The Old Covenant.—The Sabbath—The Law—The Commonwealth Of
Israel, And Christ.

The original term, rendered “Testament” and “Covenant,”
occurs thirty-three times in the New Testament. Greenfield
defines it thus: “Any disposition, arrangement, institution, or
dispensation; hence a testament, will; a covenant, mutual
promises on mutual conditions, or promises with conditions
annexed.” Secondly, “A body of laws and precepts to which
certain promises are annexed, promises to which are annexed
certain laws; the books in which the divine laws are contained,
the Old Testament, and especially the Pentateuch.”
Upon a careful examination of these definitions it will be seen
at once that the term “Testament” is a good translation. This
is confirmed, in Paul’s letter to the Hebrews, in the inter-changeable
use of the terms “Will,” “Covenant” and “Testament.”
Our Sabbatarian brethren claim, that the Old Covenant,
which was done away, was the verbal agreement of the
Children of Israel to keep the law of the decalogue. But this
definition is not sufficient. It excludes almost all that was current
in its use. It renders it improper to call it a “Testament” or
“Will,” because fathers make testaments or wills without the
consent of their children, and these are called dispositions of
estates. Their definition of the term also makes the “Covenant”
depend upon the will of man, for covenants, in the
[pg 162]
sense of agreements, have nothing to do with those who do
not enter into them. Neither can men be regarded as transgressing
a covenant, in the sense of an agreement, unless they
have first placed themselves under its obligations. So, if these
men are right in their definition of the Old Covenant, they
are wrong in trying to fasten its conditions upon all mankind.
Their logic also excludes, from all the promises of the covenant,
all those who were incapable of making an agreement.
Hence, infants were left to the uncovenanted mercies of God.
And as for the wicked, who never agreed to keep those commandments,
poor souls! they must be dealt with as violators
of a contract to which they never became a party.

These absurdities, which are legitimately drawn from their
own premises, drive us to the conclusion that their whole theory,
upon the covenant question, is wrong. The apostle Paul
says we are the children of a covenant, which he denominates
“The free woman.” “She is the mother of us all.” But, according
to Sabbatarian logic, they are the children of two covenants,
or women. How is this? One good mother is sufficient.
When they tell you that the old covenant, which was
done away, was the people’s agreement to keep the ten commandments,
remember that they, by their own showing, set
up the same old covenant by agreeing to keep the ten commandments.
So it is done away, and it is not done away.
That is, if the people say, “We will keep and do them,” it is
established, but if they say, “We will not,” it is abolished.
Again, if it was the people’s agreement that was done away,
and the ten commandments were the conditions of that agreement,
then they also are of no force, for the conditions of an
agreement are always void when the contract is nullified.
Again, if the Lord had nothing to do in causing the Old Covenant
to be done away, how did it pass away by the action of
one party to it? And how can men enter into it without the
concurring assent of the party of the second part? Accept the
Sabbatarian definition of the term covenant, and it legitimately
follows that none were ever in that covenant save those
who held converse with Jehovah, through Moses, saying, “All
[pg 163]
these things will we observe and do.” It is an old, trite saying,
“that it takes two to make an agreement.” And it also
takes two to abrogate an agreement. But these friends of the
seventh day say, The people rendered that old covenant void
by their wickedness, that they were at fault, that God never
abrogated it, that He always stood firm in reference to its conditions
and promises, holding the people to its obligations.
Then how was it done away? We will let Zechariah answer
this question: “And I took my staff, even Beauty, and cut it
asunder, that I might break my covenant which I had made
with all the people. And it was broken in that day; and so
the poor of the flock that waited upon me knew that it was
the word of the Lord. And I said unto them, If ye think
good, give me my price; and if not, forbear. So they weighed
for my price thirty pieces of silver. And the Lord said unto
me, Cast it unto the potter: a goodly price that I was prized
at of them. And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast
them to the potter in the house of the Lord.”

Judas Iscariot sold his Savior for thirty pieces of silver, cast
the money down at the feet of the priests in the temple; the
priests took it and purchased the potters’ field to bury strangers
in. And “in that day” the covenant of God was broken
by the Lord. Now, if the Lord broke that old covenant, it
follows that no man enters into it without one more concurring
action upon His part. Upon what mountain has He appeared
and reënacted this covenant? And if it was simply the people’s
agreement to keep the ten commandments, how did He
make it with all the people of Israel, seeing many of them
were incapable of entering into an agreement? The truth is
this, the Lord made a covenant in the sense of a “Testament”
or institution. This sense alone admits of the irresponsible in
its provisions. In the argument from analogy, drawn from
the introduction of the New Testament, our position is confirmed.
The Savior’s death gave force to this testament or
will, without any concurring action upon the part of any man
or number of men. And it is a covenant in the sense in
which Greenfield defines the term, that is, in the sense of a
[pg 164]
testament, or will. This also admits of covenanted or bequeathed
blessings for all the incapable.

The Sabbatarian view of the term covenant, if applied to
the “New Covenant,” cuts off all who do not enter into this
“contract.” But there is no reason in calling either testament
a “contract.” An earthly father may incorporate, among
other things, conditions, in his testament, or will, and
it is in force, by his death, even though his children find fault
with it. So it mattered not whether any man in ancient Israel
was satisfied with that ancient “testament.” But the Bible
nowhere limits the term covenant to the people’s agreement
to keep the decalogue. On the contrary, it is said, “And
He declared unto you His covenant, which He commanded
you to perform, even ten commandments; and He wrote them
upon two tables of stone.” Deut. iv, 13. These commandments
were after the tenor of all that was given by Moses,
as we learn in the thirty-fourth chapter of Exodus. After
Moses had given many precepts, the Lord said, “Write thou
these words; for after the tenor of these words I have made a
covenant with thee and with Israel. And he wrote upon the
tables the words of the covenant, the ten commandments.”
This covenant, or testament, like all other institutions which
the Lord established with the children of men, is accompanied
with reasons for its existence, and all the laws and instructions
necessary to carry out its principles. The reasons were placed
upon the tables of stone along with the commandments. When
Sabbatarians hang up their copy of those tables, it is always a
mutilated, partial copy. The whole is given to us in the fifth
chapter of Deuteronomy. No Seventh-day Adventist dare exhibit
the full copy before his audience, unless he does it at the
peril of his teaching. Here it is: “I am the Lord thy God
which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house
of bondage. Thou shalt have none other Gods before me.
Thou shalt not make thee any graven image, or any likeness
of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in earth beneath,
or that is in the waters beneath the earth. Thou shalt
not bow down thyself unto them nor serve them: for I the
[pg 165]
Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquities of the
fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation
of them that hate me, and showing mercy unto thousands of
them that love me and keep my commandments. Thou shalt
not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain, for the Lord
will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. Keep
the Sabbath day to sanctify it, as the Lord thy God hath commanded
thee. Six days thou shalt labor and do all thy work,
but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in
it thou shalt not do any work, thou nor thy son, nor thy daughter,
nor thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thine ox,
nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is
within thy gates; that thy man-servant and maid-servant may
rest as well as thou. And remember that thou wast a servant
in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee
out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm,
therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath
day. Honor thy father and thy mother as the Lord thy
God hath commanded thee; that thy days may be prolonged,
and that it may go well with thee in the land which the Lord
thy God giveth thee. Thou shalt not kill. Neither shalt
thou commit adultery. Neither shalt thou steal. Neither
shalt thou bear false-witness against thy neighbor. Neither
shalt thou desire thy neighbor’s wife. Neither shalt thou
covet thy neighbor’s house, his field, or his man-servant, or
maid-servant, his ox, or his ass, or anything that is thy
neighbor’s. These words the Lord spake unto all your assembly,
in the mount out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud and
of the thick darkness, with a great voice; and he added no
more, and he wrote them upon two tables of stone, and delivered
them unto you.”

Thus we have a fac simile of the law upon the tables of
stone. The terms employed in this law limit it to the Jewish
people, a people who were servants in Egypt. This was the
“testament,” “institution,” or “covenant” given at Sinai, and
it was after the tenor of all the rest that was given. It is worthy
of notice, that there is not a penalty in all that was written
[pg 166]
upon those tables. And yet there were terrible penalties
inflicted for a violation of its precepts. How is this? Was
it all there was of God’s law? If so, where shall we go to
find its penalties? This covenant is spoken of in Galatians,
the fourth chapter. It is called “the bond woman,” that was
cast out. In the third chapter of Corinthians it is termed
“the ministration of condemnation,” and “the ministration of
death written and engraven in stones, which was done away.”
Which Zechariah said was broken by the Lord in the day of
the terrible tragedy of the cross of Christ.

