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shown how Protestantism itself , except when in opposition , has belied its own prindples of freedom , and become Papal in its pretensions to infaTlibSitrXn opposing those who protested . against it But whatever the See may have been , the leading principles are those just stated . The tendency of the Eeformation was to make religion more subjective , consequently more vague ; and to express more directly the intimate relation of Man to his Creator as a spiritual bond . To develope that tendency to its utmost limits has been the purpose of The Leader ; and we have welcomed from all sides adherents to that cause , not regarding minor differences with any minuteness . Comte and Feuerbach , Newman and Parker , Foxton and Martineau , Emerson and Henry James—they are all working towards one end though by various routes—and that end we may name the Democratization of Religion , which " anoints the man and itu
supersedes the priest" ( to use Henry James s expression ; , wmcn aoes Religion what Democracy does for Politics , viz ., tends to replace external , arbitrary coercion , by internal , voluntary conviction . Tor what we nave said respecting the progressive development of Religion applies equally to Politics , there also the tendency is from despotism to liberty , from government to self-government . . Having thus briefly touched upon these capital points let us turn to Henry James , and see what tidings he brings of the strife between the Old and New Theology .
" Every attentive reader of the gospels will have remarked , that the controversy between Jesus and his antagonists , was a controversy between the most enlarged humanity on the one side , and a well-established orthodoxy on the other . The battle which he fought , was the battle of universal man against the principalities and powers of this world , who sought to make humanity a stepping-stone to their exaltation . It was not as commonly reported , a battle between God on the one side and man on the other : far the Christ invariably declared God to be the unchangeable friend of man , infinitely more ready to show him favour than man was to ask it . It was a battle between God considered to be thus friendly to universal man , on the one side , and a set of men , or rather a nation of men , on the other side , who arrogated His special friendship to themselves , on the ground of a certain ritual righteousness which distinguished them from the rest of mankind .
" In fact , the doctrine of the Christ is nothing more and nothing less than a revelation of the essential unity of God and man . He acknowledged no other mission than the vindication of humanity from the stigma of unrig hteousness before God , no other joy than to persuade the conventionally vilest of men of the infinite righteousness he had in God . No matter what the occasion may have been , you find him invariably identifying himself with the interests of the most enlarged humanity , and ready to sacrifice every private tie which in any way involved a denial of the universal brotherhood of the race . But what is the use of dwelling on the point ? Every one who reads the Scripture for original instruction , and not merely for the confirmation of some traditional opinion , recognises in Jesus the God-anointed champion of humanity against established injustice and superstition .
" If then the mission of the Christ claimed this humanitary character , we may be very sure that the sovereign touchstone of his Church will be its possession of the same spirit . We may be very sure that the interest of humanity will occupy the first place with it , and personal or private interests a very subordinate place . " Suppose then we apply this test to the existing or sectarian church : we shall at once discover its complete destitution of the spirit of Christ . Instead of a zeal for humanity in it , you x ) erceivo only a zeal for the person of Jesus himself . In fact , as I showed on a former occasion , the church innkes Jesus , under the name of a mediator , a perpetual barrier to the cordial intercourse of God and man . Let me make this charge plain by an example . Suppose me , then , influenced by the traditions and customs of the society in which I live , to apply to any of our clergy for the benefit of church communion . He thereupon proceeds to question me as to my fitness , and in the course of his inquiry seeks above all to be satisfied on this
point , namely , whether I am willing to receive the divine blessing only for the sake or through the merits of Jesus Christ . He tells me that God abhors me personally , and will not look upon me apart from Jesus . He is not content to tell me what Christ himself tells , that there is no such thing as merit in God ' s sight , or any ground of boasting in one man over others , since all goodness comes from ( Sod . Far from it ! A doctrine like this would prostrate the wall of separation hetween the church and the world , giving the latter despised personage in fact a very fair chance of salvation , lint he is very careful to tell me what Christ does not tell me , namely , that God entertains a personal aversion to me , that I am in fact in iny natural person intolerably odious to him , and can expect no particle of favour at his hands which is not purchased by the expiatory sufferings of Jesus . This is the essential rallying point of orthodoxy , and accordingly if iny memory prove well-posted up here , my way is tolerably clear to church-membership . "
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T / IFIC OF LOW ) LAWGDALE . Tw 0 Memoirs of the Right Hon . Jlcnri / Lord lAmgditlc . By Thomas Duffufl Har < J , ^ , ^ Wk can by no moans agroo with tlio erificB , that Lord Lang < j » l « SJ ^ , ft a life worthy of being written , simply because . Lord Langcluio * ^ ^ man ofbrilfiant talents , mick as " iu » I . oihh 1 i" generations . Ji ¦ ™ -U (> ri worthy of being written ; but let uh hasten to add , worthy oi V ° " * JltorialH ; well . " Mr . Hardy has made but a poor biography out ot ma ' HOfulnoflanevertheless , poor as it is , wo are not disposed to question us w
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806 THE LEADER . [ Saturday .
