Chapter 23

Whether the religious faculty in men be a simple faculty, or (as Sir James Mackintosh seemed to think might possibly be the case with conscience) a complex one, constituted by means of several different powers and principles of our nature, is a question not essential to the argument; for I frankly admit at once, with Mr. Newman and Mr. Parker, that there is such a susceptibility (simple or complex), and not a mere abortive tendency, as Harrington seems to suppose possible. Otherwise I cannot, I confess, account for the fact (so largely insisted upon by Mr. Parker) of the very general, the all but universal, adoption by man of some religion, and the power, the prodigious power, which, even when false, hideously false, it exerts over him. But then I must as frankly confess, that I can as little account for all the (not only terrible but) uniform aberrations of this susceptibility, on which Harrington has insisted, and which, I do think, prove (if ever truth was proved by induction) one of two things; either that, as he says, this susceptibility in man was originally defective and rudimentary, or that man is no longer in his normal state; in other words, that he is, as the Scriptures declare, depraved. I acknowledge I accept this last solution; and firmly believe with Pascal, that without it moral and religious philosophy must toil over the problem of humanity in vain.

If this be so, we have, of course, no difficulty in believing that there may be, in spite of the existence of the religious faculty in man, ample scope for an external revelation, to correct its aberrations and remedy its maladies.

But you will say that this fact is not to be taken for granted. I admit it; and therefore lay no further stress upon it. I go one step further; and shall endeavor, at least, to prove, that, supposing man is just as he was created, yet also supposing, what neither Mr. Parker nor Mr. Newman will deny, (and if they did, the whole history of the world would confute them,) that man's religious faculty is not uniform or determinate in its action, but is dependent on external development and culture for assuming the form it does, ample scope is still left for an external revelation. I contend that the entire condition of this susceptibility (as shown by experience) proves that, if in truth an external revelation be impossible, it is not because it has superseded the necessity for one; and that the declaration of the elder deists and modern "spiritualists" on this in the face of what all history proves man to be, is the most preposterous in the world.

Further; I contend that all the analogies from the fundamental laws of the development of man's nature,--from a consideration of the relations in which that nature stands to the external world,--from the absolute dependence of the individual on external culture, and that of the whole species on its historic development,--are all in favor of the notion both of the possibility and utility of an external revelation, and even in favor of that particular form of it which Mr. Newman and you so contemptuously call a "book" revelation.

I. I argue from all the analogies of the fundamental laws of the development of the human mind. Nor do I fear to apply the reasoning even to the cases in which it has been so confidently asserted that there can be no revelation, on the fallacious ground that a revelation "of spiritual and moral truth" presupposes in man certain principles to which it appeals. To possess certain faculties for the appreciation of spiritual and moral truth is one thing; to acquire the conscious possession of that truth is another; the former fact would not make an external revelation superfluous, or an empty name. Every thing in the process of the mind's development goes to show, that, whatever its capacities, tendencies, faculties, "potentialities," (call them what you will,) a certain external influence is necessary to awaken its dormant life; to turn a "potentiality" into an "energy "; to transform a dim inkling of a truth into an intelligent, vital, conscious recognition of it. Nor is this law confined to mind alone; all nature attests its presence. All effects are the result of properties or susceptibilities in one thing, solicited by external contact with those of others. The fire no doubt may smoulder in the dull and languid embers; it is when the external breeze sweeps over them, that they begin to sparkle and glow, and vindicate the vital element they contain. The diamond in the mine has the same internal properties in the darkness as in the light; it is not till the sun shines upon it, that it flashes on the eye its splendor. Look at a flower of any particular species; we see that, as it is developed in connection with a variety of external influences,--as it comes successively under the action of the sun, rain, dew, soil,--it expands in a particular manner, and in that only. It exhibits a certain configuration of parts, a certain form of leaf, a certain color, fragrance, and no other. We do not doubt, on the one hand, that without the "skyey influences" these things would never have been; nor, on the other; that the flower assumes this form of development, and this alone, in virtue of its internal structure and organization. But both sets of conditions must conspire in the result.

