Concluding Observations

If there be the weight in the preceding considerations which we attach to them, the Bible is not of man, but the work of God. Penned as it was by men, with powers and passions like our own, yet was it not in the ‘’words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth.” In tracing, in the foregoing imperfect argument, those developements of a cause which is more than human, may we not affirm, ‘’ This is the finger of God!” Every distinct consideration has its separate degree of importance; while, in the aggregate, they form a moral argument in favor of Divine Inspiration, which I trust may be regarded as deserving a place in the considerations of reflecting men.

1. There are many thoughts on which it would be pleasant to dwell in this concluding chapter, the first of which relates to the nature and importance of the argument from the Bible itself The thought of living within the empire of the God of heaven, without any clearer indications of his mind and will, as to our duty and final destination, than are furnished by the lights of reason and nature, ceases to be painful, only when it is forgotten and lost sight of. The more it is present to the mind, and the more it is dwelt upon, the more it is full of agony. It is no marvel, that some of the wiser and more thoughtful heathen of antiquity expressed the hope, that the time would come when light would dawn from heaven, and dissipate the darkness and uncertainty that enveloped them.

A revelation from God is indispensably necessary to make known his will. The only question is, Where is this revelation contained? We affirm that it was given at various times and in diverse ways; and that it was finally committed to writing, and is contained in what are called the Books of the Old and New Testaments. We maintain, that since the completion of this volume all immediate revelations from God have ceased; and that there is no immediate revelation of his will, except that which is here expressed.

We mean by inspiration in the first place, that we have things here revealed that are directly matters of faith; and that with respect to these, both the matter and the words were inspired, and the writers of them are very justly called the amanuenses of the Holy Ghost. In the next place, we have revelations of Scripture facts handed down by written tradition, and collected from other authentic sources, to which the writers were divinely directed, and in the presentation of which they were enabled, by the Divine Spirit, to distinguish the false from the true. And in the third place, we have a revelation of things, or facts directly perceived — seen and heard by the 290 Tie BIBLE NOT OF MAN.

writers themselves; and in recording which the Divine Spirit assisted their memories, so that they could put down what they did really see and hear. In one word, the God of heaven has given such a direction to the writers of this volume, that he is responsible for the Book itself.

The proof that this record is the word of God. is principally of two sorts; external, and internal: the first is testimony drawn from facts, and not immediately from the Bible; the second is evidence drawn directly from the Bible itself. This internal evidence, or the evidence found exclusively within the book itself, is separate from the external, and forms a distinct topic of consideration. So far as it regards our argument, it matters not who wrote the sacred Books, or whether they were received as inspired at the time when they first made their appearance; our object has been to show that the writers of them, whoever they may have been, were inspired men. I

The process is a simple one by which we ascertain what are the works of God, and what is the work of man. There are works which can be performed only by the Infinite and Omnipotent Creator. We have but to look upon them, and we know that they are his: our conclusion is one which it is not in the power of a sane mind to resist. The human mind cannot conceive them to be the work of man. We think it has been shown that this is true of the Bible; that it is a production that never could have had man for its author: the supposed cause is inadequate to the effect. There is no other book, that man might not have written — this is the work of God, proved to be such by the same evidence as proves that the sun in the firmament was brought into existence by his creative power. We look at the sun, and know that man could not have created it; we inspect the Bible, and our convictions are equally strong, that no unaided human pen could have written those wondrous pages. The substance of our argument in favor of its divine origin is just this, and nothing more. A thinking man, shipwrecked on a desolate island, and who knows nothing about this Book save what the Book itself contains, when once he understands it, and feels its power, could not resist the conviction that it is what it claims to be — the word of God.

If God has revealed his will to men, he must have associated with that revelation itself convincing evidence of its divine origin. There must be marks upon it that indicate its celestial birth. The strength of the argument in favor of its heavenly parentage, must be in the Book itself, rather than in anything which is out of it — in those internal indications which it bears of its Divine Author, rather than in those external processes by which it may be traced to the heaven whence it came. The human mind requires stronger proof of its superhuman origin, than any such historical research can furnish. However strong those convictions of its divine authority which are produced by an induction of the historical argument, those convictions are stronger