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" Such is the sum of orthodoxy , the sotting up u personal pretension . Instead of abiding the test therefore of a conformity to the spirit of Christ , to that Hpirit of humanity which animated all his labours , that Hpirit of peace on earth and good will to all men which was exhibited as much in his condemnation of the Pharisee ars in his clemency to the publican ; it completely violates it by converting Jesus into a mounter of self-seeking , and turning all the grace of the gospel into a mere argument of his personal supremacy . It represents the whole beneficent work of the Christ to have ; been undertaken with a view to bin own ultimate glory .
Whatever mercy may have been in it , no one shall reap the benefit of it without an entire prostration of his personal will to that of Jesus . For mercy was not the end of the work , it was only the meaiiH to nn end , winch end was the establishing his personal empire over the human mind . " " Certainly nothing can be more inhuman than this pretension . It outrages every instinct of humanity , to ascribe perfection to a person who claims iny worship under penalty of death , under jMiiialty of everlasting misery . It is a , purely diabolic claim , which all humanity disown * with loathing and contempt . In fact orthodoxy lives the little life yet left it only by a dext . eroim appeal ( o the . sensuous imagination , only by flattering the instinct * of a low prudence or expediency . Contenming the spirit of humanity , all that is best and loveliest ia humanity disowns it . "
The humanitarian mission oi' Ohririt in everywhere insisted on . Head UllH , 1 JScver since the world had stood was a fair fame jnoro outraged than that of
Jesus has been by ecclesiastical usage . Look at his gospel . Do you find tho slightest token there of his having any quarrel with the conceded sinner ? Tw not his whole quarrel lie on the contrary with the conceded saint , with him WK in the eyes of all men was righteous ? Do you find him on any occasion t > ro raising to honour those who made much of his person-promising to favour tW who should call themselves by his name ? On the contrary does he not , whenever looking forward to his second or spiritual coming , pronounce that profession or calling the one thing odious and dangerous ? Truly it is so . His whole contro versy is represented as lying with Ins professing followers , those who profess to be the children of God . He had no quarrel in Ins first coming but with those who professed to be God ' s people par excellence , and despised the claims of others . Sa also he represents himself at his second coining , as having no quarrel but with those who under the profession of honouring him , have only heaped upon him all manner of personal adulation , all manner of interested personal sycophancy . " These extracts will convey a notion of the plain speaking of Henvv
James , as also of the serious thought which lies under it ; but to our minds the great service of his Lectures is the emphatic way in which he shows that the Old Theology , by making Creation a voluntary act , a thing ab extra , leaves the creature in a very insecure relation to the Creator , inasmuch as Will is notoriously fickle ; whereas the New Theology asserts a secure immutable relation , for it denies that creation is an exhibition of the divine will , strictly so called , and affirms it to be an operation of the essential perfection of God , an outgrowth of his very Selfhood—a thing lived , not done . . All that Henry James says on it we advise the reader to meditate ; and add thereto this supplement by way of application : if it be blasphemous to talk of the fickleness of the divine Will , the blasphemy falls back on those who predicate a Will , i . e . a human faculty . Nay , do not t he Christian Teachers themselves teach this fickleness when they make God first condemn man for the sin of Eve , and then relent upon the intercession of Clrrist ? So dangerous is it to talk of the Deity in human language !
