MISCELLANEOUS COMMUNICATIONS. SCRIPTURAL ESSAYS. (No. VIII.) THE TRUTH, POWER, AND BENEFICENCE OF (For the Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine.) "As poor, yet making many rich."-2 Cor. vi. 10. to THIS declaration of the Apostle seems, in the first place, to be a startling paradox. What has poverty to do with power, and especially with extensive and beneficent power, the power of influencing many, and of influencing them advantageously, of making many rich? Yet this is the statement of inspiration: "As poor, yet making many rich." If there be influence, there must be power; and if there be power, there must be truth; for a real, permanent influence can only be exercised by truth. Error only influences so far as it is believed; that is, so far as it is considered to be truth. Let its real character be perceived, let the error become visible, and the power to influence at once and entirely ceases. An erroneous proposition only seems state something. In reality, it states nothing; and the perception of its erroneousness is the perception of its nothingness. The abiding power of Christianity results from its truth. It has been subjected to the most rigid examinations. In many instances, all the feelings and wishes of the examiners have been in opposition to its truth. But it has stood the test; and the severity of the examination has added to the certainty of the result. Christianity is true; and because it influences by means of truth, therefore is its power at once great and beneficent. Wherever it meets with man, it possesses in its truth the means of influencing him; and for the same reason that it influences at all, it influences beneficially. The primary and direct influence of truth cannot be otherwise than advantageous to him who yields to it. Man is injured only by ignorance or error,by the total absence of the very ap pearance of truth, or by the adop tion of that which appears to be true, and is not so. From the truth of Christianity, its power and beneficence may be directly concluded and one of the strongest arguments of its truth is suggested by the first term of this seeming paradox, asserting, as it does, the poverty of those by whom it was at the beginning promulgated. The investigation of the sentence, while it allows the verbal paradox to remain, re moves from the meaning even the appearance of contradiction, and fixes the proper character of the declaration as a modest, and yet fearless, assertion of the truth, the power, and the beneficence of Christianity. It is the gift of God to man; and his gift as the God of love. What is Christianity, but the full result of the mission of the Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begot ten Son of God? And "God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world," as the minister of his holy vengeance on sinful and rebellious man, but for the accomplishment of his purposes of mercy and love, "that the world through him might be saved." It is the design of this essay somewhat more fully to explain and establish the principles contained in these introductory remarks, and to point out the practical lessons which the subject involves. I. "As POOR."-We are at once reminded, by this expression, of a most important fact in the history of the Christian religion. Humanly speaking, its founder was Christ, and Christ was emphatically a poor man. However respectable the family might be,-and his mother was "of the house and lineage, of David," so that he "was made of the seed of David according to the flesh," yet the circumstances of these representatives of the royal house of Judah were almost as low as they well could be. The facts which the Evangelists record are stated too explicitly to allow the least room for doubt; and they are too well known, by all who are acquainted with the record, to require any enumeration. He who had the choice of all conditions before him, chose that from which all worldly advantages, as they may be termed, were utterly and far removed. "Though he was rich, yet for our sakes he became "-literally, and in the actual state in which he was born, and lived, and died-" poor." So were his first disciples, particularly his Apostles. Even Paul himself, though he had received a good Jewish education, and was acquainted with profane literature, required a trade; and, after his call to the apostleship, when he would avoid being burdensome to infant churches, and their comparatively weak members, he had no private resources of his own, but supplied his wants by working as a tent-maker. Widely as Christianity has spread, lofty as is the elevation which it has reached, thus humble and powerless was its origin in the estimation of the world. They who undertook the mighty task of bringing all nations into a universal discipleship, and of subduing the opposition which the very proposal of such a design could not fail everywhere to awaken, were all of them poor men; and, with one exception, because poor, uneducated. They brought to their undertaking neither worldly wealth, nor worldly honours, nor worldly influence and power, nor worldly talent. The single word by which St. Paul here describes their condition is most emphatic, and full of significance. They were poor, and they knew that they were so; and scarcely did they live a day without being reminded, by some occurrence or another, that the world was both VOL. XXIII. Third Series. acquainted with the fact, and always ready to take advantage of it against them, and against their plans. In the fact thus briefly stated, we see a powerful argument of the truth of the Christian religion, because of the inadequacy, humanly speaking, of the means employed for the production of the effects which, nevertheless, we know to have actually resulted. In this argument, we acknowledge, there is nothing of novelty; neither do we represent it as novel. Our object may be stated in the language of the Apostle to the members of the primitive churches, to "stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance." The argument itself is so powerful, and so impressively illustrates the power, wisdom, and goodness of God, that it can never be considered attentively without profit; and now that infidelity, notwithstanding its continued succession of defeats, is not only attempting to rally, but uniting with the predicted apostasy of the "last days," for what may be, though a final, yet a mighty and bitter, assault on evangelical religion, it demands renewed and most careful examination. If we have hitherto only followed " cunningly-devised fables," let the fact be established, and let us act accordingly. The knowledge of an erroneous proposi tion is merely verbal knowledge; that is, is no knowledge at all; and if we are taught anything by the study of the human mind, surely it is this, that man was designed for knowledge, not for ignorance. How, then, does the case really stand? Let us glance, for a few moments, at the undeniable state of the world at the time of the first proclamation of the Gospel. To say, that men were asleep when the angels declared what were "glad tidings of great joy for all people," were to say the very best that could be said. But this was not the case when the Apostles went forth in the name of their Master, and by his command, to "preach the Gospel to every creature." The world was awakened and aroused. The Jews were OCTOBER, 1844. 