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which result from an inspection of the Scriptures themselves. We do not deem it enough, that the sacred writers themselves profess to be inspired; this is important testimony, but, aside from what they wrote, it is not decisive; and it is only in connection with what they wrote, that it is entitled to confidence. On a question where such momentous interests are at stake, we may look for the best evidence which the nature of the case admits. And what is this, if not the Book itself? If the Book itself does not discover the hand of God, nor utter the voice of God, nor reveal the heart of God, there is no testimony whatever that it is not the work of man. Just as holy men of old, when God revealed himself to them by the ministry of angels, or by audible voices, or in visions, or by Urim and Thummim, had the unwavering assurance that he himself spoke to them, and not another, may men have the conviction that it is God himself, and not another, who addresses them in his word. It must, in the nature of the case, be a self-authenticated revelation. It is with grateful admiration of the condescending goodness of God, that we contemplate the fact, that he has rendered the evidence of divine inspiration accessible to those, who, although they cannot read extensively, can and do read the Bible, and discover in it indubitable evidence of its heavenly som’ce. This is emphatically the argument of the unlearned — the poor mans argument — hidden peradventure ^’ from the wise and prudent, and revealed unto babes.’’

It often happens that many who are first in human learning, are last in the knowledge of God. The religion of the Bible is the religion of the multitude; not the religion of the schools. A babe in Christ discovers in it what is never discovered by the pride and vanity of human learningj however great its originality and profoundness of research. The schools of pagan philosophy were among its earliest and most virulent opposers, because it obscured their literary fame, and shook the proud fabric of their intellectual ambition. ‘^ I cannot dispute for Christ,” said a heroic female martyr, “but I can die for him.” Those who live by the Bible, can die by the Bible: though amid burning fires, they repose upon its promises as on a bed of roses, while, amid the fragrance of its unearthly atmosphere, their spirits return to him who gave them.

The time was, when men of learning and men of faith gave greater prominence to this inherent evidence, than to the external testimony. I know not from what causes it has happened — unless it be that the defenders of Christianity have been driven to the efi’ort by the learning and researches of infidelity, as well as stimulated by an honest consciousness of their own superior learning and researches — that such prominence has been given by Christian writers to this latter department of inquiry. The principal writers in favor of a supernatural revelation, more especially since the attacks made upon it by Hume and Gibbon, have directed their attention mainly to this external testimony. In so doing, they have not only been successful, but triumphant; the battery of the enemy has been silenced, and the strong fastnesses in which he trusted taken by storm. So far as my information extends, Lardner, Michaelis, Jones, Paley, Chalmers and Stuart, to say nothing of others, have furnished a mass of historical testimony to which infidels have not ventured to give anything which they themselves consider a reply: it stands unassailed — a conclusive refutation of the cavils of infidelity derived from historical sources. Yet after all that may be said in favor of the historical argument, it is the argument from the Book itself which most crowds the system of infidelity. A distinguished infidel, when once asked, ^’ How is it, that the Bible is so far superior to all other books that it can be read over and over, a thousand times, and still retain all its freshness;” and ‘^ why no other book like it was ever written?” replied, “Because there is not room in the world for two such books!” Lord Herbert, of Cherbury, the author of three distinguished treatises in opposition to Christianity, and whom Dr. Leland, in his ‘^ View of Deistical Writers,’’ declares to be “the most eminent of them that had appeared in England;” urges in his volume, De Religione Laid, this strong objection against the historical argument: ‘that in order to arrive at any certainty in these matters, it would be necessary for the common people either to learn all languages, to read all the celebrated writers, and to consult all those learned men that have not written — a method which is manifestly absurd and impracticable — or else to have recourse to a supreme judge of controversies, appointed by common consent.” Fas est ah hoste doceri. There is great weight in these concessions, coming as they do from infidel lips.

The argument from the Bible itself will also, if I mistake not, be found to be that on which the champions for the historical argument do themselves place the greatest reliance. It was eminently true of the Reformers, that they wrote on this subject like men instructed out of the Bible. That God alone is a sufficient witness of himself in his word, and that the Scriptures carry with them a self-evidencing power, was the teaching of Calvin, of Stapfer, of Vanmastricht, of Witsius, of Turretin, of Owen, of Beveridge, of Baxter, and a multitude of others who were the most successful defenders of Christianity. The doctrine of the Presbyterian church, beautifully and even eloquently expressed in her standards, is in the following language: “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 glory to God, the full discovery which it makes of the only way of man’s salvation, the many other incomparable excellencies, 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.” It will be recollected also, that the Scriptures themselves, in addition to the argument from miracles and prophecy, largely insist on this department of evidence. They make their appeal to themselves: they challenge men to ‘’ search them,” to “prove them.” The evidence is not far off, because the “word is nigh.” The light which they display declares by its own luminousness its Mighty Author:

“Some great Maker,

In goodness and in power preeminent.”

