[Pg 441]

Scientific and Religious Journal.

IS THE SINNER A MORAL AGENT IN HIS CONVERSION?

There are a great many questions asked upon the subject of
conversion, and as many answers given as there are theories
of religion, and many persons listening to men’s theories upon
this subject are left in doubt and darkness in reference to what is
and is not conversion. You ask the Mormons, who fully believe
their theory of conversion, and they will refer you to their
own experience and the experience of the loyal, self-sacrificing
devotees of their faith. Ask the Roman Catholic and he will
give you an answer corresponding with his theory of religion.
All Protestant parties give you their experience, and refer you to
their loyal and self-sacrificing brethren for the truthfulness of
their theories of conversion. In the midst of this conflict and
medley of contradictions what are we to do? Shall we accept
their experience as the infallible rule by which to determine
the right from the wrong in matters pertaining to our present
and eternal salvation? A strange rule, in view of the great
contrariety of opinions and our liability to be misled. It
would justify Mother Eve, she being deceived. But “she was
found in the transgression.” We may be deceived and found
in transgression. This strange rule would justify Saul; for he
verily thought he ought to do many things contrary to Jesus,
which things he did, and did them in all good conscience
towards God and man, yet he was a blasphemer and injurious.
The Master, in view of our liability to be deceived, gave us a
[Pg 442]rule of conduct in reference to our communications in these
words: “Let your communications be yea, yea, and nay, nay.”
It requires heroism and manhood, which is the highest degree
of moral courage, to say nay where questions of personal interest
are involved.

The rule in reference to God’s word is different, being based
upon his immutability and perfections. He is not deceived,
not misled, not mistaken. Paul says in reference to the word
of God, which was preached by himself, Sylvanus and Timotheus:
“Our word toward you was not yea and nay, but in
him was yea, for all the promises of God in Christ are yea,
and in him amen unto the glory of God by us.” 2 Cor. 1, 18–20.
“Let God be true though every man be a liar,” was in
the times of the Apostles and first Christians a rule which
they had no hesitancy in affirming. A moral agent is one
who, with a knowledge of the right and wrong, exercises the
power of action. In conversion it is the exercise of the
power that begins conversion. If the sinner has not this
power, then he is not a moral agent in his conversion. All
the differences among men upon the subject of conversion
grew out of their different notions of God and of men. It is a
matter of the greatest consequence to have correct notions of
God and of self. As conversion relates to both, wrong notions
of one will create wrong notions of the other. Those who
have been taught to debase themselves under the pretext of
giving glory to God, consider meanness and wrong as natural
and inherent imperfections of their being, and attributable to
Father Adam and Mother Eve, and neglect to exercise the
powers at their command. Being taught that they are unable
to do anything to help themselves, they are left to throw the
work all back upon God or give it up in despair. If they
throw it back upon God, and regard themselves as passive recipients
of the work of conversion, then they must wrestle
with God, for there is no use in wrestling with the powerless
one.

With this view of the subject the world’s condition is incomprehensible,
and in direct conflict with the revealed character
[Pg 443]of God. We would naturally suppose when we read
that “God is not willing that any should perish, but that all
should come to repentance,” that none would be allowed to
perish on account of any neglect upon the divine side. But
thousands do die in their sins. Do you say it is because of
their great wickedness? In what does wickedness consist?
Is it the neglect of that which is not in their power? Does
not the system that God interposes in the conversion of the
sinner rest upon the idea that the sinner is helpless in respect
to his conversion? It certainly does. Then why should
the sinner he blamed? This view of the sinner’s moral condition
necessitates a view of God utterly at variance with his
character, viz: that he is now and then on the giving hand,
that he consents to pour out his Spirit occasionally, and does this
only where the good people wrestle with him and give him no
rest day nor night. One would think that “he who spared
not his own son, but gave him up for us all,” would send that
Almighty Spirit everywhere, and at once bring about the
millennial glory. What is the trouble? “God is love!”
“Tell them, as I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure
in the death of him who dieth, but rather that he would repent
and live.” This theory of the sinner’s helplessness is
the foundation of the entire system of mystical conversion
through mystical operations of the Spirit of God. And as
for plain and easy conditions of pardon and peace that we
know all sinners can comply with, this system of mystical
conversion sets them all aside. So you see that difficulties
are multiplying on our hands, and unless we can start off upon
another foot, we must be lost in the mystical and incomprehensible.
As reformers, our greatest work is to clear away
mystical and false notions of men in reference to themselves
and their God; to make men sensible of their dignity and responsibility,
as beings endowed with God-like attributes.

We have succeeded, in most communities, in killing the tap-root
of the mystical tree of conversion—i.e., the tenet of total
hereditary depravity, but the tree still stands erect, and men
claim that a wonderful outpouring of the Spirit of God has, in
many days and nights, resulted in 100 or 200 or 300 conversions.[Pg 444]
But what is conversion? It is lexically defined “to
turn upon, to turn towards.” In a moral sense, “to turn upon
or to, to convert unto, to convert from error, to turn to the service
and worship of the true God.” “And all who dwelt at
Lydda and Saron saw him and turned to the Lord.” Acts
ix, 35. The word turned, in the above text, is a translation
of the Greek term that is nine times rendered convert in its
forms and thirty-eight times turn in its forms. They, the
people of Lydda and Saron, turned, converted to the Lord. Did
they do it? Then they were active and not passive. It was
an act of their own. “Repent and turn yourselves.”—Eze.
xviii, 30. Here the Lord commanded sinners to convert themselves.
“Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby
ye have transgressed, and make you a new heart and a new
spirit; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?” Eze. xviii,
31. “If the wicked will turn, convert, from all his sins that
he hath committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that
which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die.”
Eze. xviii, 31. Here we discover that the burden of conversion
and the entire responsibility of an unconverted state is thrown
upon the sinner.

The Apostles taught men to convert themselves. See Acts
xiv, 15. “We also are men of like passions with you, and
preach unto you, that ye should turn, convert, from these vanities
to the living God.” Paul says, “He showed first unto
them of Damascus, and at Jerusalem and throughout all the
coasts of Judea, and then to the Gentiles, that they should
turn, convert, to God, and do works meet for, worthy of,
repentance.” Acts xxvi, 20. Speaking of the unbelieving
Jews he said, “But their minds were blinded; for until this
day remaineth the same vail untaken away in the reading of
the Old Testament, which vail is done away in Christ. But
even unto this day, when Moses is read, the vail is upon their
heart. Nevertheless, when it shall turn, convert, to the Lord,
the vail shall be taken away.” 2d Corinthians, iii, 14–16.
Here we find that the heart must do its own turning, converting.
Poor Jews! Could they help themselves? Yes, it all[Pg 445]
depended upon their own actions. The Infinite One did
as much for them as for any others. They closed their eyes
and stopped their ears, lest at any time they should see with
their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with
their hearts, and be converted and healed. Why did the
Master not say, “And I should convert and heal them?” Ans.
Conversion is a commandment of God, and sinners must obey
it or perish.

The above quotation is made from Isaiah vi, 10, where it
reads: “Lest they should see with their eyes, and hear with
their ears, and understand with their hearts, and convert, and
I should heal them.” Paul, speaking of the disciples in Macedonia
and Achaia, says: “They themselves show of us what
manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned,
converted, to God from idols to serve the living and true God.”
1 Thess., i, 8, 9. “Repent ye therefore and be converted,” is
passive in our translation, but imperative active in the original.
In the Geneva text it reads: “Amend your lives and turn.
So conversion is a commandment of God. If there is anything
necessary to conversion that is not in the power of the sinner,
why should he be commanded to convert? If the trouble is
in his corruption, through inborn depravity, why are some
converted and others not? If there is anything in conversion
that is not in the power of the sinner, then he must of necessity
be saved without it, or remain unavoidably in sin—doomed
to misery.”

Webster defines the term convert “to change from one state
to another, as to convert a barren waste into a fruitful field;
to convert a wilderness into a garden; to convert rude savages
into civilized men; to change or turn from one party or sect
to another—as to convert Pagans to Christianity, to turn from
a bad life to a good one, to change the heart and moral character
from enmity to God and from vicious habits to the love
of God and to a holy life.” Hence the ancient commandment:
“Make you a new heart and a new spirit, for why will you
die.” Eze. xviii, 32. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God
with all thy heart, and with all thy mind, and with all thy[Pg 446]
strength.” Is this out of your power? Then who is to blame?
Does the blessed Father command you to do what you can
not? Are you thus lost without remedy? Does the Lord
mock you with commandments that you can not obey? The
importance of conversion is in the fact that it is the turning
point or dividing line between those who serve God and those
who serve him not.