It is much the same with the mind. That it possesses certain tendencies and faculties, which, as it develops itself, will terminate in certain ideas and sentiments, is admitted; but apart from certain external conditions of development, those sentiments and ideas will, in effect, never be formed,--the mind will be in perpetual slumber. Thus, in point of fact, this controversy is connected ultimately with that ancient dispute as to the origin, sources, and genesis of human knowledge and sentiments. I shall simply take for granted that you are (as most philosophers are) an advocate of innate capacities, but not of "innate ideas"; of "innate susceptibilities," but not of "innate sentiments"; that is, I presume you do not contend that the mind possesses more than the faculties--the laws of thought and feeling--which, under conditions of development, actually give birth to thoughts and feelings. These faculties and susceptibilities are, no doubt, congenital with the mind, --or, rather, are the mind itself. But its actually manifested phenomena wait the of the external; and they will be modified accordingly. It is absolutely dependent on experience in this sense, that it is only as it is operated upon by the outward world that the dormant faculties, whatever they are, and whatever their nature, be they few or many,-- intellectual, moral, or spiritual,--are first awakened. If a mind were created (it is, at least, a conceivable case) with all the avenues to the external world closed,--in fact, we sometimes see approximations to such a condition in certain unhappy individuals,--we do not doubt such a mind, by the present laws of the human constitution, could not possess any thoughts, feelings, emotions; in fact, could exhibit none of the phenomena, spiritual, intellectual, moral, or sensational, which diversify it. In proportion as we see human beings approach this condition,--in fact, we sometimes see them approach it very nearly,--we see the "potentialities" of the soul (I do not like the word, but it expresses my meaning better than any other I know) held in abeyance, and such an imperfectly awakened man does not, in some cases, manifest the degree of sensibility or intelligence manifested in many animals. If the seclusion from sense and experience be quite complete, the life of such a soul would be wrapped up in the germ, and possess no more consciousness than a vegetable.

It appears, then, that universally, however true it may be, and doubtless is, that the laws of thought and feeling enable us to derive from external influence what it alone would never give, yet that influences an indispensable condition, as we are at present constituted, of the development of any and of all our faculties.

As this seems the law of development universally, it is so of the spiritual and religious part of our nature as well as the rest; and in this very fact we have abundant scope for the possibility and utility of a revelation,--if God be pleased to give one,--even of elementary moral and spiritual truth; since, though conceding the perfect congruity between that truth and the structure of the soul, it is only as it is in some way actually presented to it from without, that it arrives at the conscious possession of it. And what, after all, but such an external source of revelation is that Volume of Nature, which, operating in perfect analogy with the aforesaid conditions of the soul's development, awakens, though imperfectly, the dormant elements of religious and spiritual life? So far from its being true in any intelligible sense that an external revelation of moral and spiritual truth is impossible, it is absolutely necessary, in some form, as a condition of its evolution; so far from its being true that such revelation is an absurdity, it is in strict analogy with the fundamental laws of our being. Whether, if this be so, the express external presentation of such truth in a book constructed by divine wisdom and expressed in human language,--this last being the most universal and most appropriate instrument by which man's dormant powers are actually awakened,--may not be a more effective method of attaining the end than any of man's devising, whether instinctive or artificial; or than the casual influences of external nature, well or ill deciphered;--all this is another question. But some such external apparatus--applied to the faculties of men--is essential, whether it be in the Volume of Nature, or in the "Bible" or in a book of Mr. Newman or Mr. Parker. All that makes the difference between you and a Hottentot (to recur to that illustration which Harrington, I really think, fairly employed) depends on external influences, and the consequent development of the spiritual and religious faculties.

And this very fact--the unspeakable differences between man and man, nation and nation, as regards recognition the conscious possession of even elementary "moral and spiritual truth" (varying, as it perpetually does, as those external influences vary, and more or less perfect, according as that external "revelation," which, in some degree, and of some species, is indispensable, more or less perfect)--affords another indication of the ample utility of an external divine revelation, as well as of its possibility; and a proof that, if there be one, it is in harmony, again, with the conditions of human nature. And here I may employ, in further illustration, one of the analogies I adverted to a little time ago. Not only is the flower never independent of external influences for its actual development,--not only would it remain in the germ without them,--but we see that within certain limits, often very wide, the kind of external influence operates powerfully on the species, and on the individual itself;--according as it is in one climate or another,--in this soil or that,--submitted to culture or suffered to grow wild. It is needless to apply the analogy. While we see that the moral spiritual faculties of man no more than his other faculties can attain their development except in cooperation with some external influences, we also see that they exhibit every degree and variety of development according to the quality of those external influences. Is there then not even a possibility left for an external revelation? If the actual exhibition of any spiritual and religious phenomena in man not only depends on some external influences and culture, but perpetually varies with them, what would such a revelation be but a provision in analogy with these facts? But it is sufficient to rebut this gratuitous dictum, of an external revelation of "spiritual and moral truth being impossible," that some external influence is necessary for any development of the religious faculty at all. If the last be necessary, I cannot conceive how the other should be impossible.