2. Another thought has reference to those who reject the divine authority of the Sacred Writings. The infidel affirms that this Book is not from God. What are his reasons for this bold and unsupported assertion? Is it, that the book itself is not wise enough to have God for its author? — or that it is not sufficiently kind and benevolent? — or that it is an unholy book? — or that its doctrines are such that they must, or might have been the commandments of men? — or that its religion bears too strong a resemblance to those of man’s devising? — or that its revelations are inconsistent and contradictory? — or that its system of truth, and duty, and salvation, are not fitted to a race fallen by their iniquity, soon to die, and their immortal spirit to return to the God who gave it? — or that experience shows that it has no dwelling in the bosoms of the men to whom its truths, its promises, and its blessed hopes are directed? — or that it is an outrage upon reason and common sense? We have endeavored to make it appear, that the converse of all these strange hypotheses is the only position that can be substantiated by all ingenuous and fair reasoning. The burden of proof, we confess, does not lie in the first instance upon the infidel, to show that this Book is not divinely inspired: it lies upon believers in it to show that it is so. But it should startle the unbeliever, that he finds it so herculean a task to prove that it is not so. It should at least lead him to doubt of his infidelity; to question if he be not building upon a false foundation; to look around him, and see if he has any foundation to stand upon save empty air.

It is impossible for him to know that the Scriptures are not the word of God; and it is very possible for him to know that they are his word. There is a strange fatality attending a certain class of men, in soberly persuading themselves that this Book is an imposture, or is more likely to turn out an imposture, because they themselves reject it. It requires but a single flash of thought, or rather a single flash of conscience, to dissipate this delusion, and to discover the dense folds of darkness with which such a mind euAvraps itself.

Upon the sceptic’s own showing, his own conclusions are doubtful. He is not sure that the volume he rejects is not the word of the Living God. And what a fearful, what a tremendous state of mind is this, to be entertained for an hour — to be persisted in, to carry up to the chamber where he dies, to attend him to his hereafter, and there to melt away and be dissolved under the strong and steady light

Bible not of Man. 3* of eternity, till it is transmuted and transformed into absolutej perfect despair!

Infidels would do well to look somewhat into the causes of their unbelief, and to institute a rigid scrutiny into the variety of concurrent circumstances, some, or all of which have contributed to that state of mind, and that cast of moral feeling, which has arrayed them against a Book so full of light and love. Is it that their reason is scandalized by it? or is it that their pride is wounded, and that their desire of intellectual distinction, and their boasted superiority over the common opinions of mankind, are humbled? Is it their benevolence that the Bible offends, and have they persuaded themselves, that their notions are of any great importance to the present and future well-being of their fellow men? Is it their piety that is offended; and is it that their own system draws the cords of moral obligation cldser and tighter than the Bible, and gives a negligent conscience less repose, and more abundantly multiplies the inducements to practical godliness? Is it their love of truth that is assailed by this Book of God, and is it solely for the truth’s sake that they oppose its claims? An honest reply to these and similar inquiries, might reveal causes of unbelief, of the existence and power of which the unbeliever himself is not fully conscious. Such a reply were a truthful comment on the declaration, Light is come into the world, and men have loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil.^^

There is no need of reminding infidels of the obligations they are under to a character corresponding to the claims of their infidelity. We take leave to recommend to them to make less of their speculations, and more of their character and conduct, as the safest and surest way of coming at a satisfactory and tranquil conclusion of the great inquiry, Whether the Bible be, or be not, of divine origin. Amid the advantages and privileges of a Christian land, it is impossible for them to shut out the light, or disclaim the solemn and affecting obligations in which they are involved. If there were nothing but their access to the Sacred Scriptures, this privilege alone is sufficient to leave them without excuse. Let them but deny ungodliness and worldly lusts, and live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world; and there will be an end to their infidelity. Let them seek light from the Father of lights, and love from the God of love; let them be punctual and devout in the duties of religion; and their night of darkness will be superseded by a bright and cheerful day. Let them exemplify the moral influence of the truth, in their internal spirit and external deportment; let them do God’s will; and they shall know of the doctrine of the Bible, whether it be of God, or the device of an impostor. It requires no sacrifice of truth for them to make this experiment; no compromise of principle, no wrong, or even unphilosophical concessions.

It is not hazarding much to assert, that the firmest and most intrepid and inflexible advocate of infidelity will find little room for doubt, when he once consents thus to prove and bring to a practical test the truth of God’s holy word. Experience shows that the opposite course is the true way to make infidels, and to confirm them in their infidelity. Men reason themselves from a Scriptural to a loose Christianityj from early imbibed religious principles to those that are irreligious, from an intellectual conviction of the divine origin of the Scriptures to an utter rejection and contempt of them, by the strong and irrepressible desire to relax the bonds of moral obligation, and to sin without remorse and apprehension. They first reason themselves into doubt and uncertainty, and then into absolute infidelity, because they are hostile to the truth, and dread the sense of responsibility which the truth imposes.