I. The Lord commands sinners to convert.

II. The Lord’s commandments are duties that sinners owe
to God.

Therefore, conversion is a duty that the sinner owes to God.
It is the sinner’s duty; then he must perform it. We have
seen that the Lord commands it, and that sinners did perform
it. Do you say it is a work begun upon them and accomplished
by them? Then sinners must be passive in the beginning
of this work, and the beginning is most essential, for unless
the thing is begun it will never be accomplished. Is this
beginning the work of God wrought upon the sinner by a
special operation of the Holy Spirit? If this be so it follows
that the entire Christian life is of necessity, and not of choice,
for the root always bears the tree, and not the tree the root.
If the cause is the unconditioned power of God, the effects
growing out of that cause are the fruits of necessity; and so
the Christian is a necessitated creature, and entitled to neither
praise or reward, for it was not he that did it, but God. And
in this case the sinner is not a moral agent, for in moral agency
the sinner, with a knowledge of the right and the wrong, begins
the work himself and does it himself. This does not exclude
the instrumentality of Christ, the Apostles, prophets
and Christians, who, by the words of the Holy Spirit, have
placed before sinners all the knowledge necessary to give them
correct ideas of duty, and also the motives to be accepted. An
agent is one who has power to begin action, and moral agency
in conversion is the exercise of that power, with a knowledge
of the right and the wrong, and so it comes to pass that conversion
to God always makes a Christian, provided, however,
that the man, knowing what to turn from and what to turn to,[Pg 447]
honestly turned from the wrong to the right, which is the same
as to say that he was a moral agent in his conversion. A man
may turn without a knowledge of the right and the wrong,
but it is turning round and round and remaining in the same
place, i.e. in ignorance of God’s will, and so remaining in
disobedience. Such may be and often is.

In all such cases the person has been the creature of passion,
wrought upon by excitement, and left in ignorance of duty
in disobedience to the gospel of Christ. A good rule by
which to determine when such is the case, and it is the Master’s
rule, is the unwillingness of the person to do the commandments
of God, and to receive for instruction upon the
subject of duty, his word, an unteachable disposition, which
not only refuses to obey when the commandments are presented,
but absolutely persists in opposing them. A man in
this condition is worse than ignorant, his heart is irreconciled
to the government of God, and he may turn around and
around and die in sin and transgression. Do you object that
God controls in conversion, and, therefore, the man is illuminated
in a mysterious manner, and necessitated aright—that
he is a necessitated moral agent? Necessitated moral agency
and free slavery are identical. There is no such thing as
necessitated moral agency. What I am compelled to do is
not mine, but his who compelled me. All that we call moral
or immoral, virtuous or vicious, praiseworthy or blameworthy,
in our conduct, depends wholly upon the will. It begins in
us and is done by us. It is ours and we will answer for it.
No man is to be blamed or praised for that which he neither
had power to do or avoid. This, in harmony with the words
agent and action, is saying no more than that a man is to
be praised or blamed for actions done by himself and not by
another. It is the gospel rule, “that every man shall receive
according to that which he bath done; that every man shall
give account of himself to God.”

If the sinner is to blame for remaining in an unconverted
state, then of necessity conversion is his own voluntary act;
a duty imperatively enjoined upon him, in the performance[Pg 448]
of which he needs to be guided by the knowledge of the right
and the wrong, as much as in any other duty. On the other
hand, if it is a work wrought upon the man by a special effort
of the Holy Spirit, then the man is free from all responsibility
in the premises, for he will answer only for his own
work.

“Keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the
issues of life.” Prov. iv, 23. “He taught me also, and said
unto me: Let thine heart retain my words; keep my commandments
and live.” Prov. iv, 4. “Hear thou, my son,
and be wise, and guide thine heart in the way.” Prov.
xxiii, 19.

“Man, with naught in charge, could betray no trust,
And if he fell, would fall because he must.
If love reward him, or vengeance strike,
His recompense in both would be unjust alike.”

If the sinner is passive in his conversion he can claim no
reward, for it is the act of another. All action is the work
of an agent, of a being who acts. And every being who acts
is the beginner of the motion which constitutes the action.
The bullet that kills the man, the explosion that makes it fly,
the sparkles from the cap which produce the explosion, are
not agents, all being equally passive; nor is it the finger operating
upon the trigger that begins the motion; that also is a
passive instrument; it is the mind giving to the finger direction
and energy which is the mover in this business, and as
such, is, properly speaking, the agent. But if we were super-naturally
informed that the mind thus exerted was made to
do so by the mysterious and irresistible impulse of a superior
being, we should instantly declare that being the agent, and
the mind irresistibly influenced only a passive instrument, and
no more to blame than the gunpowder. Now, if the sinner is
passive he is no more to blame or praise than the passive instruments
employed by the murderer. And if he is not passive,
but active, then the thing is begun and done by himself
as the real agent. Action implies motion, and where there is
no power to begin motion there can not be action, but rest.[Pg 449]
If the sinner has power to begin that action called conversion,
then he is a moral agent in his conversion, provided that he
begins it with a knowledge of the right and the wrong in
their relations to the subject, for action without knowledge of
duty is not conversion to the service of God. In this case
the moral element is wanting, the man acts blindly from impulse
or passion; which is no more than saying that men
must know what to convert from, and what to convert to, before
they can act intelligently as rational moral agents. As
such, the thing of first importance is to teach men the will of
God upon the subject of conversion, that they may know what
to do. Anciently men were told what to do. And the gospel
of Christ tells men the same story yet. If the sinner is
the agent in his conversion then he should give himself no
rest until he learns his duty and does it. But if he is not,
then he might just as well rest contented, for the passive stone
that has no power to change its place must rest. To say that
the sinner has the power to change is giving up the question.
And when this is once given up all good people will go to
work upon sinners to teach them their duty, and persuade
them to turn, convert, to God. And the Lord will no longer
be regarded by sensible skeptics as a very changeable being.

The ancient Christians did not wrestle with God in the work
of saving sinners. He was always willing that men should be
saved, and is yet willing. If we were to wrestle with him in
solemn prayer all our days he would not be more willing than
he is at this moment.

Why is it that all men are not saved? Ans.—The Lord commands
men to convert, turn and live. Turn from what?
Ans.—From the will of the flesh and from the will of man.
To what? Ans.—To the gospel of Christ. And they refuse to
do it. To say the sinner has not the power is to relieve him,
forever, of all responsibility for his continuance in an unconverted
state, and throw it, forever, upon God. To say the
sinner has not the power, and in the next breath tell him that
he has, is a square contradiction and a self-evident falsehood,
only equaled by the statement that a thing is a round square,[Pg 450]
or that ice is red hot. Let whatever fall that may, it is true
that a thing can not be, exist, and not be, not exist, at the same
time. The sinner is either passive or active in his conversion.
He can not be both. If he has not the power to begin and
convert, it follows that all who have died in sin were fated to
ruin without remedy. Philosophers have said, “that the will
is determined by motives, purposes, intentions, or reasons.”
Granting this to be true, we can not admit that the will is
necessarily determined by motives and purposes; for it is the
self-determining power of the mind that gives a motive, or
reason, that weight and influence whereby our course is determined.
In other words, it depends on ourselves whether we
will act from one motive or another.

