First principles

Preface

In writing the pages which follow I have kept constantly in mind an honest heart in search of the way of salvation. He first inquires as to God; then as to the Bible; after which' he makes a special study of the New Testament, which he finds perfectly adapted to all his spiritual wants, and in which he is brought face to face with Jesus of Nazareth as the great Miracle Worker, the Marvelous Teacher, the Sinless Character, and the Risen King, victorious over Death and the Grave. Sitting at His feet, he learns how to be saved, enters the church and consecrates his life to the blessed service of his Savior. May his wise example be followed by many of my readers.

Author.

Dallas, Texas, Dec. 5, 1903.

Chapter I. Is There A God?

The first questions in the heart of a devout searcher after truth are those concerning God. Is there a God? If so, can I know him? A large volume might well be written in answer to these questions; and yet a helpful answer may be given in much smaller compass. In fact, the answer must be condensed and simplified, or it will not reach the masses. They have no time to read large and elaborate books. They are in the midst of the battle of life, and it is not an easy struggle. The wolf is at the door, and must be driven away,' or the children will starve. They are willing and anxious to hear, and their hungry souls are dying for want of knowledge; but if they are to hear, the answer must be simple and brief.

But these people must not expect an absolutely perfect answer. We know nothing with absolute perfection. We only know ourselves and others in part, and yet this partial knowledge is ample for present purposes. And if we cannot fully comprehend ourselves, how can we hope to comprehend God? Paul speaks of '■' that which may be known of God'' (Rom. i. 19), implying that there w^as something which could not be known. The finite cannot fully comprehend the Infinite. The ocean cannot be emptied into a tea-cup. If so, it would not be an ocean. The tea-cup may be filled from the ocean, but when filled it can contain no more until it is enlarged. And so we may now know God sufficiently well to believe in him, to love him, and to serve him, but we must not expect to know him in his fullness. In the sweet by and by we shall know him as he is, but now we can only know him as we are. ''When I was a child I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man I put away childish things. Now^ w^e see through a glass darkly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then shall I know even as also I am known" (I. Cor. xiii. 11, 12).

Our answer to these questions is twofold : the argument from without and the argument from within.

ARGUMENT FROM WITHOUT.

1. Cause and effect. Every effect must not only have a cause, but it must have an adequate cause. This is an axiom. The simple statement carries conviction to all. A caravan was crossing a desert. An early riser reported that a camel had been walking about the tent during the night. He was asked how he knew it, and he pointed to the tracks in the sand, saying that nothing but a camel made such tracks. And when we look about us, we see the tracks of Jehovah. AVe see them in the hills and mountains ; in the valleys and plains ; in the rivers and oceans ; in the flowers and trees ; in the birds and fishes; in the sun, moon and stars; in the covenant of the day and night; in the coming and going of the seasons; and, most of all, in man himself. With all his splendid achievements — and they are splendid — man has not been able to make things like these. His mountains are mole-hills ; his rivers are small canals ; his oceans are toy lakes; his flowers are without life or fragrance, and his lights are flickering tapers. Napoleon, not only the greatest soldier of his age, but also one of the world's wisest philosophers, with some of his officers, was on his way to Egypt. The night was clear, the sea was cahn, and the sky above the ship was studded with stars. The officers were engaged in an animated rehgious discussion, and when it was about to close they seemed to have proven to their own satisfaction that there was no God. Their hero all the while was apparently absorbed in other things, but it was only in appearance. He had heard the entire discussion, and had noted their conclusion, for, just as it closed, he said to them, '^ All that is very well, gentlemen;" and pointing to the myriads of stars blazing in glory above them, he asked, '^but who made these?" Echo answers. Who? They are the tracks of Jehovah.

