainly followed a breach of the seventh commandment, as it follows theft or perjury, the evil would be to a good degree abated. This is already the fact with regard to certain classes. It is so with regard to women; and it is so in the case of the clergy. If a minister of the gosspel be guilty of this offence, he is as certainly and effectually ruined as he would be by the commission of any other crime short of murder. The same moral law, however, binds all men. Theft in the case of one man is, in its essential character, just what it is in the case of any other man.\par 4. The divinely appointed preventive of the social evil is laid down in \cf2\ul 1Co_7:2\cf0\ulnone : \ldblquote Let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.\rdblquote That there aret serious difficulties, in the present state of society, in the way of frequent and early marriages, cannot be denied. The principal of these is no doubt the expensive style of living generally adopted. Young people find it impossible to commence life with the conveniences and luxuries to which they have been accustomed in their fathers houses, and therefore marriage is neglected or postponed. With regard to the poorer classes, provision might be made to endow young women of good character, so as to enableu them to begin their married life in comfort. Arrangements may also be made in various ways to lessen the expense of family living. The end to be accomplished is to facilitate marriage. Those who are so happy as to find in a dictum of Scripture the ultimate reason and the highest motive, may see the end to be attained, although, as in the present case, they are obliged to leave the means of its accomplishment to experts in social science.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496v\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Prohibited Marriages.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 That certain marriages are prohibited is almost the universal judgment of mankind. Among the ancient Persians and Egyptians, indeed, the nearest relations were allowed to intermarry\cf1\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 and in the corrupt period of the Roman Ewmpire, equal laxness more or less prevailed. These isolated facts do not invalidate the argument from the general judgment of mankind. What all men think to be wrong, must be wrong. This unanimity cannot be accounted for, except by assuming that the judgment in which men thus agree is founded on the constitution of their nature, and that constitution is the work of God. There are cases, therefore, in which the \ldblquote\lang1142 vox populi\lang1033\rdblquote is the \ldblquote\lang1142 vox Dei\lang1033 .x\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i The Ground or Reason of such Prohibitions.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The reason why mankind so generally condemn the intermarriage of near relations cannot be physical. Physiology is not taught by instinct. It is, theryefore, not only an unworthy, but is an altogether unsatisfactory assumption, that such marriages are forbidden because they tend to the deterioration of the race. The fact assumed may, or may not be true; but if admitted, it is utterly insufficient to account for the condemnatory judgment in question.\par The two most natural and obvious reasons why the intermarriage of near relations is forbidden are, first, that the natural affection which relatives have for each other is incompatible with conjugal lovze. They cannot coexist. The latter is a violation and destruction of the former. This reason need only be stated. It requires no illustration. These natural affections are not only healthful, but in the higher grades of relationship, even sacred. The second ground for such prohibitions is a regard to domestic purity. When persons are so nearly related to each other as to justify their living together as one family, they should be sacred one to the other. If this were not the case, evil could hardly fail t{o occur, when young people grow up in the familiarity of domestic life. The slightest inspection of the details of the law as laid down in the eighteenth chapter of Leviticus, shows that his principle underlies many of its specifications.\par J. D. Michaelis, in his work on the law of Moses, makes this the only reason for the Levitical prohibitions. He goes to the extreme of denying that \ldblquote nearness of kin\rdblquote is in itself any bar to marriage. His views had great influence, not only on pub|lic opinion, but even on legislation in Germany. That influence, however, passed away when a deeper moral and religious feeling gained ascendancy.\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\f1\fs16 409\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Augustine\rquote s Theory.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\}fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Augustine advanced a theory on this subject, which still has its earnest advocates. He held that the design of all these prohibitory laws was to widen the circle of the social affections. Brothers and sisters are bound together by mutual love. Should they intermarry the circle is not extended. If they choose husbands and wives from among strangers, a larger number of pers~ons are included in the bonds of mutual love. \ldblquote\lang1142 Habita est ratio rectissima charitatis, ut homines quibus esset utilis atque honesta concordia, diversarum necessitudinum vinculis necterentur; nec unus in uno multas haberet, sed singul\'e6 spargerentur in singulos; ac sic ad socialem vitam diligentius colligandam plurim\'e6 plurimos obtinerent.\lang1033\rdblquote Thus it would come to pass, \ldblquote\lang1142 Ut unus homo haberet alteram sororem, alteram uxorem, alteram consobrinam, alterum patrem, alterum avunculum, alterum socerum, alteram matrem, alteram amitam, alteram socrum: atque ita se non in paucitate coarctatum, sed latius atque numerosius propinquitatibus crebris vinculum sociale diffunderet.\lang1033\rdblquote\par A writer in Hengstenberg\rquote s \ldblquote Evangelische Kirchen-Zeitung,\rdblquote adopts and elaborately vindicates this theory. He endeavours to show that it answers all the criteria by which any theory on the subject should be tested. These marriages are called \ldblquote abominations;\rdblquote and he asks, Is it not shameful that the benevolent ordinance of God for extending the circle of the social affections should be counteracted? They are called \ldblquote confusion,\rdblquote because they unite those whom God commands to remain separate. It also accounts for the propriety of the intermarriage of brothers and sisters in the family of Adam; for in the beginning the circle of affection did not admit of being enlarged. It even meets the case if the Levirate law which bound a man to marry the childless widow of his brother. The law which forbids the marriage of relations, holds only where the relationship is close. There must, therefore, be cases just on the line beyond which relationship is no bar to marriage. And with regard to those just within the line, there must be considerations which sometimes outweigh the objections to a given marriage. That God dispensed with the law forbidding the marriage of a man with his brother\rquote s widow, when the brother died without children, this German writer regards as impossible. \ldblquote Evil,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote may be tolerated, but not commanded.\rdblquote He adds that it provokes a smile (\lang1031 man muss es naiv nennen\lang1033 ) that Gerhard finds an analogy between the case in question and the permission given to the Israelites to despoil the Egyptians. It is probable that the venerable Gerhard would smile at the writer\rquote s criticisms. In the first place, God can no more allow evil than He can command it. An act otherwise evil, ceases to be so when He either allows (\i i.e\i0 ., sanctions) it, or commands it. If He commands a man to be put to deaths it ceases to be murder to put him to death. There are two principles of morality generally accepted and clearly Scriptural; one of which is, that any of those moral laws which are founded, not on the immutable nature of God, but upon the relations of men in the present state of existence, may be set aside by the divine law-giver whenever it seems good in his sight; just as God under the old dispensation set aside the original monogamic law of marriage. Polygamy was not sinful as long as God permitted it. The same principle is involved in the words of Christ, God loves mercy and not sacrifice. When two laws conflict, the weaker yields to the stronger. It is wrong to labour on the Sabbath, but any amount of labour on that day becomes a duty, if necessary to save life. In the case of the Levirate law, the prohibition to marry a brother\rquote s widow, yielded to what under the Mosaic economy was regarded as a higher obligation, that is, to perpetuate the family. To die childless was considered one of the greatest calamities.