Popular evidences of Christianity

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POPULAR

EVIDENCES OF CHRISTIANITY.

BY

Chapter I

I am accustomed every morning, soon after sunrise, to walk and meditate by the side of the river Hooghly. At this hour the banks are crowded with Hindoos bathing themselves, and performing other ceremonies of their devotions. And with them are generally Brahmins seated on the bank under the trees, reading their religious books, and repeating their prayers. These are Gooroos, or religious teachers. And it is pleasing to observe the respect with which they are treated, especially by children and young persons, who are seen continually kneeling down to them, and offering them little presents. It is a sign that, w r ith all the errors of the Hindoo religion, the spirit of faith and childlike obedience is not lost among them ; and where this is still alive, who shall despair of bringing men to the knowledge of the truth ?

Am , n-g them I observed one morning a Brahmin younger than the rest, whose pure and noble cast of countenance, marked also by deep thoughtfulness and melancholy, and a singular earnestness and abstractedness of devotion, affected me with more than ordinary interest. Every morning, at the same hour, I found him in the same spot ; and, as my eyes were naturally drawn to him, he at length observed me in return. Many days passed before either of us ventured to ad-

Introduction

[CHAP. I.

dress the other, though we scarcely passed, after the close of his devotions, without a hesitating, half- recognising look, such as is common between persons who wish to know each other more intimately; and I was therefore neither surprised nor displeased to find one morning that he followed me in my walk, and on joining me expressed a wish to converse.

I have always been delighted at such opportunities of understanding from educated and good Hindoos the real doctrines of their religion, and of explaining to them the doctrines of the Church of Christ. It is only by such free and kindly intercourse, and by deriving information from the best men, that the prejudiced and often erroneous opinions which exist on each side can be removed ; and w r here there is a willingness and desire either to learn the truth ourselves, or to teach it to others, we may fairly hope and believe that the spirit of God is there working and preparing men's hearts to receive it.

Sir, he addressed me, after the usual salutations and apologies, I have observed, for many mornings past, that you are in the habit of frequenting this spot, and that your eyes have been directed to me with a look of pity, but not of unkindness. May I ask, if you are one of those who deride our religious ceremonies, and regard these prayers and ablutions, in which you now see so many of my countrymen engaged, as mere idolatry ?

Far from it, I replied ; I am myself a servant and minister of the Most High God, and cannot ridicule devotion, even where I think it is accompanied with useless forms or evil errors. You believe in an Almighty God, and you come here to worship him, such as you believe him to be, and with forms which you have been taught to think will please and honour him. We also worship God, but such as we know him to be, and with forms which He himself has taught us, To believe in God is good, and to fear him is good,

IDOLATRY.

and to love him " with all our hearts, and with all our minds, and with all our soul, and with all our strength ; to worship him, to give him thanks, to put our whole trust in him, to call upon him, to honour his holy name and his word, and to serve him truly all the days of our life." 1 He who does this from the heart, even if he knows not the real nature of God, I cannot despise. Rather I honour and love him ; and pray, is I hope and believe, that God may be preparing to bring him to the knowledge of his Gospel.

Sir, he replied, after a pause, your words are good. They are better than those which before this I have heard from others of your nation, who only mock at our religion, without professing to have any of their own. Man is the creature of God, and cannot live without God in the world ; and even a false religion is better than none at all.

You are right, I said : " It is the fool who hath said in his heart, there is no God ;" and such men, our holy books declare, are " corrupt and abominable." 2 It is not from them that you should learn the religion of our nation.

Neither, he replied, should you judge of ours by the conduct of bad men, or by the practice of the common people, who are incapable of true knowledge. You believe that we worship idols, you misunderstand the object of our ceremonies and the meaning of our institutions, and then you condemn us.

I am willing, I answered, to learn your religion only from those who know and practise it aright, that is, as your books and your authorized teachers command. It is hard for the best of men or the most holy of systems to make the multitude walk in the path of truth ; and it is not because the children go astray, that the fathers are to be censured. And yet

1 Church Catechism.

2 Psalm liii. 2.

B 2

IDOLATRY.

[chap. I.

