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But what sort of virtue?  Do not mistake that.  Not what the world calls virtue; not mere legal respectability, which says, I do unto others as they do unto me; which is often merely the whitening outside the sepulchre, and leaves the heart within unrenewed, unrighteous, full of pride and ambition, conceit, cunning, and envy, and unbelief in God: not that virtue, but the virtue which the Apostle tells us to add to our faith, the virtue from above, which is the same as the wisdom from above, which is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated; in one word, the Holy Spirit of God, the Spirit of Divine Love and Charity, which seeketh not its own, which St. Paul has described to us in this epistle; the Holy Spirit of God, with which the Lord Jesus was filled without measure, and which He manifested to all the world in His most blessed life and death.

Ah, my friends, this is not an easy lesson to learn.  Christ’s disciples and apostles could not learn it all at once.  They tried to hinder little children from coming to Him.  They rebuked the blind man who called after Him.  How could the great Prophet of Nazareth stoop to trouble Himself about such poor insignificant people?  They could not conceive, either, why the Lord Jesus should choose to die shamefully, when He might have lived in honour: it seemed unworthy of Him.  They were shocked at His words. ‘That be far from Thee, Lord,’ said Peter.  Afterwards, when they really understood what that word ‘Lord,’ meant, and what sort of a man a true and perfect Lord ought to be, then they saw how fit, and proper, and glorious, Christ’s self-sacrifice was.  When, too, they learnt to look on Him, not merely as a great prophet, but as the Son of the Living God, then they understood His conduct, and saw that it behoved an only-begotten Son of God to suffer all these things before He entered into His glory.

But the Scribes and Pharisees never understood it.  To the last they were puzzled and angered by that very self-sacrifice of His: He must be a bad man, they thought, or He would not care so much for bad men.  ‘A friend of publicans and sinners,’ they called Him, thinking that a shameful blame to Him, while it was really the very highest praise.  But if they could not see the beauty of His conduct, can we?  It is very difficult, I do not deny it, my friends, for the selfishness and pride of fallen man: it is difficult to see that the Cross was the most glorious throne that was even set up on earth, and that the crown of thorns was worth all the crowns of czars and emperors: difficult, indeed, not to stumble at the stumbling-block of the Cross, and to say, ‘It cannot surely be more blessed to give than to receive:’ difficult, not to say in our hearts, ‘The way to be great is surely to rise above other men, not to stoop below them; to make use of them, and not to make ourselves slaves to them.’  And yet the Lord Jesus Christ did so; He took on Himself the form of a slave, and made Himself of no reputation: and what was fit and good for Him, must surely be fit and good for us.  But it is a hard lesson to the pride of fallen creatures: very hard.  And nothing, I believe, but sorrow will teach it us: sorrow is teaching it some of us now.  We surely are beginning to see, that to suffer patiently for conscience sake, is the most beautiful thing on earth or in heaven: we begin to see that those poor soldiers, dying by inches of cold and weariness, without a murmur, because it was their Duty, were doing a nobler work even than they did when they fought at Alma and Inkermann; and that those ladies who are drudging in the hospitals, far away from home, amid filth and pestilence, are doing, if possible, a nobler work still, a nobler work than if they were queens or empresses, because they have taken up the Cross and followed Christ; because they are not seeking their own good, but the good of others.  And if we will not learn it from those glorious examples, God will force us to learn it, I trust, every one of us, by sorrow and disappointment.  Ah, my friends, might one not learn it at once, if one would but open one’s eyes and look at things as they are?  Every one is longing for something; each has his little plan for himself, of what he would like to be, and like to do, and says to himself all day long, ‘If I could but get that one thing, I should be happy: If I could but get that, then I should want no more!’  Foolish man, self-deceived by his own lusts!  Perhaps he cannot get what he wants, and therefore he cannot enjoy what he has, and is moody, discontented, peevish, a torment to himself, and perhaps a torment to his family.  Or perhaps he does get what he wants: and is he happy after all?  Not he.  He is like the greedy Israelites of old, when they longed for the quails; and God sent the quails: but while the meat was yet in their mouths, they loathed it.  So it is with a man’s fancy.  He gets what he fancies; and he plays with it for a day, as a child with a new toy, and most probably spoils it, and next day throws it away to run after some new pleasure, which will cheat him in just the same way as the last did; and so happiness flits away ahead before him; and he is like the simple boy in the parable, who was to find a crock of gold where the rainbow touched the ground: but as he moved on, the rainbow moved on too, and kept always a field off from him.  You may smile: but just as foolish is every soul of us, who fancies that he will become happy by making himself great; admired, rich, comfortable, in short, by making himself anything whatsoever, or getting anything whatsoever for himself.  Just as foolish is every poor soul, and just as unhappy, as long as he will go on thinking about himself, instead of copying the Lord Jesus Christ, and thinking about others; as long as he will keep to the pattern of the old selfish Adam, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, the longings and fancies which deceive a man into expecting to be happy when he will not be happy; instead of putting on the new man, which after God’s likeness is created in righteousness and true holiness: and what is true holiness but that very charity of which St. Paul has been preaching to us, the spirit of love, and mercy, and gentleness, and condescension, and patience, and active benevolence?

