Part 70

And who could fairly realize the fundamental idea of this scheme, without losing all confidence in his own moral convictions, and constantly distrusting his best feelings as delusions? For does he not believe, that whatever is brought to pass is absolutely right and best, and that any different view of it is an illusion incident to our human point of sight? The optimist casts his eye over the past, and can see no blot upon the retrospect: yet does it contain innumerable things,—woes and crimes the most deplorable,—which, ere they happened, were repugnant to his worthiest desires, and to be encountered by the most strenuous resistance of duty. Is he then to look at these objects, up to the last moment of the present, as utterly evil; and from the first moment of the past, as indisputably best? Is he to set up a two-faced sentiment, gazing with mutable and discriminative expression on things approaching, but with unvaried complacency on things departed? Is it possible, that actions and characters can change their complexion by mere migration in time? or was it altogether a mistake to think so ill of the iniquities which, having been summoned into existence, must always have appeared eligible in the view of God? These perplexities must perpetually arise to a mind which uses _two_ standards of good; the _moral_, which approves the _right_; and the _eventual_, which reveres the _past_. The latter incessantly contradicts the former, and insinuates that it is a blind guide, aiming at that which the All-wise will refuses to achieve. And thus our theorist, _in so far as he is true to his principles_, would lapse into scepticism of his moral judgments; into a hesitating veneration for the oracles of duty; a suspicion that they may inculcate provisional superstitions, rather than eternal truths. It must be difficult to unite pious acquiescence in the guilt of others, with uncompromising resistance to our own.

In short, the contemplations presented by this doctrine do not appear to be favourable to _active_ excellence: rising too far, and embracing too much, they quit the contact of this green earth, and lose sight of the interval between the quiet vales where virtue walks, and the giddy heights it may not tread. The soul, rendered conscious more of the immensity around it, than of the obligations upon it, lies still, without a passion, without a fear,—venturing an approach to the benignity more than to the energy of God. Perhaps it is the tendency of all systems which most amply spread forth the Divine Infinitude, to be less occupied with the conception of the Divine Holiness: perhaps the mind intensely occupied with the idea of one solitary Power, absorbing all subordinate agencies, and willing every change that renders space or time perceptible, has all its strongest impulses, both moral and sympathetic, suppressed in the abyss of mystery; and the distinction between different beings and different acts appears, in so vast a view, too trivial to be worthy of deep emotion and resolute volition. Certain it is, that the oriental religions which have encouraged this sublimity of devotion and self-annihilation in the Deity, have not been remarkable for the formation of a sound and vigorous type of moral character. Indeed we have seen that God himself, the supreme centre of reverence, no longer remains, under the Necessarian representation, a really _holy_ object of thought. If we are to admit no possibility of resisting his will, and proclaiming him the Only Cause, to drown all other powers in his immensity, it becomes impossible to feel that he has any paramount regard to moral distinctions: he cannot share our feelings towards human guilt, for it is his work: he objects to no amount of vice, provided it issues in enjoyment: and not one libertine, or traitor, or murderer, could his purposes have spared. To reconcile us to this dreadful thought, we are reminded of his benevolence, which will bring all things to a glorious result. But how can we discern any sanctity in a benevolence so indiscriminating in its instruments? Must all our various apprehensions of God, the supremely good and supremely fair, shrink into this one, of ultimate-happiness Maker, by no means fastidious in his application of means, but secure of producing the end? Must the harmony of the Divine perfections lapse into this dull monotone? It can hardly be well for our conscience to worship a Being whom we could not imitate without guilt: or, if it be said, that we may imitate his ultimate aim, though not his intermediate methods,—what is this but to admit that our moral sympathies with him must be postponed to the end of time?

This system, then, like others which trace sin to causes beyond the individual will, does not appear to foster that deep reverence for moral distinctions, and sense of personal responsibility, which eminently characterize practical Christianity. It is favourable indeed to the passive virtues, which occupy their due place in the morality of the Gospel: but in producing them, appeals to considerations discouraging to the active spirit of moral resistance and moral aggression.

To all this, however, an objector might urge the following reply:—“Human conduct is not influenced by such considerations as you have supposed. It matters little what men may think about the _origin_ of their guilt, if they make no mistake about its _consequences_: let them only be sure that it will be punished in the end, and they may please themselves with speculating about its beginning. Every one will fly an inevitable suffering, whether self-incurred or induced by foreign causes: and if he clearly sees the penal sentence, he will shun the sin, just as much when he imagines that others have involved him in it, as when he conceives that he alone has brought it on himself. In short, the will neither is nor can be determined by anything but the prospect of pleasure or pain; and so long as consequences of this kind depend on his decisions, a man will feel himself accountable. The sense of responsibility can never be weakened by any system which, like those just noticed, retain the doctrine of future retribution.”

This statement assumes that self-regarding motives, promises of happiness, and threats of misery, are the sole powers for operating on human character.

(2.) In reply, I submit as a second distinguishing feature of practical Christianity, that it makes no great, certainly no exclusive, appeal to the _prudential feelings_, as instruments of duty; treats them as morally incapable of so sacred a work; and relies, chiefly and characteristically, on affections of the heart, which no motives of reward and punishment can have the smallest tendency to excite.

