Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

confessions of faith; these they signed; and all who refused to sign them, they disowned, and persecuted out of their communities."

66

Having done these things, not according to the pattern showed by their divine Master, in his plain and peaceful sermon on the Mount of Olives, Heb. viii. 5, but according to the arcana imperii of 'the woman who sitteth on seven mountains, and who reigneth over the kings of the earth,' Rev. xvii. 9, 18, they boasted of enjoying as good a uniformity as that of which the Catholic church vaunted."

"Had the Protestants done only that with the writings of Moses and Paul, which they did with the writings of Homer and Tacitus--had they fetched them out of dusty holes in libraries, exposed them to public view, and left them to shift for themselves, their authenticity, we presume, would have shined with inimitable lustre; for fewer objections have lain against the book, than against the methods that have been used to enforce it. But that fatal notion of uniformity-this absurd dogma, unity in the faith is the test of a true church-misled those worthy men; and they adopted the spirit of persecution, that child of the mother of abominations,' Rev. xvii. 5, whom folly had produced, and whom cruelty had hitherto maintained."

"Let one party of Christians worship God as their consciences direct; but let other parties forfeit nothing for doing the same."

"Our author (Saurin) sets a fine example of a wise moderation. On the one hand, with a wisdom that does him honor, he examines the subject, and with the fidelity of an upright soul, openly declares, in the face of the

* *

*

sun, that he hath sentiments of his own, which are those of his own community, and he thinks those of the inspired writers. On the other hand, far from erecting himself, or even his synod, into a standard of orthodoxy-a tribunal to decide on the rights and privileges of other Christians, he opens his benevolent arms to admit them to communion, and, with a graceful modesty, to use his own language, puts his hand on his mouth, in regard to many difficulties that belong to his own system. There is a certain point to which conviction must go, because evidence goes before it to lead the way, and up to this point we believe, because we understand; but beyond this we have no faith, because we have no understanding, and can have no conviction, because we have no evidence. This point differs in different men, according to the different strength of their mental powers. And as there is no such thing as a standard soul, by which all other souls ought to be estimated, so there can be no such thing as a human test in a christian church, by which the opinions of other Christians ought to be valued. There is one insuperable difficulty in setting up human tests; that is, Whose opinion shall the test be, yours or mine? And the only consistent church in the world, on this article, is the church of Rome." "Were men as much inclined to unite, and to use gentle, healing measures, as they are to divide, and to gratify an arbitrary, censorious spirit, they would be neither so ridiculous as to pretend to have no fixed sentiments of their own in religion, nor so unjust as to make their own opinions a standard for all other men. There are in religion some great, principal, infallible truths, and there are various fallible inferences derived by different Christians. In the first, all agree; in the last, all should agree to differ."

"I have sometimes imagined a Pagan ship's crew in a vessel under sail in the wide ocean; I have supposed not one soul aboard ever to have heard one word of Christianity; I have imagined a bird dropping a New Testament, written in the language of the mariners, on the upper deck; I have imagined a fund of uneducated, unsophisticated good sense in this company; and I have required of this little world answers to two questions; first, What end does this book propose? The answer is, This book ' was written, that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing, we might have life through his name.' I ask, secondly, What means does this book authorize a foremast man, who believes, to employ with the rest of the crew, to induce them to believe that Jesus is the Son of God; and that believing, they also, with the foremast man, might have eternal felicity through his name? I dare not answer this question; but I dare venture to guess, should this foremast man conceal the book from any of the crew, he would be unlike the God, who gave it to all; or should he compel the cabinboy to admit his explication of the book, he would be unlike the God, who requires the boy to explain it to himself; and should he require the captain to enforce his explication by penalties, the captain ought to reprove his folly for counteracting the end of the book, the felicity of all the mariners, for turning a message of peace into an engine of faction."

SALVATION.

"What must I do to be saved?"

Do you know what being saved really implies in your own case? Are you sincere when you take up this inquiry? Such are the first and most important things to be considered. There is no salvation for a reasonable creature who will not so much as think for himself, on a subject so momentous. And the fact is too often, that men ask what they shall do to be saved, with no disposition to be saved, and who had rather not be saved, in the most important sense of the word.

Let us soberly, and in the fear of God, search, into this matter. It is infinitely important. A mistake here is most deplorable, for it hurts the soul. But we need not mistake. God has made plain the safe way, though it is not broad enough for us to walk in it with all the load of encumbrances, that an earthly mind carries about. But if we are sincere, and are willing to put off or to bear upon us just what God requires, we may not be afraid, there is no danger which ought to terrify or dishearten us.

To be saved-what is it? What happens when a human soul is saved? We may apprehend this better if we will bear in mind, that salvation is often in scripture spoken of as something past or present, as well as a future good. It is deliverance from evil. Now there are evils within us, and without us, evils which have gone, and evils which may come out of the dark and distant futurity. Salvation respects chiefly but one of these, yet its consequences embrace the whole.

But one of these! Yes. The evils that dwell deep VOL. II.-NO. II. 5*

within the heart, which cling to the soul itself and are a part of its character, these are the evils to which, chiefly, salvation by Christ has respect. He saves from sin. And now honestly confess, is there at this moment, has there ever been a burden heavier to you than your own sins? What enmity from abroad is like the strife in your own bosom, where thought conflicts with thought in ceaseless combatings, and desire and fear, passion and conscience, the spirit and the flesh war so tumultuously?

Has God stricken the body, and entailed on life maladies that have little respite and no cure? The evil is bitter. No wonder the wearied sufferer longs for deliverance. But suppose there dwells in him a portion of the mind that was in Christ. Pain, at each fresh wound, encounters a more yielding and acquiescent spirit. Resistance and complaint cease. There is a gentleness and quiet afterward, that bespeak a comfort never known to those whose freedom from disease is but a liberty to indulge in sin, or pursue some one of the thousand shadows which are mistaken for pleasures. You can understand this. You can easily enter into the case, and certainly know that if a sick body be encumbered with a soul diseased, the evils to be borne are enhanced most frightfully. You can understand then, that the mind itself is what must be saved, or deliverance from all other evils will do no good. Give a man health, fortune, fame, power, learning, friends, any and every good which can be named; if he is disposed to neglect or contemn God, to indulge his passions and appetites without scruple of conscience, to oppress and injure others, and to give up himself to chance and sin, he is accursed-his very bless

« AnteriorContinuar »