\par The question, however, concerning the rationale of these laws is one of minor importance. We may not be able to see exactly in all cases why certain things are forbidden. The fact that they are forbidden should satisfy the reason and the conscience. The two important questions in connection with this subject, to be considered, are, first, is the Levitical law respecting prohibited marriages still in force? and, second, how is that law to be interpreted, and what marriages does it forbid?\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Is the Levitical Law of Marriage still in force?\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 1. It is a strong \i\'e0 priori\i0 argument in favour of an affirmative answer to that question, that it always has been regarded as obligatory by the whole Christian Church.\par 2. The reason assigned for the prohibition contained in that law, has no special reference to the Jews. It is not found is their peculiar circumstances, nor in the design of God in selecting them to be depositaries of his truth to prepare the world for the coming of the Messiah. The reason assigned \ldblquote is nearness of kin.\rdblquote This reason has as much force at one time as at another, for all nations as for any one nation. There was nothing peculiar in the relation in which Hebrew parents and children, Hebrew brothers and sisters, and Hebrew uncles and nieces, stood, which was the ground of these prohibitions. That ground was the nearness of the relationship itself as it exists in every and in all ages. There is, therefore, in the sight of God, a permanent reason why near relations ought not to intermarry.\par 3. If the Levitical law be not still in force, we have no divine law on the subject. Then there is no such sin as incest. It is an offence only against the civil law, and a sin against God only in so far as it is sinful to violate the law of the state. But this is contrary to the universal judgment of men, at least of Christian men. For parents and children, brothers and sisters, to intermarry is universally considered as sin against God, irrespective of any human prohibition. But if a sin against God, it must be forbidden in his Word, or we must give up the fundamental principle of Protestantism, that the Scriptures are the only infallible rule of our faith and practice. As such marriages are nowhere in the Bible forbidden except in the Levitical law, if that law does not forbid them, the Bible does not forbid them.\par 4. The judgments of God are denounced against the heathen nations for permitting the marriages which the Levitical law forbids. In \cf2\ul Lev_18:8\cf0\ulnone , it is said, \ldblquote After the doings of the land of Egypt, wherein ye dwelt shall ye not do: and after the doings of the land of Canaan, whither I bring you, shall ye not do; neither shall ye walk in their ordinances.\rdblquote This is the introduction to the law of prohibited marriages, containing the specification of the \ldblquote ordinances\rdblquote of the Egyptians and Canaanites, which the people of God were forbidden to follow. And in the twenty-seventh verse of the same chapter, at the close of these specifications, it is said, \ldblquote All these abominations have the men of the land done, which were before you, and the land is deified.\rdblquote Again, in ch.\cf2\ul Lev_20:23\cf0\ulnone , still in reference to these marriages, it is said, \ldblquote Ye shall not walk in the manners of the nations which I cast out before you: for they committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them.\rdblquote This is a clear proof that these laws were binding, not on the Jews alone, but upon all people and at all times.\par 5. The continued obligation of the Levitical law on this subject\cf1\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 is also recognized in the New Testament. This recognition as involved in the constant reference to the law of Moses as the law of God. If in any of its parts or specifications it is no longer obligatory, that is to be proved. It contains much which we learn from the New Testament was designed simply to keep the Hebrews a distinct people; much which was typical; much which was a shadow of things to come, and which passed away when the substance was revealed. It contained, however, much which was moral and of permanent obligation. If God gives a law to men, those who deny its perpetual obligation are bound to prove it. The presumption is that it continues in force until the contrary is proved. It must be hard to prove that laws founded on the permanent social relations of men were intended to be temporary.\par Besides this general consideration, we find specific recognitions of the continued obligation of the Levitical law in the New Testament. John the Baptist, as recorded in \cf2\ul Mar_6:18\cf0\ulnone and \cf2\ul Mat_14:4\cf0\ulnone , said to Herod that it was not lawful for him to have his brother Philip\rquote s wife. It matters not, as to the argument, whether Philip was living or not. The offence charged was not that he had taken another man\rquote s wife, but that he had taken his brother\rquote s wife. It may be objected to this argument that during the ministry of John the Baptist the law of Moses was still in force. This Gerhard denies, who argues from \cf2\ul Mat_11:13\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote All the prophets and the law prophesied until John, that the Baptist\rquote s ministry belongs to the new dispensation. This may be doubted. Nevertheless John expressed the moral sentiment of his age; and the record of the fact referred to by the Evangelists whose Gospels were written after the Christian Church was fully organized, is given in a form which involves a sanction of the judgment which the Baptist had expressed against the marriage of Herod with his brother\rquote s wife. It is also to be remembered that the Herodian family was Idumean, and therefore, that a merely Jewish law would have no natural authority over them.\par The Apostle Paul, moreover, in \cf2\ul 1Co_5:1\cf0\ulnone , speaks of a man\rquote s marrying his step-mother as an unheard of offence. That this was a case of marriage and not of adultery is plain because the phrase \cf3\f2\'e3\'f5\'ed\'e1\f3\u8150?\f2\'ea\'e1\f4 \f3\u7956?\f2\'f7\'e5\'e9\'ed\cf0\f0 is never used in the New Testament except of marriage. This, therefore, is a clear recognition of the\cf1\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 continued obligation of the law forbidding marriage between near relations, whether the relationship was by consanguinity or affinity.\par 6. The Bible everywhere enforces those laws which have their foundation in the natural constitution of men. That this Levitical law is a divine authentication of a law of nature, may be inferred from the fact that with rare exceptions the intermarriage of near relations is forbidden among all nations. Paul says that the marriage of a man with his step-mother was unheard of among the heathen; \i i.e\i0 ., it was forbidden and abhorred. Cicero exclaims, \ldblquote\lang1142 Nuoit genero socrus. O mulieris incredibile et pr\'e6ter hanc unam in omni vita inauditum!\lang1033\rdblquote Beza says, It must not be overlooked that the civil laws of the Romans agree completely in reference to this subject with the divine law. They seemed to have copied from it.\par No Christian Church doubts the continued obligation of any of the laws of the Pentateuch, of which it can be said that the reason assigned for their enactment is the permanent relations of men; that the heathen are condemned for their violation; and that the New Testament refers to them as still in force: and which heathen nations under the guidance of natural conscience have enacted.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i How is the Levitical Law to be interpreted?\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Admitting the Levitical law of marriage to be still in force, the next question is, How is it to be interpreted? Is it to be understood as specifying the degrees of relation, whether of consanguinity or of affinity, within which intermarriage is forbidden? or, is it to be viewed as an enumeration of particular cases, so that no case not specifically mentioned is to be included in the prohibition?