The multiplicity of passages in the New Testament bearing
upon this great fact, causes our legalists in religion to shift
about most wonderfully. At one time, the people’s agreement
to keep the law was the covenant that was done away. At
another, it was the act of executing the penalty of death that
was set aside. At another, it was the glory of Moses’ face
that was done away. And at another, it was none of all these,
but it was the ceremonial law of Moses that was done away.

All these positions were taken by one man, in one discussion
with the writer of these lines. All such turns are cheap;
it requires no great wisdom to accommodate yourself in this
manner to the force of circumstances. The fact that the “first
covenant” was a “testament,” or a body of laws with certain
promises annexed, as well as penalties, is evident from Paul’s
statement in the ninth chapter of his letter to the Hebrews.
He says, “Then verily the first covenant had also ordinances
of divine service, and a worldly sanctuary, for there was a tabernacle
made; the first wherein was the candlestick, and the
table, and the show-bread; which is called the sanctuary.”
The distinction which our friends make between “Moses’
law” and “God’s law,” as they are pleased to express it, is not
only unscriptural, the two phrases being inter-changeable, but
also absurd. Moses gave all, that these men are pleased
to term his law, in the name of the Lord. The law of the
passover, found in the twelfth chapter of Exodus, is prefaced
with these words: “And the Lord God said unto Moses.” In
the twenty-fifth chapter of the same book we have the laws
[pg 167]
concerning the ark, the tabernacle, the priestly service, and
all are introduced with this saying: “And the Lord spake unto
Moses.” Moses never gave a law in his own name. Neither
did he give one of his own in the name of the Lord, because it
would have cost him his life. The Lord had guarded this
point in the following: “But the prophet which presumes
to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded
him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods,
even that prophet shall die.” Now one of two things is evident:
first, all the laws that Moses gave in the name of the
Lord were His; or, secondly, Moses violated the law governing
the prophet. And if the record is false on this account,
how can we trust it in other respects? It is as easy to turn
God out of all the pentateuch, and put Moses into it, as to
maintain the proposition that Moses had a law of his own.
Sabbatarians act the part of the unbeliever in getting the Lord
out of the law that was done away, and Moses into it. All
that is accredited to the Lord was His, otherwise the record is
untrustworthy. If our friend’s position is true, it follows that
Moses is the sole author of the sacrificial system of blood,
without which there was no remission, and thus the ancient
remedial scheme falls, being without divine sanction. But the
Lord claims all that our friends hand over to Moses. The following
phrases are uttered with reference to the priests and
other things: “My priest,” “My sacrifice,” “Mine altar,”
“Mine offering,” 1st Samuel, ii, 27-29; “The Lord’s pass-over,”
Exodus, xii, 11; “The feasts of the Lord,” Lev. xxiii;
“My sanctuary and my Sabbaths,” Ezekiel, xxiii, 38. The
manner in which Sabbatarians emphasize the phrase “My Sabbath,”
and “My holy day,” is well calculated to mislead the
unsuspecting, but those who are schooled in biblical literature will regard it
as mere rant, cheap theology, mere display! All
that Moses gave, as law, was from the Lord, was His. “The
Lord came down upon Sinai, and spake to them from heaven,
and gave them right judgments, and true laws, good statutes
and commandments, and made known to them His holy Sabbath,
and commanded precepts, statutes and laws, by the hand
of His servant Moses.” Nehemiah, ix, 13, 14.

[pg 168]

The seventh-day Sabbath was not given to the Gentile world.
It would require just as plain and positive legislation to bind
it upon us as it did to establish it in Israel. It was a sign
between God and the Hebrews. Ezek. xxxi, 13-18. “Moreover,
also, I gave them my Sabbaths, to be a sign between me
and them, that they might know that I am Jehovah that doth
sanctify them.” If there are any Gentile Christians upon the
earth who think it is essential to know that it was the Lord
that sanctified the children of Israel, set them apart from the
surrounding nations, I would say to such, It is sufficient to
your salvation that you know the Lord, as manifested in the
flesh in the person of Christ Jesus, and that you love and obey
him. I can not see that the seventh-day Sabbath, as a sign
upon a Gentile, would tell the truth, for the Lord never sanctified
the Gentiles in the sense of setting them apart from the
surrounding nations. Again, if our friends could succeed in
making it universal, it would cease to be a sign. It was a national
badge, or sign, between God and the Hebrews. Its
object was to keep in their memory that which was true of
them alone. “Remember that thou wast a servant in the land
of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence
with a mighty hand and a stretched out arm, therefore the
Lord thy God hath commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day.”
Deut. v. Can any Gentile obey this instruction? It is impossible!
Moses said, “Behold I have taught you statutes
and judgments, even as the Lord my God commanded me,
that ye should do so in the land whither ye go to possess it.
Keep, therefore, and do them, for this is your wisdom and
your understanding, in the sight of the nations which shall
hear all these statutes and say, Surely this great nation is a
wise and understanding people. For what nation is there so
great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this
law which I set before you this day.” Deut. iv, 5. The authority
and glory of Christ forbid all such Judaizing as that
which we speak against. “He was given of God to be head
over all things to the church.” “And He is head of all principality
and power.” The Father put all things under Him.
[pg 169]
The prophet Isaiah said, “He shall not fail, nor be discouraged
till He hath set judgment in the earth, and the isles shall wait
for His law.” Ch. xlii, 4. And Paul said, “Bear ye one another’s
burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.” Gal. vi, 2.

The object of law is to regulate the exemplification of principles.
Some principle is exemplified in every act that man
performs. And one principle may be in a great variety of
acts. The principle of hatred is exemplified in a great many
different actions; and the principle of love to God is manifested,
or exemplified, in every act of obedience to God. So the
spiritual may be brought out under different dispensations, and
by different laws, while it remains always the same. Indeed,
principles are unchangeable; they belong to the nature of
things. Covenants, priesthoods, dispensations and laws have
changed, but principles, never. So the moral objective of every
law is the same, viz., to bring out and develop the spiritual in
man. To accomplish this great end it is necessary that the
evil principles of a carnal, or fleshly nature, should be restrained
by the penal sanctions of law, and the principles of
man’s higher nature brought out by its motives of good. Such
being the nature of principles, and the facts of law, Paul says,
“We know that the law is spiritual.” And again, “The law
is fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the
Spirit.” “Do we then make void law through faith? God
forbid; yea, we establish law.”

I have left the article out of this text because it is not in the
original. B. Wilson translates the verse in these words: “Do
we then nullify law through the faith. By no means; but
we establish law.” The negative use of law is to restrain the
evil; and the affirmative is to bring out the good, the spiritual.
So, without any interference with the spiritual of any law
that ever was, either divine or human, we have a better
covenant, or testament, than the old testament; one that is
established upon better promises, which contains “A new and
living way into the Holiest,” which Paul says, “Is heaven
itself.” This new way was consecrated through the flesh of
Christ. The rule of life in this way is the “Law of Christ.”
[pg 170]
It is a better law, for us, because its precepts are not limited to
our neighbor. The following is a part, at least, of the contrast:

the decalogue given to israel.

“Neither shalt thou bear false witness against thy neighbor.
Neither shalt thou desire thy neighbor’s wife. Neither shalt
thou covet thy neighbor’s house, his field, or his man-servant,
or his maid-servant, his ox or his ass, or anything that is thy
neighbor’s. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not
kill.”

the law of christ bound upon the world.

“Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer. But I say
unto you, love your enemies. If thou mayest be made free use
it rather. Be ye not the servants of men. Thou shalt not
bear false witness. Thou shalt not covet. Whosoever looketh
upon a woman and lusteth after her hath committed adultery
already in his heart.”

