The divine life and the new birth

Front matter

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THE DIVINE LIFE AND NEW BIRTH

Prefatory Note

Two pamphlet editions of a material portion of this work, under the same title, were published in 1850. The same portion was afterwards incorporated into the volume entitled "Search of Truth." The original work, and some other of the more practical parts of the volume just named, form the basis of the present publication. To these materials large additions have been made upon kindred branches of Christian knowledge, with the hope that the whole will prove to be a Manual adapted to the needs of our time.

For the reception of my first efforts by the Church at large, and by many of her most gifted sons, I have been profoundly grateful. Much of the opposition which these publications encountered proceeded from local disturbances which have long since passed away, and the rest, I think, from misapprehensions growing out of the excited temper of the times.

Contention and party spirit may hardly ever be expected to cease from the Church, yet the perils of the present day have produced a very general conviction that Christians must come closer together to strive successfully for the faith once delivered. It is hoped, therefore, that all will welcome the feeblest effort to add to the unity and strength of the Christian host, and to furnish a guide to inquiring souls.

Contents

PACK.

Note 4

Chapter I

§ 1. Man Fallen and Redeemed IB

I 2. The First and the Second Adam 2A

g 3. The Second Adam is God and Man 25

§ 4. The True Deity of Christ an essential part of the Doc-

trineof Redemption 26

§ 5. Consonance of this Adorable Mystery with the Far-

Reaching Influence of Redemption 29

Chapter II

g 1. Historical Retrospect 37

#2. Establishment of The Kingdom 42

# 3. Constitution of The Kingdom 45

§ 4. The Kingdom of God a Witness to the Truth 50

§ 5. Fatal Effects of Disregarding this Testimony 52

CHAPTER III. Terms of Admission to the Way of Salvation 63

(iii)

IV CONTENTS.

Chapter IV. Page

Commencement of the Christian Life 70

I 1. Three Gospels 70

§2. Death of all Mankind in Adam 78

# 3. Universality of Redemption 84

§4- The Holy Ghost the Source of Life 85

§ 5. Spiritual li*e imparted to all 86

§ 6. The Divine Life and the Carnal Life co-exist — The conflict between them 95

§ 9. Practical Value of these Truths 125

CHAPTER Y.

Probation and Reprobation 131

CHAPTER VIII. Additional Testimonies to the Universality of the Divine Life 164

Old and New Testament — Justin Martyr — Tertullian — Clemens Alexandrinus — Bishop Ridley — John Calvin — Jeremy Taylor — Bishop Horsely — Olshausen — Bishop Harold Browne — Bishop Seabury — Bishop Ravenscroft — Bishop H. U. Onderdonk — Dr. Jarvis — Bishop Otey.

CHAPTER IX. Justification by Faith 190

CONTENTS. V

CHAPTER X. The Doctrine of Election 198

§ 1. Divine Decrees and Human Freedom 198

§ 2. The Gospel does not Entertain, much less Decide this

Problem of Nature 200

§3. Jewish Doctrine of Election 205

I 4. The Bible Doctrine of Election 205

Chapter XIII

The Application of the Gospel to Adult Persons who are not christians 225

§ 1. Practical Evils of the Theory which refers the beginning of Spiritual Life to the Period of Conversion 225

§ 2. Repentance, Faith, and Conversion, as applied to this

class of Persons 228

§ 3. Popular Fallacy in regard to Conversion 229

§ 4. The Bible Representation of this Grace 231

§ 5. A popular objection to submitting to the Terms of the

Gospel 233

§ 6. Physical Analogies to the Divine Life in the Soul of

Man 237

§ 7. Common Excuses for Refusing to Enter upon a Christian Life 239

CHAPTER XIV. Worship 244

§ 1. ItsNature 244

§2. Public Worship. A Liturgy 248

\ 3. Family and Private Worship 255

VI CONTENTS.

