Page images
PDF
EPUB

ties, in which the private differs from the public character of those, who were active in the great political transactions of Modern Europe. Since the invasion of Italy by Charles VIII. and Ferdinand of Arragon, and their respective successors, the period when the use of standing armies was resumed, and the leading powers of Europe commenced their struggle for the empire of the world, the small remains of principle and integrity which lingered in the courts of the age, were completely annihilated, and the desperate game which followed, engendered the policy, which Machiavelli has embodied, and which passes by his name;-a policy which every man professed to abhor, but which every court in Europe notoriously practised without the least hesitation, in all their foreign diplomacy. Such was the perverted public sentiment of the age, that we must not infer that all public men were necessarily bad men in the domestic and social circle. While this is no apology for the enormous political vices of the times, it is often a great relief to our feelings to find men, whose public conduct we cannot defend, prove themselves worthy of our respect and admiration, by the constancy and purity of their domestic virtues.

We rise from the perusal of every thing pertaining to the public and private life of political men with a profound sense of the wretchedness of a life which so many covet. The emptiness, insincerity, intrigue, jealousy, hatred, oppression and assassination, which go to make up the history of thrones and of courts, present a gloomy picture of human nature.

ART. VI.-1. Justification by Faith: a Charge delivered before the Clergy of the Protestant Episcopal Church, in the Diocese of Ohio, and at the twenty-second Annual Convention of the Diocese, at St. Paul's Church, Steubenville, Sept. 13, 1839. With an appendix. By the Right Reverend Charles P. M'Ilvaine, D. D., Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church, in the Diocese of Ohio. Columbus: Isaac N. Whiting. MDCCCXL. 2. Oxford Divinity compared with the Tenets of Romanism, &c. &c. By the Right Reverend Charles P. M'Ilvaine, D. D., Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church, in the Diocese of Ohio. Philadelphia: J. Whetham & Son.

1840.

In our last number, we gave a brief and cursory notice of Bishop M'Ilvaine's CHARGE to the clergy of his diocese, on the 13th of September 1839. The importance of the doctrine inculcated in this charge, the soundness of the theology taught, and the perspicuity and convincing evidence with which it was exhibited, deserved a much more full and extended review; which we were prevented from giving by several circumstances unnecessary to be here detailed, but especially by the information, that the right reverend author had another work in preparation for the press on the same subject, and which might be considered, as in some sort, an appendix to the "CHARGE." The object of this additional work was understood to be, "to bring under examination the doctrine of certain gentlemen of the university of Oxford, recently published in this country, on the subject of JUSTIFICATION." As this volume has just come to hand, and as these two works are not only closely connected, but, in the author's view, parts of the same, we have placed them both at the head of this article, and propose to review them as one work. It is not surprising to us, that there should be a continual tendency among men to degenerate from the truth, in their opinions respecting the true method of justification. To all creatures, as originally created, the only method of obtaining the divine favour, is by their own. obedience to the divine will. This is the only method of acceptance with God, of which reason has the least conception. And if the wisest of creatures had been required to devise some other method of justification, consistent with the divine law and the attributes of God, they never could have conceived

[blocks in formation]

of any such plan. Indeed, if sin had never entered among God's creatures, there had never been any need of any other method, than the one already mentioned. And after sin existed, if no purpose of mercy towards sinners had been entertained, there would have existed no occasion for a new method of securing the divine favour. The most exalted exercise of finite intellect could never have conceived of any thing else as possible, but the regular exercise of law and justice, in relation to transgressors. Accordingly, when the angels rebelled, nothing else was seen but the rigid execution of the penalty of the law upon them; and of course the same method of treating other sinners would reasonably have been expected. The method of salvation for sinners is, therefore, a doctrine of pure revelation, of which no conception could have been entertained, unless it had been revealed. And now, when made known, however, its divine wisdom may be admired by minds enlightened from above, yet human reason is prone to think of no other method of acceptance with God, than by personal obedience. It is true, that if we reasoned logically upon the facts of the case, we should soon come to the conclusion, that justification by his own works was impossible to a transgressor; but men are naturally blind to their own true character. They have no deep and abiding sense of their own sinfulness; and their views of the holiness of God are obscure and inadequate; so that they still dream of doing something to obtain the favour of God. Clear views of the divine attributes, and of the extent and spirituality of the law of God, would either drive men to despair of salvation, or would lead them to the refuge which the mercy of God has opened for sinners of the human race. But when men are left to themselves, they uniformly trust to their own righteousness; and to supply its defects, resort to such penances and sacrifices as they hope will be accepted as an atonement for their short-comings. Thus it has often occurred, in the history of the church, that with a divine revelation of the true method of justification in their hands, not only the ignorant multitude, but their learned teachers, fall into the opinions suggested by blinded reason, and lose sight entirely of the revelation which God has made on this subject. Or, they task their ingenuity and learning, to accommodate the doctrines of the word of God to their own self-righteous notions.