Ah, my friends, do not forget what I said just now; that a man could not become happy by making himself anything.  No.  Not by making himself anything: but he may by letting God make him something.  If he will let God make him a new creature in Jesus Christ, then he will be more than happy—he will be blessed: then he will be a blessing to himself, and a blessing to every one whom he meets: then all vain longing, and selfishness, and pride, and ambition, and covetousness, and peevishness and disappointment, will vanish out of his heart, and he will work manfully and contentedly where God has placed him—cheerful and open-hearted, civil and patient, always thinking about others, and not about himself; trying to be about his Master’s business, which is doing good; and always finding too, that his Master Christ sets him some good work to do day by day, and gives him strength to do it.  And how can a man get that blessed and noble state of mind?  By prayer and practice.  You must ask for strength from God: but then you must believe that He answers your prayer, and gives you that strength; and therefore you must try and use it.  There is no more use in praying without practising than there is in practising without praying.  You cannot learn to walk without walking: no more can you learn to do good without trying to do good.

Ask, then, of God, grace and help to do good: Pray to Him this very day to take all selfishness and meanness out of your hearts, and to give you instead His Holy Spirit of Love and Charity, which alone can make you noble in His sight; and try this day, try every day of your lives, to do some good to those around you.  Oh make a rule, and pray to God to help you to keep it, never, if possible, to lie down at night without being able to say, ‘I have made one human being at least a little wiser, or a little happier, or a little better this day.’  You will find it easier than you think, and pleasanter: easier, because if you wish to do God’s work, God will surely find you work to do; and pleasanter, because in return for the little trouble it may cost you, or the little choking of foolish vulgar pride it may cost you, you will have a peace of mind, a quiet of temper, a cheerfulness and hopefulness about yourself and all around you, such as you never felt before; and over and above that, if you look for a reward in the life to come, recollect this—what we have to hope for in the life to come is, to enter into the joy of our Lord.  And how did He fulfil that joy, but by humbling Himself, and taking the form of a slave, and coming not to be ministered to but to minister, and to give His whole life, even to the death upon the cross, a ransom for many?  Be sure, that unless you take up His cross, you will not share His crown.  Be sure, that unless you follow in His footsteps, you will never reach the place where He is.  If you wish to enter into the joy of your Lord, be sure that His joy is now, as it was in Judæa of old, over every sinner that repenteth, every mourner that is comforted, every hungry mouth that is fed, every poor soul, sick or in prison, who is visited.

That is the joy of your Lord—to show mercy; and that must be your joy too, if you wish to enter into His joy.  Surely that is plain.  You must rejoice in doing the same work that He rejoices in, and then His joy and yours will be the same; then you will enter into His joy, and He will enter into yours; then, as St. John says, you will dwell in Christ, and Christ in you, because you love the brethren; and you will hear through all eternity the blessed words, ‘Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of the least of these little ones, ye did it unto Me.’

