CHRISTIANITY. 



385 



rhrittiani- natural philosopher is r.ct to assert what he excogitates, 

 v '* but to record what he observes ; not to amuse himself with 

 "~ Y ~ the speculations of fancy, but to describe phenomena 

 as he sees or as he feels them. This is the business of the 

 moral as well ac of the natural enquirer. We must ex- 

 tend the application of Lord Bacon's principles to moral 

 and metaphysical subjects. It was long before this ap- 

 plication was recognized, or acted upon by philosophers. 

 Many of the continental speculations are still infected 

 with the presumptuous, a priori spirit of the old schools ; 

 though the writings of Reid and Stewart have contri- 

 buted much to chase away this spirit from the metaphy- 

 sics of our own country, and to bring the science of 

 mind, as well as matter, under the entire dominion of the 

 inductive philosophy. 



1.57. These general observations we conceive to be a 

 most direct and applicable introduction to that part of the 

 subject which is before us. In discussing the evidence 

 of Christianity, all that we ask of our reader is to bring 

 along with him the same sober and inductive spirit, that 

 is now deemed so necessary in the prosecution of the 

 other sciences ; to abandon every system of theology, 

 that is not supported by evidence, however much it may 

 gratify his taste, or regulate his imagination, and to ad- 

 mit any system of theology, that is supported by evi- 

 dence, however repugnant to his feelings or his preju- 

 dices ; to make conviction, in fact, paramount to incli- 

 nation, or to fancy; and to maintain, through the whole 

 process of the investigation, that strength and intrepidity 

 of character, which will follow wherever the light of ar- 

 gument may conduct, though it should land him in con- 

 clusions the most nauseous and unpalatable. 



158. We have no time to enter into causes ; but the fact 

 is undeniable. Many philosophers of the present day are 

 disposed to nauseate every tiling connected with theo- 

 logy. They associate something low and ignoble with 

 the prosecution of it. They regard it, as not a fit sub- 

 ject for liberal enquiry. They turn away from it with 

 disgust, as one of the humblest departments of literary 

 exertion. We do not say that they reject its evidences, 

 but they evade the investigation of them. They feel no 

 conviction ; not because they have established the fal- 

 "lacy of a single argument, but because they entertain a 

 general dislike at the subject, and will not attend to it. 

 They love to expatiate in the more kindred fields of 

 science or elegant literature ; and while the most respect- 

 ful caution, and humility, and steadiness, are seen to pre- 

 side over every department of moral and physical inves- 

 tigation, theology is the only subject that is suffered 

 to remain the victim of prejudice, and of a contempt the 

 most unjust, and the most unphilosophical. 



1 j<>. We do not speak of thib feeling as an impiety; 

 we speak of it as an offence against the principles of just 

 ^peculation. We do not speak of it as it allures the 

 heart from the influence of religion ; we speak of it as 

 it allures the understanding from the influence of evidence 

 and truth. In a word, we are not preaching against it ; 

 we reason against it. We contend that it is a transgression 

 against the rules of the inductive philosophy. All that 

 we want is, the application of Lord Bacon's principles to 

 the investigation before us; and as the influence of pre- 

 judice and disgust is banished from every other depart- 

 ment of enquiry, we conceive it fair that it should be 

 banished from theology also, and that our subject should 

 have the common advantage of a hearing, where no 

 partiality of the heart or fancy is admitted, and no other 

 influence acknowledged, than the influence of evidence 

 over the conviction of the understanding. 

 Vol.. vi. PAHT II. 



160. Let us therefore evince the success and felicity Christian*- 

 with which Lord Bacon's principles may be applied to *_ ' _ J 

 the investigation before us. 



161. According to Bacon, man is ignorant of every 

 thing antecedent to observation, and there is not a single 

 department of enquiry in which he does not err the mo- 

 ment that he abandons it. It is true, that the greater 

 part of every individual's knowledge is derived imme- 

 diately from testimony ; but it is only testimony that brings 

 home to his conviction the observation of others. Still it 

 is observation which lies at the bottom of his knowledge. 

 Still it is man taking his lesson from the actual condition 

 of the thing which he contemplates; a condition that is 

 altogether independent of his will, and which no specu- 

 lation of his own can modify or destroy. There is an 

 obstinacy in the processes of nature which he cannot con- 

 troul. He must follow it. The construction of a system 

 should not be a creative, but an imitative process, which 

 admits nothing but what evidence assures us to be true, 

 and is founded only on the lessons of experience. It is 

 not by the exercise of a sublime and speculative ingenui- 

 ty that man arrives at truth. It is by letting himself 

 down to the drudgery of observation. It is by descend- 

 ing to the sober work of seeing, and feeling, and experi- 

 menting. Wherever, in short, he has not had the bene- 

 fit of his own observation, or the observation of other* 

 brought home to his conviction by creditable testimony, 

 there he is ignorant. 



162. This is found to hold true, even in those sciences, 

 where the objects of enquiry are the mast familiar and 

 the 1 most accessible. Before the right method of philo- 

 sophising was acted upon, how grossly did philosophers 

 misinterpret the phenomena of external nature ! When a 

 steady perseverence in the path of observation could have 

 led them to infallible certainty, how misled in their 

 conception of every thing around them, when, instead 

 of malting use of their senses, they delivered themselve* 

 up to the exercises of a solitary abstraction, and thought 

 to explain every thing by the fantastic play of unmean- 

 ing terms, and imaginary principles ! And, when at last 

 set on the right path of discovery, how totally different 

 were the results of actual observation, from those systems 

 which antiquity had rendered venerable, and the autho- 

 rity of great names had recommended to the acquiescence 

 of many centuries ! This proves, that, even in the most 

 familiar subjects, man knows every thing by observation, 

 and is ignorant of every thing without it ; and that he 

 cannot advance a single footstep in the acquirement of 

 truth, till he bid adieu to the delusions of theory, and 

 sternly refuse indulgence to its fondest anticipations. 



\G'A. Thus, thsre is both a humility and a hardihood 

 in the philosophical temper. They are the same in prin- 

 ciple, though different in display. The first is founded 

 on a sense of ignorance, and disposes the mind of the 

 philosopher to pay the rnoit respectful attention to every 

 thing that is offered in the shape of evidence. The 

 second consists in a determined purpose to reject and 

 to sacrifice every thing that offers to oppose the influence 

 of evidence, or to set itself up against its legitimate and 

 wtll established conclusions. In the ethereal whirlpools 

 of Des Cartes, we see a transgression against the humi- 

 lity of the philosophical character. It is the presump- 

 tion of knowledge on a subject, where the total want of 

 observation should have confined him to the modi-sty of 

 ignorance. In the Newtonian system of the world, we 

 sec both humility and hardihood. Sir Isaac commences 

 his investigation with all the modesty of a respectful en- 

 quirer. His is the docility of a scholar, who is sensible 

 3c 



