# Our New Departure (Brooks)/Chapter 20

Herewith ends this plea for Our New Departure. Its original design included several other topics. Especially was it desired to have a chapter each on Our Relations to Other Churches, on Unbelief, and on Some Serious Questions touching the fact that, through social influences and other causes, so many of our youth have been, and are being, lost to us. But the topics could not be at all properly treated without swelling these pages beyond the limits assigned them. The field we have traversed, however, is a broad one—perhaps, for the present, sufficiently broad. Who, indeed, that has gone over it through these successive chapters, looking back upon it, can doubt that the New Departure herein suggested, could it take place at the several points indicated, all along the line of our thought, our work and our Church life, would give us, not only a spiritual awakening and impulse, but a commanding hold upon popular attention and sympathy, and a consequent practical efficiency, that would speedily make our Church the livest and mightiest agency for Christ, and for the arrest and conversion of souls, at present asserting itself in the world?
And now, reviewing these pages, and considering how this labor can be most fittingly closed, three words occur to me as best summing up what further needs to be said: Candor; Loyalty; Ignition.
I. The first of these words—Candor—indicates the mental attitude and state of feeling towards us, which we have a right henceforth to demand and expect on the part of those who regard Universalism as false,—the New Departure to which they are called in respect to us. We make no complaint that our neighbors and friends disbelieve and oppose ​Universalism, if, after duly informing themselves what it is and what are its alleged proofs, they think they see good reason to do so. On the contrary, if they have honestly and intelligently reached this conclusion, we aver it to be not only their right, but their duty, to disbelieve and oppose it—precisely as it is our right and duty to reject and oppose 'orthodoxy,' holding the convictions we do. But it is no person's duty or right to misrepresent Universalism; to oppose it, ignorant of what it is, and obstinately persisting that he will not be informed; or to vilify and scandalize its believers, denying them the Christian name. Whatever their faults, the preceding pages may properly claim, in some degree, to express alike the faith, the aspirations and the purposes dominant in the Universalist Church to-day. Are they the faith, the aspirations or the purposes of infidels, or of a profane, bad people?
Reviewing our history, we see many things we could wish otherwise, though, all the circumstances being taken into account, we do not see how, under any law of intellectual or spiritual evolution with which we are acquainted, they could have been materially different; and, considering our present condition, we confess a lack of many things which it would be well for us to possess. What Church does not? But we are not infidels. We are not a people devoid of spiritual insight or concern, blindly and godlessly travelling towards the realities of the unseen world, unconscious of the solemnity of this life, or of that which is to come, and trying to deceive others into a like blindness and godlessness. We believe that, here or anywhere, life is God's gift, and that He is continuously and mercifully over it all; but we are profoundly impressed with its solemn meaning everywhere. We feel how much is, every moment, at stake in it. We see how solicitously God is seeking to make us aware of Him and of our obligations to Him, and to induce us, in a return of His love, to devote life to His service. We believe in our need of a Saviour, and in the Saviour God has sent. We believe there is no possible way of attaining harmony with God, or with the laws of our own being, anywhere, except through the help of this Saviour, in the awakening, penitence and spiritual birth of which the ​New Testament is so full. We believe it to be guilt no less than folly to live for time and earth, as if they were all, and the soul nothing. We believe in the penalties of irreligion and sin, and, as none others do, affirm that there is no escape from these penalties. And we are Universalists only because, in a study of God's Word and of the design of Christ's mission and the spirit of his character, we cannot be otherwise, and because we are sure that the Gospel as we interpret it has far greater power than any other conception of Christianity to impress, arouse and convert, and thus to stir souls and consecrate them to God. Satisfy us that Universalism is not taught in the Bible and the life of Christ, or that anything else can do more to make God and Christ precious, and to further the salvation of men, and we shall at once renounce it, accepting what is better.
And, all this being true,—true beyond peradventure or denial,—true on the authority of every fact or exposition that has a right to be considered in the case,—proved to be true by the unbroken testimony of an entire century,—is it to pass for nothing, and are we to be perpetually tabooed under the odium of an unfounded prejudice, as if, instead of being such a people, we were a band of religious freebooters, having nothing in common with Christian society, only hanging on its skirts to ravage and destroy it? We protest against so great a wrong. We demand a new departure in this regard, and that every individual, every pulpit, every church, shall henceforth be held to be a wilful slanderer before God and man, that, overlooking what we are, dares to treat us as being what we are not. It is too late to plead ignorance of our position and character. We insist on being henceforth judged by them.
How constantly we have been otherwise judged, no one acquainted with the facts need be told. The Evangelical Alliance, lately in session, assumed to represent the whole Protestant Christian world, and so impertinently pushed us outside the Christian household—as one of the papers submitted to it, and, much to the shame of the body, received without rebuke, wickedly classed us among "the factors of American Infidelity." And this illustrates the common 'evangelical' policy towards us. Occasionally, ​some catholic mind, while thinking us in error, has recognized us as none the less Christian, and searching to know exactly in what our error consists, has been disposed to meet us with honest reference to the principles really involved. But such instances have been so rare as to render the rule the more conspicuous, and—unfortunately for any general imitation of the example—have almost invariably resulted in the conversion of such antagonists into believers, as the persecuting Saul, meeting the Lord, became the consecrated Paul. The rule has been contemptuous neglect, or systematic misrepresentation. Large numbers have superciliously affected to regard Universalism as a vagary so wild, with adherents so vulgar or vicious, as to be beneath notice; while those who have given it attention have done so only to misstate or caricature the doctrine, to travesty its arguments, to slander and abuse its believers. Any one of the numerous tracts, sermons or books against it will sufficiently attest this.
Our friends 'of the contrary part' seem, indeed, to have found it impossible to entertain the first conception of what candor with respect to us requires. Their usual answer to the question, "Have you ever read a Universalist book? is, "No, and I do not wish to." Or, if, perchance, our books are appealed to, and apparent authorities are cited, it is, commonly, to show that they have been shamefully garbled—as some of these pages are almost certain to be, or that they have been read only to cull from them the most objectionable possible statements, and to parade exceptional theories, or incidental speculations, as if they were the very substance of Universalism itself. Robert Hall, the great English preacher, who scarcely had a second as a representative Baptist, like our own Walter Balfour, against the general sentiment of his denomination, denied the natural immortality of the soul. In like manner, in the entire freedom of opinion, on the one basis of the Bible, which has prevailed among us, and which, it is to be hoped, always will prevail, some even of our representative men have held opinions not generally accepted among us, while others in no sense representative have put forth their personal notions, or idiosyncrasies—some of them of the crudest sort. But ​these opinions, or notions, have never been Universalism. Every one of them might be exploded—as most of them have been—and Universalism would not be touched. A fortress is not carried because some of the sorties from it have been defeated, or some of the works appended to it—though built by the highest officers in command—have been stormed. As little importance have these personal or incidental opinions among Universalists, representative or otherwise, as related to our central position. And yet, these are the things—for the most part, the only things—which, whenever any seeming is made of quoting us, are put forth as showing what Universalism is !—things which are no more Universalism than bubbles, or straws, on the surface of a stream are the stream itself.
Should I represent the Baptists as committed to the non-immortality of the soul, and quote Robert Hall as proof, I should be justly denounced not merely as uncandid, but as dishonest. The fact that a certain idea is held by one man, or by any number of men, no matter how eminent, in a denomination, it would be said, is no warrant for charging that idea upon the whole denomination, or for holding the general doctrinal system of the body responsible for it. On what fundamental basis does the denomination stand? What are its cardinal principles,—the ideas to which, as a denomination, it is committed? These are the questions, it would be agreed, which, controverting any denomination's position, candor is obliged to ask, and the answers to which must be the ground of objection and argument, if fair and Christian opposition is to be made.
And this, as our Church enters on the second century of its history, is the new departure which Universalism has a right to demand of its non-believers. Let those who think they must, reject or oppose it. But let them understand why, and deal with the real issue it tenders. There are theories and opinions which, limited for time as most of us are, we are justified in putting summarily aside. But Universalism is not one of these. True or false, it touches all that is most momentous in the interests of souls and of the universe. Not only everything most vital in theology, but everything most fundamental in morals is involved in it. ​God's glory, Christ's honor, man's duty and destiny, all hinge upon it. If it is true, it is the grandest, most inclusive, most inspiring of all truths, shedding its light into the darkest recesses of human experience, and sounding its messages of hope through the deepest and awfulest caverns of depravity and spiritual death. If it is false, all things are shadowed in gloom; not even the most loving Christian is assured of a desirable destiny, and there is occasion for us all to wring our hands in a perpetual agony of suspense and pain. This being so, no one with a head or a heart can afford to be indifferent to it, or can be justified in ignoring it, or in dealing with it in any other than the most earnest, most reverent, most candid spirit. The best thought, the most intelligent appreciation, the most prayerful study can give it no more than it deserves.