SERMON XXI.  TOLERATION

[Preached at Bideford, 1854]

Philippians iii. 15, 16.  And if in any thing ye shall be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this to you.  Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing.

My friends, allow me to speak a few plain and honest words, ere we part, on a matter which is near to, and probably important to, many of us here.  We all know how the Christian Church has in all ages been torn in pieces by religious quarrels; we all know too well how painfully these religious quarrels have been brought home to our very doors and hearts of late.

Now, we all deplore, or profess to deplore, these differences and controversies.  But we may do that in two ways: we may say, ‘I am very sorry that all Christians do not think alike,’ when all we mean is, ‘I am very sorry that all Christians do not think just as I do, for I am right and infallible, whosoever else is wrong.’  The fallen heart of man is too apt to say that, my friends, in its pride and narrowness, and while it cries out against the Pope of Rome, sets itself up as Pope in his stead.

But there is surely another and a better way of deploring these differences: and that is, to say to oneself, ‘I am sorry, bitterly sorry, that Christians cannot differ without quarrelling and hating one another over and above.’  And then comes the deeper home-thought, ‘And how much more sorry I am that I myself cannot differ from my fellow-Christians without growing angry with them, suspecting them, despising them, treating them as if they were not my fellow-Christians at all.’  Yes, my friends, this is what we have to do first when we think of religious controversies, to examine our own hearts and deeds and words; to see whether we too have not been making bitterness more bitter, and, as the old proverb says, ‘stirring the fire with a sword;’ and to repent humbly and utterly of every harsh word, hasty judgment, ungenerous suspicion, as sins, not only against men, but against God the Father of Lights, who worketh in each of His children to will and to do of His good pleasure.

But some will say, ‘We cannot give up what we believe to be right and true.’  God forbid that you should try to do so, my friends; for if you really believe it, you cannot, even if you try; and by trying you will only make yourselves dishonest.  But does not that hold as good of the man who differs from you?  God will not surely lay down one law for you, and another for him?  ‘But we are right, and he is wrong.’  Be it so.  You do not surely mean that you are quite right; perfect and infallible?  You mean that you are right on the whole, and as far as you see.  And how can you tell but that he is right on the whole, and as far as he sees?  You will answer that both cannot be right; that yes and no cannot be both true; that a thing cannot be black and white also.

My friends, my friends—but where is the religious controversy, the two sides whereof are as clearly opposite to each other as yes and no, black and white?  I know none now; I have hardly found one in the records of the Protestant Church since first Luther and our Reformers protested against Romish idolatry.  On that last matter there should be no doubt, as long as the first two commandments stand in the Decalogue; but, with that exception, it would be difficult to find a dispute in which the truth lay altogether with one party.  The truth rather lies, in general, not so much halfway between the two combatants, as in some third place, which neither of them sees; which perhaps God does not intend them to see in this life, while He leaves his servants each to work out some one side of Christian truth, dividing to every man severally as He will, according to the powers of each mind, and the needs of each situation.

True we have the infallible rule of Scripture: but are our own interpretations of it so sure to be infallible?  Inspired, infinite, inexhaustible as it is, can we pretend to have fathomed all its abysses, to have comprehended all its boundless treasures?  The pretence is folly.  True, again, it contains all things necessary to salvation; and those so plainly set forth, that he who runs may read, and the wayfaring man, though poor, shall not err therein.  And yet does it not contain things whereof even St. Paul himself said, that he only knew in part, and prophesied in part, and saw as through a glass darkly; and are we to suppose that they are among the truths necessary to salvation?  Now are not the points about which there has been, and is still, most dispute, just of this very number?  Do they belong to the simple fundamental truths of the Gospel?  No.  Are they such plain matters that the wayfaring man, though poor, can make up his mind on them for himself?  No.  Are they one of them laid down directly in Scripture, like the Ten Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, or the Creeds?  No.  They are every one, as it seems to me, whether they be right or wrong, abstruse deductions, delicate theories, built up on single and obscure texts.  Surely, if they had been necessary for salvation, the Lord would have spoken on them in a tone and in words about which there should be no more mistake than about the thunders of Sinai, and the tables of stone fresh from the finger-mark of God.  And He has spoken to us, my friends, on other matters, if not on these.  His promises are clear enough, and short enough, though high as heaven and wide as the universe.  There is one God, and one Mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, the only-begotten Son of God; and whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ, is born of God; and if any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He is the propitiation for our sins.  And again, ‘If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth liberally, and upbraideth not, and he shall receive it.’  ‘For if ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, much more shall your Heavenly Father give His Holy Spirit to them who ask Him.’