3 L full of bitter and inveterate prejudices. And the worst of it was, that these prejudices, like diseased excrescences, fed by the artery which poured living blood into them, were all associated with divine revelation, and actually fed and strengthened by it. Their stronghold was, "The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, are these!" All the learning of the nation, all its wealth and power, all its thoughts and feelings, were vehemently opposed to the Gospel, and resolutely determined on the rejection of its claims. They crucified the Head, and persecuted the members even unto death. "Away with such fellows from the earth," was their loud and continued cry; "it is not fit that they should live!" Then there was the Gentile world. With few exceptions, and those not for the better,-it was altogether given to idolatry; that idolatry being not only connected with all that was outwardly elegant, splendid, and imposing, but, in the fanciful mythology on which it rested, with their history, their laws, their literature. Their intellectual existence was more than fed, it was constituted, by it. It was upheld at once by civil authority, and by popular poetry; by the passions and prejudices of the people, and by the policy of their rulers. As to the Gentile philosophy, what of truth it possessed was powerless, because of its abstraction, and its entire dissociation from facts. And even had it not been thus powerless, it was held in the darkness and bondage of unrighteousness, an enemy to be imprisoned, not a friend to be sent forth on missions of enlightenment, and purity, and love. Against the Gospel were therefore arrayed the jealousy and power of rulers, the interested bigotry of a widely-ramified priesthood, the contempt of the learned, and the passions of the common people, stimulated by the prejudices which were so strongly intrenched in their ignorance. . Such was the state of the world when the first Preachers of the Christian religion went forth, with the avowed design of preparing the way for making that religion universal. Truly had their Master said, "I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves." The disproportion of David to Goliath cannot here suggest even a comparison, but altogether disappears. Nothing but the blindest and most ignorant enthusiasm could have formed the notion of such a work; and even enthusiasm must have been inflamed to the very verge of madness, to have attempted its accomplishment. The only way to feel the power of the argument, is to realize to ourselves persons in the same station in life, as such persons are at the present day. A handful of men, dwelling on the sea-coast, night and day employed in fishing, or in the work connected with fishing, must be placed before us,-a handful, so to speak, of sailor-fishermen; and we are to conceive of these as projecting the overthrow of all existing systems of religion, and the estab lishment of a new one in its place. Now, not a single feature of enthusiasm can be perceived in either their writings or their proceedings. They were in earnest, most deeply so; but they were calm and deliberative, governing and employing their own feelings, not governed by them. And yet these few men, taken from the lowest ranks of life, totally destitute of all the merely human means of influence and power, undertook to preach a new religion to the world, and to call on all, rich and poor, learned and illiterate, to submit to their spiritual directions! Can this fact-viewing the fact as upon the best historical evidence we are obliged to view it-can it be accounted for on any supposition but this one, that the religion itself was true, and that these men knew that it was so? For it is not sufficient to put the case thus generally, thus to say, Such and such men undertook to preach a new religion. A new religion! What sort of an one? Before they could preach it, they must possess it. And, therefore, we leave the undertaking, vast as it was, and unaccountable except on one only supposition,-we leave the under tuking, and come to the conception. And now where are we ? Even if we take the New Testament only, what a system opens before us, of facts, of principles, and doctrines; and of these, as by a wonderful agreement, most harmoniously united ! The character of Jesus, and the discourses of his public ministry, the mediatorial scheme, the moral system; and these, and all other parts of the religion, considered in relation to the actuallysubsisting world, to the providential administration observable there, to the actual character of man, and even to the innermost mental constitution. It is thus that the Gospel ought to be considered; for as truth only is universally consistent, in universal consistency we find no slight argument of truth. And this the Gospel presents. The very philosophy of the human mind, then in its completest infancy, and which has only been brought to its present state of improvement by the longcontinued and accurate observation of centuries, is the philosophy of mind which the whole New Testament implies. And as to its moral system, it is precisely that which such a being as man requires. It is exactly suited to him as an individual, nor less so as existing in society. It is calculated for the complete, the orderly, and beneficial developement of all the faculties of his nature; and for the production not only of a happier social state than the world has ever witnessed, but for the production of a really happy state. The French infidels, some years ago, were fond of talking of the perfectionnement of society, and