I have presented a sufficient amount of each law to show
you a part of the great contrast which exists on account of the
ancient law being given to a people set apart from all the surrounding
nations by a legal wall interfering with them in their
social walks in life. That law was sufficient for all practical
purposes among the Jews. But, since that “Middle wall of
partition” has been taken down, it is utterly useless to talk
about a law limited to your neighbor being any longer worthy
of God, or a perfect rule for man’s conduct in his associations
with all men. Indeed, it never was a law regulating a man’s
conduct with all men. The middle wall was taken out of the
way, and Jews and Gentiles have shook hands in Christian
fellowship under the new institution. Let us see how this
was brought about. When the law brings about a separation,
nothing short of law can undo it, and bring about the union
of the parties separated. But, as authority, that controls law,
is alone competent to remove legal results, we must look for
this, as a matter of necessity, lying at the foundation of the
new institution. It is just there that we find it in these words:
[pg 171]
“All authority is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go
ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name
of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching
them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded
you.” The result of obedience to this law of Christ is expressed
in these words: “But now, in Christ Jesus, ye who
sometime were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.
For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken
down the middle wall of partition between us, having abolished
in his flesh the enmity; even the law of commandments
contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one
new man, so making peace.” Eph. ii, 13-15. The God of
Abraham said unto Rebecca, “Two nations are in thy womb.”
Gen. xxv, 23. This language had its fulfillment in the decendants
of Jacob and Esau. The political history of the children
of Jacob begins at Sinai with their beginning as a nation
among the surrounding nations. The law given at Sinai was
a political law, for it was addressed to a community, pertained
to a community, and was accepted by a community.

Such is a political law in the strictest sense of the term.
This law was given to the Jews, the decendants of Jacob.
Moses said, “The Lord our God made a covenant with us in
Horeb. The Lord made not this covenant with our fathers,
but with us, even us, who are all of us here alive this day.”
Horeb is a synonymous with Sinai, and means, properly, ground
left dry by water draining off. So, Horeb and Sinai occur in
the narrative of the same event. The children of Jacob are
known as a commonwealth, from the giving of the law onward
until their overthrow by the Romans. Paul, speaking of the
Gentiles, in past times, says “They were aliens to the commonwealth
of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise.”
The Jews called them “dogs.” This great enmity had
its origin in the two-fold consideration of the Jew being favored
in a temporal and political point of view, and the pride
of his heart, which exalted him in his own imagination above
even his moral superiors. This corruption of the heart, with
the liability of its return, being removed by the abrogation of
[pg 172]
all that was peculiar to the Jews and their conversion to
Christ, Paul says, “That all are one in Christ.” Christ was
the bond of union, all were joined to him. But the same authority
that separated them by legislation must legislate with
reference to this grand change that was to take place between
these decendants of Jacob and Esau. The law of commandments
separating the Jews limited them in moral duties to their
neighbors. It was unlawful for them to go in unto one of
another nation. It limited them in trade and traffic to their
own countrymen; also limited them to their own people
in matrimonial relations. So God must be heard again, I
say, heard! for He was heard at the giving of the law, which
is now to be taken out of the way. When Jesus took Peter,
James and John up in a high mountain and was transfigured
before them, Moses and Elias, the great representatives of the
Patriarchial and Jewish dispensations, appeared unto them
and “a bright cloud overshadowed them, and behold a voice
out of the cloud, which said, This is my well-beloved Son in
whom I am well pleased, hear ye him.” Math. xvii, 5.
Here is the authority that gave the institution peculiar to the
Jews legislating with reference to Him whose doings were to
end that system of things, and lead all into “a new and living
way.” Paul says: “God, who at sundry times and in divers
manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets,
hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son.” So
Christ took away the first will and established the second. See
Heb. x, 9. Paul says: “As ye have received Christ Jesus
the Lord, so walk ye in Him.” This relation of duty to the
reception of Christ has direct reference to the character in
which we receive him. He was given to rule, to exercise
Lordship. He is Lord of all. The term Lord signifies
“ruler by right of possession.” If He is not Lord of all there
is an abundance of false testimony upon this one subject, and
Christianity is diseased in the head. And if he is Lord of all,
then we should leave that old mountain that shook and burned
with fire, and all the political paraphernalia of Sinai, and consider
ourselves complete in Christ, who is “Emanuel, God
[pg 173]
with us.” If any man does this he is not troubled with the
old “bond woman.” Jehovah said of Christ: “I have given
Him for a covenant of the people, for a light of the Gentiles.”
Isaiah xlii, 2. New duties appear before us in the New Testament,
with new obligations lying at their foundation. Jesus
said: “If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not
had sin, but now they have no cloak for their sins.” Again:
“If I had not done among them the works which none other
man did, they had not had sin; but now have they both seen
and hated both Me and my Father.” John xv, 22-24.

Justification turns no longer upon the ancient law, and the
sacrificial and typical system of blood is no longer the means
of pardon. The law contained a shadow of good things to
come, but the body was of Christ. 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. And this is the condemnation, that
light is come into the world, and men love darkness rather
than light because their deeds are evil. Everything turns in
this dispensation upon Christ and his Law. Jesus told his
disciples to teach their converts to observe all things which
He had commanded them to teach, and they filled their mission.
Paul said, He “shunned not to declare the whole counsel
of God,” “kept back nothing.” With reference to law, he
said, “If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual,
let him acknowledge that the things I write are the commandments
of the Lord.” For the glory of Christ, as his just meed
of praise, it was written, “Whatsoever ye do in word or deed,
do all in the name of the Lord Jesus.” “Christ is the end of
the Law for righteousness to every one that believeth.” In
this major proposition the minor, of the seventh-day Sabbath,
is involved. The Lord said of Israel, “I will also cause all
her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her
Sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts.” Hosea, ii, 11. No man
is threatened, by Christ or any of his apostles, on account of
Sabbath-breaking, or any of those things which are peculiar
to the Jews. But men are threatened for disobedience to the
[pg 174]
Gospel of Christ. The New Testament is of Christ. Its religion
is not “the Jews’ religion,” but Christ’s. There was
much in the Old Testament that is in the New, but it is there
by the authority of Christ. Hence, we are “complete in Him
who is the head of all principality and power.” Much in the
laws of the United States was first in the laws of England, but
we do nothing with reference to English authority. So it is
with us, as respects all who went before Christ, we do nothing
in reference to them, but do all in reference to Christ, and for
His name. The Old Kingdom of Israel, with its political
law, statutes and judgments, has passed away, and Christ
reigns “all in all.” To Him “be glory and majesty, dominion
and power, both now and ever.” Jude, xxv.

Infidels Live In Doubting Castle.

Having shown that no man in his senses can be an atheist,
unless he assume that he comprehends the universe in his
mind, with all its abstract essences and principles, which
assumption would be to make himself omnipresent and eternal,
a god in fact; and having seen that the proposition of the
divine existence and perfections is demonstrable from the universe,
as far as it is known in all its general laws and in all
its parts, we proceed from these prefatory considerations to
other matters still more intimately introductory to our design.

It is essentially preliminary to a clear and forcible display
of the reasonableness and certainty of our faith in Jesus
Christ as the author of immortality to man, that we ascertain
the proper ground on which the modern skeptic, of whatever
creed, stands when he avows his opposition to the gospel.
That we may duly estimate the strength of his opposition,
we must not only enumerate his objections or arguments, but
we must exactly ascertain the exact position which he occupies.
Does he stand within a fortified castle, or in the open
field? Presents he himself to our view in a stronghold,
well garrisoned with the invincible forces of logic, of science,
[pg 175]
and of fact? or defies he armies and the artillery of light,
relying wholly upon himself, his own experience, without
a shield, without an ally, without science, without history,
and consequently a single fact to oppose?

That we may, then, truly and certainly ascertain his precise
attitude, before we directly address him, we shall accurately
survey his whole premises. Does he say that he knows
the gospel to be false? No, he can not; for he was not in
Judea in the days of the evangelical drama. He, therefore,
could not test the miracles, or sensible demonstrations, by any
of his senses; nor prove to himself that Jesus rose not from
the dead. Speaking in accordance with the evidence of sense,
of consciousness, and of experience, he can not say that he
knows the gospel to be a cunningly devised fable. He has
not, then, in all his premises knowledge, in its true and proper
meaning, to oppose to the Christian’s faith or hope. What
remains?

Can he say, in truth, that he believes the gospel to be false?
He can not; because belief without testimony is impossible;
and testimony that the gospel facts did not occur is not
found extant on earth in any language or nation under
heaven. No contemporaneous opposing testimony has ever
been heard of, except in one instance, the sleeping and incredible
testimony of the Roman guard, which has a lie
stamped indelibly on its forehead: “His disciples stole his
dead body while we were asleep.” He that can believe this
is not to be reasoned with. We repeat it with emphasis, that
no living man can say, according to the English Dictionary,
that he believes the gospel to be false.

Alike destitute of knowledge and of faith to oppose to the
testimony of apostles, prophets, and myriads of contemporaneous
witnesses, what has the skeptic to present against the numerous
and diversified evidences of the gospel? Nothing in
the universe but his doubts. He can, in strict conformity to
language and fact, only say, he doubts whether it be true.
He is, then, legitimately no more than an inmate of Doubting
Castle. His fortification is built up of doubts and misgivings,
[pg 176]
cemented by antipathy. Farther than this the powers
of nature and of reason can not go.