These are God’s promises—simple and clear enough: and what are God’s demands?  Are they numerous, intricate, burdensome, a yoke which neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear?  God forbid again!—‘He hath showed thee, oh man, what is good.  And what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?’  And lest thou shouldest mistake in the least the meaning of these words, He hath showed thee all this, and more, by a living example fairer than all the sons of men, and through lips full of grace, in the blessed life and blessed death of His Son Jesus Christ, the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person.  To this, at least, we have already attained.  Let us walk by this rule, let us all mind this same thing, and if in anything else we are differently minded, God in His own good time will reveal even that to us.

Is not this enough, my friends?  Then why should we bite and tear each other about that which is over and above this?  If any man believes this, and acts on it, let us hail him as a brother.  After all, let our differences be what they will, have we not one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in us all?  If this is not bond enough between man and man, what bond would we have?  Oh, my friends, when we consider this our little life, how full of ignorance it is and darkness; within us, rebellion, inconstancy, confusion, daily sins and shortcomings; and without us, disappointment, fear of loneliness, loss of friends, loss of all which makes life worth having,—who are we that we should deny proudly one single tie which binds us to any other human being?  Who are we that we should refuse one hand stretched out to grasp our own?  Who are we that we should say, ‘Stand back, for I am holier than thou?’  Who are we that we should judge another? to his own master let him stand or fall—‘yea, and he shall stand,’ says the Apostle, ‘for God is able to make him stand.’

Think of those last words, my friends, they are strong and startling; but we must not shrink from them.  They tell us that God may be as near those whom we heap with hard names, as He is near to us; that He may intend that they should triumph, not over us, but with us over evil.  And if God be with them, who dare be against them?  Shall we be more dainty than God?  And therefore I have never been able to hear, without a shudder, words which I have heard, and from really Christian men too: ‘I can wish well to a pious man of a different denomination from mine; I can honour and admire the fruits of God’s Spirit in him; but I cannot co-operate with him.’  When I hear such language from really good men, I confess I am puzzled.  I have no doubt that their reasons seem to them very sound; but what they are I cannot conceive.  I cannot conceive why I should not hold out the right hand of fellowship and brotherhood to every man who fears God and works righteousness, of whatsoever denomination he may be.  We believe the Apostles’ Creed, surely?  Then think of the meaning of that one word, The Holy Spirit.  To whom are we to attribute any man’s good deeds, except to the Holy Spirit?  We dare not say that he does them by an innate and natural virtue of his own, for that would be to fall at once into the Pelagian heresy; neither dare we attribute his good deeds to an evil spirit, and say, ‘However good they may look, they must be bad, for he belongs to a denomination who cannot have God’s Spirit.’  We dare not; for that would be to approach fearfully near to the unpardonable sin itself, the sin against the Holy Ghost, the bigotry which says, ‘He casteth out devils by the Prince of the devils.’  Surely if we be Christians, and Churchmen, we confess (for the Bible and the Prayer-book declare) that every good deed of man comes down from the One Fountain of Good, from God, the Father of Lights, by the inspiration of His Holy Spirit.

