01.07.04 - Section 4

Section IV. It may be alleged, that in refusing to subject the volitions of men to the power and control of God, we undermine the sentiments of humility and submission. This objection is often made: it is, indeed, the great practical ground on which the scheme of necessity plants itself. The object is, no doubt, a most laudable one; but every laudable object is not always promoted by wise means. Let us see, then, if it be wise thus to assert the doctrine of a necessitated agency, in order to abase the pride of man, and teach him a lesson of humility.

If we set out from this point of view, it will be found exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to tell when and where to stop. In fact, those who rely upon this kind of argument, often carry it much too far; and if we look around us, we shall find that the only means of escaping the charge of pride, is to swallow all the doctrines which the teachers of humility may be pleased to present to us. Thus, for example, Spinoza would have us to believe that man is not a person at all, but a mere fugitive mode of the Divine Being. Nothing is more ridiculous, in his eyes, than that so insignificant a thing as a man should aspire to the rank of a distinct, personal existence, and assume to himself the attribute of free-will. “The free-will,” says he, “is a chimera of the same kind, flattered by our pride, and in reality founded upon our ignorance.” Now it may not be very humble in us, but still we beg leave to protest against this entire annihilation of our being.

Even M. Comte, who in his extreme modesty, denies the existence of a God, insists that it is nothing but the fumes of pride and self-conceit, the intoxication of vanity, which induces us to imagine that we are free and accountable beings. No doubt he would consider us sufficiently humble and submissive, provided we would only forswear all the light which shines within us and around us, and swallow his atheistical dogmas. But there is something more valuable in the universe, if we mistake not, than even a reputation for humility. But no one will expect us to go so far in self-abasement and humility, as to submit our intellects to all sorts of dogmas. It will be amply sufficient, if we only go just far enough to receive the dogmas of his particular creed. Thus, for example, if you assail the doctrine of necessity, on which, as we have seen, Calvinism erects itself, the Puseyite will clasp his hands, and cry out, “Well done!” But if you turn around and oppose any of his dogmas, then what pride and presumption to set up your individual opinion against “the decisions of the mother Church!”(153) And he will be sure to wind up his lesson of humility with that of St. Vincentius: “Quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab omnibus.” Seeing, then, that a reputation for humility is not the greatest good in the universe, and that the only possibility of obtaining it, even from one party, is by a submission of the intellect to its creed; would it not be as well to leave such a reputation to take care of itself, and use all exertions to search out and find the truth?

Tell a carnal, unregenerate man, it is said, that though God had physical power to create him, he has not moral power to govern him, and you could not furnish his mind with better aliment for pride and rebellion. Should you, after giving this lesson, press upon him the claims of Jehovah, you might expect to be answered, as Moses was by the proud oppressor of Israel: “Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice?”(154) He must, indeed, be an exceedingly carnal man, who should draw such an inference from the doctrine in question. But we should not tell him that “God had no moral power to govern him.” We should tell him, that God could not control all his volitions; that he could not govern him as a machine is governed, without destroying his free-agency; but we should still insist that he possessed the most absolute and uncontrollable power to govern him; that God can give him a perfect moral law, and power to obey it, with the most stupendous motives for obedience; and then, if he persist in his disobedience, God can, and will, shut him up in torments forever, that others, seeing the awful consequences of rebellion, may keep their allegiance to him. Is this to deny the power of God to govern his creatures? But is it not wonderful that a Calvinist should undertake to test a doctrine by the consequences which a “proud oppressor,” or “a carnal man,” might draw from it? If we should tell such a man, that God possesses the absolute power to control his volitions, and that nothing ever happens on earth but in perfect accordance with his good will and pleasure, might we not expect him to conclude, that he would then leave the matter with God, and give himself no trouble about it?

If we may judge from the practical effect of doctrines, then the authors of the objection in question do not take the best method to inculcate the lesson of humility. They take the precise course pursued by Melanchthon, and often with the same success. This great reformer, it is well known, undertook to frame his doctrine so as to teach humility and submission: with this view he went so far as to insist, that man was so insignificant a thing, that he could not act at all, except in so far as he was acted upon by the Divine Being. Having reached this position, he not only saw, but expressly adopted the conclusion, that God is the author of all the volitions of men; that he was the author of David’s adultery as well as of Saul’s conversion.

Now, it is true, if the human mind could abase itself so low as to embrace such a doctrine, it would give a most complete, if not a most pleasing example of its submissiveness. But it cannot very well do so. For even amid the ruins of our fallen nature, there are some fragments left, which raise the intellect and moral nature of man above so blind and so abject a submission to the dominion of error. Hence it was, that Melanchthon himself could not long submit to his own doctrine; and he who had undertaken to teach others humility, became one of the most illustrious of rebels. This suggests the profound aphorism of Pascal: “It is dangerous to make us see too much how near man is to the brutes, without showing him his greatness. It is also dangerous to make him see his greatness without his baseness. It is still more dangerous to leave him ignorant of both. But it is very advantageous to represent to him both the one and the other.”(155) The fact is, that nothing can teach the human intellect a genuine submission but the light of evidence: this, and this alone, can rivet upon our speculative faculty the chains of inevitable conviction, and bind it to the truth. Those who teach error, then, may preach humility with success to the blind and the unthinking; but wherever men may be disposed to think for themselves, they must expect to find rebels. How many at the present day have begun, like Melanchthon, by the preaching of submission, and ended by the practice of rebellion against their own doctrines. It is wonderful to observe the style of criticism usually adopted by the faithful, as one illustrious rebel after another is seen to depart from their ranks. The moment he is known to doubt a single dogma of the established faith, the awful suspicion is set afloat, “there is no telling where he will end.” Alas! this is but too true; for when a man has once discovered that what he has been taught all his life to regard and reverence as a great mystery, is in reality an absurdity and an imposition on his reason, there is no telling where he will end. The reaction may be so great, indeed, as to produce an entire shipwreck of his faith. But in this case, let us not chide our poor lost brother with pride and presumption, as if we ourselves were unstained with the same sin. Let us remember, that the fault may be partly our own, as well as his. Let us remember, that the sin of not even every unwarrantable innovation, is exclusively imputable to the innovator himself. For, as Lord Bacon says, “A froward retention of customs is a great innovator.”

If those who, some centuries ago, formed the various creeds of the Christian world, were fallible men, and if they permitted serious errors to creep into the great mass of religious truth contained in those creeds, then the best way to prevent innovation is, not to preach humility and submission, but to bring those formularies into a conformity with the truth. For, if the “Old Theology” be unsound, the “New Theology” will have the audacity to show itself. And who, among the children of men, will set bounds to the progress of the human mind, either in the direction of God’s word or his work, and say, Hitherto shalt thou come, and here shall thy proud waves be stayed? Who will lash the winds into submission, or bind the raging ocean at his feet?