Ib. p. 55.
And the other took directly up the way to Destruction, which led him into a wide field, full of dark mountains, where he stumbled and fell, and rose no more.
This requires a comment. A wide field full of mountains and of dark mountains, where Hypocrite stumbled and fell! The images here are unusually obscure.
Ib. p. 70.
They showed him Moses" rod, the hammer and nail with which Jael slew Sisera.
I question whether it would be possible to instance more strikingly the power of a predominant idea (that true mental kaleidoscope with richly-coloured gla.s.s) on every object brought before the eye of the mind through its medium, than this conjunction of Moses" rod with the hammer of the treacherous a.s.sa.s.sin Jael, and similar encomiastic references to the same detestable murder, by Bunyan and men like Bunyan, good, pious, purely-affectioned disciples of the meek and holy Jesus; yet the erroneous preconception that whatever is uttered by a Scripture personage is, in fact, uttered by the infallible Spirit of G.o.d, makes Deborahs of them all.
But what besides ought we to infer from this and similar facts? Surely, that the faith in the heart overpowers and renders innocent the errors of the understanding and the delusions of the imagination, and that sincerely pious men purchase, by inconsistency, exemption from the practical consequences of particular errors.
Ib. p. 76.
All this is true, and much more which thou hast left out, &c. This is the best way; to own Satan"s charges, if they be true; yea, to exaggerate them also, to exalt the riches of the grace of Christ above all, in pardoning all of them freely.
"Note in Edwards".
That is, to say what we do not believe to be true! "Will ye speak wickedly for G.o.d, and talk deceitfully for him?" said righteous Job.
Ib. p. 83.
One thing I would not let slip: I took notice that now poor Christian was so confounded, that he did not know his own voice; and thus I perceived it: just when he was come over against the mouth of the burning pit, one of the wicked ones got behind him, and stepped up softly to him, and whisperingly suggested many grievous blasphemies to him, which he verily thought had proceeded from his own mind.
There is a very beautiful letter of Archbishop Leighton"s to a lady under a similar distemperature of the imagination. [4] In fact, it can scarcely not happen under any weakness and consequent irritability of the nerves to persons continually occupied with spiritual self-examination. No part of the pastoral duties requires more discretion, a greater practical psychological science. In this, as in what not?
Luther is the great model; ever reminding the individual that not he, but Christ, is to redeem him; and that the way to be redeemed is to think with will, mind, and affections on Christ, and not on himself. I am a sin-laden being, and Christ has promised to loose the whole burden if I but entirely trust in him.
To torment myself with the detail of the noisome contents of the fardel will but make it stick the closer, first to my imagination and then to my unwilling will.
Ib.
For that he perceived G.o.d was with them, though in that dark and dismal state; and why not, thought he, with me, though by reason of the impediment that attends this place, I cannot perceive it? But it may be asked, Why doth the Lord suffer his children to walk in such darkness? It is for his glory: it tries their faith in him, and excites prayer to him: but his love abates not in the least towards them, since he lovingly inquires after them, "Who is there among you that feareth the Lord and walketh in darkness, and hath no light?"
Then he gives most precious advice to them: "Let him trust in the Lord", and "stay himself upon his G.o.d".
Yes! even in the sincerest believers, being men of reflecting and inquiring minds, there will sometimes come a wintry season, when the vital sap of faith retires to the root, that is, to atheism of the will.
"But though he slay me, yet will I cling to him."
Ib. p. 85.
And as for the other (Pope), though he be yet alive, he is, by reason of age, and also of the many shrewd brushes that he met with in his younger days, grown so crazy and stiff in his joints, that he can now do little more than sit in his cave"s mouth, grinning at pilgrims as they go by, and biting his nails because he cannot come at them.
O that Blanco White would write in Spanish the progress of a pilgrim from the Pope"s cave to the Evangelist"s wicket-gate and the Interpreter"s house!
1836.
Ib. p. 104.
And let us a.s.sure ourselves that, at the day of doom, men shall be judged according to their fruit. It will not be said then, "Did you believe?" but "Were you doers or talkers only?" and accordingly shall be judged.
