Men there are who, in matters of doctrine, suffer themselves to be carried away by every idle blast; who catch at this or that opinion, because it has the gloss of novelty; who are seduced from the sound form of religion by artful or violent fanatics, recommending their own peculiar dogmas upon the ground of superior sanctity in the teacher and the taught; and while from one part of human infirmity, in the precipitation with which such notions have been once embraced, we have another instance of the same infirmity manifested in the pertinacity with which they are retained. These misguided men are watchful indeed against the smallest encroachments of common sense. They stand fast in opposing assumption to argument, and ideal experiences to the general moral sentiments and habits of their fellow-creatures and fellow-Christians. They quit themselves like dogmatists too illuminated to be instructed, and like zealots too impetuous to be restrained. Fondness for novelty engenders at first versatility in belief; that versatility is followed by ambition of singularity; that ambition is increased by sympathy with other men, whom we consider not as rivals, but associates in the common pursuit of spiritual distinction from the bulk of mankind. By the co-operation of these causes, pride and fanaticism gradually gain an entire ascendency over the affections and the judgment, which soon become ductile to them; and by various progressions they ultimately produce an inveterate and invincible rigidity in opinion, a contemptuous aversion to farther inquiry, a restless impatience of dissent however modest, and discussion however sober. Most assuredly such a state of mind has no encouragement from Scripture, where we are directed to prove all things, and cleave to that which after such proof is perceived to be good; to be on the watch against rash and deceitful teachers; to stand fast in the sound form of doctrine once delivered to true believers; to quit ourselves like men who disdain to be the blind followers of blind guides; to be strong in resisting every attempt to seduce us from those simple and sublime truths which are alike approved by reason, and sanctioned by revelation. DR. SAMUEL PARR: Sermon on Resolution; in Works, vol. vi. pp. 332-4.

Nor is a mind inflated with vanity more disqualified for right action than just speculation, or better disposed to the pursuit of truth than the practice of virtue. To such a mind the simplicity of truth is disgusting. Careless of the improvement of mankind, and intent only upon astonishing with the appearance of novelty, the glare of paradox will be preferred to the light of truth; opinions will be

embraced, not because they are just, but because they are new: the more flagitious, the more subversive of morals, the more alarming to the wise and good, the more welcome to men who estimate their literary powers by the mischief they produce, and who consider the anxiety and terror they impress as the measure of their renown. ROBERT HALL: Modern Infidelity Considered; in Works, vol. i. page 33.

§ 8. THE DREAD OF CONTEMPT and RIDICULE.

Pride makes men ashamed of the service of God, in a time and place where it is disgraced by the world; and, if it have dominion, Christ and holiness shall be denied or forsaken by them, rather than their honor with men shall be forsaken. If they come to Jesus, it is, as Nicodemus, by night. They are ashamed to own a reproached truth, or scorned cause, or servant of Christ. If men will but mock them with the nicknames or calumnies hatched in hell, they will do as others, or forbear their duty. — RICHARD BAXTER: Christian Directory; in Practical Works, vol. iii. p. 23.

A system may be thrown into discredit by the fanaticism and folly of some of its advocates, and it may be long before it emerges from the contempt of a precipitate and unthinking public, ever ready to follow the impulse of her former recollections; it may be long before it is reclaimed from obscurity by the eloquence of future defenders; and there may be the struggle and the perseverance of many years before the existing association, with all its train of obloquies and disgusts and prejudices, shall be overthrown. A lover of truth is thus placed on the right field for the exercise of his principles. It is the field of his faith and of his patience, and in which he is called to a manly encounter with the enemies of his cause. He may have much to bear, and little but the mere force of principle to sustain him. But what a noble exhibition of mind, when this force is enough for it; when, though unsupported by the sympathy of other minds, it can rest on the truth and righteousness of its own principle; when it can select its object from among the thousand entanglements of error, and keep by it amidst all the clamors of hostility and contempt; when all the terrors of disgrace cannot alarm it; when all the levities of ridicule cannot shame it; when all the scowl of opposition cannot overwhelm it! There are some very fine examples of such a contest, and of such a triumph, in the history of philosophy.... When Sir

Isaac Newton's theory of gravitation was announced to the world, if it had not the persecution of violence, it had at least the persecution of contempt to struggle with. . . . This kept it for a time from the chairs and universities of Europe; and for years a kind of obscure and ignoble sectarianism was annexed to that name which has been carried down on such a tide of glory to distant ages. Let us think of this, when philosophers bring their names and their authority to bear upon us, when they pour contempt on the truth which we love, and on the system which we defend; and, as they fasten their epithets upon us, Let us take comfort in thinking that we are under the very ordeal through which philosophy herself had to pass, before she achieved the most splendid of her victories. DR. THOMAS CHALMERS: Select Works, vol. iv. p. 222.

This, too, is the ordeal through which Unitarianism has passed, and is still, in some measure, passing. This is the ordeal through which have passed the adherents of the great doctrine which confessedly lies at the foundation of all true religion, whether natural or revealed; and which, in spite of a narrow dogmatism and a crude metaphysics, is more or less recognized by all Christian churches. The believers in the strict Oneness of the Divine Being, of the unrivalled Supremacy of the infinite Father, have been subjected to every species of contempt and persecution. Their learning has been despised; their characters have been traduced; their motives maligned; their names associated with irreverence, impiety, and infidelity. But all this obloquy, though certainly presenting no evidence for the truth of their doctrine, affords, at the same time, as little ground for regarding it as erroneous. It should be tried by its own merits; judged of by its harmony or its dissonance with the principles of reason and revelation; and a decision be made of its truth or of its falsity, uninfluenced by the fulminations of bigotry, by the sneers of a cold indifference, or by the clamors and prejudices of an unthinking people.

