The Claims of Philosophy.
ANOTHER fact on which it is supposed that an argument for immortality can be founded is, The capacities of the soul. The mind of man, it is argued, by its wonderful achievements, and its lofty aspirations, shows itself capable of some higher and better state of being than we at present enjoy. And from this the conclusion is easy (if people will not stop to scan very critically the connection) that such a state of being inevitably awaits mankind, in which they are destined to live forever. But this argument, which, stripped of its disguise, is simply an egotistical assertion, I am fit to be a God, and therefore I am a God, will be found to collapse under very slight pressure. Mr. J. Panton Ham describes it in fitting terms, when he speaks of it as follows:— “Because man has skill and ability, is he therefore immortal? We, in our ignorance and imperfection, would exalt the intellectual above the moral. The former has greater attractions for imperfect man than the latter. Had we the peopling of paradise, we should fill it with the world’s heroes in literature, science and the arts. The skillful are the world’s saints, and the proper candidates for Heaven’s ‘many mansions.’ This argument, dispassionately considered apart from the imposing parade of human achievements, is just this: Man is clever, therefore he is immortal. Here is neither logic nor religion. The cleverness of man is surely no title to immortality, much less is it the proof of its possession. It is a silly logic which asserts human immortality from such strange premises as balloons and pyramids, electro telegraphs and railways.” But all men cannot engineer the construction of a pyramid, nor construct a balloon, nor build an engine, much less accomplish the greater feat involved in their first invention. All men are not learned and skillful, and of such eminent capabilities. Is it not, in fact, almost an infinitely small proportion of the human race that has manifested those great powers on which this argument is based! And can the capacities of a few leading minds, determine the destiny of the great mass of men who possess no such powers? And if an argument may be based on the capacities of some, may not an equal and opposite argument be based on the incapacity of others? And in this case on which side would the weight of evidence lie? And as there is almost every conceivable gradation of intelligence, who will tell us whereabouts in this scale the infinite endowment of immortality is first perceptible? Looking at the human race, and the races immediately below, we behold a point where they seem to blend indistinguishably into each other. Will an utter lack of capacity be affirmed of the higher orders of the brute creation? And descending in the scale, where shall we stop? Where is the transition from immortality to mortality? We gave last week extracts from eminent authors showing that brutes reason, that they exercise, to a degree, all the powers of the human mind, that they have a sense to some extent of right and wrong, and give evidence, of the same nature as man is able to give in reference to himself, that they possess just as immaterial a soul as he. And have we not all seen horses and dogs that gave evidence of possessing more good sense than some men? And in this graduated scale of animated existence, where is the dividing line between the mortal and the immortal? Will some one locate it? What degree of mental capacity is necessary to constitute an evidence of immortality? And here we leave this argument. It demands no further notice till its friends who base immortality on mental capacity will determine which class of their less fortunate brothers, is so low as to be beyond its reach. Universal belief and inborn desire. Men have universally believed in the immortality of the soul, it is claimed, and all men desire it; therefore, all men have it. Strange conclusion from strange premises. As to the first part of this argument, the universal belief, that appears not to be true, in fact. On this, a glance at a quotation or two must suffice. Whately (Essay 1 on a Future State) says:— “We find Socrates and his disciples, represented by Plato, as fully admitting in their discussions of the subject, that ‘men in general were highly incredulous as to the soul’s future existence.’ The Epicurean school openly contended against it. Aristotle passes it by as not worth considering, and takes for granted the contrary supposition, as not needing proof.” Leland on the Advantages of Revelation, says:— When Cicero “sets himself to prove the immortality of the soul, he represents the contrary as the prevailing opinion,” there being “crowds of opponents, not the Epicureans only; but, which he could not account for, those that were the most learned persons had that doctrine in contempt.” Touching the other portion of the argument, the universal and inborn desire, those who make use of it to make it of any avail, are bound to supply and prove the suppressed premise, which is that all men have what they desire. The syllogism would then stand thus: 1. All men have what they desire. 