of the natural tendency of man to such a state. That this was all even worse than idle speculation, is not only proved by the state of China and India,-by the stagnation of the former, and the nolonger-deniable deterioration of the latter; not only by the condition of savage tribes, in which not the slightest tendency to improvement has been visible in a time in which, had it existed, effects, however slight, yet appreciable, must have become apparent; but also by their own country, and its boasted civilization. French civilization may be now taken as the type of the civilization which modern infidelity is calculated to produce. And let its partisans boast of it as much as they please: they are welcome to all the advantages which their system can derive from it. It is not only hollow and insincere, possessing only a superficial glare, a refinement of manners that is purely theatrical, and which does not even faintly adumbrate that true courteousness to which Christian benevolence and charity are ever tending; but it possesses-and in proportion as it is seen to be derived from this infidel source is it more clearly seen to possess-all the worst principles of savage life,-principles which actually become the more dangerous to society by the civilization in other respects with which they are connected. Is their insane passion for military glory, their rabid passion for war and bloodshed, the unconquerable propensity to brigandage, which carries us back to the Sea-Kings and Northmen of the barbarian days of Europe, -is the combination of such principles with a national vanity, that could only exist so extensively as unhappily it does with a real and decided godlessness of the public mind, any occasion of glorying? Does it move in a direction which either promises improvement to society, or peace and happiness to the world? The true perfectionnement of man and society can only be promoted by a system combining truth as to our intellectual and moral nature, with an efficient remedy for our weakness and corruption. And as this combination is only found in the Gospel, so it is there found most completely. And let that remedy be examined, not only in its wonderful facts, but in its-if possiblestill more wonderful principles; in its exhibition of love in all its depths, and in all its forms and aspects; in its vindication of government, of law, its manifestation of the brilliant glory of a spotless purity; its presentation of the character of God as Father, Ruler, and Judge of all, not only in a light which, in every properly disposed mind, sweetly compels adoration and love, but which is also exemplary of the highest degree of moral excellence for man, who is thus called so to behold this glory as to be changed into the same image, from glory into glory. Let the whole of Chris tianity, as it is thus declared to be by its own authentic records, be thus carefully and analytically examined; let the state of the world when this system was first promulgated in Judea be recollected; let the actual power and performance of the human intellect be marked by the consideration of the writings of the philosophers and poets of the Augustan age; and then let the fact of the human authorship of Christianity-if human it were-be observed just as it is. We have the uneducated son of a provincial artisan associated with a few fishermen in circumstances like to his own. And these men, thus unlearned and unaided, thus POOR, suddenly reach ed the highest summit of intellectual light and power, and gave to the world a system most perfectly adapted to the condition and wants of the world,—a system which no succeeding ages have been able in the slightest degree to improve,—a system which neither man nor society can ever outgrow; but which, whatever the intellectual or social expansion may be, is still found to possess all the majestic superiority of independent truth and supreme law, revealing to man his proper and highest good, and guiding him to the secure and endless possession of it. To undertake the task of converting the world, as the world was eighteen centuries ago, might, perhaps, be said, however destitute the assertion of even the semblance of truth, to be a work in which a visionary enthusiasm, which either sees no difficulties, or is only the more vehemently excited by them, might profess to be willing to engage; but to devise such an instrumentality as the New Testament undeniably furnishes, is possible to neither the dreaming enthusiast, nor the crafty impostor. Not more manifestly do the heavens declare the glory of God, than does the New Testament exhibit the wisdom of God. We now set aside all questions concerning miracles and prophecy. We forego the consideration of the Old Testament, although its previous existence supplies an irrefragable proof of the divine origin of Christianity. We limit our notice to Christianity itself, as a system of religion and morals; and to its human authors, if such alone they were. We point to the unlettered Jesus of Nazareth, and to his associates, the equally unlettered fishermen of the Galilean lake. We take this company of poor men; we then take the New Testament; and we ask, Whence the pure, the lofty, the expansive wisdom necessary for framing such a system as this? Talk of miracles! Mind has its laws and its limits, as well as matter; and to heal the sick, or to raise the dead, would be a work not more beyond the physical powers of man, than the construction of the system contained in the New Testament would be beyond his intellectual capacity. He who can believe that a handful of poor Jews, at a period when Judah was but one step from her lowest degradation,—and, so far as human power is concerned, her final ruin,-devised that beautiful and magnificent scheme of moral instruction which, we again fearlessly assert, we do actually possess in the New Testament, may go on without pausing in his career, and receive every tale of wonder which the legends of pious or impious fraud may narrate. Transubstantiation itself does not involve more or greater contradictions than the merely human origin of the Christian religion. No! the weapons of their warfare were not carnal, but mighty through God. Their influence was great, for it was the influence of heavenly truth. It was, therefore, as beneficial as it was extensive. II. "YET MAKING MANY RICH." The general fact thus stated refers to the actual influence of apostolic preaching, and to its extensiveness. What was the object which the |