I scarcely know how to judge of your religion except from what I see in the practices of your people. I know not how to distinguish between these and any better doctrines which the wise among you may teach.

Why is this ? he asked : Is the father dishonest because the child steals ?

No, I replied, not if the father warn, and rebuke, and punish him for his sin. Though all mankind in the world fell into wickedness, He who made the world would not be wicked, because He remonstrates with us through the voice of our conscience, sends among us his ministers to deter us from wickedness, and punishes it with his vengeance. And though millions in a nation fell into idolatry, yet a wise man would not call the nation or the system idolatrous so long as those who ruled it, — its kings and its priests, — openly contended against the crime, and warned the people of their error. But if they are silent, and acquiesce, they must share in the general sin. And so it is with you. You may not profess idolatry yourself in your heart, nor command the evil practices which the people mix with their religion. And the doctrines which you read and believe in your holy books are many of them pure and good. But you allow the evil to prevail, because you think it more fit to affect the common people. You do not hold out the truth against error, and therefore you are guilty of the error itself.

Sir, he replied, might I not lay the same thing to your charge ? Have your rulers and your priests taken pains to teach us what they believe the true religion, or to promote among us the glory of God, by withdrawing us from what they declare is offensive to the Being whom they worship ? Have they not allowed us for years to practise what they call idolatry ; and therefore are they not parties to it themselves?

It was a painful and a just retort ; and I was silent

IDOLATRY.

for some minutes, while he looked steadfastly at me to observe how I was affected.

Your question, I answered after a pause, is full of sadness to one who loves his religion and his country ; and it might seem prudent to evade it ; but it is better to confess the truth. We have not taken pains to teach you what we know to be truth, and what God has commanded us to teach you. We have thought more of extending our empire, of governing you as you like to be governed, of promoting your happiness on earth, and of accommodating ourselves to your prejudices, than of setting before your souls the light of truth, and bringing you to the knowledge of God. And God, it is to be feared, will one day punish us for this our great and grievous sin. And yet the rulers, whom you see in this land, are only a part and a small part of a mighty nation, as a finger is a part of the hand, or as a hand is a part of the body. And the rulers in that nation, to whom those who are here belong, have before this boldly done their duty in proclaiming the truth within their own country, and deterring the common people, who are there ignorant and evil-minded as elsewhere, from dishonouring God by evil worship, •or by corrupting his truth. If they have been silent here, it has been because they feared to shock your prejudices. They feared man more than God. It is as if your Brahmins and priests denounced idolatry, and preached a pure doctrine against the errors of the people, over all the rest of the country, and were silent only in one province, say in Calcutta. Even this would be very wrong. But you are silent everywhere. Whatever you may believe yourselves, you retain it even-where within your own minds, and allow the ignorant and poor to wander blindly where they choose. And therefore you are responsible for their sins and follies. If you strove against them, you would be innocent, even when you failed,

B 3

IDOLATRY.

[chap. I.

Sir, he replied, you allow that the greater part of mankind are blind and ignorant — that they cannot discern the truth as it really is — that heavenly things are too high for them, and must be brought down to their comprehension in some more earthly form. It is for this reason that we permit them to use images, and to practise rites, which in themselves are nothing, but which enable them to see the great truths of religion, as weak-eyed mortals, who cannot bear the erfulgence of the sun, gaze on it reflected in water.

My friend, I answered, we have among us in Europe, among the millions who profess to believe in Christ, a large body who speak as you speak. Some of them may be found in this country, and they call themselves Roman Catholics. They also, with us, hold a faith which they believe to be true, and assert to have been delivered to them from heaven. But they think it is not sufficient by itself to engage the affections and influence the conduct of ignorant men, of women, and children, and the uneducated, and the poor, and they allow them, as you do, to make to themselves images, and to worship created things, instead of the one true Gocl, and to fancy that their salvation depends on outward ceremonies and rites, and to remain ignorant of true wisdom and true goodness. They do this, because they despair of bringing the high doctrines of Christianity to a level with the understanding of the many. They fear that if no such concession were made to the wants and weakness of human nature, human nature would rebel against all religion. And they think it better and safer for society, and happier for the people themselves, that they should be kept in obedience to their priests, and in adherence to their faith, though by artifice and error, than be allowed to break through all restraints, and wander off into infidelity and shameless wickedness. They adopted this plan at first from a good mo-

CKAP. I.]