Chapter XV. Page

£ 1. A means of Grace and not a Testimony of Holiness.. 258

£ 2. A Eucharistic and Commemorative Sacrifice 260

§3. Priest and Priesthood 263

§ 4. Power of Absolution committed to the Priesthood... 271

$5. Institution of the Lord's Supper 274

§ 6. The Eomish Doctrine of Sacrifice 277

§ 7. The Sacrament of the Lord's Supper is the Participation of Christ 279

§ 8. Qualifications for partaking of this Sacrement 285

Chapter XVI

§ 1. One Faith 287

§2. The Bible not a Creed 298

§ 3. The Bible not the only Witness of the Creed 299

§ 4. The Creed not an Ecclesiastical Development 300

£ 5. The Theory of Development inconsistent with "One

Faith" 301

§ 6. The Apostolical Origin of the Creed proved by the

Necessity of the Case 304

§ 7. Expressions in Scripture which plainly refer to the

Creed 305

§ 8. The Creed Proved as a Fact in all the Ancient

Churches 308

§9. The so-called Athanasian Creed , 312

§ 10. The Doctrine of the Trinity as set forth in the

Creed 314

CHAPTER XVIII. Church and State 334

CONTENTS. VI 1

Chapter XIX

1. Cause of Divisions 346

2. All Truth objective and independent of Human Con-

ception 351

3. The Church the Pillar and Ground of the Truth 354

4. The History of Corruptions 356

5. The English Reformation an Appeal to the Catholic

Church 357

6. Formation of the Romish Sect 358

7. All Christians hear Testimony to the Objective Truth. 360

8. Remote Antiquity of this Divine Provision 362

9. The Objective Truth thus witnessed not the Subject

of Compromise 364

STJPPLEMEK"T.

CHAPTEE I.

Effect of the Incarnation upon Human Nature. 3

£ 1. The Older Religions recognize the Incarnation 4

\ 2. The Augustinian Theology obscured the Doctrine

of the Incarnation 5

\ 3. Speculative Views concerning Original Righteousness and Original Sin 7

§ 4. Modern Theories a reproduction of Ancient Heresies

concerning the Incarnation 9

§5. History of the Doctrine 10

$ 6. Human Nature acted, suffered, and triumphed in

Christ '. 13

\ 7. Further Testimonies to the Effect of the Incarnation

on Human Nature 17

\ 8. Synodical Action of the Church of England on this

Question 19

§9. Bishop Andrews. 23

§ 10. Richard Holt Hutton 24

§ 11. Baptism and the Agency of the Church in the

Matter of Salvation 28

CHAPTER II.

Objections to this View of the Incarnation 34

§ 1. Article 13 34

\ 2. A New Translation of St. John iii, 3-5 35

VI 11 CONTENTS.

PAGE.

§ 3. The Words of St. John i, 12 36

\ 4. A Transcendental Objection 38

| 5. A World-wide .Field of Phenomena outside of Revelation to be accounted for 39

§ 6. Humanitarianism 40

CHAPTEE III.

Resignation in its Manifold Aspects 15

g 1. Summary 45

\ 2. Regeneration as the First Contact of the Divine with

the Human Nature 46

\ 3. Regeneration as the Conscious Choice of Good, and

Rejection of Evil 52

§ 4. Regeneration as the Admission of the Child of God

into the Kingdom of God by Baptism 55

\ 5. Regeneration as the Final Purification of the Redeemed 57

I 6. Difficulties 57

§ 7. Language Incapable of such Precision as to Preclude

Differences of Interpretation 62

CHAPTEE IV.

Incarnation as Expressed in the Holy Eucharist. 65

§ 1. Truth embodied in Material Forms and Actions 65

\ 2. Transubstantiation 67

| 3. Theory of Identit}' or Union of Christ with the

Elements 71

$ 4. Illogical Appeal of this Party to the Letter of

In st itution 74

\ 5. The Real Presence as Taught by the Church 77

\ 6. Pretended Authorities for the New Theory 81

§ 7. Misrepresentation of the English Divines — Hooker,

90; Ridley, 92; Bishop Andrews, 95; Cosin, 98;

Drs. Pusey and Brevint, 99; Jeremy Taylor, 101;

Thorndike, 102; Nicholson, 105; Hammond, 107;

Beveridge, 109; Bishop Wilson Ill

$ 8. The two Theories De Modo a sad trifling with a

Holy Mystery Ill

§9. Recapitulation ... .. 115

NOTE.