2. Design. This is an old argmnent, as simple as it is sound. It can never be overturned. We might as well expect to see the rocks of Gibraltar hurled into the sea as to look for a successful refutation of this great argument. An intelligent man for the first time examines an ordinary watch with its complicated and intricate machinery. He notes its levers and springs, its wheels and cogs, its strong case and clear face, its hour, minute and second hands, and he sees how accurately it marks the progress of time. What must be his conclusion? Please note that I do not ask what it may be, but what it inust be. There can be but one : This watch had a designer; it could not have come by chance. Dr. Frankhn once silenced a skeptic on this wise. The skeptic argued that the world did not imply a designer, but that it was the result of chance. One morning when this skeptical friend called, Franklin showed him a small globe. He had never seen one before, and asked what it was, and who made it. Franklin told him that it was a picture of the earth, but that no one made it, it just happened to be in that shape ; it was a freak of chance. His friend saw the point, and his skepticism vanished. And I w^ould ask, which is the easier — to make the globe, or to make its picture?

If you should visit a new coimtry and find palaces, gardens, streets, railways, steamships, and all things necessary for the comfort of man, could you fail to believe that these things were the result of design? With the alphabet in a sack, would you expect to shake it up and pour it on paper and get a poem? With the colors thrown carelessly on the canvas, would you expect a picture? Is it not as reasonable to believe that the palaces of the world came by chance as that this splendid earthly home of ours SO came? If even a little poem must have an intelligent author, how can we believe the great volume of Nature has none? Why not a painting by chance as well as this marvelous picture gallery of the universe? Is it easier to make a man than to make his picture?

If you should see a ship making annual voyages to some distant port, and returning at a regular time, laden with food and clothing for the people of an isolated island, and never deviating a mile from her course, and never an hour late, would it be possible to believe it the result of chance? Although you never saw them, still you would know she had a captain, a pilot, a chart and compass, who directed her on her missions of mercy. Let us think of our world as a great ship sweeping round the sun, and returning laden with all that man needs, and never out of her course the fraction of an •inch, or a single second late. It must be that a wise and loving Father is at the helm. Reason as well as religion can accept no other conclusion.

Joseph Cook finds in nature a beautiful illustration of this thought. He says that almost imperceptible creatures are building, in the Indian Ocean, a vessel known as Neptune'.s

Cup. It is sometimes six feet high, and half as broad. These httle creatures have no consultation with each other. Each works in a separate cell, cut off from the other, like prisoners in a penitentiary. They build the stem to the proper height, and then begin to widen. Everything is proportioned according to a perfect plan. Is the plan theirs? or does it proceed from a power above them and act through them? So the bioplasts, isolated from each other in the living tissues which they produce, build the rose and violet and all flowers; the pomegranate, cedar, oak and all trees ; the eagle, canary and all birds; the lion, leopard and all animals; the bone, muscle and all men; and so from the cup he drank the glad w^ine of Design.

ARGUMENT FROM WITHIN.

The heavens and the earth, with all creation, proclaim the presence and power of God. This is wonderful testimony, and constitutes a foundation on which the soundest reason and profoundest philosophy may rear the Temple of Hope. But it is not all, nor is it the best. God would have his children without excuse in this matter of faith, and hence he makes the voice within corroborate that from without, and thus the basis of the rehgious Hfe is made doubly sure.

God makes no half hinges. The desire on the part of man for bread, water, light and sound presupposes his capacity for, and his need of, these things, just as the fin of the fish implies a fluid in which to swim, and the wing of the bird an atmosphere in which to fly. The Being who created the bird and fish also created these elements, and without them they could not exist. The Creator of man so constituted him that he must have bread and water, or he will die; and he must have light and sound in order to attain the highest physical life. These things are part and parcel of his fleshly life, and in his normal condition they are never absent. All men, believers and unbelievers alike, agree here. And they agree, further, that these wants are not the result of teaching or development, but are a part of his nature.

Can we find a parallel of this in his spiritual nature? If so, then it follows with the force of a demonstration that there is a God. Man has been called a ''religious animal." He has been characterized as ''hopelessly so; " i. e., he is not only religious by nature, but his religious instincts cannot be destroyed. He has never been discovered without some form of reUgion. However fallen and degraded, there is something within which reaches after God; and a piteous voice that cries to the unseen for help. A few times he has been found so low that at first it was thought he had no spiritual aspirations. But, on closer examination, this was discovered to be an error. It is as easy to find him without speech as without religion. It is a part of his very being, and his soul can no more exist without it than his body can live without bread and water. William Shakespeare, the world's great poet, it is supposed knew something of himian nature; and here is. what he says on this point:

"The dread of something after death, That undiscovered country From whose bourne no traveler returns, Puzzles the will . .

