Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

152 THE REMEDY PROPOSED BY MALTHUS.

orders to all intruders issued by the great mistress of the feast, who, wishing that all her guests should have plenty, and knowing that she could not provide for unlimited numbers, humanely refused to admit fresh comers when her table was already full."*

Can inhumanity go a step farther? Can disobedience and contempt of the Divine command to love our neighbour as ourself imagine a farther step? It is a total denial of "the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man," and consequently a total abjuration of Christianity. The remedial measure proposed by the Rev. Mr. Malthus is in strict accordance with his theory. He proposes that, notice being given, all children begotten afterwards should in every event be denied all official and private relief, or charity of any kind. If they perish, the responsibility will rest with the parents who brought them into the world after due warning of the consequences.

*Malthus on Population, first edition; and see sixth edition, vol. ii. p. 337,

By this means, the intruders into the hall of the great feast of life would be rapidly starved out of existence, the order and harmony of the feast restored, and the "happiness of the guests be no longer destroyed by the spectacle of misery" around them.

(If this is not the doctrine of the church of England in regard to the poor, it is the philosophy which has grown out of her neglect to teach and exemplify the great duty of Christian charity: if it is not her doctrine, it is the very essence and theory of her practice.

THE SPIRIT OF PROTESTANTISM AT LARGE.-ENGLISH PROTESTANTISM,

THIS subject might justly be swelled into volumes. We might proceed to show that other Protestants besides those of England have fallen short of their duty to the poor; that they have not apprehended, taught, nor

practised the precepts of charity as inculcated by Christ and his apostles: that, split into numerous sects, they have been far more zealous in defining and defending their various shades of belief than in fulfilling Christian duties: that they have divided the vineyard which has been given them to cultivate, into innumerable subdivisions, and have spent in contests about enclosures the time and talents which they should have given to the cultivation of the vines: that they have buried themselves in theology, and neglected the plainest teachings of Him whose name they bear: that they have brought reproach upon their Master by exhibiting all manner of uncharitableness in their mutual bearing towards each other: that while they utterly scout the claim of the pope to infallibility, they severally put forth pretensions in regard to their own standards and creeds as exacting as those of the pope; and whilst they thus claim to be undoubtedly and severally right, they have, almost without exception, exalted

their own creeds, catechisms, confessions, liturgies, and forms of service above the precepts. of their Master: that they have built temples without number, and have preached the gospel, but not for nor to the poor: that whilst all religious eloquence has been cultivated with great assiduity, they have forgotten that "though they speak with the tongues of angels, and have not charity, they are as sounding brass:" that whilst they have multiplied religious books beyond all enumeration, and pursued biblical lore with a zeal and success truly wonderful, they have not remembered that "though they had the gift of prophecy, and understood all mysteries and all knowledge, and though they had all faith so that they could remove mountains, and had not charity, they are nothing:" that whilst their liberality has frequently been large and greatly diversified, and whilst they have suffered for the truth's sake, they have forgotten that "though they bestow all their goods to feed poor, and give their bodies to be burned,

the

156

CHURCHES CAN GLORY IN NOTHING.

and have not charity, it could profit them nothing."

There is, indeed, no church nor sect which can glory in its purity or perfection before God: there is none which would not be utterly condemned under the application of the same rules by which men must be finally judged. Let any of them give account of their stewardship in the administration of the great duty of Christian charity, and see how far, how very far they have fallen below the requirement. If this subject were pursued by some one fitted for the task, the picture drawn could not but lower that self-righteous spirit in which many Protestant churches so freely indulge. They would find that we may be very clear in perceiving error in others, without being right ourselves; and that so little room is there for any to indulge in self-righteousness before God, that, for the most part, those who are most positive and assuming are deepest in error. It may be well to think that whilst the great mass of Protestant theology may be

« AnteriorContinuar »