Chapter II: Part 2

The writer wishes to express his acknowledgments to the chief Librarian of the Bodleian, the Rev. H. O. Coxe, for his kindness in procuring for his use a few foreign works which were necessary. He avails himself also of this opportunity of expressing publicly his thanks to the same individual, for the perseverance with which he has accomplished the scheme of providing a reading-room in connection with the Bodleian Library, open to students in an evening. Those whose time and strength are spent in college or private tuition during the mornings, are thus enabled to avail themselves of the treasures of a library, which until this recent alteration was in a great degree useless to many of the most active minds and diligent students in the university.

Thanks are also due to a few other persons for their advice and courtesy in the loan of scarce books; also, in some instances, for assistance in the verification of a reference;(64) and in one case, to a distinguished scholar, for his kindness in revising one of the Notes.

The spirit in which the writer has composed the history has been stated elsewhere.(65) His work now goes forth with no extraneous claims on public attention. If it be, by the Divine blessing, the means of affording instruction, guidance, or comfort, to a single mind, the writer’s labour will be amply recompensed.

ANALYSIS OF THE LECTURES.

Lecture I.

_On the subject, method, and purpose of the course of Lectures._

The subject stated to be the struggle of the human mind against the Christian revelation, in whole or in part. (p. 1.) Explanation of the points which form the occasion of the conflict. (pp. 1-3.)

The mode of treatment, being that of a critical history, includes (p. 3) the discovery of (1) the facts, (2) the causes, and (3) the moral.

The main part of this first lecture is occupied in explaining the second of these divisions.

Importance, if the investigation were to be fully conducted, of carrying out a comparative study of religions and of the attitude of the mind in reference to all doctrine that rests on authority. (pp. 4-6.)

The idea of causes implies,

I. The law of the operation of the causes.

II. The enumeration of the causes which act according to this assumed law.

The empirical law, or formula descriptive of the action of reason on religion, is explained to be one form of the principle of progress by antagonism, the conservation or discovery of truth by means of inquiry and controversy; a merciful Providence leaving men responsible for their errors, but ultimately overruling evil for good. (p. 7.)

This great fact illustrated in the four Crises of the Christian faith in Europe, viz. In the struggle

(1) With heathen philosophy, about A.D. 160-360. (p. 8.)

(2) With sceptical tendencies in Scholasticism, in the middle ages (1100-1400). (p. 8.)

(3) With literature, at the Renaissance, in Italy (1400-1625). (p. 9.)

(4) With modern philosophy in three forms (p. 11): viz. English Deism in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries (p. 11); French Infidelity in the eighteenth century; German Rationalism in the eighteenth and nineteenth.

Proposal to study the natural as well as literary history of these forms of doubt.—The investigation separated from inquiries into heresy as distinct from scepticism. (p. 13.)

The causes, seen to act according to the law just described, which make free thought develope into unbelief, stated to be twofold. (p. 13.)

1. Emotional causes.—Necessity for showing the relation of the intellectual causes to the emotional, both per se, and because the idea of a history of thought, together with the comparative rarity of the process here undertaken, implies the restriction of the attention mainly to the intellectual. (p. 13.)

Influence of the emotional causes shown, both from psychology and from the analysis of the nature of the evidence offered in religion (pp. 14, 15).—Historical illustrations of their influence. (pp. 15-17.)

Other instances where the doubt is in origin purely intellectual (p. 17), but where nevertheless opportunity is seen for the latent operation of the emotional. (p. 18.)

Explanation how far religious doubt is sin. (pp. 19, 20.)

2. Intellectual causes, which are the chief subject of these lectures; the conjoint influence however of the emotional being always presupposed.

The intellectual causes shown to be (p. 20):

(α) the new material of knowledge which arises from the advance of the various sciences; viz. Criticism; Physical, Moral, and Ontological science. (p. 21.)

(β) the various metaphysical tests of truth or grounds of certitude employed. (p. 22.)

An illustration of the meaning (pp. 22, 23), drawn from literature, in a brief comparison of the types of thought shown in Milton, Pope, and Tennyson.

Statement of the exact position of this inquiry in the subdivisions of metaphysical science (pp. 24, 25), and detailed explanation of the advantages and disadvantages of applying to religion the tests of Sense, subjective Forms of Thought, Intuition, and Feeling, respectively; as the standard of appeal. (pp. 25-32.)

Advantage of a biographic mode of treatment in the investigation of the operation of these causes in the history of doubt. (pp. 32-34.)

Statement of the utility of the inquiry:

(1) Intellectually, (α) in a didactic and polemical point of view, in that it refers the origin of the intellectual elements in error to false philosophy and faulty modes of judging, and thus refutes error by analysing it into the causes which produce it; and also (β) in an indirect contribution to the Christian evidences by the historic study of former contests. (p. 36.)

(2) Morally, in creating deep pity for the sinner, united with hatred for the sin. (p. 36.)

Concluding remarks on the spirit which has influenced the writer in these lectures. (pp. 37, 38.)

Lecture II.

_The literary opposition of Heathens against Christianity in the early ages._

_The first of the four crises of the faith._ (pp. 39-74.) Agreement and difference of this crisis with the modern. (p. 40.) Sources for ascertaining its nature, the original writings of unbelievers being lost. (pp. 41, 42.)

Preliminary explanation of four states of belief among the heathens in reference to religion, from which opposition to Christianity would arise: (pp. 43-118) viz.

(1) the tendency to absolute disbelief of religion, as seen in Lucian and the Epicurean school. (p. 43.) (2) a reactionary attachment to the national creed,—the effect of prejudice in the lower orders, and of policy in the educated. (pp. 45, 46.) (3) the philosophical tendency, in the Stoics, (p. 44) and Neo-Platonists. (pp. 45, 46.) (4) the mystic inclination for magic rites. (p. 47.)