Action from motive always begins in ourselves. And if
conversion is the result of motive power, it begins in ourselves
and by ourselves. Let a man be tempted to steal, his
motive is the love of money. But if he refrains from the
deed, his motive is a regard for duty. If he suffers himself to
be governed by the first, he is a thief and deserves punishment,
but if he allows himself to be governed by the second,
he has done well. The laws of every country suppose that
men have it in their power to give to either motive that regard
which will determine their conduct. The divine laws allow
the same, placing motives high as heaven before sinners for
their acceptance, and warning them with restraining threats
deep as hell. And if sinners will not receive these threats and
act accordingly, they are without excuse. The scriptures allow
that men convert from God. How is this? Have men
power to cross the chasm backwards, and are not able, at the
same time to cross it in a forward movement? Strange logic,
this! It is the same old philosophy that sinners have the power
to go to hell, but none to get to heaven; that they are free,
like the slave, to do the tyrant’s bidding; that they are free
like the water that stands in the pool; that they are mechanically
free, are simply active when wrought upon, the
same as any machinery. If this be so, why is it that so many
are left in an unconverted state? Is it because the good Spirit[Pg 451]
prefers the existence of iniquity and crime? If the Lord
brings about the salvation of some, through a mighty outpouring
of his Spirit, then we shall never comprehend his
ways. Why is it that he does not give us one general outpouring,
one grand revival all over our country, and bring
about the long prayed for millennial day? Answer.—Conversion
is a commandment of God. It must be obeyed or the
country lie, in direct opposition to the will of God, in sin.
His will is expressed in the words, “Let the wicked forsake
his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him
return, reconvert, unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon
him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.”

“To Israel he saith, all the day long have I stretched forth
my hands unto a gainsaying and disobedient people.” Ro.
x, 21. “The Lord strove with them by his Spirit in the
prophets, and bore with them many years, yet they would not
hear.” Nehe. ix, 30. “They made their hearts as an adamant
stone lest they should hear the law, and the words which the
Lord of hosts hath sent in his spirit by the former prophets.”
Zech. vii, 12. Jesus wept over them when he stood upon
Mount Olivet and expressed the greatness of his great heart
in these words: “How often would I have gathered thy
children together as a hen doth gather her brood under her
wings, and ye would not.” Lu. xiii, 34. Their failure was
not because the Spirit did not strive with them as it did with
others who were saved. “God is no respecter of persons.”
Neither was it on account of inborn depravity. For if any
were corrupted in their moral nature by Adam’s sin, all were
corrupted alike. So that each one would be in this respect
equally hard to overcome. But why bring up inborn corruption
and helplessness? Is not the Spirit of God able for any
task which is in its own line of work? Jesus gave the true
solution of the question. He said: “Their hearts have waxed
gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they
have closed, lest at any time they should see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts and
be converted, and I should heal them.” The words “at any[Pg 452]
time” deserve particular attention, for the Lord’s time is all the
time. He is unchangeable. “He is not willing that any should
perish, but that all should come to repentance.” 2 Pet. iii, 9.

Many people talk and act as though the Lord was the most
changeable being in the universe. They seem to think that the
unchangeableness of the Lord is in the idea that he is everlastingly
changing. Let us imagine a perfect circle with a stone
permanently fixed in the center and a man walking within, and
every move he makes from side to side affecting his relations
to the center. So it is with God and the children of men. He
is immutable. He is the center of the circle. In the right
hand side of this circle are the innocent and the obedient, in
the enjoyment of all its riches, peace, pardon and all spiritual
blessings. These blessings were provided for all men, and
presented in the gospel of peace; and in the left side of this
circle are all the threatenings of God and all the wickedness
and miseries of men. The wicked at the left are able to convert
around to the right. In doing this they leave their sins
and miseries and come around where all the blessings of the
great salvation have always been, are, and will be until time
is no more. In all the work of human redemption there is no
place for change in God. The center has never changed. Man
alone changes. God has not bestowed special pardoning grace.
Such phraseology is unknown in the gospel. “His grace was
given us in Jesus Christ before the world began.” 2 Tim. i, 9.
All that we or any others have to do is to live on the Christ
side of this circle—the right hand. If we are sinners it is
our duty to convert around to the right into new relations
containing all that is grand, glorious and desirable. The sinner,
led by the motives of the gospel, changes sides; leaving
the kingdom of darkness upon the left, and crossing the line
drawn through the center of the circle, he passes into the
kingdom of light. It seems strange that intelligent men and
women should be constantly throwing mystery around a matter
that is so plain and simple. But we are aware that, by
long dwelling on an idea, and from the excited and abnormal
sensitiveness of the mind, we sometimes lose ourselves to truth[Pg 453]
amidst our own creations, which become in the imagination
stern realities, producing a species of monomania or religious
insanity.

Long dwelling upon the idea that conversion is a special
work of God destroys all disposition to convert, and causes men
to be at ease in disobedience. We will to do those things, and
those only, which we believe to be in our power. We are not
so destitute of common sense as to undertake that which we
know to be out of our power. I never attempt to fly, or raise
a weight that I know to be far above my strength. So it is
in the question of conversion. If I believe it to be a work
that is beyond my power, there will be a corresponding indifference
upon my part. As long as men are made to believe
that God must convert them by a special interposition of his
Spirit, so long their minds will be directed, beyond the plain
duties of the gospel, to the realm of the mysterious and incomprehensible.
In ancient times, when men were plainly
told to convert—turn—to God and do works worthy of repentance,
when the mists and mysticles of the schoolmen and
dogmatists of all sects and parties had not, as yet, beclouded
the minds of men, nor corrupted the simplicity of the Gospel,
thousands were converted in a day. Christianity overran the
inhabited earth in the space of a few years. Judaism and
Paganism trembled and crumbled before its mighty power.
But now the religious world is contending with sin and crime,
under the great disadvantages of a perverted mind and a Gospel
beclouded with the smoke of Babylon, and the result is
that three-score souls brought into the church is a great success
for the labors of weeks, and even months. Why should this
be so? It need not be. It would not be but for the wrong
teaching consequent upon creeds. It is said, “That many of
the Corinthians hearing, believed and were baptized.” Their
minds were clear upon the great subjects of human duty and
the goodness, love and mercy of God. They had no long sessions,
in which they were wrestling with God as though he was
insensitive and indifferent upon the subject of the sinner’s
salvation.

[Pg 454]

They were told the story of God’s love, and made acquainted
with the great fact that all things were ready for their reception;
“that Christ had finished the work which the
Father had given him to do,” and that it only remained for
them to believe and obey the Gospel and all would be well.
They were commanded to convert to the service of God.
This work was not given into the hands of Christ to perform.
It is the sinner’s own work. Christ will not believe for you.
He will not repent for you. He will not convert for you.
Conversion is the overt action of the will carried out in
“breaking off from sins by righteousness.” It begins in the
heart, but it does not end there. Murder begins in the heart,
but its consummation is the action of the will carried out.
The man first yielded to the temptation by saying, in his
heart, I will. The next thing in the order was carrying out
the will in the deed. Nothing short of the deed done would have
met the statement in the heart, I will. So it is in conversion.
The man first says in his heart, I will, I will forsake my former
course of life and be a Christian, I will obey God, I will
do his will. And nothing short of doing the will of God as
it is addressed to him in the Gospel will carry out the action
of the will, and meet the demands of the statement, I will.
“Whosoever will let him come and take the water of life
freely.” So the “tree is known by its fruits.” “He that
saith I know him, acknowledge him, and keepeth not his commandments
is a liar, and the truth is not in him.” 1 Jno.
ii, 4.

As regards the instrumentalities employed in persuading
men, I have only to say, that men were always free as moral
agents, to convert—turn, under the weakest instrumentality, or
refuse under the most powerful. The Lord himself “strove
with the ancient Jews by his Spirit in his prophets, and they
would not hear but resisted the Spirit.” Stephen, after he had
made one grand effort to instruct his hearers, said, “Ye stiff-necked
and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always
resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did so do ye.” Acts vii,
51. Was the condition of those fellows unavoidable? If it[Pg 455]
was, they were not to blame. But there was nothing in their
condition that was not in their power. If there was, why
should we find these words in their law, “circumcise the foreskin
of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked.” Deut. x,
16. The Lord has made the salvation of all men possible,
otherwise those remaining in an unconverted state, and dying
in their sins, are unavoidably lost. And who is to blame?
The Father “so loved the world that he gave his only begotten
son to die for every man. He sent him to be the Savior of
the world. The Gospel is the ministration of the Spirit. The
Apostles preached it with the Holy Spirit sent down from
heaven. They received grace and Apostleship, for the obedience
of faith among all nations, for Christ’s name.” Rom. i, 5.
A great and grand law governed them. In obeying it they
did all that they ever did for the world or for the church.
There were just three duties prescribed in that law. The first
is in the word “teach,” or, the better rendering, disciple. The
second is in the word “baptizing;” and the third is in the
phrase “teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I
have commanded you.” The whole is beautifully rendered
thus, “Going therefore, disciple all nations, baptizing them
into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Spirit.” And the whole is rested upon a declaration of kingly
authority, viz: “All power in heaven and upon earth is
given into my hands,” going therefore,—you see the connection.