Nor does the nature of the subject alone commend it to respect and investigation. The proportions which as a Christian conviction it has again attained urge the same demand. I say again attained, because, before the corruptions of Christianity began, Universalism, as we believe, was the accepted Christian faith, so that whoever denied or questioned it parted company so far not only with Christ and the Apostles, but with the whole Church. Not here to make a point of this, however, it is enough to say that Universalism is no longer the insignificant whimsey which, some years ago, it might have been held to be. Then its friends were few, its resources limited, its organization—if it could be called organization—chaotic, and all its means of influence small. But that time has passed. In spite of opposition, contumely and studied misrepresentation on the part of its enemies, and—what have been far worse for it—of numerous speculative errors and practical mistakes and short-comings on the part of its friends, it has now grown to a prevalence which entitles it to command consideration, and which no one aiming at any intelligent idea of the spiritual facts and tendencies of the time can afford to overlook. Not to speak of schools and colleges, or of the numbers, wealth, social position, learning, or moral worth, which the Universalist Church organically represents, Universalism has come, confessedly, to be a power among the elements of modern ​Christian thought and life. Rev. Dr. Patton, of Chicago, not long ago, in a labored paper against it, was obliged to concede that Universalism is "a subject so close to human feelings" that "there need be no apology for discussing" it; that "it attracts increased attention daily in the theological world;" that "we can hardly conceive that a good man should be without sympathy with such longings and hopes" as it ministers to; that the doctrine was "entertained by John Frederic Oberlin and John Foster, after an examination of the subject in the light of reason and the Word of God;" that "not a few Christians lean decidedly towards" it, "while the contrary view is accepted by yet others only with painful doubt and a sense of conflict;" and that "learned orthodox commentators such as Neander, Tholuck, Olshausen, and Lange" are among those who favor it.
And this being the testimony which its bitterest opponents are compelled to give concerning it, the time has evidently gone by for anybody to treat Universalism as if it were an obscure and contemptible heresy, with no friends to give it respectability, with no prestige to entitle it to attention. It is all about us, with everything best on its side; and while Dr. Patton is forced to admit that 'orthodoxy' is "accepted with painful doubt and a sense of conflict," and Dr. Edward Beecher testifies that it involves difficulties which are "felt by sanctified, humble and reasonable minds in proportion as they become holy, humble and reasonable," Universalism is penetrating all churches, and, as a deep, underlying conviction, or hope, is making friends and converts among their adherents and even their ministers, for the reason that, as Olshausen has said, "the feeling is deeply rooted in all noble minds, and is the expression of a desire for the perfected harmony of the universe," and because it is in so many ways proving, as distinguished authority once said it was destined to prove, "an exquisite adaptation to the spiritual wants of this distracted age."
If, then, our brethren of the traditional creeds will insist that Universalism is false, they should make due account of ​the new conditions under which the warfare against it is to be waged, and modify their methods accordingly. Neither neglect, on the one hand, nor abuse and defamation, on the other, will further answer. A system for the satisfactions of which our whole nature, when at all awakened, is hungering, and on whose behalf so much is to be said by way of argument and proof,—which alone harmonizes reason, conscience and the analogies of nature with the Word of God, and whose principles are the only principles that any Christian can put into life,—which touches questions so vital and tremendous, and whose roots so stretch down into the heart of things, taking hold of all that concerns human welfare, and twining underneath the very throne of God,—which can alone solve the problems that most perplex us, irradiate the universe with the presence of an Infinite Love, or give peace to believing souls,—a system which, numbering the noblest and most learned of the fathers, with Origen at their head, among its early advocates, can point also to such men as Archbishop Tillotson, Sir Isaac Newton, Soame Jenyns, William Law, Bishop Newton, Dr. Priestley, Oberlin, Neander, John Foster, and Maurice among its later friends,—which inspires all our best poetry, and sums up the result which every fresh revelation of science suggests, and every deduction of philosophy prophesies,—which is 'orthodoxy' in Germany, and which is honeycombing the Church of England, as well as all branches of the American Church,—which, as we have seen, contains within itself such a fulness of truth and law, and motive and appeal, for the grandest spiritual results,—which to-day exhibits on the roll of its living defenders, or believers, so large a proportion of the world's best names, in all fields of study and intellectual achievement, and which, confessedly, has so much in the number, standing, culture and character of its organized adherents to deserve and compel respect—such a system, we submit, is no longer to be brushed aside as of no account, or misrepresented with impunity, or flippantly declared to be absurd or unscriptural; and as little is it to be disposed of by denouncing its believers as vulgar and ignorant nobodies, infidel in opinion, devoid of religious conscience or purpose, and abandoned in life. It has won its ​place as one of the leading factors in the sum of the world's religious life, and it must be respected and dealt with accordingly.
Addressing ourselves, then, to those who reject Universalism, and especially to those who count it their duty to oppose it, we demand—by every law of what is gentlemanly, courteous, Christian,—nay, by every law of simple decency, have we not a right to demand?—that they honorably accept the facts, and understanding what Universalism is and who we are, henceforth in the new departure suggested, treat it and us with the Candor and Truthfulness to which we are entitled,—ceasing their aspersions on our characters; according us the Christian recognition which belongs to us; fairly stating our position; honestly dealing with our fundamental principles, and making their attacks, 'man-fashion,' on our citadel, instead of keeping up a boyish fusillade against anybody's personal outworks, and trying in the smoke and noise to make-believe that there is nothing else.
We ask nothing on the score of favor. In no way are we dependent on the countenance of these friends who so insist on treating us as heathen and outlaws. We court none of their patronage, and should resent any attempt to patronize us should they make it. Alike their smiles and their fellowship, on the one side, and their opposition or contempt, on the other, are no more to us than ours are to them. We feel ourselves in every particular their peers, with a Christian standing as legitimate and unqualified, with every Christian prerogative as much beyond question—entitled to expect from them all that they can properly expect from us, or from each other. Are they Christians? so are we. Are they believers in God and lovers of man? so are we. Are they laborers for the world's redemption? so are we. Are they ministers of the cross? We are more, because ministers of a cross omnipotent, preaching a Saviour who can know neither failure nor defeat—in faith more abundant; in expectations larger and more exultant; in assurance of victory more complete. In no sense more than they are we 'strangers and foreigners' in the Christian camp. By birth, inheritance, conviction, as much as they, we are "fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the house​hold of God, and are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone." We claim, therefore, only our equal rights. We ask for simple justice, as Christians among Christians.
Nor is it, mainly, for any reason personal to ourselves that we make this demand. We make it in behalf of the Christian cause. Men are nothing. Christ is everything. And for the sake of Christ, now in his Church so divided, dishonored, weakened, by these petty tests, by these partisan alienations, by these unauthorized lines of division and exclusion, we protest against these things, and for ourselves and others demand that his law of fellowship be the only one known among his professed friends. He builds his Church on the rock of his Messiahship as the Son of God; and whoever stands on this is a member of his body, entitled to the sympathy and fellowship of every other member as a brother in the Lord. Sects and parties as such may establish whatever terms of fellowship they choose, and, building whatever walls they wish, may admit or exclude whomsoever they will. But when it comes to the broad question of membership in the Church of Christ, every one of these walls must fall, and every one of these private tests give way. To be entitled to recognition as a Methodist, a Presbyterian, an Episcopalian or a Universalist, is one thing; to be entitled to recognition as a Christian is quite another; and whoever, in the narrowness of his sectarian spirit, assumes to set up his particular walls as the walls of Christ's Church, and to say that only those who use his private passwords and accept his creed, are to be acknowledged as Christians, invades the liberty of every Christian soul, and insolently dares to put himself in place of Christ.
Already, we are glad to see, able and catholic men, perceiving the soundness of this principle, are pushing the question whether it is expedient or Christian longer to deny us what, on such a basis, is so indisputably our due. Such a re-action and debate are only what we have always been sure would at some time come. The sentiment of justice may for a while slumber, but it never fails at length to assert itself. Our demand is that the agitation go on until our rightful place is confessed; and if, so undeniably equitable as our ​claim is, those who call themselves 'the church evangelical' will not take this new departure, and give us what they no longer have even the semblance of an excuse for denying, the motive will not fail to be understood, and on them will fall the consequences. They will be crushed under the wheels of an advancing Christian sentiment, while 'the world' will accord to us what a besotted and recreant Church withholds. With confidence, we 'bide our time' and wait the issue.
