Page images
PDF
EPUB
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small]

The one virtue reguntes our actress other improves our heart and ens. La is equally necefiary to the name of the works. Juftice is the pilar ma pole the vort func of human fociety. Merry s the penal 12, which cheers and warms the abitations of men. The perfection of our focm caracter confits in properly tempering the tyre wat one another; in holding that middle corrit, which admits of our being jut, without being rigid; and allows us to be generous, without being urjuf.

THE

CHRISTIANITY RATIONAL,

HE doctrines of the Chriftian religion are rational and pure. All that it has revealed concerning the perfections of God, his moral government and laws, the deftination of man, and the rewards and punishments of a future ftate, is perfectly confonant to the most enlightened reason. In fome articles which tranfcend the limits of our present faculties, as in what relates to the effence of the Godhead, the fallen ftate of mankind, and their redemption by Jefus Chrift, its doctrines may appear myfterious and dark.

Against

Against these the fcoffer has often directed his attacks, as if whatever could not be explained by us, ought upon that account to be exploded as abfurd.

It is unneceffary to enter, at prefent, on any particular defence of thefe doctrines, as there is one obfervation which, if duly weighed, is fufficient to filence the cavils of the fcoffer. Is he not compelled to admit, that the whole fyftem of nature around him is full of mystery? What reason, then, had he to fuppofe, that the doctrines of revelation, proceeding from the fame author, were to contain no myfterious obfcurity? All that is requifite for the conduct of life, both in nature and in religion, divine wisdom has rendered obvious to all. As nature has afforded us fufficient information concerning what is neceffary for our food, our accommodation, and our fafety; fo religion has plainly instructed us in our duty towards God, and our neighbour. But as foon as we attempt to rise towards objects that lie beyond our immediate sphere of action, our curiosity is checked; and darkness meets us on every fide. What the effence is of those material bodies which we fee and handle; how a feed grows up into a tree; how man is formed in the womb; or how the mind acts upon the body, after it is formed; are mysteries of which we can give no more account, than of the most

obfcure

obfcure and difficult parts of revelation. We are obliged to admit the existence of the fact, though the explanation of it exceeds our faculties.

After the fame manner, in natural religion, queftions arife concerning the creation of the world from nothing, the origin of evil under the government of a perfect Being, and the confiftency of human liberty with divine prescience, which are of as intricate nature, and of as difficult folution, as any queftions in Chriftian theology. We may plainly fee, that we are not admitted into the fecrets of Providence, any more than into the mysteries of the Godhead. In all his ways, the Almighty is a God that hideth himfelf. He maketh darkness his pavilion. He holdeth back the face of his throne; and spreadeth a thick cloud upon it.-Instead of its being any objection to revelation, that fome of its doctrines are myfterious, it would be much more strange and unaccountable, if no fuch doctrines were found in it. Had every thing in the Christian system been perfectly level to our capacities, this might rather have given ground to a suspicion, of its not proceeding from God; fince it would have been then fo unlike to what we find, both in the system of the universe, and in the fyftem of natural religion. Whereas, according as matters now ftand, the gospel has the fame features, the fame general

character,

with the other two, which are acknowledged to be of divine origin; plain and comprehenfible, in what relates to practice; dark and mysterious, in what relates to fpeculation and belief.

THO

RELIGIOUS WORSHIP.

HOUGHTLESS as the bulk of men are,. and attached only to objects which they fee around them, this principle has never been extinguished in their breasts, that to the great Parent of the human race, the univerfal, though invifible, benefactor of the world, not only internal reverence, but external homage, is due. Whether he need that homage or not, is not the queftion. It is what, on our part, we undoubtedly owe; and the heart is, with reafon, held to be bafe, which ftifles the emotions of gratitude to a benefactor, how independent foever he may be of any returns. True virtue always prompts a public declaration of the grateful fentiments which it feels; and glories in expreffing them. - Accordingly, over all the earth, crowds of worfhippers have affembled to adore, in various forms, the Ruler of the world. In these adorations, the philofopher, the favage, and the faint, have equally joined. None but the cold and un

feeling

feeling can look up to that beneficent Being, who is at the head of the univerfe, without fome inclination to pray, or to praise. In vain, therefore, would the fcoffer deride what the loud voice of nature demands and juftifies. He erects himself against the general and declared fenfe of the hu

man race.

HE

THE SCOFFER.

E who treats facred things with any degree of levity and scorn, is acting the part, perhaps without his feeing or knowing it, of a public enemy to fociety. He is precifely the madman defcribed in the book of Proverbs, who cafteth firebrands, arrows, and death; and faith, am I not in fport? We shall hear him, at times, complain loudly of the undutifulness of children, of the dishonesty of fervants, of the tumults and infolence of the lower ranks; while he himself is, in a great measure, refponsible for the disorders of which he complains. By the example which he fets of contempt for religion, he becomes acceffary to the manifold crimes, which that contempt occafions among others. By his fcoffing at facred institutions, he is encouraging the rabble to uproar and violence; he is emboldening

« PreviousContinue »