Go to the Acts of the Apostles and read for yourselves and
see how they turned men to God. Paul says, “That he
showed first to them of Damascus, and at Jerusalem, and
throughout all the coasts of Judea, and then to the Gentiles,
that they should repent and turn, convert, to God, and do
works meet for repentance.” Some disobeyed under the
preaching and teaching of the Apostles. Some under the
teachings of Christ. And many “rejected the council of God
against themselves in not being baptized of John’s baptism.”
Jesus said, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel
to every creature; he that believeth and is baptized shall be[Pg 456]
saved, and he that believeth not shall be damned.” Paul was
preaching at Corinth; many of the Corinthians hearing, believed,
and were baptized, and Jesus appeared unto him in a
vision by night, and said, “Speak boldly and hold not thy
peace, and I will let no man set on thee to hurt thee.”

Christ gave the commission and Paul was carrying it out.
The Savior’s visit to Corinth, in vision, was to encourage Paul
to go on. Would all the preachers in this country encourage
such a work by speaking well of it? Would they say, Go on?
If I was preaching in a great city under the same circumstances
that surrounded Paul in Corinth, and the days of miracles
were not past, I might rationally conclude that Jesus would
encourage me in the same manner. Be that as it may, one
thing is doubtless true, viz., the same work is the Lord’s work
yet, and his visit to Corinth to encourage Paul is a great
source of encouragement to us. The primitive Christians were
all baptized believers; all converted to the service of God;
none of them on probation, but all in the fellowship. All were
“sanctified unto obedience,” all had “purified their souls in
obeying the truth through the Spirit.” Many reverse the order
thus: “Get your souls purified and then obey the truth.”
But Christ has become the “Author of eternal salvation unto
all those who obey him.” Heb. v, 9. Jesus said, “Except a
man be born of water and of the Spirit, he can not enter into
the kingdom of God.” Whatever this language may mean
it is accomplished when the sinner is begotten in Christ Jesus
through the gospel and baptized into Christ.

Paul said of the Corinthians: “In Christ Jesus have I begotten
you through the Gospel.” And they, “Hearing, believed
and were baptized.” And James said: “Of his own
will begat he us with the word of truth.” Consequently, the
entire meaning is in the power of all sinners who have access
to the Gospel of Christ. Otherwise, the sinner is unavoidably
lost for his unavoidable unbelief. But we are told in John’s
Record, i, 12, “That as many as received him to them gave
he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe
on his name.” So the power of the sinner to become a son of[Pg 457]
God depends upon his belief on the name of the Son of God,
and if he can not believe it is no fault of his. Poor fellow!
Is he thus doomed? If he can believe on the name of Christ
he is able to reach the relation of a son. For the divine law
grants the privilege, liberty or power to as many as believe on
the name of Christ. The primitive Christians were the “children
of God by faith in Jesus Christ, for as many as were baptized
into Christ put on Christ.” Gal. iii, 26, 27. John said:
“Little children, let no man deceive you: he that doth righteousness
is righteous, even as he is righteous.” 1 John iii, 7.
“If ye know that he is righteous, ye know that every one that
doth righteousness is born of him.” 1 John ii, 29. The great
appeal to man as a moral agent is in these words: “Know ye
not that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his
servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death,
or of obedience unto righteousness.” Rom. vi, 16. Do you not
know this? Do you not know that you will receive, in the
great day, according to that which you have done, whether it
be good or bad? Then why not obey the Gospel and enjoy
its promises?

OUR INDEBTEDNESS TO REVELATION—No. VI.

BY P.T. RUSSELL.

THE NATURE OF MAN NECESSITATED REVELATION.

The above proposition rests upon and is in harmony with
all the relations existing between natural wants and supplies,
being itself a supply. Does the power of vision make light a
necessity? Yes; without it the eye would be useless. Could
man create his own light? It has taken ages upon ages to
invent the limited artificial light which we now have. Man is
endowed with the powers of locomotion. Could he create an
earth to move upon? Could he create the air for breathing?[Pg 458]
Were these and all such matters necessities? And was man
entirely unable to provide for his own natural wants? The
faculties with which man is endowed call for these supplies,
and they are necessities on account of the existence of these
faculties. Think of a being, if you can, with the powers of
vision in the entire absence of light, with no air to breathe
nor earth to move upon. Do you say such would be a grand
failure? So it would. But the Creator has not given powers
to man for which he has no use, having nothing to meet their
demands. The existence of a faculty or power leads logically
to the conclusion which all candid, intelligent people have
reached, viz: that the Creator has made a supply for the use
of every faculty, or power which was designed and provided.
Do you ask, what of all this? I answer, man has the power to
become religious, but he had no more power to invent a supply
for this faculty than he had to create light for the eye or
air to breathe. So the necessity for this must be met with a
supply from the Creator as well as all other natural demands
or powers.

Now, as we have a desire for the knowledge that we are approved
of God, and as religion consists in this knowledge, and
in the knowledge of our relations, dependence and obligations
to God; and, as we have but one means of obtaining
this knowledge, and that is the means of his will concerning
us, then by knowing through that will that our actions are
such as he desires and approves, the one question remains to
be answered, How can man obtain the knowledge of the will
of another concerning himself? Ans.—Only by a revelation
of the will of the one to the other. I know not the will of
the reader of this essay concerning myself. My style of writing
may not please him, but if he would tell me just how he
wishes me to write, then, by following his directions, I should
obtain the knowledge of his approbation as a necessary result
experienced in my own mental nature. This is plain, but no
more plain than God’s revelation to man and its results experienced
in conscious knowledge.

[Pg 459]

AN IMPORTANT THOUGHT.

In order to man’s highest happiness, all his powers must be
so called into activity by education that each faculty may act
with energy, but at the same time in exact harmony with all
of its kindred powers. There must be no clash, no jar nor
friction. No one power must be highly exercised and cultivated
at the expense of the rest, but each must be brought
out by its own appropriate food. Material food is for the
body—it can not feed upon thought, nor mind upon bread.
“Man should not live upon bread alone.” This is an axiomatic
truth endorsed by man’s two-fold nature. If you feed
and exercise the body only you may acquire the strength of
an Ajax, but your countenance will be as stolid and your eye
as dull as the Hottentot’s. Such a fellow would be of almost
no use whatever. Add to the education of the body the cultivation
of the intellect only; now the prospect is fearful, for
the intellect always works for its master, and in this case, the
man being without moral and religious training, the master
Will be his animal desires. Can you imagine the depth of
infamy and pollution that is possible in this case? The entire
motive power that moves his intellect is carnal, sensual and
devilish. He now needs the sanction of a higher authority.
The man is but half educated. There are two groups of
faculties in his nature that are lying dormant. His moral
and religious powers have not as yet been brought into action—they
have had no food nor exercise, and without this
there can be no development. These, as well as the intellect and
the body, must have their own appropriate food, which must
be in kind with their nature. Moral truth is for the moral
powers. This directs us in our moral relations and obligations
to our fellows with whom we may be associated. Religious
truth is for our religious faculties. Now add to all this the
sanction of the authority of God, which is like the balance-wheel
in a watch, regulating and controlling every movement.
Man, thus educated, is prepared to act in harmony with his
entire nature. He can now reach a position of moral, religious,
social and intellectual grandeur worthy of his nature.

[Pg 460]

Reader, is all of this demanded by the elements of our nature?
Then a revelation of God to man of the knowledge of
his being, wisdom, goodness, power, authority and law was
and is a necessity, without which man must have remained in
part uneducated, not perfectly developed.

Is the development of man’s religious nature necessary in
order to a full, perfect and harmonious growth? Yes. There
neither is, nor can be, a harmonious growth while any one
power is dwarfed by starvation. Without the knowledge of
God man’s religious powers must remain dwarfed, and these
can not be fed without a revelation. Are these powers so
many empty buckets, never filled and never to be filled? No.
Hence my conclusion, that man’s nature made revelation a
necessity, rests upon the bed-rock of truth. Let him who feels
able try to shake my position.

REVELATION PROBABLE.