II. Loyalty. Reference was made in our second chapter to those who, believing Universalism, are identifying themselves with other churches, or, worse still, drifting outside all churches, without religious association anywhere. It is one of our great misfortunes that there are so many such. Rev. W. E. Manley, in a recent communication to one of our papers, describing an interview with the late General Winfield Scott, reports him as saying, "I do not see how any man can read the Bible, and not be a Universalist. I am an Episcopalian because I was born and brought up in that church; but I don't believe their dogmas." Who with any considerable acquaintance, does not know scores,—possibly hundreds, whose position is thus substantially described? Visiting one of the finest and most extensive establishments in the city of my residence, shortly after taking my present charge, I congratulated the proprietor on his success, and received this reply: "All I have here achieved has been built up on the principles of Universalism—God the universal Father, and all men brethren." And yet this man, an avowed Universalist, and thus recognizing his obligation to put his faith into his business, though he knows how much Universalism in Philadelphia is needing him and all like him, is a member of a Methodist church, the teacher of a Bible class in a Methodist Sunday-school, and one of the active and generous leaders of a Methodist congregation, putting his children into associations in which they are being trained away from what he advocates as truth; helping to keep in countenance the assumptions which exclude his fellow-believers from Christian recognition; and contributing all he has and is to the support and furtherance ​of what he pronounces a gross perversion of the Gospel! The most busy and talkative Universalist whom I have met in Philadelphia never comes near our churches, but identifies himself with the Episcopalians, throwing whatever social influence he has into their scale, and against what he is so busily fond of talking about as the truth! And in a conversation with me once, he named several of the most prominent Episcopal churches of our city, saying that one half of the congregation of one, a third of another, and a quarter part of still another were, to his certain knowledge, undisguised Universalists, and that all the churches were full of them!
And these men, and all these people, as every intelligent person knows, are but representatives of multitudes all over the land. Even 'evangelical' pulpits are not without such. A Methodist minister came to me not long ago, avowing himself a Universalist, and desiring a comparison of views. I urged him to be an honest man and put himself before the world as his conclusions required; but subsequently, returning some books I had loaned him, he sent me a note, in which, though reiterating his faith in Universalism, he said, "I am bound by virtue of some pecuniary aid I received while preparing for the ministry, to be a Methodist Episcopal minister, and I am not able to make good the money, which I must do, with interest, if I leave the Methodist Episcopal church." So he remains in the Methodist ministry; but he could not close his note without revealing a consciousness of his false position by "hoping" that I would "be charitable" towards him, and that he had "not fallen in my estimation because of the course that he was in honor (!) bound to take"! Nor, I have reason to be well assured, is he the only Universalist in the Methodist ministry. There are many like him. Other churches are in a similar condition. A young man recently left our ministry for the Episcopalians, distinctly certifying the Bishop, as I am informed, that in no particular had his opinions changed, but that he was pleased with their forms, and thought he could be happy in their work. He is at present an Episcopal pastor in Philadelphia. But why multiply examples?
The time was when to identify one's self with a given denomination, in the pulpit or the pews, indicated an accept​ance of the creed of that denomination. But such identification is no longer evidence to this effect. Said the Methodist minister above referred to, in his note to me, "As the great object of preaching is the improvement of mankind, I hope that I may do good in whatever church I labor"—as if 'the improvement of mankind' did not require the preaching of the truth, and as if what one believes, or whether the church in which he labors stands for what he believes, were a question not worth the asking! And in much the same spirit, the idea has come strangely to prevail that if one 'tries to do about right,' it matters nothing what 'meeting' he attends, or in what pulpit he preaches, or whether he sincerely holds or preaches the doctrines of the Church with which he is connected or not! In fact, public sentiment has become shamefully debauched in regard to this subject. Anything like absolute responsibility to what is believed to be religious truth is, to a fearful extent, ignored; and Pilate's question, if not in so many words, and in his sneering contempt for a thing so impalpable, is, virtually, and in much of his utter unconcern, the question of a host of people to-day, "What's truth" compared with fashion, or popularity, or convenience, or fancy, or any whim or indifference that may chance to take us?
"An Orthodox Minister," in a recent magazine article of no small significance, arraigns the whole 'orthodox Protestant' church as full of defection from the creeds, and says, "There can be no doubt that there are thousands in the Protestant churches to-day, who, if required publicly to renew the same confession of faith which they made when they first entered the church, could not do it conscientiously. But the church accepts their external adherence, though cognizant of their heart-defection, and thus becomes a particeps criminis to a system of deceit which effectually undermines all integrity of character, sacrificing that for which alone the church was established, for the sake of an appearance of doctrinal soundness; preserving the shell, but destroying the kernel; debauching the conscience for the sake of preserving the creed intact." Does anybody ​doubt that the most of this apostasy is in the direction of Universalism, more or less pronounced? There is probably not a single Protestant sect without Universalists in its ministry; and it is doubtful if there is a congregation of any Protestant name, particularly in those portions of the country where the leaven of our principles has been at all diffused, that has not more or less Universalists in it, while, like the Episcopal churches in Philadelphia which have been alluded to, many would show large numbers of them. And when to these we add the other class,—probably as many more, who, while theoretically with us, are religiously homeless, helping to swell the vast throng of 'the unchurched,' we have a condition of things which may well arrest attention, astounding every honest mind, and which, as we reflect upon it, shows the occasion we have to protest and appeal for its correction. Every day, the inquiry more seriously presses, How shall these disloyal multitudes be reached and awakened to see how weak, how dishonorable, how wrong their false position is?
So far, then, as I can secure their hearing, I address myself to these multitudes in the name of the truth they are defrauding, and of the Church to which their sympathy and service should be given, calling them to a new departure.
I plead with them to look at what they are doing, in the light of its consequences. Not to speak of the suspicion and dishonor that would be brought upon the faith thus treacherously held by the failure of so many to perceive any moral or religious meaning in it, or to catch from it any hint of obligation to it, were it not that Christ himself had just such disciples, and that no form of Christian doctrine can plead exemption from such believers, I ask them, first, to consider how much is lost to the truth, and to all the interests which the truth concerns, in the faithlessness of so many thousands, whose numbers, wealth, intelligence and social standing would so re-enforce our Church, and at once increase its power! Give to Universalism all that thus, in common honesty, belongs to it, and straightway, not twofold simply, but tenfold at least would its weight as an organized religious force be augmented. Then, on the other hand, I appeal to those in other churches who should be with us, to consider what ​a fictitious show of strength is imparted to error, and how its hold upon the popular faith and sympathy is made to seem so much more than it actually is,—and what a preponderance of ecclesiastical and religious influence, which in no way belongs to it, is thus given it,—and what a most improper advantage is accorded to it as such multitudes of children are placed in its hands for education, by parents who have themselves repudiated it,—and how the progress of truth is hindered and postponed by those who should be its friends, as, in manifold ways, they become the allies and helpers of doctrines which they have not only rejected, but which they profess to abhor,—and how thus the dominion of error is prolonged, and souls caused to suffer, and the deepest life of the world denied the ministries it needs! And then, turning to the homeless drifters, who should be in our churches, but who permit themselves to be dissipated among the non-religious,—many of them among the irreligious, elements of our communities, I ask them to consider how they are helping, though professing sympathy with religious ideas, to multiply and strengthen the agencies that are at work to break up all churches and to disintegrate Christian society itself, while their children go their way, to be trained in false conceptions of God and the Gospel, or to run loose without any religious training—the 'gamins' of our respectable Christendom!
Will anybody say that all these are things of no account,—to be made light of, or to be suffered to go on, with no sense of condemnation because of them on the part of those to whose charge they are to be laid, and with no effort towards remedy by those who witness them? Are they not, on the contrary, things of grave and threatening import? And should not all who love loyalty and justice, of whatever creed, cry out against them, and do not you who are responsible for them owe it to yourselves, and your children, and truth, and the world, and all that is involved, to review the whole subject, and to resolve on an immediate departure in the direction of honor and honesty, that will put you in your true relations?
But there is something deeper and more serious than mere consequences for these disloyalists, whether in or out ​of other churches, to think of in regard to this subject, viz., the principles which their disloyalty ignores. Consequences are largely on the surface. Principles are substantive and central. Consequences we may sometimes disregard. Principles never. Loyalty is simple fidelity; and the obligations to fidelity are universal. On no possible plea can any man or woman for a moment be justified in excepting his or her opinions from the sweep of these obligations, or in thinking fidelity less a binding or solemn duty with reference to opinion than with reference to country, or family, or plighted faith of any sort. What is owed to Opinion is as actual a debt as what is owed to the butcher or the baker. All moral obligations have finally the same roots; and no man is a true man who is false to any of them. Honesty, if real, is absolute, pertaining to the whole substance of a man's life—as fineness and strength pertain not to spots of a piece of cloth, but to the whole web, if it is fine and strong. Show me a man dishonest in one thing, even the least, and I will show you a man who, on sufficient occasion, will be dishonest in anything. An honest man is not a man honest in some relations, or in reference to some trusts, but a man honest through and through,—in all relations, in reference to all trusts; honest towards God as well as towards man; honest in things innermost as well as things outermost. A vase is marred, wherever or however cracked. So is integrity. It is integrity only so long as it is complete. "Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, is guilty of all."
Will any one dispute these statements as statements of principle? If not, it is easy to see what follows. The obligations to Opinion are of precisely the same nature as those imposed by any other trust, and disloyalty to them, therefore, is in essence the same as treason to one's country, or as bad faith, treachery, disloyalty in business, in politics, in friendship, in anything else. It is falseness. It is dishonesty. Is it not worth while, then, for you who are thus disloyal to consider in whose company you are? There is, so far as I know, but one opinion of Judas and Arnold. Would it not be well for you who are helping to swell the verdict against these men, and who would feel ​insulted and indignant to be suspected of disloyalty to patriotism, to friends, to any domestic or social obligation, and who are yet every day, in your treachery to what you hold as truth, practising a faithlessness quite as culpable in God's sight, to try to see yourselves, in such a comparison, as God and all brave and noble minds see you?