How far these doubts are rational, scientific, and modest,
may yet appear in the sequel; meanwhile, we only survey the
premises which the infidel occupies, and the forces he has to
bring into the action. These, may we not say, are already
logically ascertained to be an army of doubts only.

Some talk of the immodesty, others of the folly, others of
the maliciousness of the unbeliever; but not to deal in harsh
or uncourteous epithets, may we not say, that it is most
unphilosophic to dogmatize against the gospel on the slender
grounds of sheer dubiety. No man, deserving the name of a
philosopher, can ever appear among the crusading forces of
pamphleteers and declaimers against the faith of Christians,
for two of the best reasons in the world; he has nothing better
to substitute for the motives, the restraining fears to the
wicked, and the animating hopes to the righteous, which the
gospel tenders; and he has nothing to oppose to its claims
but the weakness and uncertainty of his doubts. Franklin
was a philosopher, but Paine was a madman. The former
doubted, but never dogmatized—never opposed the gospel,
but always discountenanced and discouraged the infidel; the
latter gave to his doubts the authority of oracles, and madly
attempted to silence the Christian’s artillery by the licentious
scoffings of the most extravagant and unreasonable skepticism.

Modesty is the legitimate daughter of true philosophy;
but dogmatism, unless the offspring of infallible authority, is
the ill-bred child of ignorance and arrogance. Every man,
then, who seeks to make proselytes to his skepticism by converting
his doubts into arguments, is anything but a philosopher
or a philanthropist.

One of the most alarming signs of this age is the ignorance
and recklessness of the youthful assailants of the Bible.
Our cities, villages and public places of resort are thronged
with swarms of these Lilliputian volunteers in the cause of
skepticism. Apprenticed striplings, and sprigs of law and
physic, whose whole reading of standard authors on general
[pg 177]
science, religion, or morality, in ordinary duodecimo, equals
not the years of their unfinished, or just completed minority,
imagine that they have got far in advance of the vulgar herd,
and are both philosophers and gentlemen if they have learned
at second hand, a few scoffs and sneers at the Bible, from
Paine, Voltaire, Bolingbroke, or Hume. One would think,
could he listen to their impudence, that Bacon, Newton,
Locke, and all the great masters of science, were very pigmies,
and that they themselves were sturdy giants of extraordinary
stature in all that is intellectual, philosophic and learned.
These would-be baby demagogues are a public nuisance to
society, whose atheistic breath not unfrequently pollutes the
whole atmosphere around them, and issues in a moral pestilence
among that class who regard a fine hat and a cigar as
the infallible criteria of a gentleman and scholar.

These creatures have not sense enough to doubt, nor to
think sedately on any subject; and therefore, we only notice
them while defining the ground occupied by the unbelievers
of this generation. They prudently call themselves skeptics,
but imprudently carry their opposition to the Bible, beyond
all the bounds embraced in their own definitions of skepticism.
A skeptic can only doubt, never oppugn the gospel.
He becomes an atheist, or an infidel, bold and dogmatic, as
soon as he opens his mouth against the Bible.

Were we philosophically to class society as it now exists in
this country in reference to the gospel, we should have
believers, unbelievers, and skeptics. We would find some
who have voluntarily received the apostolic testimony as true;
others who have rejected it as false; and a third class who
simply doubt, and neither receive nor reject it as a communication
from heaven. But, though, unbelievers, while they
call themselves skeptics, often wage actual war against the
faith and hope of Christians, still their actual rejection of the
gospel has no other foundation than pure aversion to its
restraints and some doubts as to its authenticity. The quagmire
of their own doubts, be it distinctly remembered, is the
sole ground occupied by all the opponents of the gospel,
whether they style themselves antitheists, atheists, theists, unbelievers,
or skeptics.—Alexander Campbell, in 1835.

Infidelity, And The French And American Revolutions
In Their Relations To Thomas Paine.

Infidels can not free themselves from the bands which tie
the universe to its God. Every effort has been fruitless. Not
one writer among all their hosts has been lucky enough to
avoid the use of Christian terms that are in direct antagonism
with their speculation and positions. It will be interesting
to review, occasionally, their literature.

Speaking of Thomas Paine, Mr. Ingersoll says: “Every
American with the divine mantle of charity, should cover all
his faults.” What use has Col. Ingersoll or any other infidel
for the word divine? The term is thus defined: Pertaining
to the true God; (from the Latin divinus; from
deus, a god)
proceeding from God; appropriated to God; or celebrating His
praise; excellent in the supreme degree; apparently above
what is human; godlike; heavenly; holy; sacred; spiritual.
As a noun: one versed in divine things or divinity; a theologian;
a minister of the gospel; a priest; a clergyman. Zell’s
Encyclopedia.

Again, Mr. Ingersoll says, “Upon the head of his father,
God had never poured the divine
petroleum of authority.”
So much the better for the race. What would infidels do if
they had the authority? “Hume is called a model man, a
man as nearly perfect as the nature of human frailty will permit.”
He maintained that pleasure or profit is the test of
morals; that “the lack of honesty is of a piece with the lack
of strength of body;” that “suicide is lawful and commendable;”
that “female infidelity, when known, is a small thing;
when unknown, nothing;” “that adultery must be practiced
if men would obtain all the advantages of this life; and that
if generally practiced it would, in time, cease to be scandalous,
and if practiced frequently and secretly would come to be
thought no crime at all.”

[pg 179]

Lord Herbert taught that the “indulgence of lust and anger
is no more to be blamed than thirst or drowsiness.”

Voltaire contended “for the unlimited gratification of the
sexual appetites, and was a sensualist of the lowest type; nevertheless
he had the amazing good sense to wish that he had
never been born.”

Rousseau was, by his confession, a habitual liar and thief,
and debauchee; a man so utterly vile that he took advantage
of the hospitality of friends to plot their domestic ruin; a man
so destitute of natural affection that he committed his
base-born
children to the charity of the public. To use his own
language, “guilty without remorse, he soon become so without
measure.”

Thomas Paine was, according to the verdict of history, “addicted
to intemperance in his last years, given to violence and
abusiveness, had disreputable associates, lived with a woman
who was not his wife, and left to her whatever remnant of
fortune he had.”

What would such godless infidels give us if the Almighty
God should “pour the petroleum of authority upon their
heads?” But, in all candor, what use has Col. Ingersoll for
the idea of authority coming from God? Can’t he keep in his own
ruts. “The divine petroleum of authority was never poured
upon the head of Thomas Paine’s father.” Well, so much the
better for the reputation of God. But why does Mr. Ingersoll
use the term God, and have so much to say of Him? Let us
hear him. He says, whoever is a friend of man is also a friend of
God—if there is one. Yes! “is there is one.”
This reminds me of an old infidel who was struggling with the
cramp colic, and just as a minister was approaching his bedside
he turned himself over in the bed and said, O Lord, if
there is any Lord, save my soul, if I’ve got any soul. The
minister walked out. What is the condition of those minds
which modify their declarations with the saying “if there is
any Lord,” “if there is one,” “if I’ve got any soul.” How
much more manly is it to own the great universal and instinctive
[pg 180]
or inate truth, that there is a Master, God, or great
first Living Intelligence, and cease acting foolishly.

Once more, the colonel, speaking of Thomas Paine’s work,
says, “He was with the army. He shared its defeats, its dangers,
and its glory. When the situation became desperate,
when gloom settled upon all, he gave them the ‘Crisis.’ It
was a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night, leading the
way to freedom, honor and glory.” What use has the colonel
for such language? From whence did it come? Is he sitting
upon the bones of Moses and making grimaces at the old prophet
while he is adopting his sentences? Infidels blaspheme
the name of Moses, and abuse his hyperboles and his facts as
well, and, at the same time, go to his quiver to get their very
best arrows.

“At the close of the Revolution no one stood higher in
America than Thomas Paine.”—Ingersoll.

“At that time the seeds sown by the great infidels were beginning
to bear fruit in France.”—Ingersoll.