\par The former of these rules of interpretation is the one generally adopted; for the following reasons: \emdash\par 1. The language of the law itself. It begins with a general prohibition of marriage between those who are near of kin. Nearness of kindred is made the ground of the prohibition. The specifications which follow are intended to show what degree of nearness of kindred works a prohibition. This reason applies to many cases not particularly mentioned in Leviticus17 or elsewhere.\cf1\f1\fs16 4\cf0\f0\fs24 The law would seem to be applicable to all cases in which the divinely assigned reason for its enactment is found to exist.\par 2. The design of the law, as we have seen, is twofold: first, to keep sacred those relationships which naturally give rise to feelings and affections which are inconsistent with the marriage relation; and secondly, the preservation of domestic purity. As the natural affections are due partly to the very constitution of our nature, and partly to the familiarity and constancy of intercourse, and the interchange of kindly offices, it is natural that in the enumeration of the prohibited cases regard should be had, in the selection, to those in which this familiarity of intercourse, at the time the law was enacted, actually prevailed. In the East the family is organized on different principles from those on which it is organized in the West. Among the early Oriental nations especially, the males of a family with their wives remained together; while the daughters, being given in marriage, went away and were amalgamated with the families of their husbands. Hence it would happen that relatives by the father\rquote s side would be intimate associates, while those of the same degree on the mother\rquote s side might be perfect strangers. A law, therefore, constructed on the principle of prohibiting marriage between parties so related as to be already in the bonds of natural affection and who were domesticated in the same family circle, would deal principally in specifications of relationships on the father\rquote s side. It would not follow, however, from this fact, that relations of the same grade of kindred might freely intermarry, simply because they were not specified in the enumeration. The law in its principle applies to all cases, whether enumerated or not, in which the nearness of kin is the source of natural affection, and in which it leads to and justifies intimate association.\par 3. Another consideration in favour of the principle of interpretation usually adopted, is, that the opposite rule would introduce the greatest inconsistencies into the law. The law forbids marriage between those near of kin; and, according to this rule, it goes on alternately permitting and forbidding marriages where the relationship is precisely the same. Thus, a man cannot marry the daughter of his son; but a woman may marry the son of her daughter; a man cannot marry the widow of his father\rquote s brother, but he may marry the widow of his mother\rquote s brother; a woman cannot marry two brothers, but a man may marry two sisters. These inconsistencies might be intelligible if the law were a temporary and local enactment, designed for a transient\cf1\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 state of society; but they are utterly unaccountable if the law be one of permanent and universal obligation. A rule of interpretation which brings uniformity and consistency into these enactments of Scripture, is certainly to be preferred to one which renders them confused and inconsistent.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf4\i Prohibited Degrees.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The cases specifically mentioned are: 1. Mother. 2. Stepmother. 3. Grand-daughter. 4. Sister and half-sister, \ldblquote born at home or born abroad,\rdblquote \i i.e\i0 ., legitimate or illegitimate. 5. Aunt on the father\rquote s side. 6. Maternal aunt. 7. The wife of a father\rquote s brother. 8. Daughter-in-law. 9. Brother\rquote s wife. 10. A woman and her daughter. 11. A wife\rquote s grand-daughter. 12. Two sisters at the same time.\par The meaning of \cf2\ul Lev_18:18\cf0\ulnone , has been much disputed. The question is, Whether the words \lang1037\f5\rtlch\fs27\'e0\'c4\'f9\'d1\'c8\'e4 \'e0\'c6\'ec\'ce\'e0\'c2\'fa\'c9\'fa\'c8\'e4\'cc\lang1033\f0\ltrch\fs24 , \ldblquote a woman to her sister,\rdblquote are to be understood in their idiomatic sense, \ldblquote one to another,\rdblquote so that the law forbids bigamy, the taking of one wife to another during her lifetime; or, Whether they are to be taken literally, so that this law forbids a man\rquote s marrying the sister of his wife while the latter is living. It is certain that the words in question have in several places the idiomatic sense ascribed to them. In \cf2\ul Exo_26:3\cf0\ulnone , \ldblquote Five curtains shall be coupled together one to another,\rdblquote literally, \ldblquote a woman to her sister;\rdblquote so in verse 5, the loops take hold, \ldblquote a woman and her sister;\rdblquote ver. 6, the taches of gold unite the curtains, \ldblquote a woman and her sister.\rdblquote Also in ver. 17. Thus also in \cf2\ul Eze_1:9\cf0\ulnone , it is said, \ldblquote their wings were joined one to another,\rdblquote \ldblquote a woman to her sister;\rdblquote and again in ch. iii. 13. The words therefore admit of the rendering given in the margin of the English version. But it is objected to this interpretation in this case: (1.) That the words in question never mean \ldblquote one to another,\rdblquote except when preceded by a plural noun; which is not the case in \cf2\ul Lev_18:18\cf0\ulnone . (2.) If this explanation be adopted, the passage contains an explicit prohibition of polygamy, which the law of Moses permitted. (3.) It is unnatural to take the words \ldblquote wife\rdblquote and \ldblquote sister\rdblquote in a sense different from that in which they are used throughout the chapter. (4) The ancient versions agree with the rendering given in the text of the English Bible. The Septuagint has \cf3\f2\'e3\'f5\'ed\'e1\f3\u8150?\f2\'ea\'e1\f4 \f3\u7952?\f2\'f0\f4 \f3\u7936?\f2\'e4\'e5\'eb\'f6\f3\u8135?\f4 \f2\'e1\f3\u8016?\f2\'f4\f3\u8134?\f2\'f2\cf0\f0 ; the Vulgate, \ldblquote\lang1142 sororem uxoris tu\'e6\lang1033 .\rdblquote\par In this interpretation the modern commentators almost without exception agree. Thus Maurer renders the passage: \ldblquote\lang1142\lquote Uxorem \cf1\f1\fs16 416\cf0\f0\fs24 ad (\i i.e\i0 ., pr\'e6ter) sororem ejus ne ducito,\rquote \i i.e\i0 ., Nolli pr\'e6ter tuam conjugem aliam insuper uxorem ducere, qu\'e6 illius soror est.\lang1033\rdblquote Baumgarten\rquote s comment is: \ldblquote From the fact that the prohibition of the marriage of a wife\rquote s sister is expressly conditioned on the life of the former, we must infer with the Rabbins, that after the death of the wife this marriage is permitted. True, the degree of affinity is here the same as in ver. 16, but there the relationship is on the male, here on the female side; this makes a difference, because under the Old Testament the woman had not attained to the same degree of personality and independence as the man.\rdblquote Rosenm\'fcller says: \ldblquote\lang1142 Uxorem ad sororem ejus ne ducas, duas sorores ne ducas in matrimonium, scil. \lang1037\f5\rtlch\fs27\'e1\'c0\'e4\'c7\'e9\'cc\'c6\'e9\'e4\'c8\lang1142\f0\ltrch\fs24 in vita ejus, \i i.e.\i0 , uxore tua vivente. Non igitur prohibet Moses matrimonium cum sorores uxoris mortu\'e6.\lang1033\rdblquote Knobel says: \ldblquote Finally, a man shall not marry the sister of his wife, so long as the latter lives. To marry one after the other, after the death of the other, is not forbidden.\rdblquote Keil understands v. 18 in the same way. It forbids, according to his view, a man\rquote s having two sisters, at the same time, as his wives. \ldblquote After the death of the first wife,\rdblquote he adds, \ldblquote marriage with her sister was allowed.\rdblquote\par The inference which these writers draw from the fact that in this passage the marriage of a wife\rquote s sister is forbidden during the life of the wife, that the marriage of the sister, after the death of the wife, is allowed, is very precarious. All that the passage teaches is, that if a man chooses to have two wives, at the same time, which the law allowed, they must not be sisters; and the reason assigned is, that it would bring the sisters into a false relation to each other. This leaves the question of the propriety of marrying the sister of a deceased wife just where it was. This verse has no direct bearing on that subject.\par The cases not expressly mentioned in Leviticus xviii., although involving the same degree of kindred as those included in the enumeration, are: 1. A man\rquote s own daughter. This is a clear proof that the enumeration was not intended to be exhaustive. 