Opinions are unseen and impalpable, it is true. But a trust is a trust, be it what it may. Should some person place in the hands of any one of you people, so faithlessly holding Universalism, a hundred dollars for the relief of the poor, or for any other specific purpose, and he should put it unused into his pocket, or in any way prove recreant to the stewardship, how many of you all would think it a matter of no importance, or hesitate to say, He is a dishonest man? But is recreancy to truth—or what is believed to be truth *—less a dishonesty, because truth cannot be weighed or counted? Is falsity of position as to one's convictions less a falsity, because convictions cannot be handled or seen? Is good faith, is loyalty, conditioned on the material substance or avoirdupois of things, and not on their essence? So evidently judged my ministerial Methodist acquaintance, since he felt "in honor bound" to think a great deal of the money men had loaned him, and nothing of the truth God had given him! And on this point he but illustrates the judgment of the entire class he represents.
How much such need to think what opinions are! "The things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal." Ideas, opinions rule the world. Impalpable, unseen though they are, they underlie all things, and are the seed of God's grandest harvests. As such, there is no other trust so sacred. How else could one be justified in holding them at the price of martyrdom? Finally, indeed, there is nothing in this world but ideas; and in the last analysis, there is neither permanence nor power in anything but religious ideas. Religion being the life of souls, if the world is ever to be regenerated, it is to be by means of religious truth,—if Christianity be from God, by means of Christian truth. How solemn, then, the interests with which one trifles,—how grave the disloyalty of which he is guilty, who, having decided convictions touching any ​question of Christian doctrine, conceals, deserts, or, on any plea, proves faithless to them! What disloyalty so criminal? or which one of you all, practising it, can tell how many lives you are helping to poison, or how wide or disastrous the consequences of your faithlessness are to be? "If any man come to me," said Christ, "and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple." What was this but saying, in effect, that loyalty to opinion must be held the supreme duty? and what would he who spoke these words say to you who, professing faith in him, are for any reason proving false to your faith, could he speak to you to-day? Better, if the choice must be made, desertion of friends, and disloyalty to country, and a disregard of all human relations, than treachery to this supreme trust of truth.
Applying to every opinion sincerely held, all this has spe cial force in respect to Universalism. All trusts are sacred, but some place us under special obligation; and when we consider what Universalism is,—the deplorable results, theoretical and practical, of the theology it aims to supplant,—the influences which are conspiring against it, and all that helps to make up the case, we cannot fail to see that it is such a trust.
Looking at what it would displace, we see this. For those professing to believe the traditional theology of the Church, I have only words of kindness and—so far as they give evidence of sincerity—respect. Nor can we doubt that, with its many errors, this theology has elements of truth which have done much good service. But speaking of its radical and characteristic principles, if God is good, and Universalism be true, what is there falser or more pernicious? Let its own deponents answer. Dr. Lyman Beecher and authorities no less eminent long ago confessed that nearly all the infidelity of Christendom is to be attributed to it. Catharine Beecher and hosts of like impartial witnesses have told us how God has been made abhorrent, and religion distasteful, by it. Albert Barnes and similar sufferers, giving voice to their travail and agony, tell us that it makes the universe "all dark, dark, dark" to them, and ​that they find no relief from the anguish and torture which it occasions. And besides these, the sad records of insanity and suicide present themselves in terrible testimony against it; while the prevalent neglect of religion, and the formal pietism of which there is so much in the Church, and the material and mercenary conceptions of a good life, and of the motives thereto, so current, no less attest its perverting and corrupting work. Except sin, I know of nothing that so blasts and crushes, that so corrodes and agonizes, that so makes life a suspense and a torment, and death a horror, when its real principles are taken home, and come to fruit.
Is all this nothing? or can one, in view of facts like these,—facts undeniable,—be held as guilty of no wrong in counting them nothing, and, while himself disbelieving the errors thus arraigned, in allowing his children to be educated in them, or in making himself in any way a party to the continuance of their corrupting and tragic sway? Who will dare so affirm? Let those who believe this theology be faithful to it; and let us thank God for the earnest and saintly souls who, professing it, are able to draw life from the Saviour, and nutriment and inspiration from the Gospel, in spite of it. But being what it is,—with such a history as to what it has done, and such a record as to what, so far as it still retains any hold on heads or hearts, it is doing,—there is no duty more solemn or imperative for those emancipated from it than to wash their hands of all complicity with it. By all means, let us cultivate the most kindly and catholic relations with its believers. Though so mistaken, they are none the less our brehren and sisters in Christ, and many of them are setting us examples of a consecrated and fervent piety which we may well imitate. As our brothers and sisters in Christ, let us be ready to co-operate with them in every Christian endeavor; but to all inducements or pleas towards any sympathetic identification with them in the direct or indirect support of their creeds, the one answer should be, "O, my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honor, be not thou united." All words are poor to express what seems to me not simply the inconsistency, but the sin of those who say or do otherwise. For what are they doing? It would be ​bad enough if they were encouraging merely innoxious errors. But they are doing far worse. They are helping to maintain and diffuse errors that have, for centuries, been sapping the faith of Christendom, and infusing false and venal motives into every popular conception of religion. They are helping to give prevalence and permanence to what, as they believe, misrepresents the character of God, dims the glory of Christ, impairs the efficacy of the Gospel, detracts from the power of the Cross, and that has torn more hearts, and withered more hopes, and corrupted more lives, and mantled more souls in the gloom of despair than—with the single exception named—any other cause. They are thus helping to conserve what they should count it their solemn duty to God and man to correct and destroy.
Does some one say, The minister I support is 'liberal,' and does not at all offensively preach his creed? Then the more shame for the minister, and for every Universalist found among his supporters. Herein is one of the unfavorable conditions under which we have to labor. 'Orthodoxy' has, to a wide extent, ceased to be frank and honest. Greatly modified it has been, and, as was said in our first chapter, the creeds as formerly held are, every year, being put more and more out of the thought and faith of the people. Thank God for the tendencies which are thus gradually making an end of them, and for the drift in which any minister is, in any actual sense, becoming more 'liberal' and Christian in the substance of his faith. But so far as the old faith at all lingers, let us have it from every pulpit just as it is held. The ground of complaint now is that even these modified creeds are sugar-coated by too many who pretend to preach them. Public taste, if not public sentiment, has got beyond them, and so the sulphur is made to burn without the old blue or the ancient odor. What a thinning out of 'evangelical' churches, and what a corresponding filling up of ours, we should see, were it not so! The Episcopal church in Philadelphia, said by the talkative Universalist to whom I have referred to have a congregation one half Universalists, recently changed pastors. The new-comer was moved to be honest, and in a very explicit way preached the doctrines of the church, whereupon—so I was assured—he was no​tified that he must cease such preaching, or that he or a large part of the congregation would leave. He has not left, and I have not heard that the congregation has seriously diminished—from which the inference is clear. What shall be said either of such a minister, or such a congregation? or what shall be said of those openly or secretly believing Universalism who become parties to such insincerity?
Away with all concealment, or "daubing with untempered mortar"! The doctrine of endless woe is either true or false. If true, it is not a thing to be withheld, disguised, or toyed with. It should be preached, distinctly, unmistakably, constantly, in pulpits, at funerals, at every possible opportunity to alarm souls; and he who, pretending to think it true, fails so to preach it, is a trifler and a time-serving traitor to his hearers; and were it possible that it could prove true, every such dainty and treacherous trifler would go up to the throne of God at death with the blood of souls, lost through his unfaithfulness, dripping from his hands, to deserve the hottest place in the hell to which they would be doomed. When shall we have the real character of such men understood? How nobly contrasts with them the conscientious and plain-spoken minister who said, "I was dismissed because I could not preach Universalist sermons at funerals"!
And the spirit of all this applies equally to those who, having adopted Universalist conclusions, are willing, under any pretext, to occupy 'evangelical' pulpits, ostensibly committed to 'evangelical' doctrines. How can such men stand up before God and their congregations in prayer, or use the name of the pure Christ, without being crushed under a sense of their duplicity, or feeling that their pulpit floors are likely, at any moment, to open beneath them? Think of Paul, after having been met by the Master and brought to a knowledge of the truth, as concealing his conversion, and continuing to labor as if he were a Pharisee as before! Think of John, or Peter, or any of the Apostles, as pursuing such a course! The very thought is an insult to them. And yet these men of to-day, professing to stand in place of Paul and Peter and the rest, are practising a ​hypocrisy and a double-dealing which would have made the Apostles a hissing and a by-word. Is what would have been so base in Apostles manly and creditable in their successors?