The true method of a sinner's justification is clearly taught in the Old Testament, as well as in the New, and the believers

under the old dispensation, fully embraced this doctrine and placed all their dependence on it, as appears by many of the Psalms; but when Christ sojourned on earth, the expounders. of the law, the Scribes and Pharisees, had no idea of any other method of salvation but by works of law; and even when they embraced the gospel, many of them were still infected with the old leaven of self-righteousness, and insisted on a strict observance of the ceremonial law, as the only method of obtaining the favour of God and eternal life. It was this which induced Paul to enter so fully into the doctrine of a sinner's justification, in several of his epistles; and this was wisely ordered, for these self-righteous doctrines, having their foundation very deep in human nature, and receiving the support of unenlightened human reason, there is a necessity, from time to time, to combat and suppress the same set of errors. Thus, although Paul had so clearly and explicitly pointed out the danger of going about to establish our own righteousness, and not submitting to the righteousnesss of God; yet, in a few centuries, the Pelagians and Semi-pelagians, revived the old exploded heresies, which Paul had condemned. But whenever the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord raiseth up a standard against him. Augustine, who had himself, like Paul, been once blind to the truth, was raised up to defend the true doctrines of the gospel, and for the last twenty years of his life, he made it his chief object to labour for the extirpation of these false and dangerous opinions, which ascribed our salvation to the obedience of man, rather than to the grace of God. His opinions and his writings received the express and repeated sanction of the church, expressed by her councils and bishops; and the truth, as taught by this great theologian, was considered as established. But, in process of time, the majority of the Catholic church degenerated from the true doctrines of the gospel; and became as corrupt in doctrine and practice, as were the Pharisees in the time of our Saviour. There were, however, in the darkest ages, some who knew the truth and adhered to it at every risk; and all the attempts to eradicate pure evangelical doctrine were unsuccessful; for when by persecution the witnesses of the truth were scattered abroad, as in the beginning of the gospel, they went every where propagating the truth. All the precursors of the reformation, whether in England, Bohemia, France, or Switzerland, held a sound and pure doctrine respecting the method of Justification. And the Waldenses and Albigenses entertained, as their ancient creeds show, the

same doctrine which was afterwards so successfully preached by the reformers. According to the account which Luther himself gives, of the progress of light in his own mind, the doctrine of justification by faith was that which he was first led to embrace, and by a right understanding of which he was enabled to see the corruptions of the Roman Catholic church. He saw clearly that all the other errors of that church might be fairly traced to this great radical error, which led him constantly to speak in the strongest terms of the cardinal nature of this doctrine. And on this point all the reformers were perfectly agreed. If any of them went at all astray, it was not by making any of our works in whole or in part a ground of our acceptance, but by disparaging good works too much, lest man should be led to place any dependence on them. All the creeds of the reformed churches are in perfect agreement on this subject. They all held that the only ground of a sinner's justification in the sight of God, is, THE PERFECT RIGHTEOUSNESS OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST IMPUTED TO US, or set down to our account, and received by faith. Any departure from this doctrine was considered as so serious a step towards heresy, that men of great eminence, who questioned whether the active obedience of Christ was imputed to the believer, were considered as worthy of censure. But after a while the old leaven of self-righteousness began to work, and while the doctrines of the reformers stood unaltered in the public formularies of the churches, secretly and gradually, in most Protestant churches, an almost universal defection took place. This departure from evangelical doctrine, in nearly all Protestant churches, may be said to have reached its acme about a hundred years ago. The church of England, though originally as pure in doctrine as any of the reformed churches, had, about that time, so universally lost the doctrine of justification by faith alone, that when Whitefield and Wesley, Hervey, Romaine and others, were raised up to proclaim the truth, it was like the publication of a new gospel. Since that time there has been an increasing body of the clergy in the established church, who understand and faithfully preach this reformation doctrine. These excellent and evangelical men have been opposed by most of the prelates of the church, and stigmatized as enthusiasts and Methodists; but they have been able to prove, to the satisfaction of all impartial judges, that they have brought in no new doctrine, but simply held and taught the doctrines of the XXXIX Articles, in their plain, obvious meaning.

« PreviousContinue »