Detailed critical history of the successive literary attacks on Christianity. (p. 48 seq.)

1. that of Lucian, about A.D. 170, in the _Peregrinus Proteus_. (pp. 48-50.) 2. that of Celsus, about the same date. (pp. 50-55.) 3. that of Porphyry, about 270. (pp. 56-61.) 4. that of Hierocles about 303, founded on the earlier work of Philostratus respecting the life of Apollonius of Tyana. (pp. 62-64.) 5. that of Julian, A.D. 363; an example of the struggle in deeds as well as in ideas. (pp. 65-68.)

(Account of the _Philopatris_ of the Pseudo-Lucian. (p. 67.))

Conclusion; showing the relation of these attacks to the intellectual tendencies before mentioned (p. 69), and to the general intellectual causes sketched in Lect. I. (p. 69.)—Insufficiency of these causes to explain the whole phenomenon of unbelief, unless the conjoint action of emotional causes be supposed. (pp. 71, 72.)

Analogy of this early conflict to the modern. Lessons from consideration of the means by which the early Church repelled it. (pp. 72-74.)

Lecture III.

_Free Thought during the middle ages, and at the Renaissance; together with its rise in modern times._

This period embraces the second and third of the four epochs of doubt, and the commencement of the fourth. Brief outline of the events which it includes. (pp. 75, 76.)

_Second crisis_, from A.D. 1100-1400. (pp. 76-92.) It is a struggle political as well as intellectual, Ghibellinism as well as scepticism. (p. 76.)

The intellectual tendencies in this period are four:

1. The scepticism developed in the scholastic philosophy, as seen in the Nominalism of Abélard in the twelfth century. Account of the scholastic philosophy, pp. 77-80; and of Abélard as a sceptic in his treatise _Sic et Non._ (pp. 81-85.) 2. The _mot_ of progress in religion in the Franciscan book called _The Everlasting Gospel_ in the thirteenth century. (pp. 86, 87.) 3. The idea of the comparative study of religion, as seen in the legend of the book _De Tribus Impostoribus_ in the thirteenth century; and in the poetry of the period. (pp. 88, 89.) 4. The influence of the Mahometan philosophy of Averroes in creating a pantheistic disbelief of immortality. (pp. 90, 91.)

Remarks on the mode used to oppose these movements; and critical estimate of the period. (pp. 91, 92.)

_Third crisis_, from 1400-1625. (pp. 93-105.) Peculiarity of this period as the era of the Renaissance and of “Humanism,” and as the transition from mediæval society to modern. (p. 93.)

Two chief sceptical tendencies in it:

(1) The literary tendency in Tuscany and Rome in the fifteenth century; the dissolution of faith being indicated by (a) the poetry of the romantic epic. (p. 94.) (b) the revival of heathen tastes. (p. 95.)

Estimate of the political and social causes likely to generate doubt, which were then acting. (pp. 97, 98.) the unbelief was confined to Italy.—Reasons why so vast a movement as the Reformation passed without fostering unbelief. (p. 99.)

2. The philosophical tendency in the university of Padua in the sixteenth century. (p. 99 seq.) The spirit of it, pantheism (p. 100), in two forms; one arising from the doctrines of Averroes; the other seen in Pomponatius, from Alexander of Aphrodisias. (p. 101.) The relation of other philosophers, such as Bruno and Vanini, to this twofold tendency. (pp. 102-104.)

Remarks on the mode used to oppose doubt (p. 104); and estimate of the crisis. (p. 105.)

_Fourth crisis_; (pp. 105-339) commencing in the seventeenth century, through the effects of the philosophy of Bacon and Descartes. (p. 106.)

The remainder of the lecture is occupied with the treatment of the influence of Cartesianism, as seen in Spinoza.

Examination of Spinoza’s philosophy (pp. 106-110); of his criticism in the _Theologico-Politicus_ (pp. 109-113); and of his indirect influence. (p. 113, 114.)

Concluding remarks on the government of Providence, as witnessed in the history of large periods of time, such as that comprised in this lecture. (p. 115.)

Lecture IV.

_Deism in England previous to A.D. 1760._

This lecture contains the first of the three forms which doubt has taken in the fourth crisis. (p. 116.)—Sketch of the chief events, political and intellectual, which influenced the mind of England during the seventeenth century (p. 117); especial mention of the systems of Bacon and Descartes, as exhibiting the peculiarity that they were philosophies of method. (pp. 117, 118.)

The history of Deism studied:

I. Its rise traced, 1640-1700. (pp. 119-125.) In this period the religious inquiry has a political aspect, as seen (1) in Lord Herbert of Cherbury (_De Veritate_ and _Religio Laici_) in the reign of Charles I. (pp. 119, 120.) (2) In Hobbes’s _Leviathan_. (pp. 121, 122.) (3) In Blount (_Oracles of Reason_, and _Life of Apollonius_), in the reign of Charles II., in whom a deeper political antipathy to religion is seen. (pp. 123, 124.)

II. The maturity of Deism (1700-1740), pp. 125-144. This period includes (p. 127):

1. The examination of the first principles of religion, on its doctrinal side, in Toland’s _Christianity not Mysterious_, &c. (pp. 126-130.) 2. Ditto, on its ethical side, in Lord Shaftesbury. (pp. 130, 131.) 3. An attack on the external evidences, viz. On prophecy, by Collins, _Scheme of Literal Prophecy_, &c. (pp. 132-136). On Miracles, by Woolston, _Discourses on Miracles_. (pp. 136-138); and by Arnobius. (p. 143.) 4. The substitution of natural religion for revealed, in Tindal, _Christianity as old as the Creation_. (pp. 138-140.), in Morgan, _Moral Philosopher_. (pp. 140, 141.), and in Chubb, Miscellaneous Works. (pp. 142, 143.)