2. A brother\rquote s daughter. 3. A sister\rquote s daughter. 4. A maternal \cf1\f1\fs16 417\cf0\f0\fs24 uncle\rquote s widow. 5. A brother\rquote s son\rquote s widow. 6. A sister\rquote s son s widow. 7. The sister of a deceased wife.\par As nearness of kindred is made the ground of prohibition, and as these cases are included within \ldblquote the degrees\rdblquote specified, the Church has considered them as belonging to the class of prohibited marriages. It is, however, to be considered that the word \ldblquote prohibited,\rdblquote as here used, is very comprehensive. Some of the marriages specified in the Levitical law are prohibited in very different senses. Some are pronounced abominable, and those who contract them are made punishable with death. Others are pronounced unseemly, or evil, and punished by exclusion from the privileges of the theocracy. Others again incur the penalty of dying childless; probably meaning that the children of such marriages should not be enrolled in the family registers which the Jews were so careful to preserve.\par As this distinction is recognized in the law itself, so it is founded in the nature of the case. As nearness of kin varies from the most intimate relationship to the most distant, so these marriages vary in their impropriety from the highest to the lowest degree. Some of them may, in certain cases, be wrong, not in themselves, but simply from the obligation to uphold a salutary law. That is, there may be cases to which the law, but not the reason of the law applies. For example; a man may go thousands of miles from home and marry: his wife would stand in a very different relation to her husband\rquote s brothers, than had she lived in the same house with them. The law forbidding a woman to marry the brother of her deceased husband, would apply to her; but the reason of that law would affect her in a very slight degree; nevertheless, even in her case, the law should be observed.\par There is another obvious remark that ought to be made. Strong repugnance is often felt and expressed against the Levitical law, not only because it is regarded as placing all the marriages specified on the same level, representing all as equally offensive in the sight of God, but also from the assumption that all the marriages forbidden are, if contracted, invalid. This is a wrong view of the subject. It is inconsistent with the law itself, and contrary to the analogy of Scripture. The law recognizes a great disparity in the impropriety of these marriages. Some, as just remarked, are utterly abominable and insufferable. Others are specified because inexpedient or dangerous, as conflicting with some ethical or prudential principle.\par It is in this as in many other cases. The Mosaic law discountenanced\cf1\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 and discouraged intermarriage between the chosen people and their heathen neighbours. With regard to the Canaanites, such intermarriages were absolutely forbidden; with other heathen nations, although discountenanced, they were tolerated. Joseph married an Egyptian; Moses, a Midianite; Solomon married Pharaoh\rquote s daughter. Such marriages, in the settled state of the Jewish nation, may have been wrong, but they were valid. Even now under the Christian dispensation, believers are forbidden to be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. It does not follow from this that every marriage between a believer and an unbeliever is invalid. These remarks are not out of place. The truth suffers from being misapprehended. If the Bible is made to teach what is contrary to the common sense, or the intuitive judgments of men, it suffers great injustice. No man can force himself to believe that a man\rquote s marrying the sister of a deceased wife is the same kind of offence as a father\rquote s marrying his own daughter. The Bible teaches no such doctrine; and it is a slander so to represent it.\par \i\par } ''1+Q!1.19.11.C. cont..{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\ansicpg1252\dC*QE1.19.11.B. cont..{\rtf1\fbidis\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\fswiss\fcharset161{\*\fname Arial;}Arial Greek;}{\f3\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Tahoma;}{\f4\froman\fcharset0 Gentium;}{\f5\froman\fprq2\fcharset177 Times New Roman;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red153\green51\blue0;\red255\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.'eff0{\fonttbl{\f0\froman\fprq2\fcharset0 Times;}{\f1\fswiss\fprq2\fcharset0 Arial;}{\f2\froman\fprq2\fcharset177 Times New Roman;}{\f3\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red255\green0\blue0;\red255\green255\blue255;\red0\green128\blue0;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\lang1033\i\f0\fs24 Concluding Remarks.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 The laws of God are sacred. They are founded, not only on his infinite wisdom, but also on the nature of his creatures, and, therefore, should be sedulously observed. There may, in some cases, be honest difference of opinion as to what the law or will of God is, but when ascertained, it is our wisdom and duty to make it the rule of our conduct. This is so obvious that the statement of it may seem entirely superfluous. It is so common. however, for men professing to be Christians to make their own feelings, opinions, and views of expediency, the rule of action for themselves and others, that it is by no means a work of supererogation, to reiterate on all proper occasions the truism that there is no wisdom like God\rquote s wisdom, and that men are never wise except when they follow the wisdom of God as revealed in his Word, even when they have to do it blindly.\par  There are certain principles which underlie the marriage laws of the Bible, which all men in their private capacity and when acting as legislators, would do well to respect, \emdash\par 1. The first is, that marriage is not a mere external union; it is not simply a mutual compact; it is not merely a civil contract. It is a real, physical, vital, and spiritual union, in virtue of which man and wife become, not merely in a figurative sense, but really, although in a mysterious sense, one flesh. This is not only expressly\cf2\f1\fs16 9\cf0\f0\fs24 declared by Christ himself to be the nature of marriage, but it is the doctrine which underlies the whole Levitical law on this subject. Nearness of kin is expressed constantly by saying that one is \ldblquote flesh of the flesh\rdblquote of the other, \lang1037\f2\rtlch\fs27\'f9\'d1\'c0\'e0\'c5\'f8 \'e1\'c0\'f9\'d2\'c8\'f8\'e5\'c9\lang1033\f0\ltrch\fs24 , \ldblquote\lang1142 Carnem carnis su\'e6 s. corporis sui esse cognatam propinquam, qu\'e6 est ut caro ejusdem corporis.\lang1033\rdblquote According to the Scriptures, therefore, husband and wife are the nearest of all relations to each other. According to the spirit, and most of the legislation of the present age, they are no relations at all. They are simply partners. If one member of a business firm die, his property does no; go to his partner, but to his own family; so if a wife die, without children, her property does not go to her husband, but to her third or fourth cousins. They, in the eye of the law, are more nearly related to her than her husband. This is not the light in which God looks upon marriage.\par 2. The second principle which underlies these marriage-laws is, that affinity is as real a bond of relationship as consanguinity. Fully one half of the marriages specified in Leviticus are prohibited on the ground of affinity. The same form of expression is used to designate both kinds of relationship. Those related to each other by affinity are said to be \ldblquote flesh of the flesh,\rdblquote one of the other, just as blood relations; because all the specifications contained in the eighteenth chapter of Leviticus are included under the general prohibition contained in the sixth verse, \ldblquote None of you shall approach to any that is near of kin to him;\rdblquote under this head are included step-mothers; mothers-in-law; step-daughters; sisters-in-law (as when a man is forbidden to marry the widow of his brother); uncle\rquote s wife, etc. These relationships are traced out in the line of affinity, just as far as they are in that of consanguinity. The declaration, therefore, contained in the Westminster Confession, \ldblquote The man may not marry any of his wife\rquote s kindred nearer in blood than he may of his own, nor the woman of her husband\rquote s kindred nearer in blood than of her own,\rdblquote is a simple and comprehensive statement of the law as laid down in Leviticus. In saying that affinity is as real a bond of relationship as consanguinity, it is not meant that it is as strong. A daughter is a nearer relation than a step-daughter, or daughter-in-law; a mother than a step-mother; a sister than a sister-in-law. This, as we have seen, is recognized in the law itself.