The Gospel, indeed, like all things divine, is unsystematic and unbound by technical distinctions, and makes no metaphysical separation between the will and the affections. It is too profoundly adapted to our nature, not to address itself copiously to both. The doctrine of retribution being a solemn truth, appears with all its native force in the teachings of Christ, and arms many of his appeals with a persuasion just and terrible. But never was there a religion (containing these motives at all) so frugal in the use of them; so able, on fit occasions, to dispense with them: so rich in those inimitable touches of moral beauty, and tones that penetrate the conscience, and generous trust in the better sympathies, which distinguish a morality of the affections. In Christ himself, where is there a trace of the obedience of pious self-interest, computing its everlasting gains, and making out a case for compensation, by submitting to infinite wisdom? In his character, which is the impersonation of his religion, we surely have a perfect image of spontaneous goodness, unhaunted by the idea of personal enjoyment, and, like that of God, unbidden but by the intuitions of conscience, and the impulses of love. And what teacher less divine ever made such high and bold demands on our disinterestedness? To lend out our virtue upon interest,—to “love them only who love us” he pronounced to be the sinners’ morality; nor was the feeling of duty ever reached, but by those who could “do good, hoping for _nothing_ again,” except that greatest of rewards to a true and faithful heart, to be “the children of the Highest” who “is kind unto the unthankful and the evil.” In the view of Jesus, all dealings between God and men were not of bargain, but of affection. We must surrender ourselves to him without terms; must be ashamed to doubt him who feeds the birds of the air, and, like the lily of the field, look up to him with a bright and loving eye; and he, for our much love, will pity and forgive us. In his own ministry, how much less did our Lord rely for disciples on the cogency of mere proof, and the inducements of hope and fear, than on the power of moral sympathy, by which every one that was of God naturally loved him and heard his words;[568] by which the good shepherd knew his sheep, and they listened to his voice, and followed him;[569] and without which no man could come unto him, for no spirit of the Father drew him.[570] No condition of discipleship did Christ impose, save that of “faith in him;” absolute trust in the spirit of his mind; a desire of self-abandonment to a love and fidelity like his, without tampering with expediency, or hesitancy in peril, or shrinking from death.

There is, then, a wide variance between the genius of Christianity, and that philosophy which teaches, that all men must be bought over to the side of goodness and of God, by a price suited to their particular form of selfishness and appetite for pleasure. Our religion is remarkable for the large confidence it reposes on the disinterested affections, and the vast proportion of the work of life it consigns to them. And in thus seeking to subordinate and tranquillize the prudential feelings, Christ manifested how well he knew what was in man. He recognized the truth, which all experience declares, that in these emotions is nothing great, nothing loveable, nothing powerful; that their energy is perpetually found incapable of withstanding the impetuosity of passion; and that all transcendant virtues, all that brings us to tremble or to kneel, all the enterprises and conflicts which dignify history, and have stamped any new feature on human life, have had their origin in the disinterested region of the mind; in affections, unconsciously entranced by some object sanctifying and divine. He knew, for it was his special mission to make all men feel, that it is the office of true religion to cleanse the sanctuary of the secret affections, and effect a regeneration of the heart. And this is a task which no direct _nisus_ of the will can possibly accomplish, and to which, therefore, all offers of reward and punishment, operating only on the will, are quite inapplicable. The single function of volition is _to act_; over the executive part of our nature it is supreme; over the emotional it is powerless; and all the wrestlings of desire for self-cure and self-elevation, are like the struggles of a child to lift himself. He who is anxious to be a philanthropist, is admiring benevolence, instead of loving men; and whoever is labouring to warm his devotion, yearns after piety, not after God. The mind can by no spasmodic bound seize on a new height of emotion, or change the light in which objects appear before its view. Persuade the judgment, bribe the self-interests, terrify the expectations, as you will, you can neither dislodge a favourite, nor enthrone a stranger, in the heart. Show me a child that flings an affectionate arm around a parent, and lights up his eyes beneath her face, and I know that there have been no lectures there upon filial love; but that the mother, being loveable, has _of necessity_ been loved; for to genial minds it is as impossible to withhold a pure affection, when its object is presented, as for the flower to sulk within the mould, and clasp itself tight within the bud, when the gentle force of spring invites its petals to curl out into the warm light. As you reverence all good affections of our nature, and desire to awaken them, never call them duties, though they be so; for so doing, you address yourself to the will; and by hard trying no attachment ever entered the heart. Never preach on their great desirableness and propriety; for so doing, you ask audience of the judgment; and by way of the understanding no glow of noble passion ever came. Never, above all, reckon up their balance of good and ill; for so doing, you exhort self-interest; and by that soiled way no true love will consent to pass. Nay, never talk of them, nor even gaze curiously at them; for if they be of any worth and delicacy, they will be instantly looked out of countenance and fly. Nothing worthy of human veneration will condescend to be embraced, but for its own sake: grasp it for its excellent results,—make but the faintest offer to use it as a tool, and it slips away at the very conception of such insult. The functions of a healthy body go on, not by knowledge of physiology, but by the instinctive vigour of nature; and you will no more brace the spiritual faculties to noble energy and true life, by study of the uses of every feeling, than you can train an athlete for the race, by lectures on every muscle of every limb. The mind is not voluntarily active in the acquisition of any great idea, any new inspiration of faith; but passive, fixed on the object which has dawned upon it, and filled it with fresh light.