III. The decline of Deism, 1740-1760. (pp. 144-153): 1. in Bolingbroke, a combined view of deist objections. (pp. 143-147.) 2. in Hume, an assault on the evidence of testimony, which substantiates miracles. (pp. 147-153.)

Remarks on the peculiarities of Deism, the intellectual causes which contributed to produce it (pp. 154, 155); and a comparison of it with the unbelief of other periods. (p. 156.)

Estimate of the whole period; and consideration of the intellectual and spiritual means used for repelling unbelief in it (pp. 157-161); the former in the school of evidences, of which Butler is the type, the mention of whom leads to remarks on his _Analogy_ (pp. 157-159); and the latter in spiritual labours like those of Wesley. (pp. 160, 161.)

Lecture V.

_Infidelity in France in the eighteenth century; and unbelief in England subsequent to 1760._

INFIDELITY IN FRANCE (pp. 163-194).—This is the second phase of unbelief in the fourth crisis of faith.

Sketch of the state of France, ecclesiastical, political (pp. 164, 165,) and intellectual (partly through the philosophy of Condillac, pp. 166, 167), which created such a mental and moral condition as to allow unbelief to gain a power there unknown elsewhere.—The unbelief stated to be caused chiefly by the influence of English Deism, transplanted into the soil thus prepared. (p. 203.)

The history studied (1) in its assault on the Church; as seen in Voltaire; the analysis of whose character is necessary, because his influence was mainly due to the teacher, not the doctrine taught. (pp. 169-176.) (2) in the transition to an assault on the State, in Diderot, (pp. 179, 180); the philosophy of the Encyclopædists (p. 177); Helvetius (p. 180); and D’Holbach. (p. 181.) (3) in the attack on the State, in Rousseau (pp. 183-187).—Analysis of the _Emile_ for his views on religion, (p. 185), and comparison with Voltaire. (p. 188.) (4) in the Revolution, both the political movement and blasphemous irreligion (pp. 188, 189); and the intellectual movement in Volney (Analysis of the _Ruines_, pp. 191, 192).

Estimate of the period (pp. 193, 194).

UNBELIEF IN ENGLAND, from 1760 to a date a little later than the end of the century (pp. 194-209), continued from Lecture IV.

These later forms of it stated to differ slightly from the former, by being partially influenced by French thought. (p. 195.)

The following instances of it examined:

(1) Gibbon viewed as a writer and a critic on religion (pp. 196-199). (2) T. Paine: account of his _Age of Reason_ (pp. 199-201). (3) The socialist philosophy of R. Owen (p. 202). (4) The scepticism in the poetry of Byron and Shelley (pp. 203-207).

The last two forms of unbelief, though occurring in the present century, really embody the spirit of the last.

Statement of the mode used to meet the doubt in England during this period. Office of the Evidences (pp. 207-209).

Lecture VI.

_Free Thought in the Theology of Germany, from 1750-1835._

This is the third phase of free thought in that which was called the fourth crisis of faith.—Importance of the movement, which is called “rationalism,” as the theological phase of the literary movement of Germany (p. 210).—Deviation from the plan previously adopted, in that a sketch is here given of German theological inquiry generally, and not merely of unbelief (p. 211).

Brief preliminary sketch of German theology since the Reformation. Two great tendencies shown in it during the seventeenth century (p. 211).

(1) The dogmatic and scholastic, science without earnestness (p. 212). (2) The pietistic, earnestness without science (p. 213).

In the first half of the eighteenth century, three new influences are introduced (pp. 213, 214), which are the means of creating rationalism in the latter half: viz.

(α) The philosophy of Wolff, explained to be a formal expression of Leibnitz’s principles; and the evil effect of it, accidental and indirect (pp. 214-216). (β) The works of the English deists (p. 216). (γ) The influence of the colony of French infidels at the court of Frederick II. of Prussia (p. 217).

The subsequent history is studied in three periods (p. 218); viz.

PERIOD I. (1750-1810).—Destructive in character, inaugurated by Semler (pp. 218-234). PERIOD II. (1810-1835).—Reconstructive in character, inaugurated by Schleiermacher (pp. 239-261). PERIOD III. (1835 to present time)—Exhibiting definite and final tendencies, inaugurated by Strauss (Lect. VII).

PERIOD I. (1750-1810), is studied under two Sub-periods:

Sub-period I. (1750-1790, pp. 219-228), which includes three movements; (1) Within the church (p. 219 seq.); dogmatic; literary in Michaelis and Ernesti; and freethinking in Semler (pp. 221-224), the author of the historic method of interpretation. (2) External to the church (pp. 224-226); literary deism in Lessing, and in the Wolfenbüttel fragments of Reimarus (p. 225). (3) External to the church; practical deism, in the educational institutions of Basedow (p. 227).

Sub-period II. (1790-1810, pp. 227-234); the difference caused by the introduction of two new influences; viz,

(α) The literary, of the court of Weimar and of the great men gathered there (p. 228). (β) The philosophy of Kant, (the effect of which is explained, pp. 229, 230); the home of both of which was at Jena.

As the result of these new influences, three movements are visible in the Church (p. 230); viz,

(1) The critical “rationalism” of Eichhorn and Paulus, the intellectual successors of Semler (pp. 231, 232). (2) The dogmatic, more or less varying from orthodoxy, seen towards the end of this period in Bretschneider, Röhr, and Wegscheider (pp. 233, 234). (3) The supernaturalism of Reinhardt and Storr (p. 231).

PERIOD II. (1810-1835.)—Introduction of four new influences (p. 235), which completely altered the theological tone; viz. (α) New systems of speculative philosophy; of Jacobi, who followed out the _material_ element of Kant’s philosophy (p. 235); and of Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, who followed out the _formal_ (p. 238). (β) The “romantic” school of poetry (p. 239). (γ) The moral tone, generated by the liberation wars of 1813. (p. 240.) (δ) The excitement caused by the theses of Harms at the tercentenary of the Reformation in 1817. (pp. 240, 241.)