Nor is it any reply to say,--as I think has been abundantly shown in your debates with Harrington,--that any such external influences only make articulate that which already existed inarticulately in the heart; that they only chafe and stimulate into life "the ivory of Pygmalion's statue," to use his expression,--the dormant principles and sentiments which somehow existed, but were in deep slumber. That which makes them vital, active, the objects of consciousness and the sources of power, may well be called a "revelation." Nay, since it seems that, in some way, this outward voice must be heard first, I think it is more properly so called than the internal response of the heart. That is rather the echo.

It may be admitted that the elementary truths of religion, once propounded, are promptly admitted, but still in some external shape they require to be propounded. There is such a thing in the human mind as unrealized truth, both intellectual and spiritual; the inarticulate muttering of an obscurely felt sentiment; a vague appetency for something we are not distinctly conscious of. The clear utterance of it, its distinct proposition to us, is the very thing that is often wanted to convert this dim feeling into distinct vision. This is the electric spark which transforms two invisible gases into a visible and transparent fluid; this is the influence which evolves the latent caloric, and makes it a powerful and active element.

I cannot help thinking that the great source of fallacy on this subject arises from confounding the idea of certain characteristic tendencies and potentialities of our nature with the supposition,-- contradicted by the whole religious history of man in all ages,--that they must be everywhere efficaciously active, and spontaneously exhibit a moral manifestation; than which there cannot, I conceive, be a greater error.

I must entreat you to recollect Harrington's dilemma. Either the supposed truths of your spiritual theory, or that of Mr. Newman or Mr. Parker, are known to all mankind, or not; if they are, surely their books, and every such book is the most important in the world; if not, these authors did well to write, supposing them to have truth on their side; but then that vindicates the possibility and utility of a "book-revelation."

II. But I go a step further, and not only contend that, from the very law of the soul's development, there is ample scope for a revelation, even of elementary "moral and spiritual truth," but that even if we supposed all men in actual possession of that truth, in some shape or other, there would still be abundant scope for a divinely constructed external instrument for giving it efficacy; and that this, again, is in perfect analogy with the fundamental condition of the soul's action. The principles of spiritual and religious life are capable in an infinite variety of ways, of being modified, intensified, vivified, by the external influences brought to bear upon them from time to time. Not only must that external influence be exerted for the first awakening of the soul, but it must be continued all our life long, in order to maintain the principles thus elicited in a state of activity. Sometimes they seem for a while to have been half obliterated,--to fade away from the consciousness; they are reillumined, made to blaze out again in brilliant light on the "walls of the chambers of imagery," by some outward stimulus; by a "word spoken in season"; by the recollection of some weighty apothegm which embodies truth,--some ennobling image which illustrates it; by the utterance of certain "charmed words," hallowed by association as they fall on the external sense, or are recalled by memory. How familiar to us all is this dependence on the external! How dull, how sluggish, has often been the soul! A single word, the sight of an object surrounded with vivid associations, the sudden suggestion of a half-forgotten strain of poetry or song,--what power have these to stir its stagnant depths, and awaken "spiritual" and every other species of emotion, as well as intellectual activity! The lightning does not more suddenly cleave the cloud in which it slumbered, the sleeping ocean is not more suddenly ruffled by the descending tempest, than the soul of man is thus capable of being vivified and animated by the presentation of appropriate objects,--nay, often by even the most casual external impulse. If this be so, is it not possible that an external instrument for thus stimulating and vivifying spiritual life might be given us by God; which, if not, in literal strictness, a "revelation," would virtually have all the effect of one, as rekindling the dying light, reillumining the fading characters, of spiritual truth?

Nor, surely, is there much presumption in supposing that the appropriate influences of such an instrumentality may be brought to bear upon us with infinite advantage by Him who alone possesses perfect access to all the avenues of our spirits; a perfect mastery of our whole nature; of intellect, imagination, and conscience of those laws of association and emotion which He himself has framed. If Shakspeare and Milton can daily exercise over myriads of minds an ascendency which makes their admirers speak of them almost with the "Bibliolatry" with which Mr. Newman makes Christian speak of the Bible, I apprehend God could construct a "book," even though it told man nothing which was strictly a revelation, which might be of infinite value to him; simply from the fact that the modes in which truths operate upon us, and by which our faculties are educated to their perfection, are scarcely less important than either the truths or the faculties themselves.