Well, well. To what “mount” have we come at last? Paine
sailed to France in 1787. “He was elected to represent the
Department of Calais in the National Convention, and took
his seat in that radical assembly in 1792.” At this time Col.
Ingersoll’s church had everything its own way in France.
There was no God to respect or devil to fear. “Free thought”
ruled—its reign was a reign of night. The goddess of reason
was the “twin sister of the Spanish Inquisition.” The soldiers
were in power, and great hearts were made to bleed. Three
hundred and sixty-six men in the National Convention voted
for the death of the king. Three hundred and fifty-five voted
against his execution. It is true that Tom Paine was one of
the three hundred and fifty-five. A year after the king’s execution
Tom was put into prison, and remained there nearly
two years. When he was released he wrote the second part of
the Age of Reason, and in 1802 he came back to America.
What he did for American liberty was done while he was a
Quaker, and before he wrote his detestable works against the
Bible. Let some bold infidel produce just one noble public
[pg 181]
act that Paine did for our country after he avowed himself an
infidel. Will it be done?

The leaders of the French revolution were the disciples of
Rousseau, Voltaire and Diderot. They were atheists, or infidels.
Tom Paine was one of their number, participated in
their deliberations, helped to get up the constitution they enacted.
What they did is what the infidels of the United States
wish to have done. They wiped out Christianity by vote, and
forbade the utterance of the name of God to their children.
They abolished the Lord’s day, and made the week to consist
of ten instead of seven days. They took the bells from the
churches and cast them into cannons. Chaumette, a leader in
the convention, came before the president “leading a courtesan
with a troop of her associates.” He lifted her veil, and
said, “Mortals! recognize no other divinity than Reason, of
which I present to you the loveliest and purest personification.”
The president bowed and rendered devout adoration. The
same scene was reënacted in the cathedral of Notre Dame,
with increased outrages upon God and common-sense. Wrong
was reputed right, and the distinction between vice and virtue
was banished.

From this time, and onward, the test of attachment to the
government was contempt for religion and decency. Those
suspected of disloyalty were gathered; one thousand and five
hundred women and children were shut up in one prison, without
fire, bed, cover, or provisions, for two days. Men escaped
by giving up their fortunes, and women escaped by
parting with their virtue.

Seventeen thousand perished in Paris during this reign of
infidel terror. This ungodly abrogation of religion in France
cost the nation three million of lives—think of it! France’s
most dark and damning record was the fruit of the tenets of
the men that Col. Ingersoll lauds to the heavens. They were
the fruits of the labors of the men with whom Tom Paine sat,
and believed, and voted. “His faith was their faith.”

“It was the Quaker Paine who worked for our independence,
and not the infidel Paine. He did nothing in the interests
[pg 182]
of our national liberty after he avowed his irreligious
principles.” Neither was he the first to raise the voice in
favor of national liberty. Ten years before he wrote his work
entitled “Common Sense,” at the suggestion of Franklin and
Dr. Benjamin Rush, which was in 1776, Patrick Henry’s voice
was heard amid the assembled colonists in Virginia. He said:
“Cæsar had his Brutus, Charles I. his Cromwell, and George
III.—” Just then some one cried out, “Treason!” After a
pause, Henry added,—“may profit by their example.” Years
before Tom Paine came to America, even in 1748, it went to
record that American legislatures were tending to independence.
“They were charged with presumption in declaring
their own rights and privileges.” Our independence was predicted
near at hand from 1758 and onwards. In 1774, before
Paine came from England, the word freedom was ringing out
upon the air. “James Otis was hailing the dawn of a new
empire” in 1765. In this year there were utterances of such
sentiments as tended to evolve the declaration of 1776, and
these were heard all over the land from Boston to Charleston,
S. C. In 1773 “Samuel Adams insisted that the colonies
should have a congress to frame a bill of rights, or to form an
independent state, an American commonwealth.” The North
Carolinians renounced their allegiance to the king of England
in the Mecklenberg declaration, which was made in May, 1775.
But Paine’s little book, suggested by Dr. Benjamin Rush and
Franklin, and called “Common Sense,” was published in 1776.
Hildreth, writing of the year 1802, says that “Paine, instead
of being esteemed as formerly, as a lover of liberty, whose
pen has contributed to hasten the Declaration of Independence,
was now detested by large numbers as the libeler of
Washington.” In 1795 the Aurora put out the following
language, which seems to be that to which Hildreth alludes:
“If ever a nation was debauched by a man, the American nation
was debauched by Washington; if ever a nation was deceived
by a man, the American nation has been deceived by
Washington. Let the history of the federal government instruct
mankind, that the mask of patriotism may be worn to
[pg 183]
conceal the foulest designs against the liberties of the people.”
This, gentle reader, was from the pen of the man whom Mr.
Ingersoll would immortalize if he could.

William Carver addressed a private letter to Thomas Paine,
dated Dec. 2, 1806, and published in the New York Observer
Nov. 1, 1877, in which we have the following revelations:
“A respectable gentleman from New Rochelle called to see
me a few days back, and said that every body was tired of you
there and that no one would undertake to board and lodge you.
I thought this was the case, as I found you at a tavern in a most
miserable situation. You appeared as if you had not been
shaved for a fortnight, and as to a shirt, it could not be said
that you had one on, it was only the remains of one, and this
likewise appeared not to have been off your back for a fortnight,
and was nearly the color of tanned leather; and you had
the most disagreeable smell possible, just like that of our poor
beggars in England. Do you remember the pains I took to
clean you? That I got a tub of warm water and soap, and
washed you from head to foot, and this I had to do three times
before I could get you clean? You say also that you found
your own liquors during the time you boarded with me, but
you should have said, ‘I found only a small part of the liquor
I drank during my stay with you; this part I purchased of
John Fellows, which was a demijohn of brandy containing
four gallons, and this did not serve me three weeks.’ This can
be proved, and I mean not to say anything I can not prove,
for I hold this as a precious jewel. It is a well-known fact
that you drank one quart of brandy per day, at my expense,
during the different times that you have boarded with me, the
demijohn alone mentioned excepted, and the last fourteen
weeks you were sick. Is not this a supply of liquor for dinner
and supper? Now sir, I think I have drawn a complete
portrait of your character, yet, to enter upon every minutia,
would be to give a history of your life, and to develop the
fallacious mask of hypocrisy and deception under which you
have acted in your political, as well as moral, capacity of life.”
So much for the apostate Quaker’s character after the close of
the American revolution.

[pg 184]

Mr. Lecky, an infidel, says, “It was reserved for Christianity
to present to the world an ideal character, which through
all the changes of eighteen centuries has filled the hearts of
men with an impassioned love, and has shown itself capable
of acting on all ages, nations, temperaments, and conditions;
has not only been the highest pattern of virtue, but the highest
incentive of practice: amid all the sins and failing; amid
all the priestcraft, the persecution and fanaticism which have
defaced the church, it has preserved in the character
of its founder an enduring principle of regeneration.”
If such be the fountain let the stream continue
to flow.

Shall We Unchain The Tiger? Or, The Fruits Of Infidelity.

By Eld. A. I. Maynard.

An infidel production was submitted to Benjamin Franklin
manuscript; he returned it to the author with a letter,
from which the following quotations are extracted:
“I would advise you not to attempt unchaining the
Tiger, but to burn this piece before it is seen by any other
person…. If men are so wicked with religion, what
would they be without it?” He informs us that he was “an
advocate of infidelity in his early youth, a confirmed Deist.”
He says his “arguments perverted some other young persons,
particularly Collins and Ralph, and when he recollected that
they both treated him exceedingly ill without the least remorse,
and also remembered the behavior of Keith, another
‘Freethinker,’ and his own conduct toward Vernon and a
Miss Reed, which at times gave him great uneasiness, he was
led to suspect that his theory, if true, was not very useful.”

Youth and inexperience have been the secret of many young
persons being led astray, like Franklin, by infidel speculations;
but age and observation have convinced many of them
that all infidel speculations are empty and worthless.
[pg 185]
Look at the history of infidelity in France and Scotland,
and then look at liberalism in America, with Col. Ingersoll
leading the van. Can’t you see that its only tendency is to
loosen the restraints of morality and “unchain the Tiger?”

The inconsiderate and inexperienced youth of both sexes,
have need of all the motives of religion to lead them from
vice, to support their virtue, and retain them in its practice
until it becomes habitual.

Unbeliever, if you read this article, and remember that you
have prepared one sentence to cut one cord that helps to hold
the Tiger, burn it. Do not unchain the animal. Would you
substitute infidelity for Christianity, for the religion of the
Bible? Would you do that in this country? The enemies
of this religion confess that its code of morals is holy, just and
good, its doctrine is dignified and glorious; its tendency is
to purity and peace; “it is pure, peaceable, gentle and easy
to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits; without partiality,
and without hypocrisy.” Montesquieu, the publisher
of the Persian letters and president of the parliament of Bordeaux,
says: “The Christian religion, which ordains that men
should love each other, would, without doubt, have every
nation blessed with the best political and civil laws, because
these, next to religion, are the greatest good that men can
have.”