\cf2\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 The Bible asserts nothing inconsistent with fact or nature. In making affinity a real bond of kindred, it is meant that it is no merely nominal, or conventional, or arbitrary. It has its foundation in nature and fact.\par Mr. Bishop, in his elaborate work on \ldblquote Marriage and Divorce,\rdblquote says, \rdblquote A truly enlightened view will doubtless discard altogether affinity as an impediment, while it will extend somewhat the degrees of consanguinity within which marriages will be forbidden.\rdblquote He also teaches that \ldblquote the relationship by affinity\rdblquote ceases \ldblquote with the dissolution which death brings to the marriage. If, when a man\rquote s wife dies, she is still his wife, then, of course, her sister is still his sister. If, on the other hand, the wife is no more the wife after her death, then is her sister no more the sister of the husband. And though men who have no other idea of religion than to regard it as a bundle of absurd and loathed forms, may not be able to see how the termination of the relationship by the death of the wife is of any consequence in the case, yet men who discern differently and more wisely, will discover nothing unseemly in practically acting upon a fact which everybody knows to exist.\rdblquote\par It is very evident that Mr. Bishop never asked himself what, in the present connection, the word \ldblquote relationship\rdblquote means. Had he had any clear idea of the meaning of the word, he never could have written the above sentences. By relationship is here meant the relation in which parties stand to each other; and that, in the case supposed, is a matter of feeling, affection, and intimacy. This relationship is not dissolved by the death of the person through whom it arose. A wife\rquote s sister continues to cherish to her widowed brother-in-law the same sisterly affection after, as before her sister\rquote s death. She can live with him, guide his house, and take charge of his children, without the slightest violation of her self-respect, and without fear of incurring the disrespect of others.\par Besides, if relationship by affinity is dissolved by death, then a son may, on the death of his father, marry his step-mother, which Paul says (\cf3\ul 1Co_5:1\cf0\ulnone ) was not tolerated among the heathen. We have not come to that yet. On the principle of Mr. Bishop, a man may marry his mother-in-law, his daughter-in-law, and, on the death of the mother, his step-daughter. All this the Bible forbids; and whatever religion in some of its manifestations may\cf2\f1\fs16 1\cf0\f0\fs24 be, the Bible, surely, is not \ldblquote a bundle of absurd and loathed forms.\rdblquote It is the wisdom of God, in the presence of which the wisdom of man is foolishness.\par 3. The great truth contained in these laws is, that it is the will of God, the dictate of his infinite and benevolent wisdom that the affections which belong to the relation in which kindred (whether by consanguinity or affinity) stand to each other, should not be disturbed, perverted, or corrupted by that essentially different kind of love which is appropriate and holy in the conjugal relation; and that a protecting halo should be shed around the family circle.\par \pard\ltrpar\cf4\f3\fs23\par } \tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\lang1033\b\f0\fs24\'a7\~12. \i The Eighth Commandment.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\b0 This commandment forbids all violations of the rights of property. The right of property in an object is the right to its exclusive possession and use.\par The foundation of the right of property is the will of God. By this is meant, (1.) That God has so constituted man that he desires and needs this right of the exclusive possession and use of certain things. (2.) Having made man a social being, He has made the right of property essential to the healthful development of human society. (3.) He has implanted a sense of justice in the nature of man, which condemns as morally wrong everything inconsistent with the right in question. (4.) He has declared in his Word that any and every violation of this right is sinful.\par This doctrine of the divine right of property is the only security for the individual or for society. If it be made to rest on any other foundation, it is insecure and unstable. It is only by making property sacred, guarded by the fiery sword of divine justice, that it can be safe from the dangers to which it is everywhere and always exposed.\par Numerous theories have been advanced on this subject. These theories have had a twofold object: the one to explain the nature and ground of the right; the other to explain how the right was originally acquired. These objects are distinct and should not be confounded.\par 1. The modern philosophical theory that might is right, that the strongest is always the best, includes indeed both these objects. If being is the only good, and if it is true the more of being the more of good, then he who has the most of being, he in whom the infinite is most fully revealed, has the right to have and to hold whatever he chooses to possess.\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\f1\fs16 422\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 2. If a regard to our individual well-being be the only ground of moral obligation, then a man has the right to whatever will make him happy. He may, and he certainly would, make a great mistake, if he supposed that taking what does not belong to him would promote his happiness; but he is restrained from such injustice only by a sense of prudence. He is entitled to have whatever in fact would make him happy, and for that reason.\par 3. If regard to the general good, the greatest happiness of the greatest number, or expediency, as Paley makes it, be the rule and ground of duty, then it will always be a matter of opinion, a matter on which men will ever differ, what is, and what is not expedient. One might think that a community of goods would promote the greatest good, and then he would, at least in his own conscience, be entitled to act on that principle. Others might think that agrarianism, or the periodic distribution of all the land of the country in equal portions among the people, would promote the general good, and then that would be to them the rule of action. There would be no end to the devices to promote the greatest good, if the rights of men rested on no other foundation than that of expediency.\par Some of the most distinguished legal and philosophical writers of the present age teach that \ldblquote property is founded on utility.\rdblquote With some, however, utility is not the ground, but rather the test of human rights and duties. The fact that an institution or a course of conduct is conducive to the public good, is not so much the reason why it is right, as a proof that it is right and in accordance with the will of God. \ldblquote God designs the happiness of all his sentient creatures. Some human actions forward that benevolent purpose, or their tendencies are beneficent and useful. Other human actions are adverse to that purpose, or their tendencies are mischievous or pernicious. The former, as promoting his purpose, God has enjoined. The latter, as opposed to his purpose, God has forbidden. He has given us the faculty of observing; of remembering; and of reasoning; and by duly applying those faculties, we may collect the tendencies of our actions. Knowing the tendencies of our actions, and knowing his benevolent purpose, we know his tacit commands.\rdblquote It is no doubt true that it is a fair and conclusive argument that a thing is right or wrong in itself and conformed or opposed to the will of God, that its tendency is of necessity and always to produce, on the one\cf1\f1\fs16 3\cf0\f0\fs24 hand, good. or, on the other, evil. But this is a roundabout way of getting at the truth. Whether an institution or a course of action be useful or not, must be a matter of opinion. And if a matter of opinion, men will differ about it; and the opinion of one man, or even of the majority of men, will have no authority over others. God has revealed his will in his Word, and in the constitution of our nature. Paul says that even the heathen \ldblquote do by nature the things contained in the law,\rdblquote that the law is \ldblquote written in their hearts.