But, special as are the claims of Universalism on the loyalty of all who accept it, considering the errors it would supplant, and the wrong of concealing these errors when they are held as truth, or of supporting or seeming to hold them when they have been renounced, these claims are, if possible, immeasurably intensified when we consider what it is in itself. I have already sufficiently said what it is, if it be the truth. There is nothing else so grand or precious. It is light. It is consolation. It is encouragement. It is spiritual power. It is fulness of peace. And the day of millennial glory will never come till its principles are perceived and its spirit diffused, rendering it the life of all souls. We talk of the importance of our republic. And it is important. I know of no simply human trust so momentous. But what is any mere form of government compared with this Gospel of God's universal love and omnipotent grace? Blot out these institutions of ours from among the nations, and what has been done in comparison with what would follow were this central sun of truth blotted from the religious heavens? Dear, and justly dear, as our republic is to every American or Christian heart, dearer far, unutterably dearer, should this Gospel be to us; and, shameful as would be the treachery of any man against a government freighted with so much of inestimable worth to the civilization and progress of the world, still more shameful is, I believe, in the sight of God, and should be in the sight of all honest men, the disloyalty of those who, believing this Gospel, are, directly or indirectly, allowing themselves to be numbered against it—more shameful because this, in its principles, underlies not only all right government, all beneficent institutions, and all noble being or doing, but all faith in God, and all hope for man.
Have we not a right, then, to appeal to you, the thousands now in so false a position in respect to what you believe as truth, and am I doing more than my duty in holding up this word, Loyalty, before you, and, in the name of all ​that is manly and just, pleading with you to make the new departure on which, if you would be really honest men and women, deserving the world's respect or God's approval, you should at once enter? I know the excuses offered and the causes at work in connection with this subject. I know the strength of social ties. I know the power of 'respectability' and fashion. I know the force of all those currents of influence which are sweeping away from us towards more 'popular' churches, and away from all churches into indifference, or religious homelessness and vagabondism. But I know also that, as not one of these considerations weighs so much as an atom of dust in God's scales towards justifying the disloyalty in behalf of which they are pleaded, so neither will they have the force of a burnt straw to hold any true man or woman away from the Church to which his or her sympathy and support should be given.
This, it is time that it should be understood, is not a question of personal preference, or convenience, or taste, or position, or social or business interest. Like all questions of duty, it is simply a question between God and the soul: a question of honor; a question of manhood or womanhood; a question of integrity and right. No person is so rich as to be superior to the obligations it involves; none so humble or poor as to be absolved from its demands. "Where do you propose to go to church?" asked wealthy friends of a noble man,—one of the members of my Church, now in weakness sailing out to the unseen sea,—on his removal to Philadelphia. "To the Universalist Church, if I can find one," was the reply. "O, but that is not fashionable or popular here," said the friends. "No matter whether it is fashionable or not," came the manly response. "It is my Church, and I shall go to it, though its service be in a barn." In that spoke a man, as every true man, conscious of God and wishing to maintain his own integrity, will speak in answer to all possible pleas or excuses for supporting what he does not believe, or for going where he is out of place, or for going nowhere.
There is but one course for a man who would be truthful,—and that is, always to speak the truth, though the heavens fall. And for the same reason, there is but one course for ​those believing Universalism, if they would preserve their self-respect, and be able without shame to think of God, or to look the world in the face,—and that is, to be loyal to their convictions, at whatever cost. Is Universalism unfashionable or unpopular where you live? Give all you are or have to it, and help to make it fashionable and popular. "Universalism is not respectable," sneeringly said somebody in a crowded horse-car, in Philadelphia—to which remark there was, all round, a general nodding of assent. "Gentlemen," said the same noble man just referred to, rising from his seat—a man known of all to be second to no other as a high-toned and Christian merchant, "Gentlemen, am I respectable? I am a Universalist." There was no more talk about the non-respectability of Universalism in that car. In like manner should all Universalists, in the pulpit or out of the pulpit, honor themselves and their faith. Is Universalism unable in your community to boast of wealth or numbers? Put yourselves and your families and whatever money or position you command into its scale. Are companions or friends indisposed to go where it is preached? Let your word be, Go where you prefer; but as for me, let my right hand forget its cunning if I forget the faith or the Church to which my service is due. Is there no Universalist church where you live? Do the most in your power, at the earliest moment possible, to have one, putting yourselves, meanwhile, into living connection with the nearest church of your faith available to you. Have you, if you are a minister, a good position where you are, and are you doubtful what will come to you if you avow yourself, and change your relations? No matter; be an honest man, following the behest of God in the call of His truth, like Abraham, who "went out, not knowing whither he went;" like Paul, who went "bound in the spirit to Jerusalem," not knowing what should befall him there, only assured that bonds and afflictions awaited him, but saying, "None of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself." In one word, believing Universalism, be loyal to it, as the patriot is loyal to his country; as the lover is loyal to his mistress; as the saint is loyal to his God. In Paul's words to the Corinthians, and as the Lord ​Christ would say, could he speak to you out of heaven, "Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit ye like men, be strong."
How but by such steadfastness and fidelity has truth ever advanced, or humanity been carried forward? It seems a small thing to you, O man or woman disloyal to the victorious Christ and the Gospel of universal redemption, living amidst all that the sufferings of Christ and the fidelity of faithful souls have given you, to turn your back upon the truth, to conceal your convictions, to play false with God and give support to what you believe to be error; but how empty would history be of heroism, and how barren of all the grandest results it now records, had all been like you! Where, bethink you, I pray, where would the world have been to-day but for the consciousness of Responsibility to Opinion, which has possessed and moved souls, through the ages, animating them to noble doing and daring for Truth's sake? Loyalty to ideas,—fidelity to honest conviction,—the purpose at all hazards to put one's self unflinchingly where one morally and intellectually belongs—what but this has given us heroes and martyrs, illuminated the otherwise dim annals of our race with the most chivalric self-sacrifice, destroyed old errors, lifted fresh truths into victory, and so kept the wheels of the world's progress in motion? If all on whose eyes the light of new truth has dawned, and to whom advanced and unpopular convictions have come, had been as insensible to duty in this regard as some have always been, and as you now are, you would to-day have been savage wanderers in some wilderness, bowing before some stock or stone in worship, and in place of all this splendid sum of results which we call Christian Civilization, there would have been no Christ, no Cross, no Conquered Grave, no toiling Apostles, no saintly confessors, suffering for your sake and mine,—nothing of the fruitage that is, or of the more glorious fruitage yet to be,—only the dearth and darkness of an utter barbarism. Ideas, convictions, bravely held, confessed or proclaimed in face of penalty, obloquy, death,—lived for,—died for,—these it is that underlie all this fair structure which we see, and that have put us where we are, and made the life of humanity, in its ​best things, what it is; and whoever, man or woman, having any conviction really held, and especially a moral or religious conviction, is not honest towards it, does not announce it, does not seek identity with its friends, does not stand by it at whatever peril, and work for it, proves false to the law by which alone the world's growth proceeds, and deals dishonorably alike with the God who gives the truth, with the brave souls who have sought to serve it in the past, and with all who are concerned to possess it in the future.
O brothers and sisters, whoever, whatever, wherever you are, thus disloyal now, will you not, if you have any stuff of manhood or womanhood in you, awaken to a sense of these things, and with conscience alive, and self-respect asserting itself, enter on the new departure for which I plead, and, whatever the ties that now hold you, or the considerations that now influence you, for Christ's sake, for your own sake, for your children's sake, for the world's sake, resolve henceforth to put yourselves where you belong?
III. Ignition. Whatever Christianity proposes, it proposes as a ministry of Divine quickening. The baptism of Christ is a baptism of 'the Holy Ghost and of fire;' and accompanying the Pentecostal outpouring of the spirit, 'tongues like as of fire' appeared. The symbol doubtless had incidental meanings; but it significantly tells at what Christianity aims. "Light enough, but no heat," is the crisp phrase in which Wendell Phillips once explained the failure of all heathen systems and philosophies to give life. Christianity supplies this lack. Its business is to set souls spiritually on fire, melting them into contrition, kindling them to enthusiasm, and filling them with the glow of all holy emotion and purpose. Christ's own being, therefore—calm and undemonstrative as he was, was all aglow with the fires of Divine love and truth. Every Apostle flamed with faith, enthusiasm, and devout assurance and consecration. And if, anywhere, since, there have been those, high or humble, who, in Christ's name, have been in any degree earnest, saintly, heroic, it has been solely because, whatever their ​belief, or however they may have argued, they have also felt Christianity, and have been so far kindled and set spiritually to burning by it. In steam-engines, other things being equal, power is always in the ratio of fuel consumed. So, by a like law, in life, spiritual power is proportionate to the substance of truth fused in the soul. And illustrating how Christianity seeks to affect us, these things in the past indicate what must be in the future, if its work is at all effectually to proceed. The world is to be redeemed, not by dogma or debate,—only as thought is melted into feeling and purpose, and as the flame thus kindled spreads from soul to soul, from church to church, quickening our whole humanity into one universal glow of love, adoration and child-like service. Life only can give life.
