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ARTICLE II.-THE PROBLEM OF INSPIRATION.

It often happens, in theological controversy as in war, that from time to time the front of battle changes, and batteries, which commanded the enemy's position yesterday, are found out of range, and useless, to-day. The first object, in all effectual discussion, must be, to ascertain what is the real question at issue now.

"Let the dead past bury its dead."

Until the problem shall be read aright, of course it cannot be solved.

Will it be too rash to intimate that the true present issues, relating to the subject of Inspiration, have hardly been adequately met, nor always apprehended?

The present Article is designed to call attention to the want thus indicated, and to point out the nature and sources of its supply.

In the first place, it is plain that at the tribunal of real thought, the question is not, whether a supernatural revelation be possible. Philosophers may speculate and dispute on such a question, as on every other conceivable one; but the common sense of mankind will generally see that if there is a Gon, the author of nature, he can work outside the laws of nature, and carry his work thence within the system of those laws, at pleasure; and if there is a Being, the Creator of our souls, he can breathe into them new knowledge, as he did the power to know, at first. To deny that GoD can inspire his creatures, in a strictly supernatural way, is to deny that he still retains the power exercised in creation, as well as directly to deny his omnipotence, and therefore his existence.

Nor, secondly, can it be questioned, to any significant extent, whether an inspiration of religious life and light be needed among men. The evidences of need are innumerable and patent, in every age and on every hand. There is noth

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ing men so sorely need, as a higher and purer religious life; and the imperfect success of all their own efforts to attain it certainly suggests the necessity of aid from some source higher than themselves. If "proud philosophy" boast her power, let her study her own history. It will not be in the light of that record, that she will dream of regenerating the race. And if it be tauntingly thrown back, in reply, that "neither has revelation succeeded to lift mankind from the slough of misery and sin," "Why?" we ask. Does not the inspired page, its enemies even being judges, shine with a purer light, and enfold a balm of more sovereign healing power, than any scroll that the energy of thought has elsewhere unrolled? And if even its success appears but partial as yet, are we still in doubt whether men need a revelation of religious light and life from on high?

Nor can one who recognizes the being of a GOD, all-powerful, wise, and benevolent, and the father of our spirits, deny the probability of a revelation from him, such as would supply our need. We may not, indeed, comprehend altogether the plans of an infinite being, nor pronounce, a priori, with too much confidence, what he would do under given circumstances. But nothing can prevent us from feeling the strong likelihood, to all human judgment, that a Father, infinitely wise and good, will enlighten and encourage his wandering children on the path of return to himself, when, amid the darkness and dangers of the way, an assisting hand is so much needed. How can we believe that he has a father's heart, and trust and lean like children on his arm, and doubt that the heart will prompt the arm to succor us in our sorest need? The most of those who appreciate the character of God will never hesitate, a priori, to pronounce a revelation probable, nay, almost certain.

A question has been made respecting the nature of an inspiration, such as might. be expected for religious ends,— whether it would differ in kind from the inspiration, so-called, of genius. But we cannot regard this as one of the points of real difficulty, or importance. Who shall limit the Creator of the soul, as to the modes in which he may work within it?

Or who shall prescribe to the Infinite the forms under which his supernatural power shall be put forth? Who shall assume that all extraordinary mental elevation must be the same in essential nature? Yet all these assumptions are involved in the idea, evidently entertained chiefly on a priori grounds, that the inspiration of the Scriptures does not differ in nature from that of Socrates, or Shakespeare; and they are assumptions of the boldest character. In every essential feature, the two cases differ; nor is there the slightest rational necessity for classing them together. Moreover, the history of the race shows that the inspiration of the highest genius is far from implying coördinate religious light and life. There is a wide difference, in this respect, between Homer and Isaiah, between Voltaire and Paul, between Byron and John. Nothing can be more absurd than to suppose them inspired in the same sense. But suppose the inspiration in the two cases the same as emanating, in the same sense, from God; of what significance would be the fact? Might not a difference still exist as to practical religious bearing, as wide as from earth to sky? If Bezaleel were divinely inspired for his work as truly as Moses for his; and if Homer, Angelo, and Beethoven, be added to the category; does it follow that there is no radical difference between the cases? And must the awful mission of Moses be patronizingly depreciated by the mocking admission, "Yes, Moses was indeed inspired, as were also Homer, Bezaleel, and Angelo." In other words, is the divine hand, in fitting an Isaiah or a Paul for his sublime mission, to be recognized with no profounder reverence than that with which we behold a clown adapted to his work, or the shoulders of a bullock hardened to the yoke! Nay, were even the difference to be looked for in the subject matter of the revelation alone, would this justify us in limiting, or depreciating, the importance of religious inspiration, or its relation to religion and morals; as we should unquestionably do by classing it with the inspiration of Raphael and Shakespeare? Classic models are regarded as authorities in matters of taste. What if, by a similar inspiration, prophets and apostles become le