“Virtue could see to do what virtue would By her own radiant light. He that has light within his own clear breast, May sit in the centre, and enjoy bright day; But he that hides a dark soul, and foul thoughts, Benighted walks under the mid-day sun: Himself is his own dungeon.”

It is a fact of great importance to be discovered and appreciated, that wickedness, in every form and degree, has a tendency to obscure the light of truth, and diminish the force, both of the internal evidence and the external testimony by which the truth is supported. ^’ Every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.*’ Nor is it any marvel, when we consider the rectitude of God’s government, that he should send upon such persons ‘^ strong delusions, that they should believe a lie; that they all might be damned who believe not the truth, but have pleasure in unrighteousness.^^

3. Another remark suggested by the kind of evidence on which our argument has rested, relates to a long -cherished J oft-repeated and “tnost unioarrantable doctrine of the church of Rome in regard to the authority of the Sacred Writings. Among the many Roman Catholic principles the influence of which ought to be counteracted, is the bold assertion, that the fact that the Bible is the word of God rests upon the testimony of the, Papal church; and that the canonical authority of the sacred Books is proved and handed down from her alone, as the infallible oracle. In all the principal controversies between Protestants and Romanists, both in Europe and in this country, her high boast is, that the appeal of Protestants to the Bible is a virtual appeal to her; because, as she is pleased to say, it is by her decisions that the various books which compose it were ascertained to belong to the divine record.

There is so little force in this reasoning, or rather in this statement, that it scarcely deserves to be called sophistry. For the sake of argument, let this claim be conceded. It does not follow, that the divine origin of the Scriptures rests upon her decision: nor that her decision does anything more than indicate where the inspired books are to be found. What if the Council of Trent had first invented the

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mariner’s compass; it would not follow that the tendency of the magnetic needle to the pole depends on her invention. A certain mathematician of Greece produced the evidencCj that in any triangle the sum of all the angles is equal to two right angles; but it does not follow that the Grecian philosopher originated this truth, and that the angles specified were not equal to two right angles before. If the Papal church has decided correctly what books belong to the Sacred WritingSj it was upon evidence that existed independently of her decision, and because they were antecedently of divine origin. She did not assign to them their high origin: — that they would have possessed, even though discarded by Rome. When by an induction of facts she satisfied herself that God had already given them that high place and character, she announced her conviction and her decision to the world. The fact itself, that God has given a revelation of his will, was a fact before she announced her conviction of it; her conviction rested on the fact, and not the fact on her conviction or decree. Rome was never more at fault than in this pretension to argument. She first proves the authority of the church of Rome from the Scriptures, and then the authority of the Scriptures from the church of Rome. Both claims cannot be valid. For if the authority of Rome depends upon the Scriptures, the authority of the Scriptures does not depend upon Rome; or, if the authority of the Scriptures depends upon Rome, the authority of Rome does not depend upon the Scriptures.

But this is not all we have to suggest against these arrogant claims. If the argument for the divine origin of the Scriptures which has been presented is a valid one, its claims do not in any degree rest upon the decisions of Rome, but upon the inherent evidence of the Book itself. We may respect the decisions of councils in this matter, but we do not need them. We see that this Book is the word of God for ourselves; we have a right, independently of Rome, independently of all the world, to examine and judge of the evidence by which its divine origin is supported. When, with a right spirit, we inspect the Book itself, our perceptions of its superhuman origin are absolutely irresistible. A child of five years might as well be supposed to have been the architect of Solomon’s temple, as any uninspired man, or set of men to have been the authors of the Holy Bible. Compared with the productions of the unlettered fishermen and tent-makers of Judea, the greatest productions of the human mind on religious subjects were like the earth when it was without form and void, in contrast with this fair creation as it rose in order and beauty at the command of its Creator. When we read the Scriptures, we discover in them that of which human wisdom, human goodness, human purity were not the authors. In an age when there are not wanting those who would undermine the deep foundations of confidence in God’s word, and for its own intrinsic and superhuman excellence substitute the decisions of men, we have deemed the argument which has been presented in the preceding pages, not out of place. With the men who now live, and those who come after us, the struggle with Rome is not over. The turning point m the controversy with her respects the word t)f God, as the only infallible rule of faith and practice. Without the internal evidence of its divine origin, Rome might have the vantage ground: with this evidence, the vantage ground is ours.