Our series of essays are such that this requires no argument
here. There are certain analogies that we may, nevertheless,
speak of, which will not down at the bidding of David’s fool.
The facts stand thus: a supply for each and every one of our
other faculties, sufficient in quantity for all their necessities, is
placed within our reach for their use. Now let us look at
the analogy. I have food to eat, good water to drink,
light for the eye, air to breathe, and a good earth to walk
upon and space in which to move, beauties of nature to admire,
its music to listen to with rapture, and things with their
combinations to perceive and think of.

Now, Mr. Skeptic, you know that man has religious faculties,
otherwise he could never become religious, no more than
he could see without eyes and hear without ears. Now, what
say you? Did the author of all things make a mistake here
by conferring upon us a power that would be of no use? Is
this the reason of your rejection of religion? Do you say it
is of no use? Or do you say that the Great Creator and wise
and merciful Provider forgot to give a supply just here?
Come! You boast of reason. Give us your reason. Will[Pg 461]
you? To one or the other of these conclusions you are irresistibly
driven. No other retreat is open. Take either, and,
if true, the harmony of the universe is destroyed. Take
either, and your folly is so plain that it needs no words of
mine to point it out. This is the true conclusion; all analogy
points directly and clearly to the probability and fact of a
revelation.

A REVELATION OF THAT WHICH WAS NECESSARY?

To answer this question we must keep in mind the nature
of man’s religious powers, and from this deduce the nature of
the supply that is called for. Would the simple idea of the
existence of a first cause, or creator of all things, be sufficient?
This idea, by itself, could not quicken reverence and adoration
and a desire to worship, and without these there is no religion.
Would a knowledge, by revelation, of the power, intelligence,
wisdom and goodness of God be sufficient in the
absence of anything more? No. What more? Would it
not be enough, in addition to what you have named, to have a
knowledge of our relation to and dependence upon him for all
we enjoy? No; we must have one thing more shown to us
or the whole will be imperfect and unworthy of God as its
author. Religion can not be without something to do, and
that something must be done upon or by the authority of its
author. Add this to all the other items and the system is complete,
meeting perfectly the necessities of man’s nature.

THE NECESSARY ORDER OF REVELATION.

The proper arrangement of the various parts of any communication
designed to convey knowledge from one to others,
is an important factor in this subject of revelation. Remember
“the clear is the true.” This is the case in all
methodic arrangements; to this rule there are no exceptions.
The fundamental truth must first be developed. A child must
first be instructed in the rudiments of numbers in order to
learn the science of mathematics, otherwise no sensible progress
can be made. Intricate problems in Euclid are not to[Pg 462]
be presented to beginners for solution. So, in religion, the
primary thought of the existence of God is the first great
truth made known. Second, we are taught that he possesses
power, wisdom and goodness. This instruction must also be
adapted to the capacity of those who are to be taught. We
know that the very young mind needs more simple instruction
than the adult. As, of necessity, there was a first man, and a
time when that first man began to be, so, of necessity, in the
beginning of the life of that man, however perfectly developed
his body might have been, his mind was infantile—destitute
of the first principles of an education.

Object lessons were called for. Here they come in hills
and dales, dry lands and running waters, in trees and vines, in
shrubs and grass, flowers and fruits, beasts, birds and winged
insects and creeping things, and higher up in the sun with his
brilliant light, and in the moon with her paler rays, and in all
her attending, sparkling stars. Here are the objects for man’s
first lesson. Just now the wise man of this world, a skeptic,
asks the question, Could not the first man, with all these objects
before him, learn by the use of reason the fact that all
these objects originated from a creator? And if he could he
certainly needed no revelation, for, reasoning from nature up
to nature’s God, he might then, from the order, beauty and
harmony of all, reach the idea of his character, and from this
deduce a knowledge of his will, and if so a revelation was
not necessary. This seems to me very clear, and you often
say “the clear is the true.” This is my reason for rejecting
the idea that a revelation was ever made.

Will you, Mr. Christian, grapple with this? I would with
pleasure if there was anything in it to grapple with, but you
will see nothing real in your premises, for objects teach nothing
without an instructor. There lies a brick, pick it up and
examine its surface closely; do you, from it, reach the idea of
its maker? No. Yet I know it must have been made, for I
have seen other bricks made, and this resembles them. Very
well. Did you ever see worlds made, and, if so, does our
earth resemble them? But when you saw those bricks made[Pg 463]
were there not several men engaged in their manufacture, as
well as horses? There is no analogy in your premises; you
beg the question entirely; you take the whole foundation for
granted; your argument is “as clear as mud.”

Had you seen others made by only one maker, then and
only then could you by analogy have reached even the idea
that ours was made also. Also, the makers of those bricks
may have been of the most base and malignant disposition,
for you can learn nothing of their disposition from the bricks;
they only testify of the skill of their makers—this is all. Do
you not see that you give me nothing to grapple with? The
truth is this, nature gives you no sufficient foundation for
religion. Revelation must of necessity furnish us with that.
Without revelation no one can learn of the existence and character
of God. The knowledge of his existence, power and
wisdom might excite reverence, but this alone could not
bring man’s religious powers into activity. To this must be
added the knowledge of his goodness and kindness towards,
and his love of, those who are required to worship him. And
in addition to all this, there must be a revelation of the divine
will concerning human action, for the term worship indicates
submission and obedience; without this, very important
elements would be wanting, and the system show great imperfection
and want of wisdom—as man could not learn his
relation nor obligation to that great Creator and Preserver of
all. But give in addition the knowledge of man’s relation to
and dependence upon God, with a knowledge of his will in
the form of law or commands, with promises of good annexed,
resting upon the condition of obedience. Such a system of
revelation would be perfect, fitted to the necessities of human
nature. And you, Mr. Skeptic, have agreed with me, that the
nature of man was true and right. Now, when we find a
perfectly straight edge, and then find another edge that fits it,
we know that the last is also perfectly straight, for straight
and crooked edges do not match. Having already found the
kind of a revelation that human nature made necessary, in
my next I shall show that such a revelation is contained in[Pg 464]
the Bible. Then as human nature is true, and as the Bible’s
revelation is exactly fitted to it, the inevitable conclusion will
follow that the Bible does contain a revelation from God to
man.

WHERE SHALL WE TAKE INFIDELS TO GET
THEM OUT OF UNBELIEF?

Goethe says it is a law of the demons that they must get out
at the same place where they sneaked in. This is a very suggestive
expression. If a mathematician makes a mistake in
the solution of a problem his only chance to get out of the
difficulty lies just at the point where the mistake was made.
He must remain in perplexity until he finds the mistake and
corrects it. This law holds good in all our intellectual operations.
Many men are professedly in unbelief. How shall we
get them out? This is an important question and needs to be
well studied by all Christian ministers. If we can find out
just how they got in, then it will be easy to get the honest
ones out. But it is well to remember that many professed infidels
are only skeptics in heart. They are unbelievers at will.
The most effectual remedy for such unbelief, as yet known, is
an attack of cramp colic, or some other fearful affliction. Under
such circumstances they always surrender. There is not
much chance for Gospel means as long as a man’s unbelief is
simply a profession. His disease is not one of the head, but
of the heart; yet our law holds good here. The man himself
may repent; may make to himself a new heart and a new
spirit. This is his way out. If a man gets into unbelief
through a misunderstanding of Bible facts he will never get
out short of a better understanding of those same facts.

If he gets in through the impression that science and the
Bible are in conflict, there is no way to get him out short
of a removal of the impression. Hence the importance of
ministers being scientists. Many unbelievers claim that the[Pg 465]
Bible and science conflict, who have never investigated them,
and know comparatively nothing of either. This class, too,
is in the majority. They are men who ape certain leaders,
being under their influence. Many of them love to have us
know that they know something about such men as Strauss,
notwithstanding their ignorance of even the man. To have
such a mind do their thinking is the highest of their ambition.
There is a good deal of heart disease about these fellows.
They really glory in the names of such men as Strauss. He
was so far away that they never learned the fact that “he was
divorced from his wife, the former actress, Agnese Schebest,
and spent his days going about from place to place. His
pseudo-theology or mythology ended in a theatrical comedy,
and the comedy in a tragedy.” “In 1839 this famous Dr.
Strauss—who resolved the gospel history of salvation into an
incoherent and self-contradictory mythological poem, and denied
the existence of a personal God and the immortality of
the soul—was duly elected professor of Christian dogmatics
and ethics in the University of Zurich, by the party then in
power, which consisted mostly of demagogues and frivolous
infidels.”