The result of these is seen (p. 241) in

(1) An improved doctrinal school under Schleiermacher (pp. 241-250), (description of his _Glaubenslehre_, p. 245 seq.); and under his successors, Neander, &c. (pp. 250-252.) (2) An improved critical tone (p. 252 seq.) as seen in De Wette and Ewald, which is illustrated by an explanation of the Pentateuch controversy (pp. 254-258).

Concluding notice of two other movements to be treated in the next lecture (p. 259); viz.

(1) an attempt, different from that of Schleiermacher, in the school of Hegel, to find a new philosophical basis for Christianity; and (2) the return to the biblical orthodoxy of the Lutheran church.

Remarks on the benevolence of Providence in overruling free inquiry to the discovery of truth. (pp. 259-261).

Lecture VII.

_Free Thought in Germany subsequently to 1835; and in France during the present century._

FREE THOUGHT IN GERMANY (continued).—History of the transition from Period II. named in the last lecture, to Period III. (pp. 262-274.)

Explanation of the attempt, noticed pp. 242, 259, of the Hegelian school to find a philosophy of Christianity. Critical remarks on Hegel’s system, (pp. 263-267-267); its tendency to create an “ideological” spirit in religion (p. 264):—the school which it at first formed is seen best in Marheinecke. (p. 265.)

The circumstance which created an epoch in German theology was the publication of Strauss’s _Leben Jesu_ in 1835 (p. 266). Description of it (α) in its critical aspect (pp. 267, 270), which leads to an explanation of the previous discussions in Germany concerning the origin and credibility of the Gospels (pp. 268, 269); and (β) in its philosophical, as related to Hegel (p. 270); together with an analysis of the work (p. 271). Statement of the effects produced by it on the various theological parties. (pp. 272, 273.)

PERIOD III. As the result of the agitation caused by Strauss’s work, four theological tendencies are seen; viz.

(1) One external to the church, thoroughly antichristian, as in Bruno Bauer, Feuerbach, and Stirner. (pp. 274-276.) (2) The historico-critical school of Tübingen, founded by Chr. Bauer. (pp. 277-279.) (3) The “mediation” school, seen in Dorner and Rothe, (pp. 279-282.) (4) A return to the Lutheran orthodoxy, (pp. 282-285,) at first partly created by an attempt to unite the Lutheran and Reformed churches, (p. 282); seen in the “Neo-Lutheranism” of Hengstenberg and Hävernick, (p. 282), and the “Hyper-Lutheranism” of Stahl and the younger members of the school. (pp. 283, 285.)

Mention of the contemporaneous increase of spiritual life in Germany. (p. 285.)

Concluding estimate of the whole movement, (pp. 286, 287); and lessons for students in reference to it. (pp. 288, 289.)

FREE THOUGHT IN FRANCE during the present century (pp. 290-305), (continued from Lect. IV. p. 194.)

In its tone it is constructive of belief, if compared with that of the eighteenth century.

From 1800-1852.

The speculative thought has exhibited four distinct forms. (p. 290.)

(1) The ideology of De Tracy, in the early part of the century. (2) The theological school of De Maistre, &c. to re-establish the dogmatic authority of the Romish church. (3) Socialist philosophy, St. Simon, Fourier, Comte. (4) The Eclectic school (Cousin, &c.)

Remarks on the first school.—The recovery of French philosophy and thought from the ideas of this school, partly due to the literary tone of Chateaubriand. (pp. 290, 291.)

Influence of the Revolution of 1830 in giving a stimulus to thought. (p. 291.)

Remarks on the third school.—Explanation of socialism as taught by St. Simon (pp. 292, 293); as taught by Fourier (pp. 293, 294); and difference from English socialism. (p. 294.)

Positivism, both as an offshoot of the last school, and in itself as a religion and a philosophy. (pp. 295, 296.)

Remarks on the fourth school.—Eclecticism as taught by Cousin, viewed as a philosophy and a religion. (pp. 297-299.)

Remarks on the second school; viewed as an attempt to refute the preceding schools. (p. 300.)

From 1852-1862.

New form of eclecticism under the empire (p. 302), viz. the historic method, based on Hegel, as Cousin’s was based on Schelling.—E. Renan the type. (pp. 302-304.)

Free thought in the Protestant church (pp. 304, 305) regarded as an attempt to meet by concession doubts of contemporaries.

Lecture VIII.

_Free Thought in England in the present century: Summary of the Course of Lectures: and Inferences in reference to present dangers and duties._

MODERN UNBELIEF IN ENGLAND (continued from Lect V.):—Introductory remarks on the alteration of its tone. (pp. 306, 307.)—The cause of which is stated to be a general one, the subjective tone created (p. 308) by such influences as, (1) the modern poetry (p. 309), and (2) the two great attempts by Bentham and Coleridge to reconstruct philosophy. (pp. 309, 310.)

The doubt and unbelief treated in the following order (p. 311):

(1) That which appeals to Sensational experience and to Physical science as the test of truth; viz. (α) Positivism among the educated (p. 312). (β) Secularism or Naturalism among the masses (p. 313); and in a minor degree, (γ) The doubts created by Physical science (p. 314). (2) That which appeals to the faculty of Intuition (p. 315);—expressed in literature, by Carlyle, (pp. 316, 317); and by the American, Emerson. (p. 317.) Influence also of the modern literature of romance, (p. 318.) (3) Direct attacks on Christianity, critical rather than philosophical: viz. (α) The examination of the historic problem of the development of religious ideas among the Hebrews, by R. W. Mackay (pp. 319, 320). (β) A summary of objections to revelation, by Mr. Greg, _The Creed of Christendom_ (p. 321). (γ) The examination of the psychical origin of religion and Christianity, by Miss S. Hennell, _Thoughts in aid of Faith_, (p. 323.) (4) The deism, and appeal to the Intuitional consciousness, expressed by Mr. Theodore Parker (pp. 325, 326), and Mr. F. Newman (pp. 326-329). (5) The traces of free thought within the Christian church (p. 330); viz.: (α) The philosophical tendency which originates with Coleridge. (pp. 330-333.) (β) The critical tendency, investigating the facts of revelation. (pp. 334-336.) (γ) The critical tendency, the literature which contains it. (pp. 336, 337.)

