Josephus as a turbulent unruly race, rejoicing in changes, roused to arms by the slightest motion of flattery, rushing to battle as if they were going to a feast. What is the religious end of the two as yet? The Jew is immovable in his Judaism-blind, and unable to think a generous thought of any other people. The children of Edom have gone astray into the wild fanaticism of Mohammedan sectaries, and that creed's lavish sensuality, fatalism, and imposition of religious forms by the sword. A source of diversity of way of looking at subjects of thought, curious in kind, but exceedingly important because of its extent, lies in the imperfection of language as an exponent of thought. The principle is well known, that language is, to some extent, the leader of thought, the exigency of expression often bringing to hand words which, by association, will change the line of thought from what it was exactly meant to be. This influence, most perceptible in hasty expression under excitement, is so far dominant in the case of all thought that has to be expressed. Those intimate with the spoken language of the Scottish Highlands say it almost excludes logical address, and subjects all religious teaching to the risk attaching to the perpetual use of metaphor. Chevalier Bunsen, a clear writer in several languages, quotes, with some amusement, the result, in his own case, of writing in German or French or English, that to his intimate friends he seemed to differ in habit of mind with the tongue he used. His German relatives would have mistaken him for a Frenchman when they read his French writing; and he promised them to be an Englishman when they should read his 'Egypt' in the English language. Language, unavoidably an imperfect instrument, becomes, within the confinement of any nationality, chiefly fitted for expressing the ways of thinking which are seen to become peculiar to a nation, the result of all its associations of history, employment, climate, geographical feature, &c., and thought cannot keep but partially out of the established rut. Originally and properly the result of impression and thought, language thus becomes in its turn the origin of both. This is one of the sources of the religious influence exercised by the sacred writings. The language of the Bible could have arisen diversity of witnesses. 18. The eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, Recognised enumerating under the same authoritative term of "faith" such faith in the dissimilarities as belong to the instances there quoted, exhibits cloud of strikingly what diversity we are to look for of this possession under differing circumstances of outward life. What human writer would, without such authority, have classed Gideon and Barak and Jephthah along with Abraham, Moses, and David, as examples of faith? Yet the wild character which belonged to two at least of these four eminent men among Israel's deliverers differed from the ripe righteousness of Abraham and Moses and David no more remarkably than the wild distracted state of the tribes, overborne and oppressed by the Eastern Midianites and the Western Philistines, differed from the domestic peace of Abraham's general state, or the life Moses passed, consciously as it were, under the shadow of Jehovah's wings, daily taken into His presence in the tabernacle, or the days in which David, " dwelling safely in the midst of Jerusalem," was the sweet psalmist of Israel. And one quality of faith belonged doubtless to the history of the Father of the Faithful, to Moses the man of God, to David His anointed, and to those who, to human sight, are only national heroes, wild patriots, leaders of the forlorn hopes of the people in their several times. It is that quality we have already been led to infer as the fundamental consciousness of faith, its universal feature, its essential part but with undefinable additions-the feeling of union with their Jehovah, having Him "ever before" them, "in all their thoughts." Before those four worldly heroes, Jehovah the Deliverer, the Captain of Israel's national salvation, arose in inspiring vision in Israel's low estate. They felt themselves His to surely work His deliverance for His people. Before Abraham's more spiritual thoughts, the "day seen afar off" shone behind a long undefined foreground of descendants blessed in him; and before Moses, a worldly prospect arose crowned with religious glory; the growth of a nation to be a great testimony set forth among the nations"Holiness to the Lord." The quieter condition of Abraham and Moses beheld rich sanctification arise from their thinking on the holy Jehovah, before whom they dwelt. Samson, thinking of the mighty Jehovah, was not so freed from the lusts of the flesh, yet neither was David by his higher thoughts; but Samson's ending showed belief in Jehovah's being his sure helper. The catalogue of the cloud of witnesses affords many differences of a less striking kind. It should be heard as a protest against the so human-sighted looking for uniformity in mankind's thoughts of revealed things. These cases are not to be quoted as examples bidding believers seek to differ from one another, but certainly they are barriers to human criticism seeking to condemn diversity that does not appear to have been intentional. CHAPTER X. THE CONDITIONS TO FAITH. 1 JOHN iv. 8. He that loveth not, knoweth not God. MARK iv. 19.—The cares of this world . . . and the lusts of other things entering in, choke the word, and it becometh unfruitful. JOHN vii. 17.—If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God. Ps. lxviii. 11.-Unite my heart to fear thy name. necessary to faith. 1. To be able to think habitually, with the continuance of A normal personal a life habit, and under right emotions, upon the religious condition things revealed in the Bible, the thinker must be in a certain normal condition, moral, intellectual, physical, and social. This necessity is partly declared to us in the Bible itself, where it describes the "hearing" by which "faith cometh (e.g., Luke viii. 11-15; James i. 21-25); and is partly the closest inference from our own experience of other parts of emotional thinking. A healthy moral state, a conscience neither defiled nor inactive, is an experienced condition of ability to perceive and feel moral truth quickly. The mens sana in corpore sano is a condition of correct thinking upon any matters of personal interest. And a lot in life not overtrying is a kindred necessity. Moral Conditions to Faith. faithful 2. The moral condition upon which faith is possible is not Faith and one arbitrarily imposed, but one that is unavoidable under the ness reciprocal. nature of faith; which is interested and conciliating uniting sources of thinking upon God's love to us under our debt to Him. Capability of faith and the exercise of faithfulness are reciprocal. This reciprocity is only a part of the general law of human religion, whose affections have their authority and ability from the relationships which unite man to God. All the affections and active manifestations of that union are reciprocal. Love is not merely bestowed on God's part or offered on man's, but is interchanged mutually, going between the Father and His child. Repentance and the remission of sins go together, making godly sorrow and the comfort of trust in God concomitant. Dutiful exertion and imparted ability flow out together, meeting one another-"strength perfected in weakness." Faith is eminently after this manner a relative power and possession. Faith and faithfulness are reciprocal — so much so, indeed, that in the best servants of God the comfort of faith, its confidence or assurance, is a fluctuating possession; their faithfulness being a fluctuating condition. Subjective 3. The relation of the power of faith to character is a strong unbelief. point of Scriptural teaching. Faith and a good conscience are joined together in Paul's descriptions. He speaks of them that are "defiled and unbelieving," to whom "nothing is pure, but their mind and conscience is defiled" (Tit. i. 15) - of "covetous love of money," making men "err from the faith" (1 Tim. vi. 10)—of "men of corrupt minds reprobate concerning the faith" (2 Tim. iii. 8); and reveals, as an explanation of unbelief, that when it follows upon a vicious state of heart, dislike of the truth, it is allowed to come in judgment, "God giving the vicious up to a reprobate mind" (Rom. i. 28). These effects of character upon faith, so strongly represented by Paul, are what Christ himself had previously spoken of, contrasting the behaviour to the truth, which would result in unbelief, with that of believers-" This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world; but men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest" (to his faithful conscience) "that they are wrought in God” (John iii. 19, 20) |