All the doctors of the Sorbonne could not have better stated the Gospel "medium" between Pelagianism and Antinomian-Solifidianism, more properly named Sterilifidianism. It is, indeed, faith alone that saves us; but it is such a faith as cannot be alone. Purity and beneficence are the "epidermis," faith and love the "cutis vera" of Christianity. Morality is the outward cloth, faith the lining; both together form the wedding-garment given to the true believer in Christ, even his own garment of righteousness, which, like the loaves and fishes, he mysteriously multiplies. The images of the sun in the earthly dew-drops are unsubstantial phantoms; but G.o.d"s thoughts are things: the images of G.o.d, of the Sun of Righteousness, in the spiritual dew-drops are substances, imperishable substances.
Ib. p. 154.
Fine-spun speculations and curious reasonings lead men from simple truth and implicit faith into many dangerous and destructive errors.
The Word records many instances of such for our caution. Be warned to study simplicity and G.o.dly sincerity.
"Note in Edwards on Doubting Castle."
And pray what does implicit faith lead men into? Transubstantiation and all the abominations of priest-worship. And where is the Scriptural authority for this implicit faith? a.s.suredly not in St. John, who tells us that Christ"s life is and manifests itself in us as the light of man; that he came to bring light as well as immortality. a.s.suredly not in St.
Paul, who declares all faith imperfect and perilous without insight and understanding; who prays for us that we may comprehend the deep things even of G.o.d himself. For the Spirit discerned, and the Spirit by which we discern, are both G.o.d; the Spirit of truth through and in Christ from the Father.
Mournful are the errors into which the zealous but unlearned preachers among the dissenting Calvinists have fallen respecting absolute election, and discriminative, yet reasonless, grace:--fearful this divorcement of the Holy Will, the one only Absolute Good, that, eternally affirming itself as the I AM, eternally generateth the Word, the absolute Being, the Supreme Reason, the Being of all Truth, the Truth of all Being:--fearful the divorcement from the reason; fearful the doctrine which maketh G.o.d a power of darkness, instead of the G.o.d of light, the Father of the light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world!
This we know and this we are taught by the holy Apostle Paul; that without will there is no ground or base of sin; that without the law this ground or base cannot become sin; (hence we do not impute sin to the wolf or the tiger, as being without or below the law;) but that with the law cometh light into the will; and by this light the will becometh a free, and therefore a responsible, will.
Yea! the law is itself light, and the divine light becomes law by its relation and opposition to the darkness; the will of G.o.d revealed in its opposition to the dark and alien will of the fallen Spirit. This freedom, then, is the free gift of G.o.d; but does it therefore cease to be freedom?
All the sophistry of the Predestinarians rests on the false notion of eternity as a sort of time antecedent to time. It is timeless, present with and in all times.
There is an excellent discourse of the great Hooker"s, affixed with two or three others to his Ecclesiastical Polity, on the final perseverance of Saints; [5] but yet I am very desirous to meet with some judicious experimental treatise, in which the doctrine, with the Scriptures on which it is grounded, is set forth more at large; as likewise the rules by which it may be applied to the purposes of support and comfort, without danger of causing presumption and without diminishing the dread of sin.
Above all, I am anxious to see the subject treated with as little reference as possible to the divine predestination and foresight; the argument from the latter being a mere identical proposition followed by an a.s.sertion of G.o.d"s prescience.
Those who will persevere, will persevere, and G.o.d foresees; and as to the proof from predestination, that is, that he who predestines the end necessarily predestines the adequate means, I can more readily imagine logical consequences adverse to the sense of responsibility than Christian consequences, such as an individual may apply for his own edification.
And I am persuaded that the doctrine does not need these supports, according, I mean, to the ordinary notion of predestination. The predestinative force of a free agent"s own will in certain absolute acts, determinations, or elections, and in respect of which acts it is one either with the divine or the devilish will; and if the former, the conclusions to be drawn from G.o.d"s goodness, faithfulness, and spiritual presence; these supply grounds of argument of a very different character, especially where the mind has been prepared by an insight into the error and hollowness of the ant.i.thesis between liberty and necessity.
Ib. p. 178.
But how contrary to this is the walk and conduct of some who profess to be pilgrims, and yet can wilfully and deliberately go upon the Devil"s ground, and indulge themselves in carnal pleasures and sinful diversions.
"Note in Edwards on the Enchanted Ground".
But what pleasures are carnal,--what are sinful diversions,--so I mean as that I may be able to determine what are not? Shew us the criterion, the general principle; at least explain whether each individual case is to be decided for the individual by his own experience of the effects of the pleasure or the diversion, in dulling or distracting his religious feelings; or can a list, a complete list, of all such pleasures be made beforehand?