4. Another subject on which the preceding argument may legitimately have an important bearing, respects the province of reason in all matters of religious faith. We have no quarrel with those who advocate the right of private judgment. It belongs to man, from the constitution of his intellectual and moral nature. The faculty of judgment was given in order to be exercised; the right to exercise it is implied in the exhibition of all the evidences by which the truth is established; it is implied in the doctrine of personal responsibility, and in the nature of religion as a personal thing; divine revelation itself makes an appeal to it; while for the exercise of it men are accountable to God alone. “To their own Master they stand, or falL-Who art thou that judgest another man’s servant?” But while we say these things, we are not to forget, that thinking error to be truth does not make it truth; and that it is only when men come to right conclusions, that they may not only think they are right, but know themselves to be so. The Holy Scriptures are the only safe directory. Antiquity cannot guide us; for if it does, it is quite as likely to lead us into error as into truth. Tradition cannot guide us; it is too intangible and indefinite — we know not where to look for it. Human reason, with all her boasted powers, and all her rights of private judgment, cannot guide us — she herself needs a guide.

We do not deny, that human reason has its appropriate province in every question of religious truth; bat its limits are reduced to the single effort of ascertaining what God has revealed. It is not a teacher, but a pupil: its province is not to dictate, but to learn, and submit to the dictates of unerring wisdom: its proper employment is, not to decide what the word of God ought to contain, but simply to find out what it does contain. It is absolutely shut up to the binding force of instructions revealed from heaven. No matter how fearlessly men come to the word of God, so long as they come honestly; not to pronounce judgment on what God has revealed, but to form their judgment by the divine testimony. I said, no matter how fearlessly: perhaps the language is too strong. “The meek will he guide in judgment; the meek will he teach his way.” The understanding is darkened by sin; and it were no marvel, if the inspired writers do not pay the profoundest homage to human wisdom. “Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law,’’ is the most reasonable language in the world for man who is a worm. It is the true characteristic of a great mind. The truest and the profoundest reasoner on religious subjects is the truest and the profoundest listener to the teachings of heavenly truth. You may not alter; you may not expunge; you may not supply; you may not wrest from its true import a single truth which God, the Lord, has uttered. ‘^ If I, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel, let him be accursed!” Here reason may rest with confidence, as the ultimate ground of authority. Desert this record, and all is the darkness of midnight — the abyss of Atheism. Reason is no longer rational than she is satisfied with a record that has the endorsement, the seal and superscription, of Eternal wisdom.

5. Another remark from the preceding discussion, relates to a common error of modern Ratiojialists. There is a class of minds, in which the spirit of inquiry supersedes the love of truth. Truth already attained holds a less important place in their estimation than that which is doubtful and sought after. Whether there be more of egotism than the love of truth in this state of mind, they who cherish it can perhaps best decide. It is no uncommon thing to boast of light that is new, when it is only new to us; while the incense that is offered on the altar of a proud and self-complacent egotism, may indicate the ignorance, as well as the vanity of the worshipper.

The love of investigation merely, where it is not under the influence of a humble and docile spirit, is much more likely to give the thoughts a wrong, than a right direction. There are those who are ‘’ ever learning, and never come to the knowledge of the truth.” They live upon intellectual excitement, rather than upon intellectual gratification. ‘^If,” says the German philosopher Lessing — “if God held in his closed right hand all truth and in his left the single, ever active impulse after truth though with the condition that I should wander in continual error, and should say, Speak; choose! I would humbly point to the left hand and say. Father, give: — pure truth is for thee alone!” There is ensnaring beauty in such a representation as this, and there is seeming modesty; while in reality it is but an ingenious, though transparent covering of a heart that “loves darkness rather than light.” Such is the sceptic’s love of truth, but not the Christian’s. The intellectual excitement fostered by doubt, hesitation and inquiry, is not enough for him. To think, to search, to be ^’ driven about by every wind of doctrine,” is not enough for him. It is not the labor merely, but the fruit that he desires: it is not intellectual excitement, but intellectual repose: it is not doubt that he is seeking after, but certainty. He is a lover of truth — that never alters. If he can but learn the truth, he will listen thoughtfully to it, in whatever guise it approaches him. He will sit humbly at the feet of his Divine Teacher, or gather it from the lips of babes. A single truth, stamped with the impress of Heaven, outweighs with him all the vain pride of the mere philosopher and rationalist in his researches. The spirit of inquiry is not one which he wishes to see suppressed, or even embarrassed; but he would that it were always wisely

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directed, and made subservient to truth. And where can it be indulged so freely, where is there such scope for it, as in ‘^ the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God?” God has wisely bestowed upon us this ever active impulse after truth, but with no condition that leads us to error. Nay: while he opens his left, he also opens his right hand, dispensing with exuberant bounty truth, pure truth, from the eternal habitation where he dwells.