Canon Liddon on the Local Presence 121

Introduction

In The Christian Remembrancer (London, January, 1863), there is a very noticeable article in relation to the famous "Essays and Reviews." The writer affirms, and, I think, proves, that Modern Skepticism is a natural reaction from the narrowness of the popular theology. He further undertakes to show that "the genuine theology of Christ and His Church" is not liable to the assaults of this skepticism; and he therefore counsels, as its most effectual refutation, a reform of the popular theology, so as to make it the real teaching of Christ and the Church. A position very similar to this was taken by Dr. M'Cosh and other eminent men, at the meeting of the Evangelical Alliance, in Edinburgh, in July, 1864.

It is gratifying to find that this truth is beginning to be so generally perceived by the leaders of religious opinion in the mother country. A profound conviction of the same truth induced the writer of the following work — first in 1850, and then in 1855 — to throw in his little mite towards the correction of that popular theology as it is professed in our own country. In those publications an attempt was made to prove that the Bible and the Church teach a religion far more catholic, and better adapted to human need and intelligence, than much of the prevalent theology of our time.

In speaking thus freely of systems which have so extensively prevailed, let us not forget that the most injurious dogmas of some of them were the result of a violent reaction of the Christian mind from that deadly form of ecclesiastical pharisaism which destroyed all the individuality of the human soul, and degraded religion into a superstitious round of propitiatory observances. Thus our nature is ever oscillating between two vicious extremes, and is with the utmost difficulty stayed in the just equilibrium of pure and simple truth.

It was not from books or reviews that my knowledge ot the truth, announced from these various quarters, was principally derived. A familiar intercourse with many of the educated and uneducated men of America had made me acquainted with their thoughts and feelings, their doubts and perplexities; and, although downright infidelity was comparatively rare, yet there was among the educated classes a reasonable and intelligent repugnance to the popular religion, as something outside of their nature and inconsistent with their deepest convictions. This made them insensible to all the appeals of the Gospel, because those appeals were based upon a system which they could not reconcile with the facts of observation and consciousness. To this class my little book was addressed, and I have the happiness of knowing that, within the limited sphere of its circulation, it gave effectual relief to many inquiring minds.

It is painful to be compelled to say that the specific remedy proposed by the Remembrancer for the evil it has pointed out seems to be partial, one-sided, and insufficient. For one false system it has substituted another just as narrow, and just as much in conflict with human experience and human consciousness. In place of one set of dogmas, restricting the grace of Grod and the operations of His Spirit to the elect, or to the converted, it proposes the Romish theory, which restrains these and other benefits of the incarnation and sacrifice of Christ to the baptized members of His Church. The writer says: "It is to the Sacraments that man must look, both for the beginning and the continuance of Divine Grace. In Baptism Grace is first infused."

The maintenance of such opprobria of technical theology as this and the opposite prevailing theories, each contradicted alike by human consciousness and by universal experience, the swaying back and forth of such large parties between indefensible opinions, unhappily confounded with Christianity, are among the chief causes which have alienated multitudes from Christianity itself, and raised up in the Church a school of such latitudinarian construction as almost to take away the foundations of the Christian religion.

To claim for the baptized, or for a class deemed elect, or for the professedly converted, an exclusive interest in the work and mediation of Christ ; to declare that in these alone the Spirit of Christ resides to guide and instruct them, while men just as good, and in some instances a great deal better, exhibiting far more genuine evidences of the work of the Spirit in their temper and conduct, are represented as having as yet received no benefit from the incarnation and death of Christ, and as utterly destitute of the Spirit of life, is to expose Christianity to contempt and denial. "By their fruits ye shall know them" is at least one Christian rule which the world universally applies. To take a community whose members are living and acting together apparently on the same principles and in the very same way, and separate them by an arbitrary line so broad and deep, that all on one side are declared to be the special favorites of heaven, guided and illuminated by the Spirit of God dwelling in them, while all on the other *ide are represented as abandoned to the polluting force of natural corruption and to the absolute dominion of the devil. is so manifestly false, so utterly irreconcilable with the facts of the case, as to provoke opposition and to challenge rejection.