Thus conscience doth make cowards of us all."

Put emphasis on ^'thus," and you get the poet's point. Looking forward to a place of punishment beyond the veil makes cowards of us all. Not simply such as are under the influence of Christianity, but also the ancient Greek, Roman and pagan. This dread is a part of our nature, and is as natural as the song in the moment of joy, and the groan in the moment of sorrow. It is organic and ineradicable. And this is not simply the teaching of Shakespeare, but is the voice of the great students of human nature since time began. And it is also the voice of Paul. ''When the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law,, are a law unto themselves: which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another'^ (Rom. ii. 14, 15). Bishop Butler says, ''Conscience without being consulted, always naturally, and of course, unless forcibly stopped, goes forward to anticipate a sentence higher than its own, and which shall hereafter second and confirm its decisions.'' It is this which is so large an element in our own desire for God, and it must be accounted for. A volcanic peak suddenly rises a thousand feet above the water in midocean. What is its basis? No sane man would say that it rested on the waves. There must be something solid beneath it. But such a towering peak would not be more prominent than this instinctive propensity of man to worship. On what does it rest? It is deep seated, and refuses to be removed. He may be induced to abandon an old religion and espouse a new one, but he must have religion. If he loses loiowledge of the true God, he will adopt a false one. There is no pinnacle in the whole range of human nature which stands out more clearly than this ; and therefore it must rest on the same basis which supports human nature.

A student was annoyed by the singing of a canary. Some one suggested that it w^as a bird in another cage w^hich made it sing, and he moved it. But the song continued. It was not the presence of its companion which made it sing, but a something within, placed there by its Maker. Its song was a part of its life — as much so as shining is a part of the life of the sim, and as exhaling sweet fragrance is a part of the life of the rose; and so, whether alone or with its companion, in shine or shade, in winter and in summer, alw^ays and everywhere the canary sings. So the heart sings to God, not because of the absence or presence of friends or foes, or because of any outside influence, but because of its innate yearnings. Beecher says : ''The ocean is the same, whatever craft sail up and down upon it ; whether they be pleasure boats, brigs, merchant ships, pirates, or men-of-war; so, whatever rehgious navigators may be going up and down the sea of hfe^ its depths and shores and distant haven remain the same. The stars never change for astrologers or astronomers. They roll calmly above storms and above opinions. So man's nature does not vary for circumstances, or conflicting views, but still wants God above, and fellow-man below."

It is as impossible for us to get away from God as it was when David wrote: ''Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there ; if I make my bed in the grave, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say. Surely the darkness shall cover me, even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee" (Ps. cxxxix. 7-12). He follows us as the shadow follows the substance. This thought was powerfully impressed on me the day I first saw Pike's Peak, the great monarch of the Rockies, standing like a sentinel from the skies, guarding that world of mountains. I needed no one to point it out to me. The moment my eyes rested on it, I exclaimed, '^There's Pike's Peak!'' And for almost a hundred miles it was seldom out of view, and seemed to keep alongside of our train, as if it, too, was mo^dng. It looked as if we would never get away from it. And so the thought of God, towering high above ali others, follows us through every experience in life. It fills the mind of the little child with awe, and trembles in reverence on the lips of old age. It throbs in the heart of youth as he nears manhood, and becomes his inspiration in the stern battles of life. It is a benediction at the marriage altar, and the one solace and stay at the open grave. It goes side by side with the poor wretch on the downward way to ruin, and on the pathway of the just it shines more and more imto the perfect day. The murderer cannot drive it from his narrow cell, and all bad men and demons combined cannot rob the dying martyr of its holy presence.

Tell man that there is no God; and after a moment of terrible suspense he will look you in the face and declare that your teaching is inhuman; that if this life is not to be followed by another and better life; that if hopes are only born to be blighted; if ties are only made lo be sundered; if heart yearnings are only roused to be crushed; if man is only created to be destroyed — then God must be either weak or wicked. He will quote you Browning^s forceful lines :

"Truly there needs another Ufe to come! If this be all

And another life await us not for one, I say 'tis a poor cheat, a stupid bungle, A wretched failure. I for one protest Against, and I hurl it back with scorn."