gitimate guides in the realm of morals and religion; do we owe less reverence and obedience to their office, on that account? Even "a genius for religion," like that of Homer in poetry, would entitle its possessor to a rank as a religious authority, especially in the absence of a revelation more absolutely divine, little inferior to that claimed by orthodox theologians for the Scriptures; and sufficient to render it the duty of cavilers to sit down as humble learners at its feet, instead of lifting the feeble tongue of a presumptuous criticism against it! What signify, then, barren questions of classification and nomenclature? Genius, at least, has not elsewhere given us the prophecy of Isaiah, the Psalms of David, the Epistles of Paul, or the Gospel of John. What we most want to know, respecting these books, is something else than the question we have been considering.

Nor, finally, is the real issue at this day, whether the Bible involves in some way an inspiration such as has been described. Too often has been acknowledged, even by its enemies, the immeasurable superiority of the Bible, in elevation of religious consciousness, in depth and strength of religious power and light, over every other book; too thoroughly have its unique and wonderful characteristics been studied, its transcendent powers recognized, its varied and priceless treasures drawn forth; too firmly is its position fixed, far beyond comparison, above all that the human heart and mind have elsewhere conceived, or, may we not infer, could ever originate; to permit longer doubt whether there is, shining through its wonderful sentences, a revelation of religious life and light, by inspiration of God to man. It is easy, indeed, to cavil at many things found on the sacred page. It may be difficult to answer every objection which, by the help of some ingenuity, may be urged, or to remove every difficulty which even an honest mind may feel. That as much as this should not be true of a book written by so many hands, in times and circumstances so varied and strange, handed down to periods and types of mind so remote, and above all, dealing with themes so rare, abstract, and difficult, would be a miracle, far greater than all its most

reverent admirers claim for the Bible. But to look on the Bible, and consider the light which has beamed from its peerless pages upon the world; to mark the spirit and life which from it, and from it alone, have been breathed into the hearts of men; to trace its history, and that of its associations and effects, upon the fortunes of the race; to learn how it stands connected with the purest, most elevated, most simple and child-like faith and piety everywhere; and still deny the manifest divinity which reveals itself in those immortal lines;-this, we say it deliberately, is, to a sound and appreciating mind, impossible!

"A glory gilds the sacred page,

Majestic, like the sun;

It gives a light to every age,

It gives, but borrows none."

All the issues above enumerated will doubtless continue to be made. There will be minds in which the objections involved will continue to have a living force; and others, on the other part, who have not discovered that it is the smoke of battle only that hangs over the field, while the living power of the foe is already entrenched in another quarter. Nor is it strange, or inconsistent with the truth of what has been said, that it should be so. The public mind does not always know the true forces that move it, nor what are the living thoughts which struggle, like Esau and Jacob, in the womb of the present, and are destined to challenge and control the future. There are always eyes which look backward, and not forward; and arms, whose blows fall upon the corpses of dead foes. There are minds in which the true elements of the problem, though working, are latent and unpronounced. There are those, too, who do not think, but speak; whose parrot lips repeat the words of cavil and logomachy that they have learned. Dead and dying issues may still, therefore, for a time, sound louder than the living and the true. But the wakeful mind of the age will not be long at fault. "The thunder of the captains, and the shouting," will be heard and recognized in other quarters of the field; and there, where

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