The Congress of 1776, speaking of religion, declared it was
the “only solid basis of public liberty and happiness.” General
Washington said it was “one of the great pillars of human
happiness, and the firmest prop of the duties of men and citizens.”
What could we gain by exchanging it for Deism, or
Atheism, or Ingersollism? Infidelity proposes to break down
the altars of prayer, take away our Bibles and our days of
worship, shut up the doors against all our Sunday-schools and
turn more than a million of children into the streets, away
from sweet song and moralizing influences, and the pure
morals of the gospel of Christ. This would bereave the
living of his rule of life, and rob the dying of the antidote
of death.

[pg 186]

Shall we “unchain the Tiger”—unbelief? What would it
bring us in return? Its doctrines are vague speculations,
founded on neither data nor evidence; some of its supporters
believe in some kind of a God, while some deny every God;
some few believe in the immortality of the soul, while a majority,
with the French infidels, write over the gates of their
cemeteries, “Death is eternal sleep.”

In looking over the various infidel productions I think of
the old saying, “Be sure you are right, and then go ahead.”
There is no certainty in their speculations. They do not
agree even in their so-called moral code, nor, as yet, in their
doctrinal speculations.

Lord Herbert and the Earl of Shaftesbury thought that
the light of nature would teach all men, without the aid of
revelation, to observe the morality of the Bible. Spinosa and
Hobbes, one believing in a God, and the other an Atheist,
agreed that there was nothing that was either right or wrong
in its own nature; and also agreed “that every man had a
right to obtain, either by force or fraud, everything which
either his reason or his passions prompted him to believe was
useful to himself—duties to the State were his only duties.”

Blount, another Freethinker, supposed “that the moral law
of nature justified self-murder.” Lord Bolingbroke claimed
that it enjoined polygamy; and neither Blount nor Bolingbroke
prohibited fornication, or adultery, or incest, except between
parents and children.

But the vagueness and uncertainty of the doctrinal speculations
of infidelity, and the looseness and immorality of its
rules of life, are not the only objections to it. Its tendency,
wherever it has been introduced in the history of our world,
has been evil, and only evil. France, at the commencement
of her revolution in 1789, was an infidel nation. The profligacy
of the Catholic priesthood, and the demoralizing example
of the Regent, Duke of Orleans, and the infidel publications of
Voltaire and his associates, had produced a contempt for religion
through every rank of society. The people of France
were taught by their literati that the Bible was at war with
[pg 187]
their liberties; and that they could never expect to overturn
the throne till they had, first, broken down the “altar.”
here the tiger was unchained!

The lusts and passions of man were set free from the restraints
of Christianity, and the bloody history of that nation,
in its devotion to infidelity, should convince every man that
infidelity only “unchained the tiger”! It did France no good,
but much evil. In this state of things France needed revolution,
as America did, and had she engaged in it, with as pious
reliance upon God, “and with the hearts of her people deeply
imbued with the morality of the Bible, the scion of liberty, carried
in the honored Lafayette from this country,” would have
taken deep root, and spread forth its branches; and ere this
time the fairest portion of Europe might have reposed under
its shadow. But her principles poisoned her morals, and her
immorality disqualified her for freedom. After expending an
incredible amount of treasure, and sacrificing more than two
million of men, she consented to be ruled by a despot in hope
of some protection from her own people, and in hope of some
security against the animal which she had unchained.

With such facts before us, let us Americans decide, not
merely as Christians, but as “patriots and fathers,” whether
we will cling to the pure “Gospel of Jesus Christ,” given to
us in the love of Heaven, and in the blood of Jesus, rather
than accept in its stead the empty, Godless, Christless, good-for-nothing
negative of God and Christ and Christianity. The
chief article in the unbeliever’s creed is in these words, “I believe
in all unbelief.”

Will not our friends take interest enough in the Journal
to increase its circulation. There is no reason why it should
not be immediately doubled, and thus placed upon a solid basis.
It is our intention to make it a thorough defense of the
truth, so much so that all will relish it, and remember it with
delight.

The Struggle.

There are two different periods in the history of the race;
in the history of a nation; in the history of the church; in the
history of moral institutions, and in the history of families.
In one the intellect predominates, governs; in the other the
emotional nature, or passion, rules. The fatal day in the history
of a nation is the day in which, through party strife or
otherwise, a nation of people becomes a seething mass of heated
passion. Such a nation is like a vessel tossed upon the
waves above the falls of some mighty river, liable to be buried
in the whirlpool of destruction. Men who are governed
by their emotional nature are most liable to disappointments,
to troubles, and difficulties of every kind. Select all the miserable
families in your community, tell me where they are,
and I will show you every family in which passion reigns.

Troubles are generally legitimate children of passion. Who
has not heard some one say, repentingly, “If I had taken a
second, sober thought I would not have done it.” Intellect
belongs to our higher nature, and emotion belongs to our lower.
Intelligence is always at a discount where the emotional
nature governs—it is subordinated to passion. When the intellect
governs, the emotional is subjected to thought; when
either one predominates, the other is brought under and enslaved.
These are the two conflicting elements in man’s nature
which are generally at war with each other, leading to
different and antagonistic results. During the dark ages,
which were ushered in through the repudiation of intelligence
and the predominance of passion, the emotional reigned, and
men were governed by their passions in religious as well as
state affairs. The shadows of those ages still linger with
some communities, and with many persons in almost all
communities. Our fathers had a long and hard struggle in
getting away from an emotional to an intellectual state, both
[pg 189]
in civil as well as religious affairs. To-day, if we consider
this matter in connection with our people as a nation, we may
safely say that we are in an intellectual period—mind predominates.
This is an age of investigation. The time was,
in the history of our fathers, when a man was fined fifty
pounds of tobacco if he refused to have his innocent child
christened. See the “old Blue Laws.” The time was when
innocent persons were tried, condemned, and put to death for
being, in the estimation of men, clothed with disgraceful ignorance,
witches. Who has not heard of the “Salem witchcraft?”

The emotional nature of man, as a ruling sovereign, is losing
its “legal-tender value” daily. The time was when it
brought a premium in the most of the churches in our country.
An aged father, who is now “across the river,” once said to
me, “I was bewildered, and mentally lost for thirty years of
my life.” I asked him for the facts. He, answering, said:
“During all that period of time I was a church member, and,
like some others, I was a quiet, still kind of a soul; I paid
my honest debts; told the truth about my neighbors, and
lived a moral life to the very best of my abilities. There
were others of the same character. The preachers frequently
called us Quakers—the Quakers were a very still people in
those days. There were others who were reckless; would not
always tell the truth, and would not always pay their honest
debts, but they were, nevertheless, very noisy in the church,
and the preacher always made most of those noisy fellows.
Now,” said the aged father, “I never could understand that.”
The old man lived to learn the secret, and changed his religious
relations and began a new life in religion.

The scenes of the “Cane Ridge revival,” down in Kentucky,
have not been repeated in all our country for more than twenty
years, and it is probable that they never will be. There
are many things in the past history of religion in our country
that will never be repeated. Did you ever witness a panic in
a large congregation of people? If you have, you may go
with me to “Cane Ridge.” Before we start I wish to remind
you of the fact that some of the most fearful panics known to
[pg 190]
men took place where, and when, there was no reason for them
outside of existing ignorance. Fright or fear, coupled with
ignorance, produced them. Now let us go to “Cane Ridge.”
There we find the people in the emotional period in the history
of religion. They are laboring under the conviction that
Jehovah has concentrated all the powers of His Spirit at Cane
Ridge—it is the common conviction. The people all over the
country believe that God is there. The excitement runs high,
and yet higher; it becomes contagious—a religious epidemic—the
ruling element being the thought of the presence of the
Divine Majesty, and the emotional nature of man the field of
its operations. All the ignorance of a genuine panic is there.
There were no well-informed unbelievers there to tear off the
veil, nor better-informed Christians to remove it, not even so
much as a Wesley to exonerate God by saying, “I am constrained
to believe that it is the devil tearing them as they are
coming to Christ.” No! There is one conviction at Cane
Ridge—it is this: Jehovah is here. It was a wonderful panic—a
wonderful time. Persons going on to the ground immediately
fell down like dead men; got up with the jerks;
barked like dogs. Women went backwards and forwards,
making singular gestures; their heads were bobbing with the
jerks, and their long hair cracking like whips. The scene was
beyond description. The whole country flocked to the place,
and all were confounded with amazement and astonishment.