What fact or thought, then, so fit as this wherewith to end these pages? These several chapters are the children of my brain; but they are even more the outpouring of my heart. I believe Universalism, my faith in it being identical with my faith in God. I love the Universalist Church, believing in its future as confidently as I believe in the future of Christianity itself. I see in it the leaven which is, ultimately, to leaven all Christendom; the stone that is to smite every image of error, and to become a great mountain, filling the whole earth. It is, therefore, I believe, the Providential agency which is not only to bring the entire Church into agreement with the truth, but which is to attract and organize in allegiance to Christ the vast multitude of souls, sickening of the creeds and temporarily drifting from all positive faith and religious ideas. But this future of our Church, I equally believe, is not possible in the line of much of our present thinking and methods; is contingent upon an utter renunciation of various errors now prevalent among us,—upon a clearer perception of truths now held only as half-truths, and so held, if not for evil, certainly for no good,—and upon a deeper and intenser religious experience and a higher order of spiritual life. And these last, I no less believe, are to be attained only through a more vital and inseeing appreciation and a closer and more pungent and personal administration of the Gospel as an awakening, converting and consecrating power.
​So believing, it is the one desire of my life to see these conditions fulfilled, and our Church realizing its proffered destiny. This book is the result. It is a contribution towards an attempt to help on an end for which we are all praying. And now, approaching its close, not without some concern as to whether it is at all to answer the purpose for which only I have written it, as I look back over the themes I have tried to discuss, and forward to our future,—as, especially, having spoken to those in opposition, and to those disloyal, I turn, finally, to those who are the active and contributing constituency of our Church, organized or scattered, and, reflecting on what we have and are, and on what we must have if we are to live, query how far they,—rather, how far we, are to prove duly considerate of what is demanded of us, and equal to it, no word in the language comes to me as so well summing up all our needs in one, as this word, Ignition. It is not a word often used in such a connection,—I do not know that I ever saw it so used; but it is none the less—possibly it is all the more—fitting on this account for the service here appointed it.
The burden of all these pages is that the time has come for an advance of our whole Church, not simply into methods and appeals more consonant with our predominant conclusions, but on to altogether higher ground spiritually, in more pronounced and earnest labor for the conversion and salvation of souls, and the systematic cultivation of the religious life. As I have not failed to intimate at every suitable point, there are many things to be said greatly to our credit, and we have numerous reasons for encouragement and thanksgiving. We have brain, thought, argument. We have money, schools, intelligence. We have large and kindly hearts, and a most reputable benevolence and uprightness. We have thus many of the conditions for becoming a mighty and effective Church already in the process of fulfilment. But—and in saying this I shall only be repeating what has been implied or said on every page preceding—spiritually we are not alive as we should be. Souls are not kindled. Hearts are not aglow. We scarcely begin as yet to be penetrated by any proper consciousness of what Universalism means. We do not at all commen​surately feel what, in it, God has given to our charge, nor what there is for us, under God and the leadership of Christ, to do for our own salvation, or for the salvation of others.
I speak, of course, of the rule. Those there have been and are, profoundly alive to all these things,—hearts fervid, glowing, consecrated, showing every day what Universalism duly appreciated and experienced would make of us all. But how few such, comparatively!—though not few in the aggregate. Mainly, Universalism is accepted and held with sole reference to its letter. It is a theory. It is a doctrine. It is an arraignment and challenge of other creeds; a denial; an attack; a controversy; an argument; a shell of statements. Or, it is simply a certificate of final safety for everybody; a proclamation of God's impartial love and of Christ's certain triumph in getting the whole world into heaven. What is implied back of and underneath all this is little considered. We fail, therefore, of the quickening and inspiration we should get from it. We are not warmed, fused, made spiritually fluent and forceful by it. The baptism of fire does not come, as it ought to come, upon us through it. Hence coldness, lack of life, waste of opportunity, loss of power. We need vivification. We need that the rays of the Sun of Righteousness shall strike down to the roots of our being, penetrating us with kindling and life-giving energy. Beneath the letter, we need to perceive and catch the spirit, that we may be set on fire by it; and we shall never personally know what Universalism is, nor can our Church ever become spiritually electric and mighty, until we are.
Assuming nothing, then,—speaking only as from the ranks, as a fellow-believer and a humble laborer with you for what is so worthy of our love, may I address myself, frankly, earnestly, to you, brothers and sisters of the Universalist Church of America, wherever or whoever you may be, and as my final word touching this New Departure which I have been trying to further, plead with you, by all that is precious in our faith, and by all that is at stake upon your spiritual life, to consider what this word, Ignition, means, and to seek henceforth to have its meaning fulfilled among us? You will agree with me that we want Candor ​from our neighbors and friends who reject and oppose Universalism, and that we have a right to demand it. You will equally agree with me that we want Loyalty from those who, believing Universalism, are now faithless to it, and that we no less have the right to demand it. But are you under less obligation to Universalism than these others? You avow Universalism. You represent it. Its banner is in your hands, its interests in your special keeping. It is strong or weak, it is spiritually effective or fruitless, it will command the world's attention and respect, becoming a confessed power or otherwise, according to what you are and do, and the illustration you thus furnish, or fail to furnish, of what it is able to be and to accomplish as an element of Christian experience and life. If, then, it has a right to the Christian recognition and the fidelity on which we all insist as its due from these others, what has it not a right to demand of us, of you? Am I not justified in saying that more even than it needs, or has a right to demand, Candor from the one class, or Loyalty from the other, it needs and has a right to demand Ignition among you? needs and has a right to demand this more than either of these other things, because, important and desirable as they are, our Church is in no sense dependent on them, can live, and grow, and do its work, if it must, without them, while this is vital and indispensable.
Each of the preceding chapters has been a mention of some condition on which, as I believe, our future growth and effectiveness depend. But really, as has been intimated, these and all conditions are summed up in this one—that Christ's baptism of fire shall come upon us through the kindling and igniting power of the truth we hold. We need this ignition through and through. But let me mass as much as possible concerning it under two specifications.
1. We require it in respect to our responsibility. What is our responsibility? It is, as the stewards of God's truth, to give this truth faithful expression and service, for the world's redemption. Till this is felt, no conception of our real position and work is possible.
As Universalists, we claim no exclusive possession of the truth. But conceding all we can as to truth among others, ​we have in Universalism, if it be not altogether false, the best interpretation of Christianity as Christ taught it which has thus far been reached. Not that, as any of us yet hold it, it is final. The clearest minds among us doubtless have their misconceptions, or somehow fail to see the whole truth without refraction, in its exact relations at every point. But in the doctrine of God's Fatherhood and of man's brotherhood, in the doctrine of Christ's efficiency and of the ultimate unity of human destiny, with what is contained in these as to duty and the means and conditions of salvation, we have what is final, if anything is final. And these doctrines being final, we have in them, for substance, the very Gospel of Christ, for which alike the intellect and heart of man are clamoring,—in which alone is furnished that which can most successfully stem the present incoming tides of materialism and unbelief, and bring to the solid shores of faith the drifting thousands whose rescue in this world is at all possible, and by which can be done for man and the world what nothing else can do.
Think, then, what momentous interests are hanging upon a due realization of these things by us, and upon our fitting appropriation and illustration of a Gospel so precious! Who can exaggerate its importance, or what is depending on our fidelity as its representatives? It is not a mere doctrine about salvation, we are to remember, that is in our keeping. It is a redemptive power. It is salvation itself, because a Divine agency for the conversion of individuals and the regeneration of the race; and we have it as God's gift, that, putting it first of all into our own lives for their sanctification, we may each help to put it into the thought and life of the world, to fulfil its redemptive purpose.
What, then, follows? That if the world is at any time, or anywhere, actually to be saved, we, under Christ, serving his truth, have each something to do towards saving it. This is the method of redemption. Christ's subjects become his instruments. For this reason, every Christian, according to the truth he holds, has a share in the saving work. Hence our Lord's words to his disciples, "Ye are the salt of the earth; ye are the light of the world." Not, absolutely, that there is no truth, or religious life, outside the ​pale of Christian influence, but that the world's hope, religiously, is in Christianity and its believers. Of those, however, to whom much is given, much is required; and this saving work is ours beyond all others, because our trust of truth is so much larger and better. A most unfit and beggarly conclusion, indeed, it would be, for us to vaunt the superior grandeur and excellence of Universalism as we do, and then to live as if it were only so many empty words, and the world were never to be saved, and we had nothing to do towards saving it! The grander the truth, the more saintly the life, and the more Christian the work, demanded as its expression in the world's behalf.
The difficulty—or one of the difficulties—in respect to this subject is, that not only is there a failure to feel how much God has given us in the Gospel, but that there is no sufficient sense of the actual peril of souls and the world on account of error, indifference, unbelief, and sin, and therefore no fitting sense of the reality of their need, or of the demand on us in their behalf. If a building is on fire, and human beings are seen in it exposed to destruction,—if a child is in the water, drowning, or some poor creature is found perishing of starvation, instantly, the appeal being to our senses, we appreciate it, and are stirred to a sense of duty to do what we can to render succor. In the case of those needing the ministry of Christ, and our ministry as his instruments, there is no such vividness of impression. But precisely this is what is wanted. And why may we not have it? True, the appeal is to our moral consciousness, and not to our senses. But who doubts that there is an unseen life more real than the seen? Or who does not know that whatever touches this touches us most keenly, because in the thing most vital? What is any physical exposure or suffering, at its worst, compared with mental agony or a breaking heart? Mind is always more than matter. Souls are always more than bodies. And by so much as this is true, ignorance of God and alienation from Him, spiritual darkness and destitution, the agony of hearts crushed and comfortless, or yearning for light and finding none, the decay of manhood, the waste of moral stamina and force, the insensibility and death of the soul, are really far more ​terrible, and ought to stir us to an intenser anxiety to render relief and cure than any bodily peril can.
