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In the "Conflict of Ages," Dr. Beecher includes not only the fact of an original entrance of sin, but more especially the perpetuation of it through successive generations of men depraved in infancy. The origin of sin, indeed, is soon passed over as having in itself no great difficulty, and the whole difficulty is made to rest, and the whole attention turned upon the discordance of the divine perfections with the existence of infant depravity. The eye is perpetually fixed upon the opening of human life, and, as in all cases this opening of life is in helplessness and ignorance, and under constant and strong bias and influences to transgression, and with a certain issue in sin of every completed trial, the inquiry becomes most urgent, and is followed up most seriously and anxiously. How can such depravity be consistent with honor and right on the part of God?

An extended and very able and thorough examination is made of the many forms in which the doctrines of original sin and infant depravity have been presented by various theological authors. This is, moreover, accompanied by a very acute analysis of the different philosophical theories, and their modified phases, by which it has been sought to account for, and explain the facts of, human depravity consistently with divine integrity. In this protracted and careful investigation, there is apparent an intentional candor and impartiality, which wins much upon the interest and confidence of the reader. Indeed, the determination to be honest and fair has manifestly, at times, been overstrained, and by an excess of liberality, more has been accorded to theories with which he does not sympathize, and less to those with which he more nearly does, than the exact truth will warrant. There is also a spirit of deep earnestness, seriousness, and at times of tender and touching sadness, which effectually excludes all the sharpness and tartness too often found in connection with theological controversy. This patient and comprehensive examination of declining and of now prevalent theories, leaves his own mind still unsatisfied. They do not reconcile the facts, as given by them, with the claims of honor and right in God. They do not give

to him a Deity whom his heart can love, or his soul revere and worship with confidence and gladness.

In Dr. Beecher's apprehension, the two great moving forces of revelation and christianity are, human depravity, and God's integrity of character, and that those have been most unhappily "misadjusted," and made comparatively ineffective by an early and unfortunate assumption, "that men as they come into this world are new-created beings." The "readjustment" of these great forces is to be secured only by a denial and rejection of such assumption. "If in a previous state of existence, God created all men with such constitutions, and placed them in such circumstances as the laws of honor and right demanded, if then they revolted and corrupted themselves, and forfeited their rights, and were introduced into this world under a dispensation of sovereignty disclosing both justice and mercy, then all conflict of the moving powers of christianity can be at once and entirely removed."

Such fact of preëxistence in sin reconciles, to his mind, with God's rectitude all the attendant circumstances of ignorance and weakness and tempting occasions which the infancy of human life encounters. These infants are already sinners in a former sphere of action, and they deserve even worse conditions of existence and severer retributions than such as are here imposed; and besides, they are placed here under a dispensation of mercy and with the opportunity of a fresh probation, in which multitudes of those already lost spirits will be rescued and brought back to God. The great and glorious employment of this redeemed church, is then to be a ministration of diligent instruction and pious nurture. Myriads of new-created beings successively come under their charge, and the story of the divine dealings with them, and their gracious recovery to righteousness, together with all the holy counsel and culture bestowed, will avail to restrain all those myriads from sin, and keep them in perpetual holiness and uninterrupted happiness. God thus gloriously justifies his ways to men.

Now, it can hardly be questioned that this assumption of

human preëxistence must almost universally, upon its first announcement, meet with incredulity and repugnance. It is so unlikely that such previous agency should have existed without leaving some traces upon our consciousness, that it will be spontaneously rejected by the common mind. In ancient times, and not very unfrequently since, it was proposed to human conception as a pagan superstition, or a philosophical myth, or a veritable christian dogma, but in no form has it been competent to give to it general currency, nor even that it should obtain credence from any considerable number of speculating and imaginative persons. It is a good argument against it, that common conviction always rejects it. It must be worked under the strong pressure of seeking relief from some uncomfortable dogma; or it can never make any progress, even as an hypothesis, and nothing can probably give to it general acceptation as a veritable But there are other direct reasons for rejecting it as a satisfactory method for reconciling human depravity with the divine perfections.

fact.