But the free Swiss would not submit, so the people of the
Canton of Zurich rose in their republican majesty and marched
to the city under the lead of an energetic pastor, and with the
weapons which they hastily collected scared the Strauss clique
away; they very courageously took to their heels; then the
people of the Canton of Zurich placed the government into
the hands of conservative, trustworthy Christian men, and
quietly retired to their mountain homes without shedding a
drop of blood. The new government elected Mr. Lange in
the place claimed, but never occupied, by Strauss; but Mr.
Strauss claimed half the salary, and it is said that he enjoyed
it, up to 1857 at least.

How much influence could such a man in our own country
exert over the American mind? For these facts touching the
life of Strauss, see “Germany; Its Universities, Theology and
Religion,” by Phillip Schaff, pages 101, 386. The reader[Pg 466]
may rely upon the quotations given above. I have taken
them with the book referred to open before me.

Infidels who investigate the Bible honestly, with reference
to an understanding of its contents, are unknown to us. The
master spirits in unbelief give abundant evidence of their ignorance
of the scriptures of the Bible. Not one in a thousand
ever investigated the scriptures of the Bible with pure
and honest motives. Many have never investigated it at all.
To read a chapter here and there for the sole purpose of finding
fault and getting up a difficulty, is not investigation. An
honest investigation requires a very different course. All the
evidence must be brought into the court and presented in such
a manner as to be understood, just as it was given, otherwise
the court is not qualified to decide righteously in the case.
That all such men as Col. Ingersoll have failed to thus investigate
the Bible is evident from the fact that they, to be like
him, must be infidels in all their history. It is published to
the world that the Colonel was born an infidel. He has been
hacking away at religion and the Bible ever since he was a
small boy. So his infidelity is not the result of an intelligent
investigation of either science or religion. I will not undertake
to say what the Colonel’s trouble is, but if he was born
an infidel it is possible, according to our law, that he will die
an unbeliever.

Many infidels, governed by a spirit of fanaticism, undoubtedly,
have labored with as much earnestness as if the world’s
salvation depended upon their efforts, without the least hope
of bettering its condition, for the false philosophy of materialism
which they advocate gives to a man nothing to live for
except his own animal nature. This philosophy says all is
well as long as you dodge the sharp corners of the laws of
your country. If the materialist can avoid paying fines, along
with all other penalties of the laws of his country, what need
he care for one course of life in preference to another? Do
you say he has a conscience? Well, it may be that it is not
seared so that he is past feeling. Very few men, I know, ever
reach such a depraved condition. And this is doubtless the[Pg 467]
greatest reason why all infidels, as a general rule, get into
mental distress during great bodily afflictions. Many of them
are converted by disease of the body, for two reasons: first,
they were unbelievers at will, just because it suited their desires,
and, second, because they are in possession of a religious
nature or conscience. But men who are converted by disease
of the body are liable to go back to the old wallow as soon as
prosperity and health crown them again.

Many men are driven to irreligion through its abuses. I
have often thought it a misfortune that we Americans are
under the necessity of meeting the infidel literature of the old
world, for the simple reason that it is evolved out of the
circumstances peculiar to state churches. In America our
religion is heroic; that is, it rests upon the merits of its own
evidence, and is supported by the voluntary contributions of
the people. But in Europe, where the mass of our infidel
literature comes from, Christianity is not free and independent,
but entangled with the affairs of state, and supported by
the secular arm. The result is that difficulties are continually
arising out of the unholy alliance which are disgusting to the
independent scientific mind. The natural result is to drive
such persons into irreligion. Where men are educated in
both science and religion, and have not been all their lives
called upon to look upon religion in a secular light, tangled
up in the interests of politics and law, there should be no
fears on account of any literature that infidels may pass
around. The misfortune that I speak of is not with such
men, but with the uneducated in religion and science, who are
more than anxious to find an excuse for irreligion. Christianity
fears nothing in the light.

The desires that have only a bodily end and aim, that are
unconnected with the high, holy, and noble purposes of a pure,
true, and good life, are false desires, and should be cast off.

[Pg 468]

COUNCILS—No. II.

UNITY OF THE ROMAN CHURCH.

In our October article on Councils we closed with the council
that was assembled by Mrs. Irene in the year 787. The
Franks, having heard that a council at Constantinople had
ordained the adoration of images, assembled, in the year 794,
by order of Charles, son of Pepin, afterwards named Charlemagne,
a very numerous council. In this council the second
council of Nice is spoken of as an impertinent and arrogant
synod held in Greece for the promotion of the worship of
pictures. This council, held at Frankfort, was composed of
three hundred clergymen from England, Italy, France and
Germany. Aventin, Hinemar and Regina say the Frankfortians
rescinded the decisions of the false Grecian synod in favor
of image worship.

In 842 a grand council was held at Constantinople, convened
by the Empress Theodora. Here the worship of images was
solemnly established. The Greeks still have a feast in honor
of this council called “Orthodoxia.” Theodora did not preside
at this council.

“In 861 a council was held at Constantinople consisting of
three hundred and eighteen bishops, assembled by the Emperor
Michael. St. Ignatius, patriarch of Constantinople, was
deposed and Photius elected.

“In 866 another council was held at Constantinople, in
which Pope Nicholas III. was deposed for contumacy and
excommunicated.

“In 869 was another council at Constantinople; in this
Photius, in turn, was deposed and excommunicated and St.
Ignatius restored.

“In 879 another council was held in Constantinople, in which
Photius, already restored, was acknowledged as true patriarch
by the legates of Pope John VIII., who declares all those to
be Judases who say that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the
Father and the Son.

[Pg 469]

“In 1122–3 a council was held at Rome, in the church of
St. John of Lateran, by Pope Calixtus II. This was the first
general council assembled by the popes. The emperors of the
west had now scarcely any authority, and the emperors of the
east, pressed by the Mahometans and by the crusaders, held
none but little wretched councils. In this council the bishops
complained heavily of the monks. ‘They possess,’ said they,
‘the churches, the lands, the castles, the tithes, the offerings
of the living and the dead; they have only to take from us
the ring and the crosier.’ The monks remained in possession.“

“In 1139 was another council of Lateran, by Pope Innocent
II. It is said a thousand bishops were present. Here
the ecclesiastical tithes are declared to be of divine right, and
all laymen possessing any of them are excommunicated.

“In 1215 was the last general council of Lateran, by Pope
Innocent III. Four hundred and twelve bishops and eight
hundred abbots were here. This was in the time of the Crusades,
and the popes have established a Latin patriarch at
Jerusalem and one at Constantinople. These patriarchs
attend this council. This council declares, among other
things, that ‘no one can be saved out of the Catholic church.’
The word transubstantiation was not known until after this
council. It forbade the establishment of new religious
orders; but, since that time, no less than eighty have been
instituted. It was in this council that Raimond, Count of
Toulouse, was stripped of all his lands.

“In 1245 a council assembled at the city of Lyons. Innocent
IV. brings thither the Emperor of Constantinople, John
Puleologus, and makes him sit beside him. He deposes the
Emperor Frederick as a felon, and gives the cardinals a red
but, as a sign of hostility to Frederick, and the source of
thirty years of civil war.

“In 1274 another council is held at the city of Lyons. Five
hundred bishops are present, seventy great and a thousand
lesser abbots. The Greek emperor, Michael Paleologus, that
he may have the protection of the Pope, sends his Greek[Pg 470]
patriarch, Theophanes, to unite, in his name, with the Latin
church; but the Greek church disowns these bishops.

“In 1311 Pope Clement V. assembled a general council in
the small town of Vienne, in Dauphiny, in which he abolishes
the order of the Templars. It is here ordained that the
Begares, Beguins and Beguines shall be burned. These were
a species of heretics ‘to whom was imputed all that had formerly
been imputed to the primitive Christians.'” So says Voltaire.
He does not, like the pitiful blaspheming infidels of
to-day, try to heap all this corruption of the dark ages upon
primitive Christianity. No! The hull of Voltaire’s soul
was too great for such a deed.