On the relation between God and Man , Henry James says : — " The sectarian conception of the relation between God and man is notoriously disclaimed by science , or the organized observation of nature and society , because every advance of science demonstrates the perfect unity of God and man , by shotting the whole realm , of nature divinely accommodated to the development of man ' s power , and to the aggrandizement of his passional and intellectual existence . Our ecclesiastical dogmas teach the opposite of this . They place God in the attitude of exacting something from his own dependent creature , and they place the creature consequently in a meritorious attitude towards Him , in the attitude of serving Him for a reward . Science demonstrates that the only becoming temper of mind on our part towards the Divine , is that of boundless exultation in the riches of His beneficence , and of determined activity towards the fullest possible realization of it . Sectarianism , on the other hand , declares that God looks upon us with aversion , save as we are connected with itself ; being stayed in His purpose of summary
destruction only by the intervention of a third party : and that our proper position towards Him therefore is one of trembling and abject supplication . Every day ot the week the sun comes forth to illustrate the benignity of the Universal Father , and the waving of leaves , and the murmur of brooks , and the laug hter or corn on the hill-sides , and the ringing melody that ascends from the whole physicfn creation , and the myriad-fold success of human enterprise in the realms of traffic and art , all attest and confirm the illustration . Much more eloquently , even , docs the grander temple of the human heart proclaim the same benignity . For we find all of its various affections when left to their unperverted flow , bringing forth fruits of invariable joy and peace . But on Sunday , sectarianism diligently denies all that the busy week and a peaceful heart have taught us . For instead of confirming their tidings of the life which comes everywhere unbought , and even unsought , ot the glory that is on every creature , both great and small , which the Diyine hand has fashioned , it reports a life universally forfeited , and never to be regained , save in a limited measure , and through the purchase of inconceivable suffering .
And further on : — " It is impossible , when men begin to apprehend that God is a spirit , and that his kingdom accordingly is exclusively within them , that they should not speedily dismiss that sanctity winch stands in meats and drinks , and tho observance ot sabbaths arid baptisms , and sacraments . When I perceive God to be no longer i mere outside and finite person , but the very life of my life , more inseparable iicmi my inmost self than my soul is from my body ; when 1 perceive that neitlici ncifc nor depth , neither the highest heavens nor the lowest hells have power to Hevei - from his profuse ; and benignant presence , it seems a purely superfluous and t t * .. . ... . t ii- i . . _ l 1 ... ..,, « + lmur I call < 10 , to t to him banything i < - ,
fore ridiculous thing , attempcommending myself y _ especially by anything I can do in the way of favourably differencing myself ^ other persoiiH . I am profoundly 4 iahamed of such differences . ^ J low Had it is to witness tho complacency with which tho sectarian heaps i i family-worship , his private- devotions , his social concerts of prayer , Ins » ^ exercises , fancying full surely , that thus , and not otherwise , does one ' s soul "" - ^^ tho side * . Of course sincerity always attracts your respect , wherever it app < ^ > but if superstition mean the worship of that of which one is ignorant , whei i < ^ we find it in livelier play than here ? Would one ever dream that tin . wan worshipping the Giver ' of life ? Would it not rather seem that ho WUM tfJ shipping the withholder of it , from whom nevertheless he waa resolved one ( y
extract it by the irresistible forceps of prayer ?" We must cease , thoug h extracts and comment lure us on . / W ia . ^ hove quoted will bo tmfficient to justify tho praise given to tins voi ^ and will , we hope , excite tho reader's curiosity to see all Jleliry Jai ' . j to say . That there in not a little to bo questioned , or ovon ihitiy uo will not ailed ; tho trcmora ! interest and suggentivenoss oi the voiuiu .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 21, 1852, page 806, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1948/page/18/
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