If this be true, and if it be the object of practical Christianity, not only to direct our hands aright, but to inspire our hearts; then can its ends never be achieved by the mere force of reward and punishment; then no system can prove its sufficiency, by showing that it retains the doctrine of retribution, and must even be held convicted of moral incompetency, if it trusts the conscience mainly to the prudential feelings, without due provision for enlisting the co-operation of many a disinterested affection.

To this objection must any scheme be liable, which represents the Creator as having made choice of the instrumentality of evil. I freely admit, that no one urges the _personal_ motives to duty with more closeness and force than the Necessarian. Maintaining, with the utmost strictness, the connexion of moral cause and effect, teaching the alliance of happiness with excellence, and of misery with vice, by a law inexorable as fate, he convinces us, that every concession to temptation, every relaxation of conscientious effort, is an addition of wretchedness to our future lot; that when the evil volition has once passed, no fortuity can provide evasion, nor any mercy give us shelter; that on the decisions of our will is suspended whatever can make our everlasting destination blessed. But his doctrine goes on to assure us, that it is only to ourselves that our sins create any clear increase of suffering; they are a part of the best possible system, designed for the general good; and shown, by their occurrence, to be clear benefits to the world. No love of our fellow-man, then, can be engaged in behalf of duty; let conscience say what it will, we hold no power, and incur no risk, of creating injury to others; and our sympathies with them cannot reasonably determine any moral choice. No love of God can tender help to our feeble virtue: for he is not “grieved in our sins;” and whether, in our conflicts, we succumb or conquer, the issue is well-pleasing in his sight. He appears to sustain a relation, not of concern, but of indifference, to our choice; and the idea of him, as spectator of the strife, inspires no courage, and brings no victory. If it be urged, that these considerations are of too high and abstract a kind to influence us in practice, and that to us our misconduct must always appear injurious to men, and offensive to God; what is this but to allow the unfitness of the doctrine to our minds, and to say, that it is harmless, in proportion as it remains unrealized? It is a poor plea for the value of a system to exclaim, “Never mind its threatened mischiefs, conscience is too strong for them.” The point at which the present argument rests is this, that _in so far as the doctrine operates_, it dismisses all but the prudential feelings from the service of duty.

Our conclusion is evident. The spirit of practical Christianity gives a double suffrage against the scheme which makes moral evil the _instrument_ of God; and bids us regard it as his _enemy_. Revelation allies itself with the primitive religion of the conscience.

To the theoretic question, still urged by our wonder and solicitude, “But _whence_ this foe?” it has been already said, that no answer can be given. All the ingenuities of logic and of language, leave it a mystery still: and it is better to stand within the darkness in the quietude of faith, than vainly to search for its margin in the restlessness of knowledge. Were we compelled, for relief of mind, to select _some_ definite method of representing the case to our apprehensions, I know not any simpler or better conception than that of the ancient Platonists;—that the process of creation consisted, not in the origination of matter itself out of nothing, but in the production of form, order, beauty, organization, life, sentiency, out of matter,—in making it the residence of mind, the receptacle of experience, and the servitor of souls: that the Divine hand has manifested illimitable skill, and the Divine love infinite versatility, in the use and application of the original material; but that, as it is the negative opposite to his positive perfections, its unsusceptibility of life and spirit has occasioned the portion of evil which deforms the universe, and which, however varied and reduced, and, in the higher gradations of being, attenuated to the verge of extinction, cannot be utterly annihilated. From the large proportion of visible evil, natural and moral, that is traceable to disorganization and its related changes, this view is easily apprehended, and may indeed be detected, in many common forms of thought and speech. If it be not true, no better substitute for the truth is within our reach. It limits the power of God no more than the rival scheme: for were we to say, that he became the author of evil, as the _unavoidable_ means of ulterior benefits, we should admit, that _only on these terms_ was the contemplated good producible, even by him whom, in relation to all our measures of force, we justly call Omnipotent. It is impossible to escape, and therefore better to confront, the idea of a NECESSITY, restricting the conditions within which the Divine goodness operates;—a necessity, mysterious, but not dreadful; not great enough to be subversive of faith, nor trivial enough to be reasoned out of sight. I know not why our thoughts should not find a residence for this necessity, rather in the materials awaiting the Creative hand, than in any immaterial laws, under the mystic title of “the Nature of things,” or (in other words,) any dark Fate behind the throne. But in saying this, I only propose to _state the problem_ in the most salutary form, and by no means to offer a solution: mere pretension to ideas, where truly we have none, only excludes us from the benefits (which are many) of our allotted portion of ignorance. I have no sympathy with the confident and dogmatic spirit, which exclaims, “Let the counsel of the Holy One draw nigh, that we may know it;” and would only protest against systems that “call evil good, and good evil,” that “put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter.”