“In 1414 the great council of Constance was assembled by
an emperor who resumes his rights, viz: by Sigismund.
Here Pope John XXIII., convicted of numerous crimes, is
deposed, and John Huss and Jerome of Sprague convicted of
obstinacy and burned.

“In 1431 a council was held at Basle, where they in vain
depose Pope Eugene IV., who is too clever for the council.
This was a stormy council, and it is said that Eugene regretted
in his old age that he ever left his monastery.

“In 1438 a council assembled at Ferrara, transferred to
Florence, where the excommunicated pope excommunicates
the council, and declares it guilty of high treason. Here a
feigned union is made with the Greek church, crushed by the
Turkish synods held sword in hand.

“Pope Julius II. would have had his council of Lateran in
1512 pass for an ecumenical council. In it that pope
solemnly excommunicated Louis XII., King of France, laid
France under an interdict, summoned the whole Parliament of
Provence to appear before him, and excommunicated all the
philosophers because most of them had taken part with Louis
XII. Yet this council was not like that of Ephesus, called
the council of robbers.

“In 1537 the council of Trent was first assembled at Mantua,[Pg 471]
by Paul III., afterwards at Trent, in 1543, and terminated
in Dec., 1561, under Pius VI.” See vol. Phil. Dic.

“Pope Pius IX. convened a council in 1869, which in July,
1870, decreed the personal infallability of the Pope in matters
of faith and morals, to be a dogma of the church.”

Reader, if you will digest this little piece of history, you
will doubtless discover good reasons for asserting the right of
private judgment and the liberty of conscience. Truth stands
true to her god; men alone vascillate.

FREE-THOUGHT IN GERMANY, FRANCE AND
RUSSIA, OR RUSSIAN NIHILISM.

BY FITZ CUNLIFFE OWEN. LIBRARY MAG. VOL. 3.

Rationalism and radicalism exist to a certain extent in every
country of Europe. But the Social Democrats of Germany
and Austria and the Communists of France and Spain turn
with horror from Russian revolutionists, who consider the
programme of the Paris commune of 1871 condemnably weak,
and Felix Pyat, Cluseret and their companions as little better
than conservatives. The Social Democrats and even the
Communists of the rest of Europe have in view aims which,
no matter how fantastic, are always of a sufficiently defined
nature. They look forward to an entirely democratic form of
government, and hope for a recognization of the social world,
under which all capital and property would be held either by
the State or Commune for the equal benefit of everybody.
They are levellers, but they are not destroyers. Take the right
of property from the citizens of a government and the greatest
motive to industry and prosperity is gone.

The revolutionary party in Russia has no definite aims of
either reorganization or improvement. In its sight everything
as it now exists is rotten, and before anything new and good[Pg 472]
can be created all existing institutions must be utterly destroyed.
Religion, the state, the family, laws, property,
morality, are all equally odious, and must be rooted out and
abolished. It is because “nothing,” as it exists at present,
finds favor in their eyes that they have been called “Nihilists.”
They maintain that no one should be bound by laws or even
moral obligations of any kind, but that every body should be
allowed to do exactly as he pleases. They desire to break up
the actual social organization into mere individualism, with
entire independence for each separate person. Their object is
anarchy in the very truest sense of the word. They are only
modest enough to decline the attempt to create a new order of
things in the place of what they propose to destroy. That
they intend to leave for a better and more enlightened generation.
The following, from a Nihilist paper, Narodnia Volya
(The Will of the People), which is published at St. Petersburg
by means of secret presses, will set them forth in their
true inwardness:

“The Russian press is bent almost double by the imperial
government. Notwithstanding its disagreeable position it
does its utmost to curry favor of its oppressors. Whenever
thefts, murders, or incendiarisms take place in Russia the
press invariably attributes them to the Nihilists. There is an
old proverb which says, ‘Slander, slander; some result will
always be obtained.’ Judging from the tone of the press some
result has been obtained. According to its statements the
Nihilists are little better than wild beasts. We do not venture
to assert that there are no bad men in our ranks, but are
yours entirely free from them? The number of bad persons
among the Nihilists is so very small that we need hardly
enumerate them. Since 1862 over 17,000 persons have been
exiled to Siberia for political offenses.

“You accuse us of adopting means of action which are unjustifiable
in every way. But what can we do? We are reduced
to silence. We only adopt questionable means of action
very rarely, and then only in self-defense; whereas you use
them daily.

[Pg 473]

“The money obtained from private individuals by means of
theft and blackmail has not been levied by order of the ‘committee,’
but by certain unscrupulous Nihilists acting on their
own behalf. However, we are all the more ready to admit
that such things have been done when we remember that only
five such cases are known to have taken place.

“Do not accuse us of being murderers, because of our attempts
to take the life of His Most Sacred Majesty? Why,
we would most gladly accomplish his destruction, and he has
only escaped until now in consequence of the many cowards
in our ranks! It has been stated that Solowjew’s attempt in
April last has disturbed the rest and peace of mind of many
harmless and respectable citizens. Some of the Liberal papers
even go so far as to say that it will have the effect of producing
a reaction in favor of the government. Why, what idle
and stupid talk! These good newspaper proprietors, who love
their ease and their books, must have been asleep not to have
perceived that the reaction began sixteen years ago, not in
favor of the government, but against it.

“We are quite persuaded that if Solowjew’s attempt had
succeeded, everybody would talk in a different manner,
even the slaves and asses who surrounded the throne would
have rejoiced.

“Do not be surprised at these political assassinations, but
rather be astonished that they are not more frequent. Unfortunately
for our cause, the Nihilists are too humanitarian, and
hence are incapable of carrying out many necessary measures.
Perhaps in time they will acquire the aptitude necessary in
critical moments; perhaps it will be your conduct which will
effect this change in them. Then in that case the responsibility
of terrorism and assassination will rest with you, and
not with us.”

How many amusing and ridiculous scenes should we witness
if each pair of men that secretly laugh at each other were
to do it openly!

[Pg 474]

AXIOMS LYING AT THE FOUNDATION OF ALL
PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION.

Out of nothing, nothing comes. Into nothing, nothing goes.
These are foundation axioms underlying the entire system of
Christian theology. The first looks backward, and the second
looks forward. The first correllates with the saying, “So
things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.”
The converse of this is the following: Things which
are seen were made of unseen things; that is, the visible universe
is the manifestation of the invisible. The real universe
is the invisible. There is nothing that can not be thrown into
the invisible. Even the diamond has been thrown into solution,
and all solutions may be thrown into the invisible
by heat. The question, What is matter? has puzzled
the best minds of earth, and puzzled all, both infidels and
Christians, as much as any other question. The visible, organic
universe was created, but it was created out of the
invisible. The invisible is eternal. There is an eternal world,
and that is the invisible and real universe, without which the
visible would not be, for of nothing, nothing comes. All
matter is to be referred to antecedent substance—that which
lies under and causes it to be. Substance, strictly speaking,
lies in the invisible. Matter, properly speaking, is an effect,
which is the visible manifestation of an unseen substance, and
this is eternal.

God created the universe by means of eternal substance.
He is the king eternal. The time never was when he was the
king of nothing. It is said of Leibnitz that he thought inert
matter insufficient to explain the phenomena of body, and had
recourse to the entelechies of Aristotle, or the substantial
forms of scholastic philosophy, conceiving of them as primitive
forces, constituting the substance of matter, atoms of substance,
but not of matter imperishable, but subject to transformation.
This view of the atomic theory is two-fold: First,
the atomic invisible, as the very term atom indicates, for it[Pg 475]
is from “ha temno,” which means not cut—literally indivisible.
You can’t cut an atom chemically or otherwise, unless you
are working upon that which is an atom in the loose and more
modern sense of the term. You may reduce matter chemically
to the invisible or underlying substance, but beyond this
you can not cut? Can you run it into nothing? No. Into
nothing nothing goes. Physicists are indebted to the oldest
philosophers, who lived prior to Democrites, for the use of the
term atom. Those oldest philosophers used the term to indicate
something that was not matter, viz: immaterial substance.
The term in its primary sense is applicable nowhere else.