In the first place, the general scope of Scripture statement and teaching is very strongly against it. The history of man's creation carries with it the evidence, that the writer of the first two chapters of Genesis supposed that Adam and Eve then began their being. The statement of their trial and fall has all the directness which belongs to a narration of real occurrences; and if any should be disposed to consider it as a myth, or a figurative representation, such would still be obliged to admit, that the writer meant to comprehend the fall of the race in one progenitor, and not that it can be interpreted as a typical allusion to myriads of distinct and separate transgressors. Neither Moses, nor any other Scripture writer, gives the faintest traces of any recognition that Adam came into Paradise a sinner, nor that this Paradise and fall were in some previous state of being. The most forced and unnatural interpretation must be given to the Bible, on such an hypothesis, carrying with it the evidence that there is some supposed exigency, making it necessary to attain a meaning by violence. It is indeed quite as appa

rent that such is a forced interpretation, as when the attempt is made to sustain the doctrine of universal salvation to be the meaning of the Bible. Neither of the one nor the other do the writers say any such thing; nor say anything which implies that they thought of it; while they do say many things which evince that they did not believe it.

We have the recognition of preexistence in the Lord Jesus Christ, but this only for his divinity, not his humanity. We have also the intimation that, in some sense, John the Baptist was Elijah, the old Hebrew prophet; but we are not given to believe that the same soul existed in the two bodies, and that Elias and John were but one and the same person. The spirit and power of Elias came upon John the Baptist, much as his spirit rested upon Elisha when he caught the falling mantle. Once only, is there a pretty fair allusion to the notion of human preëxistence in the Scriptures, and then the notion is at once denied by the Saviour. "Master, who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? Jesus answered: Neither hath this man sinned nor his parents; but that the works of God should be made manifest in him" (John 9: 23).

But if such supposition give the only method for reconciling the facts of depravity in man with the principles of honor and right in God, the doctrine of preexistence should have been fully revealed. Nothing else can give the inquiring and anxious mind relief; and this is no principle of reason, which may be attained by careful study and thus applied in elucidation of the mystery. It is a fact beyond consciousness, which no powers of recollection can call up, and no testimony but God's can establish. Surely it should not have been left to conjecture, but have been made a plainlyrevealed truth.

Again, if benevolence be the same as honor and right, there is no assistance in the assumption of preëxistence. As a matter of fact, so many of the human race are lost, and so many saved, either without or with this hypothesis. There is no change made in the sum total of human happiness by its introduction. It is introduced for no such purpose as ac

counting for any changes, or effecting any, after the birth of man upon the earth. It is precisely one and the same fact, one and the same onward progress and issue, with two suppositions of origin. Benevolence really gains nothing by adopting the notion of preëxistence; why then introduce it? you answer: To save the perfections of honor and right in God. But if the highest attainable happiness be the ground of honor and right, they are safe already, and this supposition adds nothing to them. If you are troubled with questions of honor and right, they must come from some other source than considerations of greater happiness, for you actually get no greater happiness by any such hypothesis.

Once more; the assumption of preexistence recognizes only individuals, and admits of no conception that there is any higher unity in man. All acted and sinned in their isolation on a previous stage, and all begin action here with each his own depravity brought down from a former sphere of being. All stand out in separate individuality, with no headship in Adam, no unity of race, no one humanity, but only manifold and discrete personality. But such is not the Bible representation of man; such is not the philosophical truth; such is not the empirical fact. The Bible repeatedly and most emphatically recognizes some headship in Adam. Philosophy ever contemplates man as a concrete; humanity entire in its unity. Experience, with its broadest inductions, confirms the existence of a law above that which reigns in the individual, and which binds all individuals in one community. The perpetuation of human form, and mental faculty, and relative proportions of sex, and the one stream of historic development for man, all evince that there is a prevalent and persistent causality before and above all individual peculiarity. This higher unity in humanity, above all distinct personality, need not be viewed as holding the sin and guilt of all in the aggregate, and distributing it in positive demerit to each as he emerges in separate identity; but only as holding all under the same generic liabilities while leaving each to his own distinct responsibilities; and yet such higher unity there is, and it may not be over

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