184 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION. 



In short, we expect no grand moral reforma 

 tion to be achieved no commencement of the 

 millennial era of the church, till &quot; the watchmen 

 upon Mount Sion,&quot; with more energy than they 

 have yet displayed, &quot; shall lift up their voice like 

 a trumpet, and show to the house of Jacob their 

 transgressions&quot; till they &quot; lift it up with 

 strength, and not be afraid&quot; of any suspicions 

 that may be thrown out against their orthodoxy, 

 when they show unto men the path of duty in all 

 its bearings on the relations of time, and on the 

 employments of eternity till they make the mo 

 ral principles of Revelation bear, in all their 

 force, not only on the prominent features of social 

 life, but upon every minute ramification of human 

 conduct till every lurking principle of jealousy, 

 envy, avarice, and revenge be made to feel their 

 energy till even the very amuss?nents of public 

 and domestic life be made to bend to the eternal 

 laws of rectitude, and to carry on their fronts 

 that noble inscription, &quot; HOLINESS TO THE 

 LORD.&quot; 



II. If the preceding train of sentiments be ad 

 mitted, we may be directed in our views of the 

 nature and ends of church discipline, and the 

 persons on whom it ought to be exercised. 



In a great majority of Christian churches, cen 

 sures are inflicted chiefly, or solely, on persons 

 guilty of an external breach of one or two precepts 

 of the decalogue only one or two species of vio 

 lation of the moral law are considered as worthy 

 of cognizance ; while the systematic operations of 

 slander, revenge, envy, and avarice the indica 

 tions of harsh, sour, and ungovernable tempers, 

 and the absence of Christian candour and affec 

 tion circumstances which display the real cha 

 racters of men far more distinctly than any 

 insulated acts of immorality can do are either 

 wholly overlooked, or considered as characteris 

 tics of very trivial import. The censures to 

 which I allude, are likewise accompanied, in 

 many instances, with a degree of magisterial 

 haughtiness, severity, and unchristian feeling, 

 which is directly repugnant to every amiable, 

 candid, and generous principle. A person guilty, 

 in a single instance, of a breach of the seventh 

 or eight commandments, will lie under the frown 

 of a religious society for years, and even to the 

 close of his life, notwithstanding every evidence 

 he can give of the sincerity of his repentance, 

 and even be deprived of the means of earning his 

 subsistence ; while another may habitually vio 

 late almost all the other precepts of the decalogue, 

 and be screened from the discipline of the church. 

 He may be avaricious, cunning, and deceitful ; 

 harsh and unfeeling in his conduct ; uncandid and 

 uncharitable in his dispositions towards others ; 

 proud, selfish, and obstinate in his temper.; ad 

 dicted to slander and to incessant litigations ; 

 impatient of control ; and boisterous and conten 

 tious in his general deportment and yet be con- 

 idered as no proper object of censure; and, 



though never manifesting the least rjympicm of 

 penitence, will be viewed as a tolerably fair cha 

 racter in religious society, especially if he has 

 acquired a considerable share of wealth and of 

 influence in general society. Of such cases and 

 practices, the author had selected a number of 

 striking examples, which the narrow limits to 

 which he is confined in the present work, con 

 strain him, in the mean time, to postpone. 



Now, if the general sentiments already thrown 

 out be founded on truth, and on the nature of 

 things, such a practice as that to which we allude, 

 must be absurd, unchristian, and inconsistent 

 with the preservation of the moral purity of reli 

 gious society. It has this pernicious tendency, 

 among others, that it leads multitudes to imagine, 

 that, if they can keep clear of two or three acts 

 of moral delinquency, they may trample on every 

 divine principle and law with impunity. A poor 

 wretch, under the pressure of poverty, steals a 

 hen or a pocket handkerchief, and, notwithstand 

 ing his subsequent repentance, is banished from 

 social intercourse, and held up to execration-, 

 while a sanctimonious hypocrite will swindle his 

 neighbour out of a hundred pounds, if no criminal 

 law can take hold of him, and will retain his sta 

 tion in the church, and hold up his face without 

 a blush in the presence of general society. It is 

 obvious, if there he any truth in what we havo 

 hitherto stated, that the general tenor of the con 

 duct, and the uniform manifestation of beneve- 

 lent affections, ought, in every case, to form the 

 grand criterion of a man s being entitled to the 

 character of a Christian; and, that dispositions 

 of an opposite nature habitually displayed, how 

 ever much overlooked in the general intercourse 

 of life, ought to form a ground of exclusion from 

 the society of the faithful. 



III. This subject has a particular bearing 

 upon the divisions which subsist in the icligious 

 world, and the grand principles which ought to 

 form a bond of union among all who acknowledge 

 the truth of the Christian Revelation. If the 

 train of thought illustrated in the preceding 

 pages be correct, it will follow, that a cordia! 

 union of the various sections of the Christian 

 church is to be expected from the cultivation of 

 the Spirit of Love, more than from any attempt 

 to produce an exact coincidence of opinion OH 

 these theological points in which they now differ 

 Wherever this spirit is found expanding the soul, 

 and governing the affections, it will lead its pos 

 sessors to view the peculiar opinions of others 

 with candour ; to respect their persons ; to al 

 low them liberty of thought on all the subordinate 

 ramifications of theological sentiment ; and to 

 set a higher value on moral qualifications, and 

 the manifestation of benevolent affections, than 

 on those circumstantial opinions which do not 

 enter into the essence of the Christian scheme. 

 If the professing Christian world were thoroughly 

 investigated, it would be found, that it is owing 