If such operations were religion, our country has been without
it for a long time. Then our old-fashioned camp-meetings—where
are they? They are things of the past. I recollect
leaving a camp-ground at a late hour of the night, just as the
congregation divided up into groups, and the groups went out
into the woods in different directions to engage in secret
prayer. We heard them when we were three miles away—strange
secret prayer! Do you know anything of that kind
of secret prayer at the present time?

The common pulpit teaching of those times was wonderful(?),
but it was the best they had. It was common for preachers to
make war upon education. They often boasted of their ignorance.
[pg 191]
They claimed that education was not necessary to
qualify a man for the pulpit. The best school teachers in our
country received twelve and fifteen dollars per month for
teaching, and boarded themselves. Teachers who now pay
five dollars per week for board, can’t see how those old teachers
got along upon such wages. In those times it was very
common for teachers to get their board for seventy-five cents
per week. The farmers claimed that it was unnecessary to
educate their daughters, and only necessary to educate their
sons sufficiently well to enable them to keep their accounts.
Beyond this it was often claimed that an education was of no
value—that it only made rascals. I recollect a very zealous
old man who preached for the German Baptists; he is now
“across the waves.” Once, in my presence, he disposed of a
grammatical argument that was put against him, by saying,
“It is the wisdom of the world, and it is sensual and devilish.”
It was common forty years ago for preachers to say, “I don’t
know what I shall say, but just as the Lord gives it to me I
will hand it to you.” As a general thing those men knew no
better, and the masses of the people knew no better. The
people were living in an Emotional period, with the exception
of a few brave thinkers, and they were governed by their emotions.

Prosperity grew with the growth of our country, and the standard
of education was elevated. The free-school system
took the place of the old-fashioned subscription schools, which
were worth twelve dollars per month to the whole community,
and the brave thinkers continued stirring up thought in religion,
and giving the fathers and mothers trouble about this thing
of confounding religion with passion, and our country is now
fairly at sea in an Intellectual period. Religion is now a
thing to be learned and lived—to be done. Those brave men
who advocated an intelligent religion forty years ago, were
denounced, from almost every pulpit in our country, as a set
of “whitewashed infidels,” having no religion, and “without
God in the world.”

But that day is past, and we are in a period in which mind
[pg 192]
generally predominates. The language of the emotional is
seldom heard. In that period it was common to hear men
ask: “How did you get religion?” “where did you get religion?”
“where did you get religion?” “describe it;” “O
I can’t, it is better felt than expressed.” Such language was in
keeping with a very common idea which was held sacred in
those days. It was this, the Lord made general provision
for the salvation of men, but He makes a special application
to the sinner. Of course, all to whom salvation was not especially
applied, were, in the estimation of those people, lost.
There are a few communities yet that are away back in the
emotional period. There are men and women in every community
who are yet governed by their emotional nature in
matters of religion. Those persons have no use for an intelligent,
argumentative preacher. They want a preacher who
will say smoothe things; and there is now and then a preacher
who has no strength outside of the emotional.

We have an emotional nature. I am glad that we have. I
would not be an intellectual wooden-man if I could. But if
you say, the Almighty Father intended that we should be intellectually
subordinated to our emotional nature, and therefore
governed by our passions, or feelings, I shall deny it. He
never intended that we should be governed by our passions.
To-day there are strong intellects in unbelief flooding our
country with their literature. How shall they be met? Mr.
Moody says, “Show them that you are full of Jesus Christ
and the Holy Ghost.” Very well. Can you do that without
the truth? can you do that without word or wisdom? can you
do it without “contending earnestly for the faith once delivered
unto the saints?” In the days of Christ and His apostles the
men who were full of the Holy Spirit had a mouth and wisdom
which none of their adversaries were able to resist or
gainsay. The antichrists of our day can not be met successfully
without reason, without argument, without meeting the
intellectual demands of the times.

There are intellectual men and women in almost every community
throughout our country—men and women with whom
[pg 193]
intelligence governs—who want the whys and wherefores upon
every subject. This class is on the increase at a rapid rate.
It does no good to set ourselves against reason, and oppose the
current of thought with our emotional nature. In that way
we may succeed with those who are governed by their emotional
nature, but the work, when it is done, is a work upon
the passions, and will soon pass away, unless the intellect was
at the same time enlisted. The men who stir the world with
thought, and give intellectual cast to the age in which we live,
are to be met with thought, met with reason, met with truths
tried in the crucible.

Christianity has nothing to fear in the great struggle that is
being carried on for the truth’s sake. But it has lost much
for want of investigation. Our free school and Sunday-school
systems are making the rising generation better acquainted
with both science and the Bible, and a thorough
acquaintance with both is the one thing most needed in order
to a better future in religion, as well as in every other human
interest. The time is come when men will no longer be content
to listen to grave errors and keep silence. Every truth
is being put to the test of logic, as well as fact. It is natural
to abhor a contradiction, and it is right. All truth is harmonious.
I am glad that harmony is demanded in religious
teaching; I often think of pulpit teaching away back thirty
and forty years ago. It used to be very popular in some
parts to tell people that they could do nothing to better their
condition in a future state, and, at the same time, exhort them
to do better.

I heard of three brothers, George, William and James.
George and William were “Hard-shell Baptist” preachers;
James made no profession. His wife was a member of
George’s congregation. She was a great “scold.” One day
James failed to do just as she wished him, and, as a matter of
course, he received quite a lecture; finally the woman told
him that it was a great pity that he could not be a good man,
like his brother George or brother William, and fell to exhorting
him to do better. He finally became impatient and
[pg 194]
said, “Yes! George and William were too lazy to work, and
I called them to preach. They both stood it until the third
call, and then put on their hats and went. You belong to
George’s church, and I go there with you to hear him preach.
He tells me that I can do nothing, and you tell me that I can
do nothing; and, now, what in the h—l do you want me to
do?” Such inconsistent teaching was always repugnant to
common sense and natural reason. There are many persons
yet teaching the old falsehood that man is passive in his conversion,
notwithstanding the fact that men are imperatively
commanded to convert—turn, that their sins may be blotted
out. Men are yet found in some Protestant pulpits who spend
a great deal of their time praying the Lord to convert sinners.
It is often the case, in their own estimation, that the Lord
gives no heed to their prayers; but this has happened so frequently
that it does not seem to trouble them. It has been a
very short time since I heard a minister advocating what he
was pleased to call “miraculous conversion.” I thought, if
you are right in that matter, why did the Heavenly Father
command his love, commended in the Savior’s death, preached
to every creature, and still refuse to convert every creature?
What difference does it make to me whether the Lord passed
me by before He made Adam, or passed me by on yesterday?
And if He refuses to send His spirit and convert me until the
last, and I die in my sins and am lost, who is to blame?
What is the difference between His neglect to convert me and
the old Calvinistic idea that Christ did not die for me? What
is the difference between the spirit of God being partial to
communities—going into one and converting a great many
persons and passing others by—and God Himself being partial?
And why does the Spirit not convert all the unwilling
sinners in the community where it does convert sinners?
These are questions that have been asked in a great many
hearts before they yielded themselves up to skepticism and infidelity.

In the present stage of critical investigation it is well for
all preachers to remember that there is but one question involving
[pg 195]
this whole matter of conversion and pardon, and that
is the question coupled with the Judgment; it is not, How
much did the Heavenly Father love me? He loved all men.
It is not, How much did Jesus do for me? He tasted death
for every man. It is not, How much has the Spirit done for
me? It gave the gospel to all nations, as the power of God
unto salvation to every man that believeth. The one, and
only, question in the Judgment is, What have I done for myself?
What are the deeds done in my body? the deeds
which I have done.

Christianity is right thinking and doing; all that is to be
attained in the religion of Christ is enjoyed in an upright life.
Every theory that conflicts with this grand sentiment is smoked
with the darkness of the dark ages. The Father of Spirits
made us with the power of choice—gave us the liberty to
choose—and we all may have, in the future, just such a state
as we will. The Father loved all; the Son died for all; and
the Spirit says to all, come!

The great struggle that is now going on between Christianity
and unbelief is accomplishing two good things: First, it is
making it hard for professors of religion to hold their errors,
or cover up hypocrisy; and second, it is making it hard for
infidels and skeptics to hold on to their flimsy objections to
the Christian religion. Let the struggle go on!

The Records Respecting The Death Of Thomas Paine.