The thought has more than once been suggested, that the evidence by which the divine origin of the Sacred Writings is established, is, after all, nothing more than that which results from the manifold combination of strong probabilities in its favor. The writer well remembers the impression which this thought made upon his own mind in early life, when he first met with it in a published discourse of a justly celebrated theologian of our country. ‘-No Christian,’’ says this writer, “can certainly kjioio that the Gospel itself is of divine inspiration.” It were no marvel if this single remark, as dangerous as it is unwarranted, had made as many unbelievers, as the able and unanswerable discourses of the same author on “The Nature and Danger of Infidel Philosophy” have made believers. Whatever depends on probable evidence only, can never produce the conviction of certainty. The most that can be said of all propositions of this sort is, that there is a strong probability in their favor; and that they are rather suspended over the fancy as an airy vision, than recognized as immutable truth. I confess I shudder at the thought that we have no higher evidence in favor of the divine origin of the Scriptures. Is it so? Is it so, that nothing more can be affirmed of the divine legjation of Moses and the prophets, Christ and the apostles, than that it is iii a very high degree probable 1 Is it no more than probable that there was such a personage as Jesus Christ, “who was delivered for our offences, and rose again for our justification?” Did Paul reason thus, when he said, ‘^I knowlxovn I have believed?” Did John reason thus, when he said, ‘^ We know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him?” Perish all such scepticism as this! Trust it, who may; but God forbid that the faith of his people should rest on such a questionable basis! The highly respected and venerable author himself, to whom we have just referred, in defiance of his theory, could not help contradicting it, whenever his own ardent and strong mind kindled with the importance and responsibility of his theme. Comparing Christianity with infidel philosophy, he says, “Here is no uncertainty no waverings no tossing on the billows of anxiety, no plunging into the gulf of despair; your path is a straight and beaten way, and were you way -faring men and fools, you need not err therein.”

Every proposition within the circle of moral science, is either certainly true, or certainly false: otherwise we know, and can know nothing about it. We may conjecture much, and hope much; we may be strongly persuaded; but we know absolutely nothing: our minds must necessarily be in that state

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of suspense which is the medium between absolute certainty and absolute unbelief. And this state of suspense admits of as many degrees as there are between the lowest and highest probability. If such were the basis of our reasoning in regard to the divine origin of the Sacred Writings, it would be impossible for us absolutely to affirm, or deny the truth on this great question. We might have a prevailing opinion one way or the other, which approaches the nearest step to certainty; but we must still have some degree of doubt. There is nothing desirable in such a state of mind as this on any subject; much less on the great subject involved in the preceding discussion. Unless it be from a strong desire to divest himself of all moral obligation, or from a vain desire of intellectual distinction, or from the dread of credulity, or from the love of error, no man ever prefers ignorance to knowledge, doubt to certainty. On some subjects there is no necessity for such a state of mind, because there is no foundation in the nature of the subjects themselves for uncertainty. Nor is there any foundation for uncertainty in the nature of the subject we have been considering. The proposition that the Scriptmes of the Old and New Testaments are of divine origin, is either true, or false — it is either certainly true, or certainly false. It cannot in its own nature be a doubtful question. It may be doubtful in the mind of the inquirer; but it is not so in itself, and in reality. There is truth and certainty on this subject, as well as every other, and nothing but truth and certainty. The admission of the opposite hypothesis unsettles the whole subject; nor can those who admit such an hypothesis, gain anything more than to keep truth and certainty at a distance from their own minds, and the minds of others, for a time only. Certainty exists, and it is impossible to reason it out of existence; while every effort to do so is as logically absurd as it is practically unwise.

It is certainty that we have been seeking in the foregoing pages. We hope we have sought it honestly and modestly. But we have no desire to disguise the fact that Ave have sought it. Those who doubt on this subject, do so where there is no room for doubting. No man is called on to believe that the Bible is not of man, merely because there is a strong preponderance of probabilities that man was not its author.

6. We may not overlook, in these concluding observations, the great importance of established principles 071 all religious subjects. The truth cannot be too often repeated, nor too deeply felt, that men are no better than their principles. There are exceptions to the remark, that where a man’s principles are good, his character is good; but it is always true, that where his principles are bad, his character is bad. Right principles lie at the foundation of moral obligation. No man is one thing in his principles, and another, and the opposite, in his sense of duty. Conscience is governed by light and truth; and just so far as the character is controlled by conscience, it is controlled by principles. The character of men has its sources and foundation. The principles of a man lie at the foundation of his character, and influence his thoughts, his emotions, his conversation, his deportment. “Men do not gather grapes of thorns, nor figs of thistles.” Nor may they, with any more semblance of reason, look for a virtuous and good character from principles that are vicious and bad. Moral rectitude, is conformity of heart and life to truth; wickedness, is conformity to error. The devil first corrupted men, and corrupts them still, by inducing them to adopt false principles; and in all the efforts of his mercy to reclaim them, the great means which the God of truth makes use of are principles of the opposite character. In all the ordinary affairs of human life, men are controlled by their principles. The politician is controlled by his principles of government; the merchant, by his principles of commerce; the jurist, fey his principles of law; the scholar, by his principles of literature and science. It is impossible that men, in the exercise of their rational faculties, and a due discretion, should be controlled in any other way.