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Rom_2:14-15\cf0\ulnone .) Property is sacred, not because in our opinion it is a useful institution, and hence inferentially approved by God, but He has said in the Bible, and says in every man\rquote s conscience, \ldblquote Thou shalt not steal.\rdblquote Mr. Austin\rquote s theory does not prevent his teaching that \ldblquote property \lang1142\i jus in rem\lang1033\i0 ,\rdblquote depends on \ldblquote principles of utility.\rdblquote\par 4. Paley says also that \ldblquote the real foundation of our right [to property] is the law of the land.\rdblquote He admits, however, that the law may authorize the most flagitious injustice. He therefore makes a distinction between the words and the intention of the law; and adds: \ldblquote With the law, we acknowledge, resides the disposal of property; so long, therefore, as we keep within the design and intention of a law, that law will justify us, as well in \lang1142\i foro conscienti\'e6\lang1033\i0 , as in \lang1142\i foro humano\lang1033\i0 , whatever be the equity or expediency of the law itself.\rdblquote The law of the land has indeed legitimately much to do with questions of property; but the right itself does not rest upon that law, and is, in the sight of God, independent of it. The right exists prior to all law of the state. The law cannot ignore that right. It cannot rightfully deprive a man of his property, except in punishment of crime, or on the ground of stringent necessity, and, in the latter case, with due compensation. Property, however, is not the creature of the law. No unjust law gives a title to property, valid in the sight of God; that is, a title which should satisfy a conscientious man in entering upon its possession and use. Even when the law is not unjust, it may work, not legal, but moral injustice. A will, for example, may clearly express the wishes and intention of a testator, but for some clerical or technical error be set aside and the property go to a person for whom it was not intended. Such person would have a legal, but not a morally valid title to the property. Good men are sometimes heard to say: \ldblquote We will take all the law gives us;\rdblquote in saying this, they do not apprehend the full meaning of their words; it amounts to saying that in matters of property they will make the law of the land, and not the law of God, the rule of their conduct.\par 5. It is a very common doctrine that the right of property is founded on common consent, or on the social compact. Men agree that each man may appropriate to himself a portion of what originally is common to all. But this consent only recognizes a right; it does not create it. If a man takes a glass of water from a stream common to all, it is of right his; and he has no need to appeal to any compact or consent to justify his appropriating it to himself. The question how a man acquires a right to property, and the nature of the right itself, as before remarked, are different questions, although intimately related.\par 6. Both are included in the common theory on the subject. If a man puts under culture a portion of unappropriated land, it is for the time being his, on the principle that a man owns himself, and therefore the fruits of his labour. Exclusive possession and use of the land in question are necessary to secure the man those fruits; he has, therefore, the right to the land as long as he uses it. If he abandons it, his right ceases. On the other hand, if his use is continued, so as to involve occupancy, his right of possession becomes permanent. It is on this principle men act in mining districts in unoccupied lands. Each man, the first comer, stakes out for himself a claim; this he works, or is entitled to keep to himself. If he abandons it and goes elsewhere, it ceases to be his. If he permanently occupies it, it is permanently his. The right of property is thus made to rest on occupancy and use; in other words, on labour. But even this, according to Blackstone, is not a natural right. \ldblquote All property,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote must cease upon death, considering men as absolute individuals, and unconnected with civil society: for then, by the principles before established, the next immediate occupant would acquire a right in all that the deceased possessed. But as, under civilized governments which are calculated for the peace of mankind, such a constitution would be productive of endless disturbances, universal law of almost every nation (which is a kind of secondary law of nature) has either given the dying person a power of continuing his property, by disposing of his possessions by will or, in case he neglects to dispose of it, or is not permitted to make any disposition at all, the municipal law of the country then steps\cf1\f1\fs16 5\cf0\f0\fs24 in, and declares who shall be the successor, representative, or heir of the deceased; that is, who alone shall have a right to enter upon this vacant possession, in order to avoid that confusion which its becoming again common would occasion.\rdblquote On the same page, speaking of the right of inheritance, he says: \ldblquote We are apt to conceive at first view that it has nature on its side; yet we often mistake for nature what we find established by long and inveterate custom. It is a wise and effectual, but clearly a political establishment; since the permanent right of property, vested in the ancestor himself, was no natural, but merely a civil right.\rdblquote He had said before, \ldblquote Necessity begat property; and in order to insure that property, recourse was had to civil society, which brought along with it a long train of inseparable concomitants; states, government, laws, punishments, and the public exercise of religions duties.\rdblquote This seems to be inverting the natural order of things. Disregard of the moral law would result in endless evil, and there is an absolute necessity that its commands should be observed and enforced; but the obligation of the law does not rest on that necessity; it is altogether anterior and independent of it. So the right of property is anterior and independent of the necessity of its being held sacred, in order to secure the wellbeing of mankind. The fact is, that the right of property is analogous to the right of life, liberty, or pursuit of happiness. It does not come from men; it is not given by man; and it cannot be ignored, or arbitrarily interfered with by man. It rests on the will of God as revealed in the constitution of our nature and in our relation to persons and things around us.\par 7. Stahl, the distinguished German jurist, gives substantially the following account of the matter. Man was formed out of the earth; but a divine spirit was breathed into him. He is, therefore, on the one hand, dependent on the material world; on the other, exalted above it. He is placed here as its lord and owner. The things of the outer world are given to him for the satisfaction of his physical wants, and of his spiritual necessities. He, therefore, has power and right over things external, and they must be permanently and securely under his control. This is the foundation of the right of property. Property is the means for the development of the individuality of the man. The manner in which it is acquired and used, reveals what the man is; his\cf1\f1\fs16 6\cf0\f0\fs24 food, clothing, and habitation; his expenditures for sensual enjoyment, for objects of taste, of art, and of science, and for hospitality, benevolence, and the good of society; and the consecration of his acquisitions to the interests of a higher life, \emdash these in their totality as they rest on the right of property, make out a man\rquote s portrait. Property, however, is specially designed to enable a man to discharge his moral duties. Every man has duties of his own to perform; duties which belong to him alone, not to others, not to society; duties which arise out of his personal vocation and standing, especially such as belong to his own family. Therefore he must have what is exclusively his own. Property, therefore, is not intended for mere self-gratification or support; nor is it a mere objectless mastery over things external; it is the necessary means to enable a man to fulfil his divinely-appointed destiny. Herein lies the divine right of property!\par The right of property, therefore, is not founded on the law of the land, or on any explicit or implied contract among men; but upon the law of nature. It is true that natural, as distinguished from positive laws, have been differently explained. \ldblquote As the science of ethics,\rdblquote says Lord Mackenzie, \ldblquote embraces the whole range of moral duties, its province is evidently much wider than that of jurisprudence, which treats only of those duties that can be enforced by external law.