Then think, my friends, think what words we have said.  We confess that the great, absolute, almighty, eternal God, in whose hand suns and stars, ages and generations, hell and heaven, and all which is and has been, and ever will be, are but as a grain of sand; who has but to take away His breath, and the whole universe would become nothing and nowhere; the utterly holy and righteous God, who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, who charges His angels with folly, and the heavens are not clean in His sight—we confess, I say, that this great God has condescended to visit that man’s soul, and cherish it, and teach it, and shape it (be it ever so little) into His own likeness: and shall we dare to stand aloof from him from whom God does not stand aloof?  Shall we refuse to walk with one who walks with God?  Shall we refuse to work with one who is a fellow-worker with God, to love one whom God loves, to take by the hand one whose guest God has become?  Shall we be more dainty than God? more fastidious than God? more righteous than God? more separate from sinners than God?  Oh, my friends, let us pray that we may love God better, and know His likeness more clearly; that we may be more ready to recognise, and admire, and welcome every, even the smallest trace of that likeness in any human being, remembering that it is the likeness of Christ, who was not merely The Teacher of all in every nation who fear God and work righteousness, but the Saviour who ate and drank with publicans and sinners: and then we shall be more careful how we call unclean what God Himself has cleansed with His own presence, His own grace, His own quickening and renewing and sanctifying Spirit.

Be sure, be sure, my friends, that in proportion as we really love the Lord Jesus Christ, we shall love those who love Him, be it in never so clumsy or mistaken a fashion; and love those too whom He loved enough to die for them, and whom He loves now enough to teach and strengthen.  We shall say to them, not ‘Wherein do we differ?’ but ‘Wherein do we agree?’  Not, ‘Because I cannot worship with you, therefore I will not work with you;’ but rather, ‘I wish that I could worship with you; I will whenever and wherever I can, as far as you allow me, as far as the law allows me, as far as your worship is not in my eyes an actually sinful thing: but, be that as it may, we can at least do together something better even than worshipping, and that is, working.  We can surely do good together.  Together, let our denomination or party be what it may, we can feed the hungry, clothe the naked, reform the prisoner, humanize the degraded, save yearly the lives of thousands by labouring for the public health, and educate the minds and morals of the masses, though our religious differences (shame on us that it should be so!) force us to part when we begin to talk to them about the world to come.’

For are we not brothers after all?  Has not God made us of one blood, English men, with English hearts?  Has not Christ redeemed us with one and the same sacrifice?  Has not the Holy Spirit given us one and the same desire of doing good?  And shall we not use that spirit hand in hand?  Look, look at the opportunities of doing good which are around you; look at God’s field of good works, white already to the harvest; and the labourers are few.  Shall these few, instead of going manfully to work, stand idly quarrelling about the shape of their instruments, and their favourite modes of using them?  God forbid!  True, there are errors against which we are bound to protest to the uttermost; but how few?  The one real enemy we have all to fight is sin—evil-doing.  If any man or doctrine makes men worse—makes men do worse deeds, protest then, if you will, and spare not, and shrink not: for sin must be of the Devil, whatever else is not.  And therefore we are bound to protest against any doctrine which parts man from God, and, under whatsoever pretence of reverence or purity, draws again the veil between him and his Heavenly Father, and denies him free access to the Throne of Grace, and the feet of Jesus, that he may carry thither his own sins, his own doubts, his own sorrows, and speak (wondrous condescension of redeeming grace!) speak with God face to face, and yet live.  For this we must protest; for this we must die, if needs be; for if we lose this, we lose all which our reforming forefathers won for us at the stake, ay, we lose our own souls; for we lose righteousness and strength, and the power to do the will of God.

For to shut a man out from free access to God and Christ is to make him certainly false, dishonest, cowardly, degraded, slavish, and sinful; as modern Popery has made, and always will make, those over whom it really gains power.  This is the root of our hereditary protest against Popery; not merely because we do not agree with certain of its doctrines, but because we know from experience, that as now taught by the Jesuits, with whom it has identified itself, its general tendency is to make men bad men, ignorant, dishonest, rebellious; unworthy citizens of a free and loyal state.