IDOLATRY.

tive, to benefit the souls of men ; they retain it, too many, it may be feared, for the purpose of securing their own power over them, which power they often abuse. And you, if you will forgive me for saying it, seem to me to have acted much in a similar way, and with similar objects — the good among you thinking of the good of others, and the bad only of their own interest. Shall I tell you how we protest against this conduct of the Roman Catholics ?

I have met with some of the Christians whom you describe, said the Brahmin, and they have often argued with me and endeavoured to convince me of the errors of our religion. I would willingly hear what you say of them, though I may not think, as you do, that it will apply to ourselves.

We tell them first then, I proceeded, what they know as well as we do, that, in the sacred books delivered to us from God, we have a positive, distinct commandment from his mouth to abstain from all such practices. I will repeat it to you in the words in which God himself delivered it, and in which it is repeated every sabbath-day in our churches, and is taught to our children. It is the second of his ten commandments. The first commands us to have none other gods but Him. The second runs thus : — , " Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven image, nor the likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down to them, nor worship them : for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, and visit the sins of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me, and show mercy unto thousands in them that love me, and keep my commandments."

And a great part of our sacred books is full of words like these, denouncing God's wrath and indignation against not only those who worship other gods than Him, but those who worship him under any form, or

IDOLATRY.

[chap. I.

name, or character, but that which he has revealed to us. For this is the meaning of the commandment. God has given us a law not to commit murder ; and it binds us to abstain from every act by which the life of a fellow-creature can be in any way injured. He commands us not to steal ; and we are bound to avoid the slightest trespass on the property of others. He forbids adultery ; and by this is implied, as in your own language, that he forbids every unclean thought, and unchaste act, as well as the grossest of such acts, adultery. And so it is when he forbids us to make or to worship graven images. A graven image is a representation of God — a perverted, degraded, and profane representation of Him who, in the words of your own holy books, is " unchangeable, holy, eternal, supreme, the creator, the preserver and destroyer of the world ; the support of all things, the one with true wisdom, the ruler of the w r orld, unborn, imperishable, undecaying, who is not to be apprehended by the senses, who is always and alone, and is exempt from birth, and vicissitude, and death — of one essence, ever pure as free from defects ; " 1 . or, to use the words of our own holy belief, it is a profane representation of the " one living and true God, everlasting, without body, parts, or passions; of infinite pow T er, wisdom, and goodness ; the maker and preserver of all things, both visible and invisible." 2

And if we may not degrade and insult the majesty of that great Being by a graven image, neither may we degrade it by exhibiting him in any form, or under any names, or with any attributes, but such as he really possesses, and such as we know him to possess, because he has revealed them to us. For in no other way can we know what God is, except by his own revelation. If therefore God be one, and you represent

1 Vishnu Purana, Wilson's Trans., chap, ii., p, 7. 2 Articles of Religion. 1 .

IDOLATRY.

him as many — if he be separate and distinct from his creatures, and you teach that he is the same with them — if he loves a spiritual worship, and you teach men to worship him in empty forms — if he so hates sin that no works of mere man can expiate it in his eyes, and you think to purify your souls by your own works — and if he has revealed himself unto man once, and once only, in the form of man, even as we know is true, in the person of Jesus Christ, and you write that he has appeared often under the names of Vishnu and Brahma, and Kudra and Chrishna, and many others ; then you are misrepresenting his true nature, and profaning his holy name, and therefore violating his second great commandment, and provoking his indignation, m the same way, if not in the same degree, as if you pictured him to yourself in the form of a graven image, or a shapeless idol, or some brute animal. How much more if you allow others — those who are walking in darkness, and ought to be enlightened by your light — to fall down and worship before such creatures, as if they either were divine, or could in any way picture or shadow forth the mystery of the Almighty God !

My friend seemed struck with my words ; and I proceeded. We speak thus, I said, to the Roman Catholics, because they acknowledge that this commandment came from God, though they do not like to obey it, and sometimes put it out of their sacred books, although God has expressly forbidden us either to add or to take away aught that he has written in them .