Is there a God? Yes; or the voice of Nature is false, and the deepest instincts of the heart are misleading.

Chapter II. Did The Biblp: Come From God?

If there is a God, and if that God, as the Christian beUeves, is our Father, then we may be sure he has spoken to his children; for what earthly parent, with a child away from home, would not, if he could, communicate with him? Hence our second study: Did the Bible come from God?

In the discussion of this large question both our purpose and space forbid the discussion of details. Even the much-discussed question of Inspiration must be passed by with a sentence, for we have in mind the young soul in search of the truth, and not the learned theologian, or the average Christian with years of experience and knowledge. Lowth, speaking on this subject, says: ''Inspiration maybe regarded, not as suppressing or extinguishing for a time the faculties of the human mind, but of purifying and strengthening and elevating them above what they w^ould otherwise reach.'' It is like the sun shining through colored glass. The colors in the glass are not destroyed, but rather heightened and brightened. And so the personality of the Bible writers is preserved and perpetuated. Paul, for example, is as distinctly himself when inspired of God, as when he writes of his own accord.

Nature bears the marks of divine origin. Man never made the heavens nor the earth. As well might we say that the great bridges which span our rivers and the ships which ride the seas are the works of ten-year-old boys. And so the Bible bears marks of its divine origin. What are some of them?

ITS UNITY.

The Bible is one hook; not because it is bound in a single volume, but because of the plan and purpose manifest on every page. 'Taradise Losf and ^^The Course of Time" are not more distinct unities. Barnes is right in claiming that it has '^ a beginning, a middle, and an end — a beginning, a middle, and an end more complete, extending through more years, and embracing a greater variety of characters and events than any other volume in the world — its beginning the beginning of creation ; its middle the Incarnation and the Atonement ; its end the consunmiation of the world's affairs."

FIRST PKINCIPLES 25

That one may better appreciate this high and true claim, let us remember:

1. The people from whom it came. The Jews had no scientific or Uterary fame. They were regarded as narrow and bigoted, with no ambition in these directions. The Chaldeans and Egyptians had their observatories through which they were familiar \\\.\h. the heavens, and splendid temples dedicated to literature, science and religion. Had the Bible come from these people it w^ould not have been so strange. But it came from a people just the reverse; a people as incapable of producing such a book as Alaska is of producing the California orange. And yet Milton (and who knows better?) says, ''No songs are comparable to the songs of Zion; no orations are equal to those of the prophets ; and no politics are like those which the Scriptures teach."

2. The number of the writers. The Bible of the Chinese has but one author: Confucius; and the Koran is from the pen of Mohammed. But the Bible has more than forty authors.

3. Character of these icriters. Some of them were men of renown, and others were fishermen and shepherds. Some were men of culture, and others were •'unlearhea ana ignorant." Some of them, by travel, had come in touch with the wisdom of the world, but most of them were never beyond the narrow limits of their native land.

4. The length of time they were writing. The Bible was not written in a single year, or during a period of several years, but more than fifteen hundred years swept by between its beginning and its close.

5. The changes going on in the world during this time. These were many and vast. The whole earth was feverish and restive like a volcano ; it heaved and sighed and groaned like an ocean in a storm. Great conquerors founded empires which swayed the world for a moment, and then passed away; and discoveries followed each other in rapid succession in the scientific world; there was as little rest among the scholars as among the soldiers; and vast revolutions of many kinds were shaking the earth to her center. But despite all this, the Bible writers, like men in a cave, sheltered from the storm raging about them, slowly and surely pushed their work to completion.