This completes the history of the fourth crisis of faith (p. 339), the history of which began near the end of Lect. III. at p. 105.

SUMMARY of the course of lectures. (pp. 339-41.)—Recapitulation of the original purpose, which is stated to have been, while assuming the potency of the moral, to analyse the intellectual causes of doubt, which have been generally left uninvestigated.

Refutation of objections which might be made; such as

(1) One directed against the utility of the inquiry. (p. 342.) (2) One directed against its uncontroversial character.

A critical history shown to be useful in the present age, (1) in an educational point of view for those who are to be clergymen, and to encounter current forms of doubt by word or by writing (pp. 342-345); and (2) in a controversial point of view, by resolving the intellectual element in many cases of unbelief into incorrect metaphysical philosophy; the value of which inquiry is real, even if such intellectual causes be regarded only as the conditions, and not the causes, of unbelief. (p. 345.)

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Further objections anticipated and refuted in reference (3) to the candour of the mode of inquiry, and the absence of vituperation which is stated not to be due to indifference to Christian truth, but wholly to the demands of a scientific mode of treatment (p. 346); (4) to the absence of an eager advocacy of any particular metaphysical theory; which is due to the circumstance that the purpose was to exhibit errors as logical corollaries from certain theories, without assuming the necessary existence of these corollaries in actual life (p. 347); (5) to the insufficiency of the causes enumerated to produce doubt without taking account of the moral causes; which objection is not only admitted, but shown to be at once the peculiar property which belongs to the analysis of intellectual phenomena, and also a witness to the instinctive conviction that the ultimate cause of belief and unbelief is moral, not intellectual; which had been constantly assumed. (p. 347.)

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THE LESSONS derived from the whole historical survey. (p. 348 seq.)

I. What has been the office of doubt in history? (p. 348.)

Opposite opinions on this subject stated. (p. 348.) Examination of the ordinary Christian opinion on the one hand, which regards it as a mischief (p. 348), and of Mr. Buckle’s on the other, which regards it as a good. (p. 349.)

1. The office is shown to be, to bring all truths to the test. (p. 349.) Historical instances of its value in destroying the Roman catholic errors. (p. 350.)

2. Free inquiry also shown in some cases to be forced on man by the presentation of new knowledge, which demands consideration. (p. 350.) Denial of the statement that the doubts thus created are an entire imitation of older doubt. (p. 352.)

3. The office of it in the hands of Providence to elicit truth by the very controversies which it creates (p. 352); the responsibility of the inquirer not being destroyed, but the overruling providence of God made visible. (p. 353.)

II. What does the history teach, as to the doubts most likely to present themselves at this time, and the best modes of meeting them? (p. 353.)

The materials shown to be presented for a final answer to these questions. (p. 354.)

The probability shown from consideration of the state of the various sciences, mechanical, physiological (p. 355), and mental (p. 355), that no new difficulties can be suggested hereafter, distinct in _kind_ from the present; nor any unknown kinds of evidence presented on behalf of Christianity.

Analogy of the present age as a whole, in disintegration of belief, to the declining age of Roman civilization. (p. 356.)

The doubts which beset us in the present age stated to be chiefly three (p. 357), viz.:

1. The relation of the natural to the supernatural. This doubt is sometimes expressed in a spirit of utter unbelief; sometimes in a tone of sadness (p. 358), arising from mental struggles, of which some are enumerated (p. 358). The intellectual and moral means of meeting these doubts. (p. 359.)

2. The relation of the atoning work of Christ to the human race. (p. 360.) Explanation of the defective view which would regard it only as reconciling man to God, and would destroy the priestly work of Christ; and statement of the modes in which its advocates reconcile it with Christianity. (p. 361.)

The importance that such doubts be answered by reason, not merely silenced by force. (p. 362.)

An answer sought by studying the various modes used in other ages of the church (p. 362); especially by those who have had to encounter the like difficulties, e.g. the Alexandrian fathers in the third century, and the faithful in Germany in the present. (p. 363.)

This method shown to have been to present the philosophical prior to the historical evidence, in order to create the sense of religious want, before exhibiting Christianity as the divine supply for it. (p. 364.)

In regard to the historic evidence, three misgivings of the doubter require to be met for his full satisfaction (p. 366); viz.

(α) The literary question of the trustworthiness of the books of the New Testament.

The mode of meeting this explained, with the possibility of establishing Christian dogmas, even if the most extravagant rationalism were for argument’s sake conceded. (p. 367.)

(β) The doubt whether the Christian dogmas, and especially the atonement, are really taught in the New Testament. The value of the fathers, and the progress of the doctrine in church history, shown in reference to this question. (p. 368.)

(γ) The final difficulty which the doubter may put, whether even apostolic and miraculous teaching is to overrule the moral sense. (p. 369.)

The possibility shown of independent corroboration of the apostolic teaching, in the testimony of the living church, and the experience of religious men. (p. 371.)

The utter improbability of error in this part of scriptural teaching, even if the existence of error elsewhere were for argument’s sake conceded. (p. 370.)

Difference of this appeal from that of Schleiermacher to the Christian consciousness.

3. The relation of the Bible to the church, whether it is a record or an authority. (p. 372.)

Statement of the modes of viewing the question in different ages. (p. 373.)