Men are often kept in error, not because they have any special objection to the truth itself, or to the practical consequences, in general, which result from it, but because they are unwilling to acknowledge that they have been in the wrong. A man who has always been on one side, and is so universally regarded, cannot admit that he has been mistaken, without feeling mortification himself, and exciting the ill-will of others. Light, however, comes in,,which he secretly perceives is sufficient to show him that he has been wrong; but he turns his eye away from it, because he instinctively feels what must inevitably follow from its admission. JACOB ABBOTT: The Corner-stone; or, a Familiar Illustration of the Principles of Christian Truth, p. 296.

§ 9. THE INFLUENCE OF A PROUD, EMPTY, SECTARIAN CRITICISM.

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Men of high station in the church, and of high reputation for knowledge, should be cautious in what terms, and before what hearers, they pass sentence upon books which they professedly do not deign to read. A specious criticism, begotten, it may be, by rashness upon prejudice, and fostered by vanity or ill-nature, as soon as it was produced, random conjecture, suddenly struck out in the conflicts of literary conversation,—a sprightly effusion of wit, forgotten perhaps by the speaker the moment after it was uttered, -a sly and impertinent sneer, intended to convey more than was expressed, and more than could be proved, may have very injurious effects upon the reputation of a writer. I suspect, too, that these effects are sometimes designedly produced by critics, who, finding the easy reception given to their own opinions, prefer the pride of decision to the toil of inquiry. The remarks of such men are eagerly caught up by hearers who are incapable of forming for themselves a right judgment, or desirous of supporting an unfavorable judgment by the sanction of a great name. They are triumphantly repeated in promiscuous, and sometimes, I fear, even in literary assemblies, and, like other calumnies, during a long and irregular course they swell in bulk, without losing any portion of their original malignity. — DR. SAMUEL PARR: Dedication to Warburtonian Tracts; in Works, vol. iii. p. 387.

Our theology may be greatly improved by encouraging among our scholars more freedom and candor of criticism. We have long been dissatisfied with the manner in which the critical department of our literature is conducted. Our theological criticism, especially, ought to be governed by well-established and sure principles, and to breathe a spirit of the utmost candor. It ought to love the truth more than the canons or the symbols. Its reverence for the dead ought not to exceed the limits of sound reason, nor should its tenderness to the living hazard the interests of science. It ought to rise above party sympathies, above popular prejudice. But it is only a small part of our theological criticism which is regulated by these principles. We have many parties in theology, and each school is inclined to extol the writings of its own partisans, and to depreciate the productions of its opponents. There is more severity of criticism with us than with the hard-nerved disputants of Germany; but it is severity against those from whom we are separated by party lines. There is more adulation of authors in this country than in that land of authors; but it is the

adulation of those who are hemmed in with us by the same sectarian limits. Like our political editors and orators, we are too much disposed to speak only well of him that is with us, — only ill of him that is against us: the flattery is too fulsome, the censure too unsparing. It is rare that we find a truly dispassionate and unbiassed criticism, dispensing praise and blame where it is deserved, without fear and without favor, without bitterness and without partiality. It is by no means easy to determine the exact value of a work from any review of it which is given in some of our religious journals; so much allowance are we compelled to make for party predilections, so much severity are we called upon to mitigate, so much adulation to qualify. Now, we ought to have candor enough, independence enough, enough of the liberal spirit of true learning, to rise above so narrow and baneful a policy, and to redeem the character of our national criticism from the extravagance both of flattery and of sarcasm, which has so generally been objected against us. If criticism is to hold any valuable place in subserviency to theological science, it must be more liberal, more discriminating, more moderate in its sectarian partialities, more faithful to the spirit of sound scholarship and fraternal sympathy. — Bibliotheca Sacra for November, 1844; vol. i. pp. 753-4.

With much pleasure we make the preceding extract, taken from an excellent article, prepared by a society of clergymen, on "the State of Theological Science and Education in our Country." In the present age, when the pulpit has, both for good and evil, lost so much of its former power, and the press is the main instrument employed in influencing the public mind, we know of nothing more detrimental to catholicity of spirit and the love of truth among the people than that narrowness of soul, on the part of editors, which, by its withering scowl on all that is excellent out of its own pale, would prevent the readers of a professedly religious journal from perusing any work that bears not the stamp of a prevalent and a stereotyped orthodoxy. Truth is divine, wherever found,—in friend or foe; and it should be the delight of the Christian critic to separate it from the error with which it may be blended, and to exhibit its beauty and holiness, without any bigoted regards to his own particular form of theological specu'lation.

§ 10. THE SEDUCTIONS OF FEELING AND IMAGINATION, OF IMPRESSIONS AND PASSIONS.

Sometimes a strong, deluded imagination maketh men exceeding confident in error, some by melancholy, and some by a natural weakness of reason, and strength of fantasy; and some, by misappre