\rdblquote The duties, however, which can be thus enforced are of two kinds; those which arise from the natural, and those which arise from common or statute law. \ldblquote By the law of nature,\rdblquote says Chancellor Kent, \ldblquote I understand those fit and just rules of conduct which the Creator has prescribed to man as a dependent and social being, and which are to be ascertained from the deduction of right reason, though they may be more precisely known and more explicitly declared by divine revelation.\rdblquote Cicero, teaches that God is the author of natural law, and that its duties are of unchangeable obligation. He says, \ldblquote\lang1142 Nec erit alia lex Rom\'e6, alia Athenis, alia nunc, alia posthac; sed et omnes gentes et omni tempore una lex et sempiterna et immutabilis continebit, unusque erit communis quasi magister et imperator omnium deus.\lang1033\rdblquote\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\f1\fs16 427\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 Lord Mackenzie gives the doctrine of Cicero the sanction of his own judgment: \ldblquote Where,\rdblquote he says, \ldblquote the law of nature absolutely commands or forbids, it is immutable and of universal obligation, so that, although it may be confirmed, it cannot be controlled by human laws without a manifest violation of the divine will.\rdblquote\par In these days, when so many are disposed to throw off the authority of God, and regard marriage and property as mere creatures of the law, which may be regulated or ignored at the caprice or will of the people, it is well to remind them that there is a law higher than any law of man, enforced by the authority of God, which no man and no community can violate with impunity.\par Although the right of property involves the right of absolute control, so that a man can do what he will with his own, it does not follow that this right is unlimited, or that the civil law has no legitimate control over the use or distribution of his property. A man has no right to use his knowledge or strength to the injury of his fellow-men; neither can he use his property so as to make it a public nuisance; nor can he devote it to any immoral or hurtful object; nor can he dispose of it by will so as to militate against the public policy. Of course, as different nations are organized on different principles, the laws regulating the use and distribution of property must also differ. Among the Hebrews the land of Canaan was originally distributed equitably among the several families. The head of the family had not the unrestricted control of what was thus given him. He could not finally alienate it. His sons, not his daughters, unless there were no sons, were his heirs. The first-born had a double portion. (\cf2\ul Deu_21:15\cf0\ulnone ff.) These limitations of the right of property were ordained by God, in order that the ends of the theocracy might be accomplished. God saw fit to render it impossible that any large portion of the land should be engrossed by one or by a few families. In England public policy has assumed that it is important to maintain a powerful order of nobility. To secure that end the laws of primogeniture and entail have been long in force, with the result that the greater part of the land in Great Britain is in the hands of comparatively few families. This unequal distribution of property has gone on rapidly increasing, so that Hugh Miller, when editor of the \ldblquote Edinburgh Witness,\rdblquote said that England was now like a pyramid poised on its apex. In France the right of a testator to dispose of his property is very much limited. \ldblquote If any one die without issue or ascendants, he may leave his whole property to\cf1\f1\fs16 8\cf0\f0\fs24 strangers; but if a man at his death has one lawful child, he can only so dispose of the half of his estate; if he leave two children, the third; and if he leave three or more children, the fourth.\rdblquote In Scotland \ldblquote if a man die without either wife or issue, his whole property is at his own disposal; if he leave a wife and issue, his goods or personal property are divided into three equal parts, one of which goes to his wife as \lang1142\i jus relict\'e6\lang1033\i0 , another to his children as \lang1142\i legitim\lang1033\i0 (\i i.e., \lang1142 legitima portio\lang1033\i0 ), and the third is at his own disposal; if he leave no wife, he may dispose of one half, and the other half goes to his children, and so \lang1142\i e converso\lang1033\i0 , if he leave no children, the wife is entitled to one half, and he may bequeath the other.\rdblquote These facts are referred to simply as illustrations of the way in which the law, both divine and human, may limit the exercise of the right of property while the sacredness of that right, as higher than any human law, is fully recognized.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\i Community of Goods.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Community of goods does not necessarily involve the denial of the right of private property. When Ananias, having sold a possession, kept back part of the price, Peter said to him: \ldblquote While it remained was it not thine own? and after it was sold, was it not in thine own power?\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Act_5:4\cf0\ulnone .) Any number of men may agree to live in common, putting all their possessions and all the fruits of their labour into a common fund, from which each member is supplied according to his wants. This experiment was tried on a small scale and for a short time, by the early Christians in Jerusalem. \ldblquote The multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common.. Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses, sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, and laid them down at the Apostles\rquote feet: and distribution was made unto every man as he had need.\rdblquote (\cf2\ul Act_4:32-35\cf0\ulnone .) Some indeed say that these passages do not imply any actual community of goods. Having \ldblquote all things common\rdblquote is understood to mean, \ldblquote No one regarded his possessions as belonging absolutely to himself, but as a trust for the benefit of others also.\rdblquote This interpretation seems inconsistent with the whole narrative. Those who had possessions sold them. They renounced all control over what was once their own. The price was handed over to the Apostles and distributed by them or under their direction.\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\f1\fs16 429\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3 On the narrative as given in the Acts it may be remarked, \emdash\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 1. That the conduct of these early Christians was purely spontaneous. They were not commanded by the Apostles to sell their possessions and to have all things in common. There is not the slightest intimation that the Apostles gave any encouragement to this movement. They seem simply to have permitted it. They allowed the people to act under the impulse of their own feelings, each one doing what he pleased with his own.\par 2. It can hardly be deemed unnatural that the early Christians were led into this experiment. To us the wonders of redemption are \ldblquote the old, old story,\rdblquote inexpressibly precious indeed, but it has lost the power of novelty. In those to whom it was new it may well have produced an ecstatic bewilderment, which led their judgment astray. There are two great truths involved in the Gospel, the clear perception of which may account for the determination of those early converts to have all things in common. The one is that all believers are one body in Christ Jesus; all united to Him by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit; all equally partakers of his righteousness; all the objects of his love; and all destined to the same inheritance of glory. The other great truth is contained in the words of Christ, \ldblquote Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.\rdblquote It was no wonder, then, that men whose minds were filled with these truths, were oblivious of mere prudential considerations.\par 3. This experiment, for all that appears, was confined to the Christians in Jerusalem, and was soon abandoned. We never hear of it elsewhere or afterwards. It has, therefore, no preceptive force.