And there are practices against which congregations have a right to protest, not only as Christians, but as free Englishmen.  Congregations have a right to protest against any minister who introduces obsolete ceremonies which empty his church and drive away his people.  Those ceremonies may be quite harmless in themselves, as I really believe most of them are; many of them may be beautiful, and, if properly understood, useful, as I think they are; but a thing may be good in itself, and yet become bad by being used at a wrong time, and in a way which produces harm.  And it is shocking, to say the least, to see churches emptied and parishes thrown into war for the sake of such matters.  The lightest word which can be used for such conduct is, pedantry; but I fear at times lest the Lord in heaven should be using a far more awful word, and when He sees weak brethren driven from the fold of the Church by the self-will and obstinacy of the very men who profess to desire to bring all into the Church, as the only place where salvation is to be found,—I fear, I say, when I see such deeds, lest the Lord should repeat against them His own awful words: ‘If any man scandalize one of these little ones who believeth on Me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depths of the sea.’  What sadder mistake?  Those who have sworn to seek out Christ’s lambs scattered up and down this wicked world, shall they be the very ones to frighten those lambs out of the fold, instead of alluring them back into it?  Shall the shepherd play the part, not even of the hireling who flees and leaves the sheep to themselves, but of the very wolf who scatters the flock?  God forbid!  The Church, like the Sabbath, was made for man, my friends: not man for the Church; and the Son of Man, as He is Lord of the Sabbath, is Lord of the Church, and will have mercy in its dealings rather than sacrifice.  The minister, my friends, was made for the people: and not the people for the minister.  What else does the very name ‘minister’ mean?  Not a lord who has dominion, but a servant, a servant to all, who must give up again and again his private notions of what he thinks best in itself for the sake of what will be best for his flock; who must be, like St. Paul, a Jew to the Jews; under the law to those who are still under the law; and yet again without law to those who are without law (though not without law to God, but under the law to Christ); weak with the weak; strong with the strong; that he may gain men of all sorts of opinions and characters by agreeing with them as far as he honestly can, and showing his sympathy with each as much as he can; and so become all things to all men, that he may by all means save some.  Oh, my friends, who can read honestly that glorious First Epistle to the Corinthians and not see how a man may have the most intense earnestness, the strongest doctrinal certainty, and yet at the same time the greatest freedom, and charity, and liberality about minor matters of ceremonies and Church arrangements, and practical methods of usefulness; glad even that Christ be preached by his enemies, and out of spite to him, because any way Christ is preached?

But, my friends, if it is the right of free Englishmen to protest against such doings, how shall it be done?  Surely in gentleness, calmness, reverence, as by men who know that they are standing on holy ground, and dealing with sacred things, before the Throne of God, and beneath the eye of Jesus Christ.  Not surely, as it has been too often done, in bitterness, and wrath, and clamour, and evil-speaking, with really unjust suspicions, exaggerations, slanders, (and those, too, anonymous,) in the columns of the public prints.  My friends, these are not God’s weapons.  Not such is Ithuriel’s magic spear, the very touch of which unmasks falsehood.  This is to try to cast out Satan by Satan, to make evil worse by fighting it with fresh evil.  Oh, my friends, if there is one counsel which I would press on all here more earnestly than another, it is this—never, never, howsoever great may be the temptation, to indulge in anonymous attacks on any human being.  No man has a right to do it who prays daily to his Father in heaven, Lead us not into temptation.  For it is to lead oneself into temptation, and that too sore to resist; into the temptation to say something which one dare not say, and ought not to say, were one’s name known; the temptation to forget not only the charity of Christians, but even the courtesies of civilized life; and to shoot, from behind the safe hedge of anonymousness, coward and envenomed shafts, of which we should be ashamed, did the world know that they were ours; of which we shall surely be ashamed in that great day, when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed.  I speak strongly: but only because I know by bitter experience the terrible truth of my own words.