Instead of these narrow and insufficient theories, the Scriptures and the Church teach that the Grace of God is co-extensive with the sinfulness of man — that the quickening power of the Second Man, who is the Lord from heaven, is equal to and parallel with the destroying and death -entailing influence of the first man — that the healing virtue of the Second Representative of the human race is commensurate with the taint and corruption derived from the first. Therefore, all who die without actual sin are undoubtedly saved, because they are Christ's. Therefore, He said, "Suffer little children to come unto me" — not to make them His, but because they were His already — "for of such is the kingdom of Heaven."

As Christ tasted death for every man, so He sends His ministers to preach the Gospel, not to insensible reprobates, not to the mere carnal mind, which can not discern spiritual things, but to the partakers of His own nature — to men made alive in Him, quickened by the Holy Ghost, and thus imbued with spiritual power to apprehend, believe, obey, and love the truth. Therefore, every man who commits sin resists and strives against the Spirit given unto him, else he could be in no condemnation for his sin. The Spirit of Christ, given to all, places all alike in a state of trial and probation for heaven or for hell; and the rule of judgment will be the use which each man has made of his opportunities to be and to do good, under the guidance of that Spirit of Life and Light. In this rule is involved the Divinely enunciated principle, that to whom much is given, of him, and of him alone, will much bs required.

Between this teaching and the human consciousness there is no repugnance, but a perfect and delightful harmony; and this teaching of the Bible and the Church would seem to be the most effective way of bringing men to Christ; for when they know that all the good they feel and enjoy is the witness of the Spirit of Christ within them, who would thus draw them to Himself, to make them partakers of His eternal blessedness, and that a refusal to come to Him will deprive them forever of that Spirit, and leave them to the baseness and darkness and misery of unrelieved corruption, every right and generous feeling, every sense of beauty and goodness, every aspiration after nobleness and true greatness, will draw them to Him who is the Fountain of Life, the Regenerator of humanity, Jesus Christ the Savior of the world.

The state of opinion among all cultivated peoples requires that these important truths should now be brought prominently forward, as the best solvent of most of the religious questions of the age. To connect, logically and fairly, the broad catholic truths which are at the foundation of religion, with that great fact in the history and method of redemption, the Kingdom of God, "the Church which is His body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all," is the special object of the following work. Unless this connection be established, some minds will rest in the mere technicalities of Churchmanship, ignoring those truths, and thus exposing religion to the contempt of the most enlightened portion of the community; while another class of minds will run off into that reckless rejection of all that is distinctive in Christianity, which characterizes the German and English rationalistic schools. The recognition of that Divinely ordained connection leaves unimpaired those great catholic verities which belong to mankind, while it shows the imperative obligation of union with the Church, on the part of all those to whom the whole Gospel is sufficiently proposed.

Now, in this period of unsettled opinion, when the human mind is breaking loose from the moorings of the past, is the time for the Church of God to show herself the conserver and advocate, not only of a certain class of positive truths, but of human freedom as well. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." (2 Cor., iii, 17.) Let the world see that in the Church alone is true liberty, that her teachings are the noblest and only genuine catholicity.

The objection to some of the conclusions of this work, that we must not attempt to be wise above what is written, is sufficiently answered by a proposition just as true, that we are bound to seek for wisdom enough to understand what is written. And when human systems of theology so interpret certain positive and general expressions of Scripture as to make them assert contradictory propositions, and to be at variance with the very principles upon which all Scriptural teaching is founded, then it is obvious that these systems have perverted and misunderstood what is written : and it is of essential consequence to bring the Christian mind back to the comprehension of that which God's blessed Word does really and truly teach. This duty is the more imperative when it becomes apparent in the progress of society that this unwarranted change of the meaning of God's Word is a cause of offense and a formidable obstacle to the candid reception of the Gospel.