The invisible world of substance is undoubtedly eternal.
But those men who try to make this fact an argument against
the existence of God are guilty of the most stupid nonsense
and impudence, for, having allowed eternity not only to substance,
but to material substance, they have no right in logic
to deny eternity to life and mind; because it is as easy, and
as rational, to conceive of the eternity of one thing known to
exist as of another. But the idea that the visible world is
eternal is in direct conflict with the facts of science, which establish
beyond contradiction the mutable nature of all organized
bodies. Aristotle, though a believer in the existence of
God, did affirm the world’s eternity, and therefore held that
there never was any first male or female in the history of any
animals whatsoever, but affirmed, on the contrary that one
begat another infinitely, without any beginning. This thought
was so repugnant to common sense that Aristotle himself
seemed to be skeptical about it, admitting it to be a disputable
thing. After affirming his notion he added, “If the
world had a beginning, and if men were once earth-born, then
must they have been, in all probability, either generated as
worms, out of putrefaction, or else out of eggs.” But the
question comes up for an answer, From whence came the
eggs?

Old Epicurus, after Aristotle, fancied that the first men
and animals were formed in certain wombs or bags growing
out of the earth, by a fortuitous concourse of dead atoms.[Pg 476]
Here we have the last home stretch of all physicists in their
efforts to get rid of the Christian idea of creation; beyond it
no modern infidel has traveled in his speculations, nor ever
will.

But if men were formed from eggs growing out of the
earth, or from bags, or from wombs created by a fortuitous
concourse of dead atoms, by chance, why, the motion of
atoms being as brisk and vigorous as ever, should we not expect
the same thing to occur occasionally throughout all the
ages?

Anaximander, however, concluded that men, because they
require longer time than other animals to be hatched up,
were at first generated in the bellies of fishes, and there
nourished till they were able to defend and shift for themselves,
and were then disgorged and cast upon dry land. So we are
driven to the conclusion that there is nothing in the world too
absurd for those men, both ancient and modern, to swallow
down in their efforts to get rid of the notion of an intelligent
creation by the hand of an intelligent creator.

ESTOPPELS; OR, FOSSILIZATION.

In our religion we find no law requiring uniformity of
thought. Think the same things. Be of the same opinion.
These and like statements are no part of our religion. Faith
and opinion are not the same. All Christians have one faith,
“the faith of Christ.” “Be of the same mind and of the
same judgment.” “Speak the same things.” These are to be
taken in their proper relations. The made up judgment is the
result of faith in the judgment of Christ. “I judge nothing
by myself; he that judgeth me is the Lord.” The one great
mind enjoined is the result of thought upon the one great subject
of the life of Christ, which is given as the light of men.
These imperatives are summed up in the beautiful expression,
“Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.”[Pg 477]
Uniformity of thoughts or opinions is a very different thing.
A man would be considered worse than a knave who would
throw chains around the human intellect, so as to put an end
to progress in thought; it would be the stagnation of all in
which we are most interested. Christians are not to be charged
with any such wickedness, for they are using all their powers
to produce thought; money and talent are freely bestowed in
many ways to get men to think, and then decide, not in reference
to opinions but facts; not in reference to things which
are matters of opinion only, but of the living object of faith,
Christ and Christian duty. There is no system of things in
which investigation, liberty of thought and action, upon all
matters of interest to our humanity, both as respects this
world and the world to come, is more encouraged and insisted
upon. Wicked and unholy thoughts only are prohibited.

Who would paint every flower of the same hue? Who
would trim all the trees of the forest into one and the same
shape? Or, who is so foolish as to want all faces cast into
one mould? Who would chain human thought or mould the
opinions of men so that they should not only be one in
Christ, the greatest living fact in history, but one in every
other being known in the world’s history—one in opinions?
The freeist thing in the universe is thought. The liberties of
thought are charter liberties from the King of Kings. The
spirit of man is free in its normal state. You can not chain
it in slavery against its will. No. It knows no servitude
but the voluntary. But, then, its wanderings are many. In
the field of search after beauty, rectitude and truth, many
minds may come into collision. But greater evils would result
from chaining them all to one spot, and thus ending progress
in many things of interest lying in the realm of thought.
Of all the varieties known among men those of thought are
the most sublime and useful.

This variety causes the investigation of every interest; it
brings every truth and every error to the surface.

Men have made many attempts to check the onward march
of intellect. But every attempt in that direction is marked[Pg 478]
by some great dread. Men are not anxious to put on the
brakes unless they are in fear of being wrecked. Nothing
is more dangerous in any government than perfect indifference
to public interests. Men in places of public trust always
need watching. Irresponsible power, it is said, would
corrupt an archangel, and is, doubtless, unknown among the
inhabitants of the better land. Among men there is great
liability. Every political candidate has his accusations, his
promises, and scheme, with which he confronts his rival and
agitates the minds of the people. So we have been saved
from that stagnation of thought which has retarded progress
among other nations. Many men, seeking office, have been
wise enough to see the danger to their interests of an expose
of corruption. So they have been perfectly willing that
mechanics, artisans and farmers should investigate and expose
to public view all the questions of interest belonging to our
government, but good Christians, “and especially preachers,
entering the field of political investigation, at once forfeit
their right to the crown of life.(?)”

But just how it is that lawyers, doctors and politicians will
all reach heaven in spite of political action, and preachers will
sink to perdition on account of the same, is a problem among
problems that has never yet been satisfactorily solved. Are
we to conclude that such men as Generals Hancock and Garfield,
along with a great many more, had, and have, no religion
to be disturbed? Or is there a double portion of sacrifice,
the sacrifice of principle and liberty, demanded at the
hands of ministers of the Gospel of Christ? How is this?
We are anxious to know. Are the politicians of the country
the voluntary scapegoats of the nation, who risk their own
salvation for political toil, which, from its character, would,
according to a very common opinion, kill out the religion of
all the saints in America? Surely we ought to feel grateful
to the political sinners who so willingly take all the risk of
being shut out of Paradise that they may have the exclusive
right of controlling the offices of the government. They seem
to say to us Christians, Hear us, ye hard-thinking toilers and[Pg 479]
aspirants to the realms of bliss while we proclaim to you the
perils of our position; we warn you against the crime of accustoming
yourselves to the investigation of the political and
civil interests of the day, and let not your devout meditations
be disturbed by secular pursuits. Read your Bibles and other
pious books; attend to all your prayer meetings and all your
philanthropic societies.

What is the object of all this pious policy? Is it to keep
the national mind as far as possible in a state of political
stagnation, or, otherwise, to ostracise politically the preachers
of the land with reference to party success? How is this?
Are the preachers of the United States a dangerous element
in our land? If they are, then the fewer we have of them
the better we are off. Do any but infidels take that view of
the subject? It correllates with infidelity, but not with
Christianity.

TO KEEP A ROOM PURE.

To keep a room purified it is only necessary to keep a
pitcher or some other vessel full of water in it. The water
will absorb all the respired gases. The colder the water is
the greater is its capacity to hold the gases. At ordinary temperature
a pail of water will absorb a pint of carbonic acid
gas and several pints of ammonia. The capacity is nearly
doubled by reducing the water to the temperature of ice.
Water kept awhile in a room is unfit for use. The pump
should always be emptied before catching water for use. Impure
water is more injurious than impure air.

Man, being essentially active, must find in activity his joy,
as well as his beauty and glory, and labor, like everything
else that is good, is its own reward.

[Pg 480]

INTERESTING FACTS.

Glass windows were used for lights in 1180.

Chimneys first put up to houses in 1236.

Tallow candles for lights in 1290.

Spectacles invented by an Italian in 1240.

Paper made from linen in 1302.

Woolen cloth made in England in 1341.

Art of printing from movable types in 1440.

The first book printed with movable types in 1450.

Watches first made in Germany in 1447.

Telescopes invented by Porta and Janson in 1590.

Tea first brought from China to Europe in 1501.

Circulation of blood discovered by Hervey in 1610.

Newspaper first established in 1629.

Pendulum clocks first invented in 1639.

Barometer invented by Torricelli in 1535.

Steam engine invented in 1649.

Bread made with yeast in 1650.

Cotton planted in the United States in 1759.

Fire engine invented in 1685.

Telegraph invented by Morse in 1832.

Cure for a Felon.—”Take common salt, dry it in the
oven, then pound it fine and mix it with turpentine, equal
parts. Put it on a rag and wrap it around the finger, and as
soon as it gets dry put on some more, and in twenty-four
hours the felon will be as dead as a door nail.”—Old Mr. Mix.