That he bitterly regretted the writing and the publishing
of the Age of Reason we have incontestable proof. During
his last illness he asked a pious young woman, Mary Roscoe,
a Quakeress, who frequently visited him, if she had ever read
any of his writings, and being told that she had read very little
of them he inquired what she thought of them, adding,
“From such a one as you I expect a true answer.” She told
him, when very young she had read his Age of Reason, but
[pg 196]
the more she read of it the more dark and distressed she felt,
and she threw it into the fire. “I wish all had done as you,”
he replied, “for if the devil ever had an agency in any work,
he has had it in writing that book.”—Journal of Stephen
Grellet, 1809.

Dr. Manley, who was with him during his last hours, in a
letter to Cheetham, in 1809, writes: “He could not be left
alone night or day. He not only required to have some person
with him, but he must see that he or she was there, and if,
as it would sometimes happen, he was left alone, he would
scream and halloo until some person came to him. There was
something remarkable in his conduct about this period, which
comprises about two weeks immediately preceding his death.
He would call out during his paroxysms of distress, without intermission,
‘O Lord, help me! God, help me! Jesus Christ,
help me! O Lord, help me!’ etc., repeating the same expressions
without the least variation, in a tone of voice that
would alarm the house. It was this conduct which induced
me to think that he abandoned his former opinions, and I was
more inclined to that belief when I understood from his nurse,
who is a very serious, and I believe pious woman, that he
would occasionally inquire, when he saw her engaged with a
book, what she was reading, and being answered, and at the
same time asked whether she should read aloud, he assented, and
would appear to give particular attention. The doctor asked
him if he believed that Jesus Christ is the Son of God? After
a pause of some minutes he replied, ‘I have no wish to believe
on that subject.’ ‘For my own part,’ says the doctor,
‘I believe that had not Thomas Paine been such a distinguished
infidel he would have left less equivocal evidences of
a change of opinion.’ ”

The Roman Catholic Bishop, Fenwick, says: “A short
time before Paine died I was sent for by him.” He was
prompted to do this by a poor Catholic woman who went to
see him in his sickness, and who told him if anybody could do
him any good it was the Catholic priest. “I was accompanied
by F. Kohlman, an intimate friend. We found him at a
[pg 197]
house in Greenwich, now Greenwich street, New York, where
he lodged. A decent-looking, elderly woman came to the
door, and inquired whether we were the Catholic priests; ‘for,’
said she, ‘Mr. Paine has been so much annoyed of late by
other denominations calling upon him, that he has left express
orders to admit no one but the clergymen of the Catholic
church.’ Upon informing her who we were, she opened the door
and showed us into the parlor. ‘Gentlemen,’ said the lady,
‘I really wish you may succeed with Mr. Paine, for he is laboring
under great distress of mind every since he was told
by his physicians that he can not possibly live, and must die
shortly. He is truly to be pitied. His cries, when left alone,
are heart-rending. “O Lord, help me!” he will exclaim during
his paroxysms of distress: “God, help me! Jesus
Christ, help me!” Repeating these expressions in a tone of
voice that would alarm the house. Sometimes he will say,
“O God, what have I done to suffer so much?” Then shortly
after, “but there is no God,” then again, “yet if there should
be, what would become of me hereafter?” Thus he will continue
for some time, when, on a sudden, he will scream as if
in terror and agony, and call for me by name. On one occasion
I inquired what he wanted. “Stay with me,” he replied,
“for God’s sake, for I can not bear to be left alone.” I told
him I could not always be in the room. “Then,” said he,
“send even a child to stay with me, for it is a hell to be alone.”
I never saw,’ she continued, ‘a more unhappy, a more forsaken
man. It seems he can not reconcile himself to die.’

“Such was the conversation of the woman, who was a Protestant,
and who seemed very desirous that we should afford
him some relief in a state bordering on complete despair.
Having remained some time in the parlor, we at length heard
a noise in the adjoining room. We proposed to enter, which
was assented to by the woman, who opened the door for us.
A more wretched being in appearance I never beheld. He
was lying in a bed sufficiently decent in itself, but at present
besmeared with filth; his look was that of a man greatly tortured
in mind, his eyes haggard, his countenance forbidding,
[pg 198]
and his whole appearance that of one whose better days had
been one continued scene of debauch. His only nourishment
was milk punch, in which he indulged to the full extent of his
weak state. He had partaken very recently of it, as the sides
and corners of his mouth exhibited very unequivocal traces of
it, as well as of blood which had also followed in the track and
left its mark on the pillow. Upon their making known the
object of their visit, Paine interrupted the speaker by saying,
‘That’s enough, sir, that’s enough. I see what you would be
about. I wish to hear no more from you, sir; my mind is
made up on that subject. I look upon the whole of the Christian
scheme to be a tissue of lies, and Jesus Christ to be nothing
more than a cunning knave and imposter. Away with
you, and your God, too! Leave the room instantly! All
that you have uttered are lies, filthy lies, and if I had a little
more time I would prove it, as I did about your imposter,
Jesus Christ.’ Among the last utterances that fell upon the
ears of the attendants of this dying infidel, and which have
been recorded in history, were the words, ‘My God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me?’ ”

“Some thousand famous writers come up in this century to
be forgotten in the next. But the silver cord of the Bible is
not loosened, nor its golden bowl broken, though time chronicles
his tens of centuries passed by…. You can
trace the path of the Bible across the world, from the day of
Pentecost to this day. As a river springs up in the heart of a
sandy continent, having its father in the skies; as the stream
rolls on, making in that arid waste a belt of verdure wherever
it turns its way; creating palm groves and fertile plains, where
the smoke of the cottage curls up at eventide, and marble cities
send the gleam of their splendor far into die sky—such
has been the course of the bible on
earth.”—Theodore Parker.

“I must die—abandoned of God and of
men.”—Voltaire.

Three Reasons For Repudiating Infidelity.

Bishop Whipple says, “I once met a thoughtful scholar who
told me that for years he had read every book which assailed
the religion of Jesus Christ. He said he would have been an
infidel if it had not been for three things:

“ ‘First, I am a man. I am going somewhere. I am to-night
a day nearer the grave than last night. I have read all
that they can tell me. There is not one solitary ray of light
upon the darkness. They shall not take away the only guide
and leave me stone blind.

“ ‘Secondly, I had a mother. I saw her go down into the
dark valley where I am going, and she leaned upon an unseen
arm as calmly as a child goes to sleep upon the breast of a
mother. I know that was not a dream.

“ ‘Thirdly, I have three motherless daughters. They have
no protector but myself. I would rather kill them than leave
them in this sinful world if you could blot out from it all the
teachings of the Gospel.’ ”

Col. Ingersoll Is A Philosopher?

Col. Ingersoll tells us that “intellectual liberty, as a matter
of necessity, forever destroys the idea that belief is either
praise or blameworthy, and is wholly inconsistent with
every creed in Christendom.” Again, he says, “No man can
control his belief.” Notwithstanding all this, his whole occupation
consists in traveling over the country and blaming men,
women and children for their belief. He is consistent? He
is a Scientist, you know? He does nothing that is absurd?
He is a philosopher, sitting on the bones of Moses and making
grimaces at the faith of Moses, when neither Moses nor his
friends could control their belief? He works hard for no purpose
if men can’t control their belief, and does men injustice,
if he blames them for their faith?

“No man can control his belief.” Then why labor to make
your brother of humanity believe that he is but—

[pg 200]

And then—

If these—

Think of Ingersoll at his brother’s grave!

Life Of Elder E. Goodwin.

This interesting volume will be ready for delivery in a few
days, as it is now in the hands of the binder. It is a neat volume
of 314 pages, on good paper, and substantially bound in
cloth. Price, $1.50.

Some two months ago we issued a prospectus for this book,
proposing to make a work of 300 pages, and putting the price
at $1.25, and these papers have been in the hands of agents
for some time, and quite a large number of persons have subscribed
for the book at that price. Of course all who have
subscribed to date shall have the book in good faith at $1.25,
as understood, but we are compelled to raise the price to all
new subscribers from this date to $1.50, on account of the advance
in all book stock and the increased size of the book.

All our old agents, and all persons desiring an agency for
this work, will please correspond with us at this place—Bedford,
Lawrence County, Indiana.

April 2, 1879.
J. M. Mathes.

Elder Mathes, also, keeps on hand a full supply of all the
publications of the Christian church. Address all orders for
any good book in the market to Elder James M. Mathes,
Bedford, Lawrence County, Indiana. Send money by postal
money order, bank draft, or registered letter.

J. M. Mathes.