The same may be said of principles that are religious, or irreligious. No matter when, or where, or how they are imbibed, they exert an influence; just as wheat produces wheat, or tares produce tares, whether sowed by the agriculturist, or deposited by the wind or the birds of the air. Nor is the appropriate influence, either of good or bad principles, prevented or impeded by the sincerity with which they are received; but rather secured by it, and rendered more permanent.

Nor is this abstract speculation; it is the state

A ment of facts. History, both sacred and profane, shows them to be facts; biography shows them to be facts; observation and consciousness demonstrate them to be veritable reahties. The true character of the pagan world — the true character of the followers of Mahomet — the true character of papal Rome — of Protestantism, of Infidelity, and of Christianity, is to be traced to the respective principles of each of these distinct systems of religion. Principles are nothing without their practical nature and tendency. What is virtuous character, if not the application of virtuous principles to the heart and life? and what constitutes vicious character, if not the application of vicious principles to the heart and life? Good principles generate good institutions, good habits; evil principles, those that are evil. Let good principles hold dominion over the minds of men, and virtue and true piety will progressively win their way over our lost world; while, in the same proportion in which loose and evil principles hold dominion, will virtue languish and wickedness triumph.

And not only may this result be looked for as the natural and necessary sequence of the effect from the cause; but it is the matter of deliberate, moral calculation. Men imbibe and cherish good principles, with the deliberate and express design of being influenced by them; and when they pursue a wrong course of conduct, they fall back upon wrong principles to justify them. They intend to be governed by their principles, be they good or bad. No

Bible not of Man. 2 4 man attributes his character to accident or contingency; nor does he, for any considerable time, ever suppose that his principles will be ineffectual and abortive. If men act from good principles, it is because they mean to do so; and if they act from bad principles, while they may not acknowledge that their principles are corrupt, they would rather be driven to this acknowledgment, than to the confession that they act from no principle at all. It is for the most part the deliberate purpose of men, that their principles shall affect their character and conduct. Voltaire, Diderot, D’Alembert, and Frederic of Prussia, rejected the Christian religion; and their object in so doing was to fortify themselves in their sworn confederacy to subvert all religion and established order, and introduce the reign of universal licentiousness. David Hume lived and died an avowed sceptic and Atheist; and though the annals of scepticism do not furnish a more favorable example of moral reputation, his life and death show that he intended his conduct should be governed by his principles. His life was devoted to unsettling all fixed principles of belief in the human mind; to subverting the whole system of moral obligation; to obliterating a sense of God’s authority from the conscience, and to inculcating the innocence of the greatest crimes; while his dying hours were occupied at the card table, and the thoughts of his dying pillow devoted to his insipid raillery of the doctrine of a /uture state and final retribution.

The infidelity of the present age has learned a

I better lesson than to hold the Bible in contempt. It is a part of its policy to award to it great excellence, a sound morality, and a benign influence on the social relations. It regards the writers of it as far in advance of their contemporaries in moral science, and as deserving higher consideration than the most eminent of ancient sages. But it does not award to it the infallibility of unerring wisdom, nor listen to it as the oracle of God. It is a more specious infidelity than that of Voltaire and Paine, but it is infidelity still. It has strong pretensions to an impartial rationalism; it has the semblance of ingenuousness and candor; it invests itself with the broad mantle of a professed charity; but it pays its court to unblushing infidelity, and reduces the Book of God to a level with the teachings of uninspired men. It has, too, a scholar-like modesty. It would not be too confident; decently suggesting, that strong and tangible proof is excluded from this sphere of religious inquiry.

Now we deem it important to possess better and more established principles on this great subject than any of these. This is not the reception the Sacred Writings demand. Their credentials are of such force and authority, as to afi’ord no room for this hesitating state of mind. If they are a cunningly devised fable, no matter how soon, or how decidedly they are exploded; if they are true, every man ought to be satisfied of their truth, and hold them fast to he end.

