Letters to Dr. James Brown
Edinburgh, BQth August 1833.
MY DEAR SIR, — It is owing entirely to my having been so long from home, that I have not till now requested your a call the accompaniments of a Jewish conversion, and a first resurrection, and a destruction of the assembled hosts of Antichrist” — (Posth. Worlcs, vol. iii. p. 51.)
Ps. LXYIII. 18-35. — “Mixed up with all the literalities of the typical, the great antitype shines forth in this high, sacred composition. We have positive evidence for Christ in this psalm, in Eph. iv. 8, — after which we need be at no loss for objects in the future triumph and victory of His cause adequate to the loftiest expressions which we here meet with.... There is every likelihood of allusions here to the great contest of the Book of Revelation.... But God has in reserve for His people still another restoration. He will bring them again as of old, from Bashan and the Red Sea to their own land. His people will see Him wlwm they have pierced,’ perhaps when his feet stand on the Mount of Olives, and Jerusalem will again become the great central sanctuary by becoming the metropolis of the Christian world.” — (Ibid. p. G9.)
ISA. LXV. 1 7-25. — “It is delightful to mark how an expression so general as that of the new heavens and the new earth, and therefore of the great and general renovation, should be blended with the expression of God’s special kindness to his ancient people — proving that the Jews are to bear a prominent part in the establishment of the next economy. We are greatly wanting in the details of the millennium; and perhaps from the want of Scriptural data for the determination of them. We can not think of those who bear part in the first resurrection that they will again die; but will none of the righteous die? And if not, what is meant by the child dying a hundred years old? And in contrast with him, the sinner, who, though he should live a hundred years, will be accursed. We doubt not that there will be two contemporaneous societies at that period — the righteous and the wicked, who are without, and will not be permitted to hurt or to destroy in all God’s holy mountain. Again, will there be a change in the laws of animal nature — that the carnivorous shall cease being so; or are these things only figurative? The earth, with its curse fully removed, will be greatly more productive, and so as that men shall not labour in vain, as now.” — (Ibid. p. 339.)
ceptance of my last work; and I feel very much flattered by your favourable opinion of it. This is but the second day of my return from England.
I agree in all you say on the subject of Mr. Duncan’s work, with the exception of your single remark upon its dedication, than which he could have done nothing more rightly and appropriately. It is the common feeling of us both, that what ever of the academic spirit, or of the purely academic enthusiasm, either of us may possess, we are far more indebted for it to you, than to all other teachers put together. Of all my living instructors, I have ever reckoned first yourself, then Professor Robison of Edinburgh, and, lastly, Dr. Hunter of St. Andrews, as far the most influential in the formation both of my taste and intellectual habits. I have read the Preface, and I think the book promises vastly well. My two eldest daughters, who have mastered the first four books of Euclid, are to attempt the perusal of it; and I mean to accompany them. Such is my confidence in Mr. Duncan’s powers of lucid conveyance, while he at the same time sustains the purity and dignity of the science, that I have no doubt of their fully understanding him.
I shall do all I can for the volume, but that is little. A review from your pen in the pages of the “Edinburgh” would make its fortune. — With best regards to Mrs. and Miss Brown, I am, my dear sir, yours most truly, THOMAS CHALMERS.
No. CCLIX.
Edinburgh, IQth February 1834.
MY DEAR SIR, — I agree with you in thinking that the appointment of Ivory would shed very great eclat on our University. Whether he would make a good working professor, I know not; but I shall take every fair opportunity of stating what I do know of him as an illustrious savant.
On the subject of your second note, which I presume to be yours though subscribed only with your initials, I agree with you in deprecating the universality of popular preaching throughout the Church, if by this is meant flimsy, or vulgar, or untasteful, or irrational preaching. But there is one ingredient of popularity which I should like to sec in all sermons, grounded as it is on the adaptation of the peculiar doctrines of Christianity to the felt wants and exigencies of our moral nature, and to the workings and aspirations of which nature the peasant is as feelingly alive as the philosopher. For example, his conscience tells him, often more powerfully and just as intelligently, that he is under the condemnation of a violated law; and so it falls with all the greater acceptance upon his ear, that unto him a Saviour is born. The doctrine of the atonement, in fact, urged affectionately on the acceptance of the people, and held forth as the great stepping-stone, by which one and all are welcome to enter into reconciliation and a new life, (for a fully declared gospel is the very reverse of Antinomianism,) I hold to form the main staple of all good and efficient pulpit-work./ I need not say how much my recent illness has endeared to me the propitiated forgiveness of the New Testament — a forgiveness to which we cannot resort too early, and on which we cannot, if honestly desirous of conforming ourselves to the whole word and will of God, cast too confidently the whole burden of our reliance.
The interest you have taken in me inclines me to mention, that on Saturday week I received the notification from Paris of my appointment as a Corresponding Member of the Royal Institute of France. The place which they have assigned to me is in the Academy or Department of the Moral and Political Sciences. — I am, my dear sir, yours most gratefully, 2 E
No. CCLX.
Burntisland, 30th August 1836.
MY DEAR SIR, — It is with no common interest and satisfaction that I received your kind note; and am much gratified with your remembrance of me, who have fallen so much short of my own desires, and what, had it been possible, I should have regarded as one of my most incumbent duties, that of testifying, both by my frequent calls and frequent inquiries, how deep the respect, and how cordial is the attachment, I have ever felt for you. I need not say how much I am gratified by the approval you have given to my last published sermon. I have long thought that great injustice has been done to the theology of the New Testament, by the inadequate representations of Orthodoxy in regard to its practical character; and that if these were more insisted on, it might serve to recommend its precious overtures of welcome and good-will; its proclamation of forgiveness; its full and free amnesty, even to the chief of sinners; its grand disclosure of pardon to all who will, through the medium of an atonement, by which the law is magnified, while the transgressors of the law are taken into full reconciliation; and so a fairer exhibition of the righteousness of the Christian system might gain the acquiescence of many in these doctrines of salvation and grace, by which so many are nauseated, because they do not perceive the goodness and the virtue with which the acceptance of these doctrines is inseparably associated.
I cannot express the earnestness I feel that you, my dear Sir, may enjoy the comforts here, and be admitted to all the triumphs hereafter of a firmer faith in the Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
With kindest regards to Mrs. and Miss Brown, ever believe me, my dear Sir, yours most cordially and with great esteem,