THE DIVINE LIFE AND THE NEW BIRTH,

Chapter I. Redemption

The central fact of all Revelation is the Redemption of mankind in Christ Jesus. The fact of the redemption of gi. Man Fallen man presupposes two other facts as its reaand redeemed. son an( j foundation. First, the upright creation of man; and, secondly, his fall from that condition. These are not mere doctrines, but facts. God created man in His own image, and a part of that image was the power to know Him as God, and to trust in Him as Good. This power is Faith, the very highest exercise of human reason and affection. Humau reason perceives and decides upon the evidences of truth. The purest exertion of human affection is to love and trust in that God — that Infinite Good — whom the truth reveals. So false is the notion that faith and rea- Bon are antagonistic; true faith is the highest reach, the noblest exercise of reason. That such a faculty as Faith belongs to man, either in a sound or in a diseased state, is certain ; for he attempts to exercise it. And every abortive attempt is just as much a proof of the Original existence of the faculty, as a successful exertion of the same faculty would be.

The second fact assumed and presupposed by the great fact of Redemption is, the fall of man — the depravement, the vitia- 2 tion of his whole nature, of all his powers, faculties, and affections. Of this fact every man has the witness in himself, in the consciousness of his own imperfection, frailty and sinfulness. It is a fact strongly written upon every page of human history. The credulity with which men have ever adopted the vilest religious impostures is an especial attestation of this fact. For one of the most melancholy parts of this superinduced pravity of human nature is the conversion of faith into credulity. Credulity is the vitiated, the corrupted state of faith. Faith, as we have seen, is the exercise of human reason apprehending truth upon sufficient evidence, and of human affections moving towards the good thus apprehended. Credulity is the effort of infirm reason, accrediting falsehood upon insufficient evidence; and of corrupt affections seizing hold upon the falsehood thus received.

Now, as when you prove that a man has a broken limb, or a diseased organ, you as certainly prove the existence of the limb or of the organ ; so the universal prevalence of that credulity which, in every age, has admitted and relied upon the grossest impostures, proves both the great facts which we have stated, viz : the original gift to man of that noble faculty by which he was enabled to apprehend and love the truth ; and tne corruption of that faculty which induces him rather to receive and to trust in a falsehood.

The Redemption of man, by some Divine intervention, from this ruin is, again, a fact, the proof of which is patent and inscribed upon the whole history and condition of the race. For, if truth is at all received among men, and has ever triumphed over error; if real goodness is loved, and genuine Godliness is practiced, these are facts which prove the more general fact of this Divine restoration of humanity. For, a bitter fountain can not send forth sweet waters; a diseased organ can not* perform a healthy function; imbecile credulity can not convert itself into enlightened faith.

The corruption of human nature is abundantly proved by many phenomena of our being. But it is strikingly and mournfully manifested in the history of revealed religion.

The common dealing of man with religion has ever been to corrupt and debase it. This could only be true upon the supposition that the human heart and mind are essentially corrupt.

It is a popular fallacy that the lowest forms and conceptions of religion are to be found in the infancy of society and of the race. The evidence of history proves, on the contrary, that the nearer you approach, in time and place, to the origin of the human race, the purer is the religion of the people. An unintended testimony to this fact was given lately by an antichristian writer in the Westminster Review, who was obliged to confess that the religion and morality of the book of Job were nobler, purer, and more refined than the most beautiful speculations of modern philosophy*

* "In the writer of the Book of Job there is an awful moral earnestness, before which we bend as in the presence of a superior being." " If we ask ourselves how much during this time has been actually added to the sum of our knowledge in these matters, what — in all the thousands upon thousands of sermons, and theologies, and philosophies, with which Europe has been deluged — has been gained for mankind beyond what we have found in this very book of Job, for instance; how far all this has advanced us in the 'progress of humanity,' it were hard, or rather it is easy to answer. How far we have fallen below, let Taley and the rest bear witness ; but what moral q\iestion can be asked which admits now of a nobler solution than was offered two, perhaps three thousand years ago." — Westminster Review, for October, 1853. p. 233. American edition.

The same writer frequently speaks, with hearty scorn and contempt, of the dogma of "the corruption of humanity," as "a lie." But in another part of the same article he furnishes this strong testimony to the truth he had thus boldly denounced : " But it seems from our present experience of what — in some, at least, of its modern forms — Christianity has been capable of becoming, that there is no doctrine in itself so pure but what the poorer nature which is in us can disarm and distort it, and adapt it to its own littleness."