But it may be that God has given the same commandment to you, though not in the same words or form.

How can that be, he asked, if we have never seen your holy books ?

Will you answer me, I said, some questions ?

IDOLATRY.

[chap. I.

Willingly, lie replied.

When, I said, an all-wise, and all-powerful, and all-good Creator creates a creature, does it not seem that he will impress on it his own image, and lay it under a rule to act and to feel as he the Creator acts and feels himself?

B. Certainly.

C. And we cannot imagine that God should have done otherwise, when he created the world ?

B. We cannot.

C. And yet there are many things which men both do and like by their natural constitution, which yet we believe to be contrary to God's will and law, to be sins and crimes ?

B. There are.

C. But these are not universal, and men do not praise them or like them for themselves. And they are punished and blamed, and disliked, even by those who follow them, except inasmuch as they procure other advantages : for instance, no man loves to steal for its own sake, or praises adultery as good, or encourages murder as murder, though they like money, and sensual pleasure, and victory over their enemies ; and to obtain these, do not scruple to steal, and commit adultery and murder, if their ends cannot be obtained in any other way.

B. Why have you said this?

C. Because I wish you to make a distinction. Those things which men do, not for their own sake as liking them, but for the sake of something else and as disliking them, cannot be supposed to be enjoined on us by God. They are not really natural. But that which we all universally, whether young or old, wise or unwise, good or bad, approve and disapprove by the instinct of our own heart, that must have been stamped upon us by the Being who created us ?

B. You would say, for instance, that the desire of

IDOLATRY.

li food was common to all men, and therefore natural ; and therefore that the taking of food was a law enjoined on us by God ?

C. I do.

B. But that the. desire of this or that particular food, or the desire of it to excess, though very common, is not in the same manner universal, and therefore not natural ?

C. Certainly. And so when I look at the fabric of watches or any other machines, I see in all of them springs and wheels, and contrivances to produce certain motions. I argue, therefore, that such motions were intended by their maker. But if I find in some of them a wheel broken, or a spring clogged, or dust and dirt in the works, I do not argue that the maker so designed it, because it is not universal.

B. I understand you.

C. And the more so, if, while the works are evidently framed to produce a movement, this clog or impediment evidently tends to stop it. And, for this reason also, man's vicious desires and evil actions cannot have been intended by his Maker — can have formed no part of his original design — cannot therefore indicate His real nature and wishes, because they evidently interfere with the great object and rule of all the other parts of man's nature, which is to make him good and happy.

B. Certainly.

C. And now, having guarded against a very common mistake, I will ask you if you have in your own heart, and if all men universally have in theirs, anything which would prove that to set before the minds of others a low, false, unworthy representation of the Divine Being must be displeasing to him ? Let us apply it to yourself. If you had a child, or a friend, or a subject, or any persons far beneath you, you would desire that they should look up to you with

IDOLATRY.

[chap. I.

reverence and awe, should know you as you really are, should not mix with their ideas of your nature any false or degrading notions — you would wish that your name should be honoured and hallow r ed in their eyes?

B. I should.

C. And if your servants, even with good intentions, set before those children, or those dependents, ridiculous and deformed, or hideous and loathsome figures in clav or wood, and told them that these were like to you ; or if they invented tales and stories of what you did, and said, and thought, but which were false and degrading ; or if they led others to believe that you were like themselves, were subject to the same weaknesses, and delighted in the same follies or sins, would you, and would all men in the same place, feel indignant and chastise them ; even though it was done by them with the best intentions — to keep your image before those who were to serve you, and to endeavour to im press upon their weak and imperfect minds as much truth as they were capable of receiving, rather than allow them, as it might seem, to sink wholly into error ?

B. We should all feel indignant alike.

C. And generally, I continued, it is a thing which we dislike and are offended at, if our inferiors mistake our character, speak falsely of us, misrepresent our actions, depreciate our motives, caricature our figures, describe us otherwise than w r e wish to be described ; it is a common and universal desire among all men, and therefore natural to the human mind, to be thought of as we deserve, and to be honoured by a true estimate of our power and goodness.