\par 4. The conditions of the success of this plan, on any large scale, cannot be found on earth. It supposes something near perfection in all embraced within the compass of its operation. It supposes that men will labour as assiduously without the stimulus of the desire to improve their condition and to secure the welfare of their families as with it. It supposes absolute disinterestedness on the part of the more wealthy, the stronger, or the more able members of the community. They must be willing to forego all personal advantages from their superior endowments. It supposes perfect integrity on the part of the distributors of the common fund, and a spirit of moderation and contentment in each member of the community, to be satisfied with what offers, and not he, may think to be his equitable share. We shall have to\cf1\f1\fs16 0\cf0\f0\fs24 wait till the millennium before these conditions can be fulfilled. The attempt to introduce a general community of goods in the present state of the world, instead of elevating the poor, would reduce the whole mass of society to a common level of barbarism and poverty. The only secure basis of society is in those immutable principles of right and duty which God has revealed in his Word, and written upon the hearts of men. And these truths, even if acknowledged as matters of opinion, lose their authority and power if they cease to be regarded as revelations of the mind and will of God, to which human reason and human conduct must conform.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\i Communism and Socialism.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 Heaven is not higher than \ldblquote the lower parts of the earth,\rdblquote than the principles and aims of the early Christians were exalted above those of the modern advocates of the community of goods. This idea is not of modern origin. It appears in different forms in all ages of the world. It entered into the scheme of Plato\rquote s Republic, for in his view private property was the chief source of all social evils. It was included in the monasticism of the Middle Ages. Renunciation of the world included the renunciation of all property. Voluntary poverty was one of the vows of all monastic institutions. It was adopted by many of the mystical and fanatical sects which appeared before the Reformation, as the Beghards, and \ldblquote Brethren of the Free Spirit,\rdblquote who taught that the world should be restored to its paradisiacal state, and that all the distinctions created by law, whether of social organization, property, or marriage, should be done away. At the time of the Reformation the followers of M\'fcnzer adopted the same principles, and their efforts to carry them into practice led to the miseries of the \ldblquote peasant-war.\rdblquote All these movements were connected with fanatical religious doctrines. The leaders of these sects claimed to be inspired, and represented themselves as the organs and messengers of God.\par Modern communism, on the contrary, so far as its general character is concerned, is materialistic and atheistic, and in some of its forms pantheistic. This is consistent with the admission that some of its advocates, as St. Simon, Fourier, and others were sincere and benevolent men. Some of them, indeed, said that they only desired to carry out the principle of brotherly love so often inculcated by Christ. Communism and socialism are not properly convertible terms, although often used to designate the same system. The one has reference more especially to the principle of community in property; the latter to the mode of social organization. With Fourier, the former warn subordinate to the latter. He did not entirely deny the right of property, but insisted that society was badly organized. Instead of living in distinct families, each struggling for support and advancement, men should be gathered in large associations having common property, and all labouring for a common fund. That fund was to be distributed according to the capital contributed by each member, and according to the time and skill employed in the common service. Proudhon, immortalized by the book in which the question \ldblquote What is property?\rdblquote is answered by saying, \ldblquote Property is theft,\rdblquote makes the rule for the distribution of the common fund to be the time devoted to labour. Louis Blanc puts capital, labour, and skill out of consideration, and makes the wants of the individual the only rule of distribution. It is common to all these schemes that the right to property in land or its productions is denied. The two latter deny to a man all property in his own skill or talents; and the last, even in his labour, so that the idlest and least efficient member of society\cf1\f1\fs16 2\cf0\f0\fs24 should, according to it, receive as much as the most industrious and useful.\par The denial of the right of property is, to a great extent, connected with the rejection of religion and of marriage. Marriage, next to religion and property, was declared to be the greatest means of social misery. Children were not to belong to their parents, but to the state; inclination and enjoyment were to be the motive and the end and the rule of life.\par \pard\ltrpar\sb180\qc\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf3\i International Society.\i0\par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf0 France has been the birthplace and the principal seat of Communism in its modern form. The principles involved in the system have made wide progress in other countries, and leavened to a fearful extent the minds of the labouring classes both in Europe and in America. Organization and combination among the scattered millions said to be included in the membership of this society have given it an importance which has forced itself on the attention of almost all Christian states. What the principles and aims of this formidable body are, it is not easy satisfactorily to state. There has been no authoritative annunciation of principles recognized by all the affiliated societies. They differ, within certain limits, doubtless, among themselves. Some find their fit representatives in the Communists of Paris as they revealed themselves during the current year (1871). Others would shrink from the excesses which rendered the name of Communists an object of execration and abhorrence in all parts of the civilized world. Enough, however, is known of the designs of the society in question, to render it certain that its success would involve the overthrow of all existing governments; in placing all power in the hands, not of the people, but of a particular class, the operatives, the \i proletariat\i0 (the men without land); in the dissolution of society as at present organized; the abolition of private property; the extinction of the family; the abrogation of all marriage laws; and the proscription of religion, and especially of Christianity, as a public evil. Such are the avowed objects of some of the leaders of the movement, and such are the logical consequences of the principles advocated by the more reticent of their number.\par \pard\ltrpar\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656\cf1\f1\fs16 433\cf0\f0\fs24 \par \pard\ltrpar\fi360\sb180\qj\tx916\tx1832\tx2748\tx3664\tx4580\tx5496\tx6412\tx7328\tx8244\tx9160\tx10076\tx10992\tx11908\tx12824\tx13740\tx14656 It is a historical fact that Communism had its origin in its modern form in materialistic atheism; in the denial of God, who has the right to give laws to men, and the power and the purpose to enforce those laws by the retributions of justice; in the belief that the present life is the whole period of existence allotted to men, and that the enjoyments of this life are, therefore, all that men have to desire or expect. These principles had long been inculcated by such men as Rousseau, Voltaire, d\rquote Holbach, Diderot, and others. To produce a conflagration, however, there must be not only fire, but combustible materials. These materialistic principles would have floated about as mere speculations, had there not been such a mass of suffering and degradation among the people. It was minds burdened with the consciousness of misery and the sense of injustice which were inflamed by the new doctrines, and which burst forth in a fire that for a time set all Europe in a blaze. We must not attribute all the evil either to the infidels or to the people. Had it not been for the preceding centuries of cruelty and oppression, France had not furnished such a bloody page to the history of modern Europe.\par \ldblquote L\rquote Internationale\rdblquote for March 27th, 1870, expressed succinctly the object of the International Society: \ldblquote The rights of the working-men, that is our principle; the organization of the working-men, that is our means of action; social revolution, that is our end.\rdblquote It is \ldblquote working-men,\rdblquote artisans, not the mass of the p