But I need say the less upon this point, inasmuch as Mr. Newman has spoken of the New Testament, and its influence over his mental history, in terms which conclusively show that, if it be not a "revelation," ample space is left for such a divinely constructed book, if God were pleased to give one.

"There is no book in all the world," says he, "which I love and esteem so much as the New Testament, with the devotional parts of the Old. There is none which I know so intimately, the very words of which dwell close to me in my most sacred thoughts, none for which I so thank God, none on which my soul and heart have been to so great an extent moulded. In my early boyhood, it was my private delight and daily companion; and to it I owe the best part of whatever wisdom there is in my manhood." (Soul, pp. 241, 242.)

I only doubt whether even this testimony, strong as it is, fully represents the power which the Book has had in modifying his interior life, though he would now fain renounce its proper authority; whether it has not had more to do than he thinks in originating his conception of such "moral and spiritual" truth as he still recognizes. Its very language comes so spontaneously to his lips, that his dialect of "spiritualism" is one continued plagiarism from David and Isaiah, Paul and Christ. Nay, I may well be doubted whether the entire substance of his spiritual theory be any thing else than a distorted and mutilated Christianity.

Some of the previous observations apply to the possibility and utility of a divinely originated statement of "ethical truth"; nor will they be neutralized by an objection which Mr. Newman is fond of urging, --namely, that a book cannot express (as it is freely acknowledged no book can) the limitations with which maxims of critical truth are to be received and applied; that all it can do is to give general principles, and leave them to be applied by the individual reason and conscience. Such reasoning is refuted by fact. The same thing precisely is done, and necessarily done, in every department in which men attempt to convey instruction in any particular art or method. It is thus with the general principles of mechanics, of law, of medicine. Yet men never entertain a notion that the collection and inculcation of such maxims are of no use, or of little, merely because they must be intelligently modified and not blindly applied in action. If indeed there were any force in the objection, it would put an end to all instruction,--that of Mr. Newman's "spiritual faculty" amongst the rest, for that too can only prompt us by general impulses, and leaves us in the same ignorance and perplexity how far we are to obey them. That is still to be otherwise determined. The genuine result of such reasoning, if it were acted upon, would be that we need never, in any science or art whatever, trouble ourselves to enunciate any general principle or maxim, because perfectly useless! Similarly, we need never inculcate on children the duty of obeying their honoring their superiors, of being frugal or diligent, humble or aspiring, the particular circumstances and limitations in which they are to be applied being indeterminate! But is not the experience of every day and of all the world against it? Is not the early and sedulous inculcation of just maxims of duty fell to be a great auxiliary to its performance in the circumstances in which it is necessary to apply them? Is not the possession of a general rule, with the advantages of a clear and concise expression,--in the form of familiar proverbs, or embodied in powerful imagery,--a potent suggestive to the mind; not only whispering of duty, but, by perpetual recurrence, aiding the habit of attending to it? Is not the early and earnest iteration of such sententious wisdom in the ears of the young, --the honor which has been paid to sages who have elicited it, or felicitously expressed it,--the care with which these treasures of moral wisdom have been garnered up,--the perpetual efforts to conjoin elementary moral truth with the fancy and association,--is not all this a standing testimony to a consciousness of the value of such auxiliaries of virtue and duty? Is it not felt, that, however general such truths may be, the very forms of expression,--the portable shape in which the truth is presented,--have an immense value in relation to practice? Admitting, therefore, as before,--but, as before, only conceding it for argument's sake (for the limits of variation, even as regards the elementary truths of morals, are, as experience shows, very wide),--that each man in some shape could anticipate for himself the more important ethical truth, there would be yet ample scope left for the utility of a divinely constructed instrument for its exhibition and enforcement, in perfect harmony with the modes in which it is actually exhibited and enforced by man, in close analogy with the form in which he attempts the same task, whenever he teaches any practical art or method whatever.

Only may it not be again presumed here, that He who knows perfectly "what is in man" would be able to perform the work with correspondent perfection? Whether He has performed it in the Bible or not, that book does, at all events, contain not merely a larger portion of pure ethical truth than any other in the world, but ethical truth expressed and exhibited (as Mr. Newman himself, and most other persons, would admit) in modes incomparably better adapted than in any other book to lay hold of the memory, the imagination, the conscience, and the heart.