B. It is.

C. But God made the mind of man ?

B. True.

C. And he made it after his own image, to like what he likes himself, and to hate what he hates himself ?

B. It is probable.

C. It is more than probable ; for we cannot, as you confessed, imagine that an Almighty and all-good Creator should create a creature with any other law r written upon his heart but that which his Creator approved. He may have permitted him to err by his own self-will, but he cannot have given him a law to err, and this desire is a law, for it is universal ; all men feel it.

B. It is so.

C. 0, my friend, I continued, may it not be, then, that God has given to you, who are not Christians, but who are still his creatures, a law as clear and palpable as that which he has written in a book, and given to us his chosen people, commanding you not to make to yourself any graven image ; not to bow down to it, or worship it ; not to tolerate, much less to teach, the falsehoods, which your common people mix up with their notions of their God ? Has he not written it in your heart ? Does he not speak it to you in the voice of your own conscience? And will he not punish you for disobeying it, even though you profess to disobey it, just as the Roman Catholic Christians profess, for the purpose of honouring God more; and deny that you worship the image, but only God under that sign or representation ? It is an unworthy and degrading representation. And that is enough.

I paused here, and we were both silent : at last he looked up and said, How then are we to convey to common minds a knowledge of that Divine Being, whS cannot be comprehended by the senses ? Must we not teach them religion ? And how can such minds be taught, except by forms, and symbols, and rites adapted to their imperfect capacities ?

I know not, I said, what may be the maxims of ycur sacred books; but Jestts Christ, our Lord and master, has given us a law to think only of what God

part i. c

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[CHAP. I.

commands, to ascertain -what he wishes, and then, whether we understand the end or not, to obey; sure that nothing can be wrong which is pleasing in his eyes. We have a command from Him not to depart from that representation of his nature which is true and prescribed; and for us this is enough. And yet if it were allowable to speculate, where our only duty is to obey, we might find out many reasons why this command should be given.

B. I should like to hear them.

C. I will give them to you briefly, if you will only remember that I do not produce them as the grounds of our practice. When I warn you to abstain from idolatry, I warn you as an ambassador from God charged to deliver you that law. If you will not obey the law, you are defying your Creator ; and if you follow it merely because in your own eyes it seems wise, and good, and expedient, you are not obeying God, but yourself.

B. I will remember this.

C. What then is your object in permitting the common people to indulge in a belief and a worship, which you yourselves acknowledge not to be true and perfect? Is it not to do them good ?

B. Certainly.

C. But to do them good, you must give them the knowledge of God. " This is life eternal," say our own holy books, " to know the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom he has sent." 1 And your own books say the same. What is your own object, and prayer, and the end of all your life, but to obtain' the knowledge of God ?

B. It is true.

C. And to know him as He is, not under signs and figures, not as imaged by our fallible senses, not

1 John xvii. 3.

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as corporeal and mutable, but as pure, and perfect, and infinite, and immortal.

B. It is so.

C. And to obtain this knowledge you strive with all your efforts to free yourself from the trammels of the senses. In the words of your own sacred books, " The sage who is capable of discriminative knowledge must refrain his mind from all the objects of sense, and therewith meditate upon the Supreme Being, who is one with spirit, in order to attain liberation he must apply himself to contemplative devotion 55 . . . "he must restrain his organs of sense from susceptibility to outward impressions, and direct them entirely to mental perceptions." 1 And, without this, you think that you cannot reach to happiness or perfection. And yet the common people, whose good you are bound to seek even more than your own, you not only permit, but encourage, to obscure their minds, and darken their knowledge, and deaden their devotion, and lose their happiness by thinking of God only as a being comprehended by our fallible senses, as confined under the fetters of form and matter, as corruptible like themselves. Are you really seeking their good, or rather are you seeking to preserve your own power over them, by confining true knowledge to yourselves, and excluding from it all others ?

B. But all men are not capable of this knowledge, and we must address to them only what they are able to receive.

C. It is true that all men have not the same powers. God has made the elephant and the ant; the king and the beggar ; the sage and the child. And we also know, as Christians, that He has dispensed his gifts differently to us his servants. " All flesh is not the same flesh; but there is one kind of flesh of men,