The Bible an authority; but the importance shown of using wisdom in not pressing the difficulties of scripture on an inquirer, so as to quench incipient faith. (p. 374.)

The mention of the emotional causes of doubt conjoined with the intellectual, a warning that, in addition to all arguments, the help of the divine Spirit to hallow the emotions must be sought and expected. (p. 375.)

Final lesson to Christian students, that in all ages of peril, earnest men have found the truth by the method of study united to prayer. (pp. 376-379.)

LECTURE I. ON THE SUBJECT, METHOD, AND PURPOSE OF THE COURSE OF LECTURES.

LUKE vii. 51.

_Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you,
nay; but rather division._

The present course of lectures relates to one of the conflicts exhibited in the history of the Church; viz. the struggle of the human spirit to free itself from the authority of the Christian faith.

Christianity offers occasion for opposition by its inherent claims, independently of accidental causes. For it asserts authority over religious belief in virtue of being a supernatural communication from God, and claims the right to control human thought in virtue of possessing sacred books which are at once the record and the instrument of this communication, written by men endowed with supernatural inspiration. The inspiration of the writers is transferred to the books, the matter of which, so far as it forms the subject of the revelation, is received as true because divine, not merely regarded as divine because perceived to be true. The religion, together with the series of revelations of which it is the consummation, differs in kind from ethnic religions, and from human philosophy; and the sacred literature differs in kind from other books. Each is unique, a solitary miracle of its class in human history.

The contents also of the sacred books bring them into contact with the efforts of speculative thought. Though at first glance they might seem to belong to a different sphere, that of the soul rather than the intellect, and to possess a different function, explaining duties rather than discovering truth; yet in deep problems of physical or moral history, such as Providence, Sin, Reconciliation, they supply materials for limiting belief in the very class of subjects which is embraced in the compass of human philosophy.

A conflict accordingly might naturally be anticipated, between the reasoning faculties of man and a religion which claims the right on superhuman authority to impose limits on the field or manner of their exercise; the intensity of which at various epochs would depend, partly upon the amount of critical activity, and partly on the presence of causes which might create a divergence between the current ideas and those supplied by the sacred literature.

The materials are wanting for detecting traces of this struggle in other parts of the world than Europe; but the progress of it may be fully observed in European history, altering concomitantly with changes in the condition of knowledge, or in the methods of seeking it; at first as an open conflict, philosophical or critical, with the literary pagans, subsiding as Christianity succeeded in introducing its own conceptions into every region of thought; afterwards reviving in the middle ages, and gradually growing more intense in modern times as material has been offered for it through the increase of knowledge or the activity of speculation; varying in name, in form, in degree, but referable to similar causes, and teaching similar lessons.

It is the chief of these movements of free thought in Europe which it is my purpose to describe, in their historic succession and their connection with intellectual causes.

We must ascertain the facts; discover the causes; and read the moral. These three inquiries, though distinct in idea, cannot be disjoined in a critical history. The facts must first be presented in place and time: the history is thus far a mere chronicle. They must next be combined with a view to interpretation. Yet in making this first combination, taste guides more than hypothesis. The classification is artistic rather than logical, and merely presents the facts with as much individual vividness as is compatible with the preservation of the perspective requisite in the general historic picture. At this point the artistic sphere of history ceases, and the scientific commences as soon as the mind searches for any regularity or periodicity in the occurrence of the facts, such as may be the effect of fixed causes. If an empirical law be by this means ascertained to exist, an explanation of it must then be sought in the higher science which investigates mind. Analysis traces out the ultimate typical forms of thought which are manifested in it; and if it does not aspire to arbitrate on their truth, it explains how they have become grounds on which particular views have been assumed to be true. The intellect is then satisfied, and the science of history ends. But the heart still craves a further investigation. It demands to view the moral and theological aspects of the subject, to harmonize faith and discovery, or at least to introduce the question of human responsibility, and reverently to search for the final cause which the events subserve in the moral purposes of providence. The drama of history must not develope itself without the chorus to interpret its purpose. The artistic,—the scientific,—the ethical,—these are the three phases of history. (1)

The chief portion of the present lecture will be devoted to explain the mode of applying the plan just indicated; more especially to develop the second of these three branches, by stating the law which has marked the struggle of free thought with Christianity, and illustrating the intellectual causes which have been manifested in it.

In searching for such a law, or such causes, we ought not to forget that, if we wished to lay a sound basis for generalization, it would be necessary not to restrict our attention to the history of Christianity, but to institute a comparative study of religions, ethnic or revealed, in order to trace the action of reason in the collective religious history of the race. Whether the religions of nature be regarded as the distortion of primitive traditions, or as the spontaneous creation of the religious faculties, the agreement or contrast suggested by a comparison of them with the Hebrew and Christian religions, which are preternaturally revealed, is most important as a means of discovering the universal laws of the human mind; the exceptional character which belongs to the latter member of the comparison increasing rather than diminishing the value of the study. All alike are adjusted, the one class naturally and accidentally, the other designedly and supernaturally, to the religious elements of human nature. All have a subjective existence as aspirations of the heart, an objective as institutions, and a history which is connected with the revolutions of literature and society. (2)

Comparative observation of this kind gives some approach to the exactness of experiment; for we watch providence as it were executing an experiment for our information, which exhibits the operations of the same law under altered circumstances. If, for example, we should find that Christianity was the only religion, the history of which presented a struggle of reason against authority, we should pronounce that there must be peculiar elements in it which arouse the special opposition; or if the phenomenon be seen to be common to all creeds, but to vary in intensity with the activity of thought and progress of knowledge, this discovery would suggest to us the existence of a law of the human mind.

