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imagine, not a few of the most unhappy feelings and measures which christians now cherish and adopt in relation to each other, and would turn to account, according to God's own plan, all peculiarities of constitutional character in advancing his cause, instead of making them, as at present, the means of universal blight and disaster.

SECTION II.

Gospel not adapted to produce a uniformity of opinion and judgment.

The gospel may and does often produce such a degree of uniformity as to foreclose all disputatious feeling and conduct. And this was what the apostle intended when he besought his brethren to be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment. Not that he expected among them an absolute uniformity of opinion any more than he anticipated an identity of physical conformation; but he looked for such a degree of uniformity and such a spirit of mutual concession in things upon which they might differ, as would lead them to mind and speak the same things.

There are some subjects that do not admit an exercise of judgment or the formation of an opinion. Of this description are mere matters, first of intuition -second, of sensation—and third, of supernatural revelation.

That we exist, that the whole of a thing is greater than a part, that an object cannot be and not be at the same time, that we did not create ourselves, and all similar truths do not admit of an exercise of judgment or the formation of an opinion; for they are known by intuition. In other words, we being as

we are and points of this nature such as they are, our perception of them must necessarily be what it is. And if the perceptions which any two persons have of such matters be different, there is no method by which they could make them similar. Whereas it is necessary to an opinion or judgment that it relate to something which does not strike the mind upon a first view; it is the result at which we arrive by means of a process of reasoning. And of course, by comparing our ideas with those of another person and learning from him our mistakes, or by running over the process a second time in order to detect its errors, we may arrive at a different conclusion and so change our opinion. But there is no way of doing this in regard to the facts of intuition.

The same may be said of mere matters of sensation. There is no method by which the simple impressions which we recieve from the optic, olfactory, gustatory, or other organs of sensation can be made different from what they seem. If these impressions in any individual do not accord with nature nor agree with what they are in other individuals, he has no means of effecting such accordance and agreement. Where is no chance for an intermediate process of reasoning, therefore, and no power of making the first impression of the mind different from what it is, there is no room to form a judgment or opinion.

In like manner, what is purely a matter of supernatural revelation leaves no room for such an intermediate process of reasoning; because the revelation being our only means of knowledge on the subject, there is nothing else with which to compare it, in order to modify or correct our impression concerning it. That there is a mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, that all men became sinners through the sin of one man, that Christ bore our sins in his own body on the tree, that we must be born again, that the bodies of all men will be raised from the

grave, and many similar facts are so entirely dependent upon the testimony of the Scriptures, that, on the part of those who admit them to be a revelation from God, there is no room left for forming an opinion or judgment whether they are so or not.

The only opportunity for the exercise of judgment concerning the facts of revelation respects one or the other of two questions, first, whether the Scriptures are a revelation from God, and second, whether the facts which they actually state be thus or otherwise. In settling the claims of the Scriptures to Divine inspiration, and in philological inquiries after the precise truths which they design to communicate, a field is open for such a process of reasoning as is necessary to the formation of a judgment and opinion. But admitting the Scriptures to be a revelation from God, then, what they actually teach should be ranked among the simple elements of our knowledge as much as intuitive truths or the impressions upon our senses. They are both and all alike, not the result of investigation, except so far as may be necessary to the understanding of language, not the products of reasoning, but the primitive materials with which the Creator has mercifully invested us, and out of which the mind must rear the sublime fabric of its knowledge.

Who has the means of saying that the character of God, the way of salvation by Christ, a future life, or any other matter purely of revelation, is different from what it is represented on the face of Scripture? Do not these things stand in this respect upon the same basis with the facts of intuition or of sensation? Who is able to penetrate the deep mysteries of the Infinite Mind, so as to obtain other materials in judging of them, than those which are already revealed? Can we seize an angel's pinion, explore the regions which he has traversed, or contemplate the wonders which have astonished his vision? Can we draw aside the

curtain of eternity, place our foot on the outskirts of this magnificent universe, or scale the walls with which God has enclosed our aspiring knowledge? "Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?" Our business consists not in exploring regions from which God has fenced us in, but in wielding the materials of knowledge, with which he has favored us, so as to arrive at still further conclusions. When we have made the most of these materials, and have thouroughly cultivated our little enclosure, perhaps God will furnish us with more, if not in this world, yet in some other state of being where our capacities will enjoy a richer soil, a more salubrious clime, and will receive their most luxuriant growth. Till then we must make the most of our present materials of knowledge.

When we say, therefore, that the gospel is not adapted to produce a perfect uniformity of judgment, we must not be understood to assert that there is not a uniformity in the subject-matter of what is revealed to each of us; for as this does not depend upon any process of reasoning in our minds, nor admit of any opinion whether it be so or otherwise, it must be the same to us all so far as our understanding of the language in which it is couched is the same e; but our meaning is that the reasonings which are instituted on the basis of revealed facts cannot be expected to conduct every mind to the same result. Similar diversities are to be expected here, that we meet with in the use of all other materials of knowledge. There is scarcely two minds, that in wielding a given amount of facts, will arrive in all points at the same conclusions.

Nor could the gospel attain the end of producing a perfect uniformity of judgment, either upon religion or any other subject, without enduing us with the power of arriving at unerring conclusions. Before this

is done we must all seize in every case upon the same facts, place them in the same order, give each of them the same bearing in our process of reasoning, and that must be the exact bearing of truth, or the result will not be the same. In one word, our minds must be made on the same scale of strength and clearness, expansiveness and vigor, and this must be the scale of infallibility like God, or the end cannot be attained of producing between us a perfect uniformity of judgment.

These considerations may not be a reason for tolerating every absurd deduction which an erratic and adventurous mind may draw from the matter of Scripture; but they should teach us caution in regard to making the mere fact of difference an occasion for controversy.* They show also that while it is scarcely possible to go too far in pinning men down to an admission of statements in the words which "the Holy Ghost teacheth," great latitude and indulgence should be exercised in regard to mere matters of opinion.All creeds, except those that go into a detailed statement of revealed thoughts, inasmuch as they are attempts at generalizing those thoughts, and are for the most part a mere expression of the opinions concerning them of those with whom they originated, besides being often intermixed with much foreign matter, should be used with caution and with repeated references to the inspired text. They may embody much truth and may approach as near the Bible as it is possible for any human production to do; but still, as they are merely human productions, they cannot be made the tests of fellowship and of the measure of

This fact suggests the propriety of discussion, it is true, which is necessary in all departments of inquiry; but this is by no means to be confounded with those argumentative collisions, in which each party toils for the triumph of its own opinions, under the impression that the surrender of them would be tantamount to a surrender of christianity itself.

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