We cannot appreciate too highly the importance of firm and established principles on this great subject, and more especially in strong and well-cultivated minds. Truth is easily distinguished from error, when men are once willing to see the difference; and when they are once willing to see this, they will no longer regard it as of little consequence what they believe. ^’ Buy the truth and sell it not,” is the kind counsel of heavenly wisdom. Nothing is too dear to part with for the truth. Pride, vain reason, prejudice, interest, sloth, sin, the favor of men, are all of little worth compared with the truth of God. Buy it at any rate; part with it for nothing — not for ease, nor fame, nor gold, nor life. Love the truth, adorn the truth, honor the truth; be witnesses for the truth, and the truth shall make you free.

7. It were also a natural deduction from the series of observations presented in this volume, and not to be omitted, that the Sacred Writings deserve the most serious and patient study, and affectionate regard. It is the Great God who speaks to men in these writings. It is God your Maker, your Lawgiver, your Redeemer, your Judge. It is the voice of your Father who is in heaven, uttering truths which no human intellect ever conceived; dictating them by his own Spirit, and subscribing them with his own name and seal. He who inhabits eternity, and fills and occupies it as his own dwelling-place, here makes discoveries of the eternal world to the view of mortals, as momentous as the heaven where he dwells. Every other book is fiction and romance, compared with this. If there be an altar where the human intellect may bow in profoundest reverence, and where human learning may find laurels that never wither, it is at the altar of revealed truth. These wondrous writings have done more to extend the field of human thought, than all others combined. Men of genius and learning, men who have been distinguished for superior strength of mind, for eloquence of tongue and pen, for brilliancy of imagination and acute powers of disquisition, on opening the Bible, have found themselves to be children; and been constrained to honor its ever-blessed and adorable Author.

“Learning has borne such fruit in other days On all her branches; piety has found Friends in the friends of science, and true prayer Has flowed from lips wet with Castalian dews.”

Names that are the adornment of their race, and in the highest and most enlightened classes of society, have identified their ripest honors with their apologies for the Christian faith.

This one Book will live when the remembrance of all other books is passed away. It will go down through the successive generations of men; and when the earth shall be burnt up, and the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, it shall remain inscribed on the hearts of an exceeding great multitude, which no man can number. It shall go up to the bar of God, shall enter into the gates of the heavenly city, and there be hailed as the charter of

14^ its immortal joys. Precious, precious, thrice precious Book of God! It can cheer when every other comforter is far away. It can visit the chambers of solitude, and counsel and comfort on the bed of languishing. It can soothe griefs which nothing else can soothe. It holds up the torch-light of heaven’s tenderest mercy in the midst of the dark valley; it is the comforter of the otherwise comfortless, wiping away the tear that trembles in the eye which fixes its last look on things below. Who that does not deliberately purpose to live without God, and without hope; that is not prepared to seal the warrant that consigns him to a hopeless death and an undone eternity; can live in the allowed neglect of the Holy Scriptures? ‘^ Hear ye, and give ear; be not proud, for the Lord hath spoken.” That man shall not lose his reward, who is a diligent and humble student of God’s word. We do earnestly invite the sons and daughters of men to this rich field of thought. We bid them rove over it from flower to flower, and we bid them dig for its hidden treasures. It has running streams, and sparkling fountains, and -> deep wells, at which he who drinks shall find living water.

It were a fearful state of mind to believe in the divine origin of this holy Book, and neglect its great salvation. This is one of those facts in the moral history of man, which his extreme depravity alone can account for. The simple truth that the Bible is the word of God one would think, were enough to rouse every man who reads it from spiritual apathy, and fix impressions on his mind that would render him solemn as eternity. Yet is there not one of all the truths here revealed, but is sober verity. It is even so. The God of truth declares it. There is no delusion in the Bible. No, there is no delusion in the Bible. Its great God, its holy God, its just God, its God of love and mercy, is the greatest of all realities. Its vast and immeasurable eternity, where, though millions of ages roll away, they shorten not its duration, is too an unwasting reality. Its all gracious. Almighty, and Infinite Saviour too, is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever.

O ye, who are fallen by your iniquity, and to whom this wondrous redemption is revealed anc offered in the Bible — ye, who are so insensibly ana rapidly borne on the broad and rapid torrent of time to that eternity, where the friends of this Bible am this Saviour will encircle the throne, and where the enemies of this Bible and this Saviour will have lost a throne, never to be regained; is it to that blissful presence that you are bending your course? or to that mournful exile? That eternity is at no greai distance; you stand upon its brink: it is but a little moment and you pass into it. Time is too shorty life too precious, to disregard the counsels of this Bible, to trifle with this eternity, and this salvation. O perverse, O senseless world! that can be blinded thus, and thus infatuate, while all below is vanishing like a shadow, and there is yet an eternity to lose, or an eternity to gain!