Such a study would also furnish valuable data for determining precisely the variation of form which alteration of conditions causes in the development of such a struggle. In the East, the history of religion, for which material is supplied by the study of the Zend and Sanskrit literature, (3) would furnish examples of attempts made by philosophers to find a rational solution of the problems of the universe, and to adjust the theories of speculative thought to the national creed deposited in supposed sacred books. And though, in a western nation such as Greece, the separation of religion from philosophy was too wide to admit of much parallel in the speculative aspect of free thought, yet in reference to the critical, many instances of the application of an analogous process to a national creed may be seen in the examination made of the early mythology, the attempt to rationalize it by searching for historical data in it, or to moralize it by allegory.(66) Again, within the sphere of the Hebrew religion which, though supernaturally suggested, developed in connexion with human events so as to admit the possibility of the rise of mental difficulties in the progress of its history, how much hallowed truth, both theoretical and practical, might be learned from the divine breathings of pious inquirers, such as the sacred authors of the seventy-third Psalm, or of the books of Job and Ecclesiastes, which give expression to painful doubts about Providence, not fully solved by religion, but which nevertheless faith was willing to leave unexplained.(67) If in the Oriental systems free thought is seen to operate on a national creed by adjusting it to new ideas through philosophical dogmatism; if in the Greek by explaining it away through scepticism; in the Hebrew it is hushed by the holier logic of the feelings. The two former illustrate steps in the intellectual progress of free thought; the last exhibits the moral lesson of resignation and submission in the soul of the inquirer.

Nor ought this method of comparison to be laid aside even at this point. It would be requisite, for a full discovery of the intellectual causes that the generalization should be carried further, and the operations of free thought watched in reference to other subjects than religion.(68) Reason in its action, first on Christianity both in Europe and elsewhere, secondly on Jewish and heathen religions, lastly on any body of truth which rests on traditional authority,—these would be the scientific steps necessary for eliminating accidental phenomena, and discovering the real laws which have operated in this branch of intellectual history. The suggestion of such a plan of study, though obviously too large to be here pursued, may offer matter of thought to reflective minds, and may at least help to raise the subject out of the narrow sphere to which it is usually supposed to belong. The result of the survey would confirm the view of the struggle now about to be given which is suggested by European history.

When any new material of thought, such as a new religion which interferes with the previous standard of belief, is presented to the human mind; or when conversely any alteration in the state of knowledge on which the human mind forms its judgment, imparts to an old established religion an aspect of opposition which was before unperceived; the religion is subjected to the ordeal of an investigation. Science examines the doctrines taught by it, criticism the evidence on which they profess to rest, and the literature which is their expression. And if such an investigation fail to establish the harmony of the old and the new, the result takes two forms: either the total rejection of the particular religion, and sometimes even of the supernatural generally, or else an eclecticism which seeks by means of philosophy to discover and appropriate the hidden truth to which the religion was an attempt to give expression.

The attack however calls forth the defence. Accordingly the result of this action and reaction is to produce scientific precision, either apologetic or dogmatic, within the religious system, and scepticism outside of it; both reconstructive in purpose, but the former defensive in its method, the latter destructive. The elements of truth which exist on both sides are brought to light by the controversy, and after the struggle has passed become the permanent property of the world.

These statements, which convey a general expression for the influence of free thought in relation to religion, are verified in the history of Christianity.

There are four epochs at which the struggle of reason against the authority of the Christian religion has been especially manifest, each characterized by energy and intensity of speculative thought, and exhibiting on the one hand partial or entire unbelief, or on the other a more systematic expression of Christian doctrine; epochs in fact of temporary peril, of permanent gain.(69)

In the first of these periods, extending from the second to the fourth century, Christianity is seen in antagonism with forms of Greek or Eastern philosophy, and the existence is apparent of different forms of scepticism or reason used in attack. The very attempt of the Alexandrian school of theology to adjust the mysteries of Christianity and of the Bible to speculative thought, by a well meant but extravagant use of allegorical interpretation, is itself a witness of the presence or pressure of free thought. The less violent of the two forms of unbelief is seen in the Gnostics, the rationalists of the early Church, who summoned Christianity to the bar of philosophy, and desired to appropriate the portion of its teachings which approved itself to their eclectic tastes; the more violent kind in the rejection of Christianity as an imposture, or in the attempts made to refer its origin to psychological causes, on the part of the early enemies of Christianity, Celsus and Julian, prototypes of the positive unbelievers of later times. The Greek theology, which embodied the dogmatic statements in which the Christian Church under the action of controversy gave explicit expression to its implicit belief, is the example of the stimulus which the pressure of free thought gave to the use of reason in defence.

As we pass down the course of European history, the Pagan literature which had suggested the first attack disappears: but as soon as the elements of civilization, which survived the deluge that overwhelmed the Roman empire, had been sufficiently consolidated to allow of the renewal of speculation, a repetition of the contest may be observed.

The revived study of the Greek philosophers, and of their Arabic commentators introduced from the Moorish universities of Spain, with the consequent rise of the scholastic philosophy in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, furnished material for a renewal of the struggle of reason against authority, a second crisis in the history of the Church. The history of it becomes complicated by the circumstance that free thought, in the process of disintegrating the body of authoritative teaching, now began to assume on several occasions a new shape, a kind of incipient Protestantism. Doubting neither Christianity nor the Bible, it is seen to challenge merely that part of the actual religion which, as it conceived, had insinuated itself from human sources in the lapse of ages. Accordingly, the critical independence of Nominalism, in a mind like that of Abélard, represents the destructive action of free thought, partly as early Protestantism, partly as scepticism; while the series of noted Realists, of which Aquinas is an example, that tried anew to adjust faith to science, and thus created the Latin theology, represents the defensive action of reason. The imparting scientific definition to the immemorial doctrines of the Church constituted the defence.

In the later middle ages, however, philosophy gradually succeeded in emancipating itself so entirely from theology, that when the Renaissance came, and a large body of heathen thought was introduced into the current of European life by means of ancient literature, a third crisis occurred. The independence passed into open revolt, and, fostered by political confusion and material luxury, expressed itself in a literature of unbelief.