How, under these circumstances, are we to account for the perfect unity of the Bible? It came from a people who had never produced anything of the kind; it is the joint work of more than forty writers differing greatly from each other, and without conference with each othei", or knowledge of the fact that they were engaged in writing a single book; their work covered a period of more than fifteen hundred years of the most turbulent history of the world. (What man has lived long enough to supervise the writing of a book during so long a time?) And yet the keynote sounded at first was the keynote to the last. ''It is susceptible of easy proof/^ says Barnes, ''that one part is the completion or complement of the other, as the two parts of a tally, or as complementary colors; not as the Jews would have done it, but as it was intended it should be. There is a scheme commenced. There is an anticipation. There is progress. There is a completion in the Messiah. There is the unfolding of a plan running through many centuries ; one writer in one age stating one thing, and another in another, as if in one age an ariist should have fashioned an arm, and another a leg; and one a hand, and another a foot; one the nose, another the lips, another the chin ; one the form and size of the head, and another the body; and all at last should have been put together in the form of Minerva or Apollo." Such a book is as different from all other books as the sun is different from a taper, and like the sun it bears on its shining face the proof of its divine origin.

ITS VITALITY.

Books, like men, are born, live their little day, die, and are forgotten. . This results from various causes:

1. They are coymnonplace. They lack the merit that perpetuates. They have a few friends and a local reputation, but the great, wide world neither knows of them nor cares for them. It is appalling to see this large and everincreasing list ; it is enough to make an author's pen fall from his fingers. It is like the advance of an army, which can be traced by the refuse in its wake. Here is an old wagon; there is a disabled piece of artillery; and yonder an old horse, no longer able to keep his place in the ranks. And so there are many books which cannot keep up with the procession of this on-going world. Their only friend is the antiquarian. He may preserve them because they are rare. But this is a doubtful honor, for if they had been valuable they would not have been rare.

2. They have been displaced by better books. If all of this class were piled together they would make a small mountain. They were once useful, but better books have taken their place, and they are now fit companions of the old-time engine and reaper.

3. They are false. The works of Ptolemy, with all other books founded on the Ptolemaic system of astronomy, are illustrations of this class. Though ingenious and profound, they passed away when the Copernican theory was established; and their chief value to-day is that they mark the mighty progress of science.

But the Bible belongs to neither of these classes. It is not found in the hands of the antiquarian, honored solely because of its quaintness and its age; better books are not pushing it aside; and it is not being discarded because of its errors; but it holds its high place in the vanguard of the world. It is translated into more languages than any other book; better presses are printing it; more money and skill are spent in its embellishment; it finds a welcome in more and better homes ; and its influence is now greater than ever before. It has withstood alike its furious foes and its false friends ; and, like its Author, it remains the same '^ yesterday, to-day, and forever/' needing no revision and adaptation, like our Constitution. A few years ago when a new translation of the New Testament reached New York, a Chicago daily, rather than wait a few hours for the railroad train to bring it, had it flashed over the wires, and gave it in full in a single issue to its readers. Does that look like it had lost vitality? It throbs with life to-day as it has always done, and it thrills with life everything that receives it. It is as unlike any other book as the mountain is like a mole-hill, and it shows, as does the mountain, that Jehovah is its Author.

ITS POWER TO BLESS.

Here is perhaps its highest proof of heavenly origin. That which always ennobles, elevates and purifies must be of God. In my old Virginia hom.e the land is thin and much fertilizer is used, each plant of tobacco receiving a tablespoonful of the guano. It sometimes happens that a small part of a field is neglected because the supply of fertilizer is exhausted. In such a case you can tell by the feebleness of the plant every one so neglected. And when w^e look over the world we can discover by the ricli foliage and fruit just where the fertilizing influence of the old Book has gone. Solomon states this thought in one of his proverbs: ''Where there is no vision the people perish; but he that keepeth the law, happy is 'he " (Prov. xxix. 18).

There are those who claim that human culture, philosophy, science, art, etc., are better for man than the Bible. If so, the map of the world should show it. Egypt was once the seat of the world's best learning, but her scholars as well as her serfs bowed in worship to the brute. Greece in her palmiest days, when reason and philosophy reigned supreme, w^as gross and sensual in her devotions. And when Corinth was famous for beauty and elegance, Venus, the very personification of lust, was her goddess. At best these powers could only elevate the few, and these they failed to purify. They could build the pyramids and the colisemn, but they could not build up the morals of the people. One emperor slew twenty thousand men in celebrating a Roman holiday.

Now see the Bible tested. Look upon the lands where it has been open to the masses and you see the noblest men, the purest women, the largest liberty and the best government. Behold England, Scotland and America. Then follow the missionary in Asia, Africa and the