Why cannot this be understood? Above all, theoretically insisting on the fact in our moral philosophy so constantly and emphatically as we do, why is it not more generally understood and felt among us? Why, but that our convictions are formal instead of vital,—cold and torpid instead of glowing and propelling? Set these convictions, that we so readily talk, rightly to burning within us, and with them the sense of responsibility which they are fitted to kindle, and there could be no such heedlessness or inactivity as now. Feeling our obligation, we should bestir ourselves as sedulously, in our anxiety to live and work for human redemption in Christ, as we now do to extend succor to those in physical peril; and, with our hearts burning as they would burn, we could no more justify ourselves before God, or to our own consciences, for unconcern or indolence, or for doing anything, directly or indirectly, save in the line of purity and Christian living and endeavor, than we could now justify ourselves should we push back the drowning into the water instead of helping them out, or should we fan the flames in which screaming victims were enveloped instead of doing our utmost to extinguish them.
A becoming intensity of feeling, then, in regard to Christ and the reality of his work, and of our obligation to be his helpers—this, in a word, is the thing demanded among us. Now, we don't half believe what we profess. Think for a moment of the inconsistency of professing to believe in the salvation of the world through God's truth and grace in His Son, and then living a life that in some way tells every day against the fulfilment of what is so argued for as truth!—of proclaiming that the time is coming when all are lovingly and reverently to delight in God's service, and then living irreverently and profanely!—of talking of the triumph of righteousness, and then helping to create a weak and languid public sentiment concerning intemperance and the habits and business from which it comes, or concerning any evil from which Christ would save, or in any way contributing an example that helps to strengthen sin and Satan, or to hinder the victory of holiness! Conscience needs stir​ring, conviction needs igniting, in respect to all these things; and could we but have the sense of responsibility that would thus be kindled in a becoming consciousness of what souls and the world are suffering without Christ and his regenerating power, and of the reality of that work of redemption in which, as believers of truths so grand and precious, we are called to participate, we should see an awakening among us that would speedily set us all to thinking, and praying, and living, and working for the fulfilment of our faith, that would very soon make us a power for the salvation of souls beyond anything the world has ever seen.
Ah, if we could but have something of the intensity of Christ's conviction and feeling! Why did he leave the glory he had with his Father, and come down to earth to give himself to this work of human redemption? Or why was all heaven moved with concern at his coming? Or why is there such joy in heaven over every repentant sinner? Why but because, in the light in which they regard it, the need of redemption is seen to be so real, and the importance of the work so great? And should what is so real and important to them seem of small consequence to us? What work of human suggestion can begin to compare with this in the momentousness of its interest, or its claims? And yet, should some earthly dignitary send to us, saying, I am engaged in an important enterprise for the instruction and elevation of my people, and I desire your aid to give it success, who of us would not be proud of the invitation, and be ambitious, in a becoming sense of the importance of the work and of our responsibility, to do all we possibly could to insure the success desired? Shall we the less appreciate such an invitation because it comes from God and His Son, or be less desirous, rightly estimating the greatness of the work and our responsibility, to make of ourselves all that we can as co-workers with them? There is not one of us, not even the feeblest and poorest, to whom God is not saying, I want your help in my effort to save men, or to whom Christ is not sending his pleading message, Will you not work with me for the great end for which I died? Shall we answer, No? Who can tell what shall be the effect of our earnestness and fidelity, in light, redemption, and peace to ​souls, on the one hand, or what consequences of sadness and wretchedness shall follow our insensibility and sloth, on the other?
Let no one say that this is pressing things to extremes. It is not pressing things to extremes. It is the literal, practical fact, unless the Gospel be a dream, and Christ a visionary, and the prophesied coming of the kingdom of God the wildest hallucination. Where does God work towards any highest purpose for man except through man? Where are harvests gathered save as man plants and tills? Or, how have ignorance and sin been conquered, or liberty achieved, or any progress in knowledge, or civilization won, save as man has struggled, sacrificed, toiled? Either God is, or He is not, proposing the spiritual enfranchisement and perfection of our race. If He is not, Christianity is false, and we are believing a lie. If He is, the design is to be fulfilled through means; and if through any means, then in part through us, because we have in charge the truth which can best help on the sanctifying process. Any idea or assumption to the contrary is a misconception that needs, first of all, to be burned out of us, as a consciousness of the real fact is set to burning in us. If the grand prophecy of our faith is ever to be accomplished, and truth and righteousness are actually to triumph, the consummation is to be reached, under God, only as we and those like us do the work and fight the battle; and the question we have reason, every day, most anxiously to ask, is, How are we doing what God has assigned us? Is Christ the moral battery of the universe? We are his conductors. Are we electric? Is he the Captain of our salvation? We are his soldiers. Are we rightly waging the contest? If we are not, it is for us to feel, and so far as we are not, we waste his power; subtract from the sum of the moral forces on which the world's redemption depends; help to shadow and drag down souls and the race instead of aiding to illumine and lift them up; and to this extent postpone the hour when Christ shall conquer, and God 'be all in all.'
Who of us, then, does not need to be set on fire by a deeper and intenser comprehension of such a responsibility, that we may be moved to greater warmth of feeling and pur​pose, and so be impelled to more of earnestness and consecration as the disciples of Christ and laborers with him for the subjugation of evil and the victory of God and good?
2. But not alone in a juster sense of our responsibility, do we need Ignition. Most of all we need it in a juster and more vital appreciation and experience of the spirit and power of our faith. Here is the weak point of all Christendom—a failure to perceive the inmost meanings of Christ, and to have him, a living power, instead of a technical assent, in the soul. It is our weak point with the rest. Can we, just here, have an awakening? If not—this whole book has been an attempt to intimate what must be accepted as the certain conclusion.
God's prices are fixed. Spiritual results can come only from spiritual causes; and if we are to make ourselves further felt to any wide and positive Christian purpose, we must become a people, as the Apostle expresses it, "alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord." The old churches are intrenched in the popular sympathy and attachment, notwithstanding they no longer represent as formerly the current of popular thinking and faith. They have the public ear. They draw the multitudes. Tradition and prestige are theirs. And it is sometimes asked—often with no little concern, as we see how much occasion there is in many communities to consider the question,—How are we to change all this, or to compete with these intrenched churches in securing attention and attracting the people? If we speak of sensational or illegitimate methods, there are many ways to do this. But, legitimately, I know of but one way.
Speaking only in a general, and not in an absolute sense, we have done all we can with Universalism as a mere doctrine or theory. Not that there is not a great work for Universalism yet to do in the rectification of opinion. There is. Not that it is to spread no farther as an idea, or as an interpretation of the universe. It is to become the prevalent thought of Christendom. What I mean to say is that we can no longer maintain ourselves as a distinct Church on a mere argumentative or controversial basis, or live and grow on mere dogmatic discussions. Ephraim did not thrive on the east wind. Topics that were once suffi​cient to crowd our churches, now, save under exceptional circumstances, no longer 'draw.' They have grown familiar; are regarded as 'stale,' and, to a large extent, therefore, have lost their charm. The world's attention is seldom long held by any purely dogmatic issue. There comes a time in every theological or religious reform when the awakening and enlisting force of mere doctrine expends itself, and when, if it is to be permanently established as an organized power, in a living and growing church, it must become something more than a protest, an exposition, or an argument;—must become a minister to the spiritual life of the world, or having answered its end, it dies. This time has come with us. So far as we are really doing anything to-day, getting hold of the people and building a Church, we are doing it by virtue of what religious life there is among us, and because of the spiritual power we are putting into our communities.
And this is the one only way of which I just now spoke, for answering the question referred to. How did Paul and Peter and their associates enlist attention to their crucified Christ, and withdraw the people from the divinely appointed, but superseded, religion of Moses, and from the magnificent temples of idolatry and the established power of heathen rituals? How did Peter the Hermit inflame all Europe into such a fever for the crusades, drawing such multitudes away from home and friends and everything that was dear? How did Luther conquer the almost invincible hold of Rome upon the popular mind and heart, and so shake the seven-hilled hierarchy from the despotic domination in which it had thought itself secure? How did the Wesleys succeed, how have any of the world's agitators and reformers succeeded in securing the public ear, and conquering the possession of the public sympathy and faith? How but by a burning enthusiasm? How but by being themselves on fire with that with which they sought to kindle others? How would Christianity have won the place it did, had the Apostles been content with merely disputing in synagogues, or arguing with the Gentiles? They had their doctrines, and arguments, and knew how to use them. But they were no dealers in mere doctrine, or argument. They had them only ​as the sun has light and heat—to glow with them, or as a furnace has coals—to burn with them. To them, every doctrine was a sublime fact, and every opinion a vehicle through which the fire of God's truth was communicated to them, that they might communicate it to others for their kindling and salvation. There was not a faculty of their nature, not a precinct of their souls, that was not aflame with the truth they bore. How else could they have faced and endured what they did, or have so wrought even unto death? Or who wonders that men so possessed with a sense of the reality and importance of their message, so pervaded with its indwelling spirit, so burning with the impulse to proclaim it, were a success as to the effect of their ministry, though they sealed their testimony with their blood?