The mental awakening which had commenced in art and extended to literature paved the way for a spiritual awakening. The Reformation itself, though the product of a deep consciousness of spiritual need, an emancipation of soul as well as mind, is nevertheless a special instance of the same dissolution of mediæval life, and must therefore be regarded as belonging to the same general movement of free thought, though not to that sceptical form of it which comes within the field of our investigation. For Protestantism, though it be scepticism in respect of the authority of the traditional teaching of the Church, yet reposes implicitly on an outward authority revealed in the sacred books of holy Scripture, and restricts the exercise of freedom within the limits prescribed by this authority; whereas scepticism proper is an insurrection against the outward authority or truth of the inspired books, and reposes on the unrevealed, either on consciousness or on science. The one is analogous to a school of art which desires to reform itself by the use of ancient models; the other to one which professes to return to an unassisted study of nature. The spiritual earnestness which characterized the Reformation prevented the changes in religious belief from developing into scepticism proper; and the theology of the Reformation is accordingly an example of defence and reconstruction as well as of revulsion.

During the century which followed, mental activity found employment in other channels in connexion with the political struggles which resulted from the religious changes. But the seventeenth age was another of those epochs which form crises in the history of the human mind. The reconstruction at that time of the methods on which science depends, by Bacon from the empirical side, by Descartes from the intellectual, created as great a revolution in knowledge as the Renaissance had produced in literature or the Reformation in religion; and a body of materials was presented from which philosophers ventured to criticise the Bible and the dogmatic teaching of the Church. This fourth great period of free thought, which extends to the present time, has been marked by more striking events than former ones.(70) Though the movement relates to a similar sphere, the history is rendered more complex by union with literature, and connexion as cause or effect with social changes, as well as by the reciprocal operation of its influence in different countries. Language, which is always a record of opinion, popular or scientific,(71) classifies the forms of this last great movement of free thought under three names, viz. Deism in England in the early part of the eighteenth century; Infidelity in France in the latter part of it; and Rationalism in Germany in the nineteenth; movements which exhibit characteristics respectively of the three nations, and of their intellectual and general history. English Deism, the product of the reasoning spirit which was stimulated by political events, directed itself against the special revelation of Christianity from the stand-point of the religion of natural reason, and ran a course parallel with the gradual emancipation of the individual from the power of the state. French infidelity, breathing the spirit of materialist philosophy, halted not till it brought its devotees even to atheism, and mingled itself with the great movements of political revolution, which ultimately reconstituted French society. German Rationalism, empirical or spiritual,(72) in two parallel developments, the philosophical and the literary, neither coldly denied Christianity with the practical doubts of the English deists, nor flippantly denounced it as imposture with the trenchant and undiscriminating logic of the French infidels; but appreciating its beauty with the freshness of a poetical genius, and regarding it as one phase of the religious consciousness, endeavoured, by means of the methods employed in secular learning, to collect the precious ideas of eternal truth to which Christianity seemed to it to give expression, and by means of speculative criticism to exhibit the literary and psychological causes which it supposed had overlaid them with error.

Nor has the activity of reason used in defence been less manifest in these later movements. The great works on the Christian evidences are the witness to its presence; and the deeper and truer appreciation of Christianity now shown in every country, and the increasing interest felt in religion, are the indirect effect, under the guidance of divine Providence, of the stirring of the religious apprehension by controversy.(73)

We have thus at once exhibited the province which will be hereafter investigated in detail, and stated the general law observable in the conflict between free thought and Christianity. The type reappears, perpetuated by the fixity of mind, though the form varies under the force of circumstances. Christianity being stationary and authoritative, thought progressive and independent, the causes which stimulate the restlessness of the latter interrupt the harmony which ordinarily exists between belief and knowledge, and produce crises during which religion is re-examined. Disorganization is the temporary result; theological advance the subsequent. Whatever is evil is eliminated in the conflict; whatever is good is retained. Under the overruling of a beneficent Providence, antagonism is made the law of human progress.

The restriction of our inquiry to the consideration of the free action of reason will cause our attention to be almost entirely confined to the operation of reason in its attack on Christianity, to the neglect of the evidences which the other office of it has presented in defence; and will also exclude altogether the study of struggles, where the opposition to Christianity has rested on an appeal to the authority of rival sacred books; such for example as the conflict with rival religions like the Jewish (4) or Mahometan (5); as well as of heresies which, like the Socinian (6), claim, however unjustly, to rest on the authority of the Christian revelation.

The law thus sketched of this struggle needs fuller explanation. We must employ a more exact analysis to gain a conception of the causes which have operated at different periods to make free thought develop into unbelief.

It will be obvious that the causes must depend, either upon the nature of the Christian religion, which is the subject, or of the mind of man, which is the agent of attack. The former were touched upon in the opening remarks of this lecture, and may be reconsidered hereafter;(74) but it is necessary to gain a general view of the latter before treating them in their application in future lectures.

These causes, so far as they are spiritual and disconnected from admixture with political circumstances, may be stated to be of two kinds, viz. intellectual and moral; the intellectual explaining the types of thought, the moral the motives which have from time to time existed.(75) The actions, and generally the opinions of a human being, are the complex result arising from the union of both. Yet the two elements, though closely intertwined in a concrete instance, can be apprehended separately as objects of abstract thought; and the forms of manifestation and mode of operation peculiar to each can be separately traced.

In a history of thought, the antagonism created by the intellect rather than by the heart seems the more appropriate subject of study, and will be almost exclusively considered in these lectures. Nevertheless a brief analysis must be here given of the mode in which the moral is united with the intellectual in the formation of opinions. This is the more necessary, lest we should seem to commit the mistake of ignoring the existence or importance of the emotional element, if the restriction of our point of view to the intellectual should hereafter prevent frequent references to it.