The article, like many of the writings of its class, has many noble thoughts. The great error, out of which all the capital for infidelity is made by this writer, is the quiet assumption that Calvinism is orthodox Christianity.

This popular fallacy about the natural and progressive improvement of religion, is founded upon a comparison of the state ( f religion among the barbarous tribes of men, living far beyond the bounds of civilization, and the state of religion among those same tribes after they had become civilized and cultivated nations. But the comparison proves nothing at all, unless it could be shown that the civilization and religious improvement of these nations proceeded from themselves, without external help or prompting. But this fact, so indispensable to the validity of the popular conclusion, has never been shown, even in a single instance. The unvarying testimony of history upon this subject is, that every improvement of the religion of a people has been brought to that people from an external source. The Bible alone tells us whence came that light which has thus been gradually diffused among the nations, civilizing, refining, and elevating them. In every instance it was a distinct revelation from Grod — that revelation being made fuller and more complete under each dispensation of His Grace, according as it seemed meet to His unsearchable wisdom.

In creating man, Grod conferred upon him all the gifts that were necessary to his well-being. He gave him, therefore, the true religion — the knowledge of God and of the subsisting relations between God and man. He bestowed this great benefit, as every other, to be used or abused, to be improved and cultivated, or to be deteriorated and lost, as men might determine for themselves, in the exercise of the fearful responsibility thus thrown upon them. The history of the whole human race proclaims the melancholy fact that men. manifesting in this, as in other ways, the malign influence of their own apostasy, have universally corrupted the religion which God revealed. The effect of this corruption has been to make religion, indeed, more popular, more congenial to the natural heart ; but at the same time to take away, more or less, according to the extent of the vitiation, the purifying, life-giving, and elevating power of religion. And the true religion has only been preserved, pure and unadulterate, in the world, by the continual interposition of the Almighty, co-operating with ordinary human powers by supernatural agencies. For this purpose — to counteract the tendency of men to corrupt the true religion — God has given, in successive ages, prophets, apostles, written revelations, holy sacraments, and a divine society called the Church.

"When men wandered away in tribes and families from the early seats of civilization and knowledge, they rapidly sunk into barbarism; and the religion which they took with them, already corrupted, became more stupid and senseless as they declined in intellectual and moral power. The plan of Divine Providence for the reclamation of these innumerable wanderers has been to send them, by various human agencies, the truth which He had already revealed.

Again, the upright creation of man is shown by the correspondence between human nature and the law of God. The fall of man is as plainly manifested by the opposition between his nature and that same holy law.

Every man who examines thoroughly the moral law, sees that it is the law of his nature — the constitution of the Almighty written upon his soul, and demanding his obedience. He finds that this law, if perfectly obeyed, would produce the highest development, and the greatest happiness of which his nature is capable. This correspondence between a perfect law and the soul of man, proves that the soul was originally created as perfect as the law which is thus a part of its essential constitution.

But every man finds that this same law, although evidently ordaioed to be a law of life, is to him a law of condemnation.

20 DIVINE LIFE AND NEW DLRTH.

because he has broken the law. Instead of securing, by obedience, the happiness it promised, and which it manifestly tends to produce, he has incurred its penalty by disobedience. He is compelled, therefore, to concur with St. Paul in the declaration, " The commandment which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. Wherefore, the law is holy and the commandment holy, and just, and good." (Eom. vii, 10, 12.) But the creature for whom it was ordained has left his first estate — fallen from the uprightness which corresponded with the law, and finds himself now under the curse of that same holy, just, and good commandment.

This is the plain teaching of nature, without the aid of revelation. The Word of God simply affirms the same thing : "And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." "So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him." (Gen. i, 26, 27.) Here was man perfect in himself, and with a perfect law adapted to his nature. Life and happiness were the conditions of obedience to this law; death and misery its penalties for disobedience. An external test and witness of man's continual allegiance to the law of life was at the same time appointed. "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." (Gen. ii, 17.) After the disobedience and the expulsion from Paradise, "God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." "And God looked upon the earth, and "behold it was corrupt ; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth." (Gen. vi, 5, 12.)