So, if we are to be most profited by what we believe, or if the Universalist Church is to live and become a power, we must be possessed by Universalism; feeling what it is; made fervent, fluid, burning by it; with hearts glowing; with eyes streaming with the light of the Divine flame within. Our work, if we have any permanent work, is not simply to displace old faiths, and dispossess other churches, but to attract those who are now churchless,—multitudes of them without faith, and to transfuse the world with a new life; and if we are to do this, we must ourselves be transfused, showing in our own fervors, in the ardor of our devotion, in the warmth of our zeal, in the glow of our enthusiasm, what we have wherewith to warm, vitalize and save others:—not one minister, nor one church must do this, but all,—by a common awakening, a common purpose, a common opening of hearts to the baptism of fire. There is no other way for us to conquer, or prevail.
I will not here speak of what Universalism has thus to move and kindle us. Enough, perhaps, has been said on these points in previous chapters. But I cannot forbear the remark that nowhere since the Apostles has there been such a spectacle of souls awakened and glowing, or of wise, consecrated, unconquerable living in nearness to Christ, and in blessed experience of what he only can impart, as we should show, if, through insight and consciousness, we could but ​be thoroughly ignited to understand and to feel all that this faith bestows and discloses: for to whom else have been given such revelations, such incentives, such appeals, such encouragements? Nothing in connection with this whole subject so surprises, nay, so amazes me, as the fact that there are so many professing to be Universalists,—intelligent people, thoughtful people, good people, most of them,—ready stoutly to insist, theoretically, on the religious power of Universalism, and ready, not a few of them, in their way to work for it, who are so insensible to the grandeur of these revelations, so dead to these appeals, incentives and encouragements, and apparently so lost to any thought that they should be at all moved or kindled by them. They talk Universalism, and talk it well, many of them; but they fail to get anything but mere dogma out of it, as one gets only a bunch of bones in a skeleton's hand.
How much is said among us about the salvation of the world! But how many hearts are touched by a sense of what it includes, or by the prospect it opens? Let some good man who has been willing to expose himself to danger for the sake of others, return, bringing them in safety with him, and into what enthusiasm we are all kindled, and how their hearts throb with gratitude towards their deliverer! Let some soldier ride through our streets, bearing the trophies of a battle in which he has conspicuously helped to win victory for the right, and how our pulses beat as we shout his welcome! But here is Christ, with our whole race redeemed and brought home through what he has done and suffered,—here is God, victorious over all the forces of evil,—here are good triumphant, and every human soul helped into purity and blessedness, and all heaven surging with the joy of death destroyed, sin conquered, all mystery solved, all lost ones found, all parted ones united, all pain compensated, and all God's family made one forever in His presence—and pulses beat not! souls glow not! hearts are unkindled, as cold as if all this were a thing of no concern! Think of it! We have here included all that God is as our Father, all that Christ is as our Saviour, all that the Cross is as the symbol of an unconquerable love, all that sin is as our curse, all that heaven is as the perfect answer to ​our largest hopes,—and yet men and women, professing to believe it, and arguing and quoting the Bible to prove it, could scarcely be less moved by it, in any penetrating, fusing, experimental way, if it were simply a theory how best to dispose of last year's chaff! What but the baptism of the Holy Ghost can rightly move those so insensible? Or how can we ever be a live and spiritually effective people save as there somehow comes to us an arousing—an opening of eyes, to see what Universalism is,—a quickening of spiritual sensibility, to feel it,—an electric influx, causing thought, emotion, purpose, the whole soul, to be set on fire by it?
Not that we should invite or desire any fever or excitement. The sun makes no 'fuss,' or crackle, in shining. Neither do the trees in growing. Christ made no show. He did not "strive nor cry, neither did any man hear his voice in the streets." He simply felt and glowed. So with the Apostles. So it has been with all who have had Christ deepest and most experimentally in them. So it should be with us. We want no noise; no cheap and boisterous 'gush'; no fanaticism; no showy or overflowing religious effervescence; no 'strange fire.' We want only warmth; sensibilities thoroughly awakened; spiritual perceptions clarified; a fervor and glow of the entire being, as the fires of God's grace and of Christ's self-sacrificing love pervade it, and as the resulting sense of all Divine realities, with the glory that is possible now and the fulness of glory beyond, becomes a sweet experience and joy. This is Christian ignition, by which only can our faith possess us, or can we possess the world. Shall we have it?
Shall we have it? This is one question of this book; and, penning it here for the last time, I do so in confidence and hope, and yet not without solicitude and prayer. For, though I see much as I look over the field to assure and encourage us, yet, as I yield myself to the thoughts which the question suggests, and consider how many things must concur for its right answer, and how much depends, for ourselves, for our country, for the world, on its being so answered, I cannot conceal from myself how ​serious it is, nor that there are grounds for some apprehension.
Dwelling for a moment on the question, my mind is busy with our past, our present, our future. Looking back over these years of our first century, I think of the manifest Providence which attended the opening of our history, and of all that has since been done to plant and extend this Church of our love. I reflect on all that has helped to make it what it is, and that not only are we the heirs of the ages, sharing in the results of all the great work of the world's great souls,—apostles, heroes, martyrs, and gathering fruit from the seed which, in blood and tears, they planted, but that we are specially the heirs of the devoted and earnest men who founded and have builded our Church—building themselves, some of them, forever into it. I think of Murray and Winchester and the early Streeters, and Lathe, and Richards, and the rest, whom I never saw. I think of the Ballous, and Turner, and Balfour, and Sebastian Streeter, and Whittemore, and their co-laborers, whom it was my privilege to know, and whose faces hang as unfading pictures in the gallery of my heart. I think of the zeal and sincerity and self-sacrifice which these names, and those of others no less faithful, symbolize, and thus of what has been done to make us what we are, and something of the toil and brain and heart our Church as it exists to-day has cost.
Then, as I consider what is the truth which has thus been served, and how we have ripened in apprehending it, and what an influence has gone out from us, and what we have come to be, and what are the possibilities inviting us to their fulfilment, the query comes, For what has all this been? To what end have these men lived and labored? To what end has this Church so grown in all the resources of church-power? To what end these leavening influences which it has so diffused? To what end these great possibilities? Only that we, and those who are to succeed us, should suffer them to be in vain, or so far in vain that Universalism is to go into history, not as an organized Church, standing through the generations to do permanent work for Christ and the evangelization of the world, but simply as an ​ephemeral movement, a temporary means of modifying thought, appearing for a little while, and then passing away? And then, as I reflect what would be lost should this be our end, and how hungering hearts, and eyes blinded with tears, and an unbelieving and sinful world need us, and what momentous consequences are suspended on our continued existence and increasing power, I seem to hear all our ascended saints and worthies, with one voice, appealing to us, and protesting, God forbid that, through the insensibility and faithlessness of those to whom we have bequeathed so great a trust, our toils and sacrifices should come only to such an end! Shall this be their end? This is the question which God, and Christ, and all who have labored in our past, and every interest concerned, are uniting to press upon us as we stand on the threshold of our second century. How will we answer?
A potent and impressive answer was that, so far as one man could answer, given by the solitary Universalist who, in a community doctrinally arrayed against him, conquered prejudice and disarmed opposition, extorting the confession, "We think we might manage his arguments, but we don't know what to do with his life"! It was a life so generous, so pure, so prayerful, so thoughtful and loving towards man, so full of piety towards God, in all things so pervaded by the very flavor of Christ's spirit, and thus so in advance of the lives about him, that it was a constant wonder to those who observed and felt it. Who can tell what came of it for the honor of Christ and the conversion of souls?
God help and quicken us till every Universalist, penetrated in like manner by the spirit of our faith, shall attest its power in a similar life. Then will all questions touching our Future be effectually answered, and our destiny be assured. Then will Universalism become the recognized synonyme of all that is grandest in thought, noblest in aim, purest in life, and most sanctifying in influence; and, giving demonstrative evidence that the life of God is flowing through it, the Universalist Church will go forward into constantly fresh Departures, because into steadily enlarging plans and ​widening power—each New Departure taking it on to higher ground, and into more earnest labor in Christ's behalf, until its work below shall be finished in the flowing together of all churches in form, as they should now be one in spirit, and as the Church praying and struggling on earth becomes the Church victorious in heaven.
* ↑ These extracts are quoted from a review of Dr. Patton, in the Universalist Quarterly, Vol. viii. p. 182, by Rev. G. T. Flanders, D. D.
* ↑ Scribner's, for July, 1873, p. 298.