2. All men desire immortality. Conclusion. Therefore all men are immortal. This is a fair statement of the question; but are any presumptuous enough to take the ground that all men have what they desire? Is it true, in fact? Do not our every day’s observations give it the unqualified lie? Men desire riches, but do all possess them? they desire health, but do all have it? they desire happiness here, but what an infinitely small portion of the race are really happy. To try to get over the matter by saying that these desires that men have may be gratified by their taking a right course, is an abandonment of the whole argument; for thus much we readily grant concerning immortality: all men may gratify their desires here by taking a right course; immortality also is suspended upon conditions, and those only will have it in whom those conditions are found to be scrupulously complied with. But there is another fatal flaw in this argument in another respect; for it is not immortality in the abstract that is the object of this great desire among men, but happiness. And the very persons who contend for immortality because men desire it, hold that a great portion of the race will be forever miserable. But this is not what men desire; and not being what they desire, it follows that all will not obtain what they desire, and hence the argument built on desire is good for nothing on their own showing. It simply proves universal salvation, or that men will be forever happy because all men desire it, or it proves nothing. The analogies of nature. The day shuts down in darkness, but is not forever lost; the morn returns again, and the bright sun comes forth rejoicing as a strong man to run a race. Nature is bound, cold and lifeless, in the icy chains of winter; but it is not lost in absolute death. Anon the spring approaches, and at its animating voice and warm breath, the pulse of life beats again through all her works; her cold cheek kindles with the glow of fresh vitality; and she comes forth adorned with new beauty, waking new songs of praise in every grove. The chrysalis, too, that lay apparently a dead worm, motionless and dry, soon wakes up to a higher life, and comes forth gloriously arrayed, like a “living blossom of the air,” sipping nectar from the choicest sweets of earth, and nestling in the bosom of its fairest flowers. And so, too, it is claimed of man, “that when the body shall drop as a withered calyx, the soul shall go forth like a winged seed.” (Horticultural Address by E. H. Chapin.) Let us take care that here our judgments are not led captive by the fascinations of poetry, or the rhetorical beauties of which this argument is so eminently susceptible. Among the many instances of nature, we find only a few that present the analogies here presented. The chrysalis, so often referred to, after it has spent its brief day as a living butterfly, perishes and is heard of no more forever. So with all the higher order of brutes: they fall in death and make no more their appearance upon our path. The most, then, that can be drawn from this argument, is a faint foreshadowing, perhaps, of a future life. But here, let it be understood, there is no issue. We all agree that the race shall be called again to life. “As in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive.” 1 Cor. 15:22. But the point at issue is, Are our souls immortal, and must this life be, to all our race, necessarily eternal? To prove that man will live again is one thing; to prove that that life will be eternal, is quite another. The anomalies of the present state. How often do we here see the wicked spreading himself like a green bay tree, having more than heart could wish, while the righteous grope their way along, in trouble and want. The wicked are exalted, and the good are oppressed. This does not look like the arrangement of a God who is the patron of virtue and the enemy of vice. It is therefore argued that there will be another state in which all these wrongs shall be righted, virtue rewarded, and wickedness punished. Yes, we reply, there will. But, certainly, a space of time infinitely short of eternity would suffice to correct all the anomalies of this brief life, which so puzzle men here. This argument, like the former, may be a fair inference for a future state; it may portend to the ungodly a scene of retribution, but can prove nothing as to its duration. Immortality assumed. We are told that the Bible assumes the immortality of the soul as a truth so evident that it is not necessary to expressly affirm it. This is why the doctrine has come to be so generally received against so explicit evidence against it. It has been taken for granted! Says Bishop Tillotson:— “The immortality of the soul is rather supposed or taken for granted, than expressly revealed in the Bible.” “It is taken for granted” that immortality is an essential attribute of the soul, and that therefore for the Bible to affirm it would be mere tautology. But we reply, Is not immortality an essential attribute also of Jehovah? Yet the Bible has been tautological enough to plainly state this fact. And it would seem that it might have carried its “tautology” a little further, and told us as much, at least once, about the soul, if that too is immortal; for surely its immortality cannot be more essential than that of Jehovah. Annihilation impossible. Nature everywhere revolts, we are told, against our doctrine of annihilation, and everywhere proves it false; for nothing ever has been, nor ever can be, annihilated. To which we reply, Very true; and here we would correct the impression which some seem to entertain, that we believe in any such annihilation of the wicked; or the annihilation of anything as matter. In reference to the wicked we simply affirm that they will be annihilated as living beings, the matter of which they are composed passing into other forms. The second definition of annihilate, according to Webster, is, “To destroy the form or the peculiar distinctive properties, so that the specific thing no longer exists; as, to annihilate a forest by cutting and carrying away the trees, though the timber may still exist; to annihilate a house by demolishing the structure.” Just so of the wicked: as conscious intelligent beings they are annihilated, being resolved into their original elements. Evil tendency. Why promulgate the doctrine of the destruction of the wicked, it is asked, even if it be true? Will not evil rather than good result from it? Some, honestly no doubt, deprecate any agitation of this question; and we have even heard some, impelled either by their fears or their prejudices, go so far as to declare that “it will make more infidels than Tom Paine’s Age of Reason,” and that “no conversions to God will ever follow in the track of its blighting and soul-destroying influence.” It might be necessary first to inquire what idea these persons have of infidelity. Perhaps they apply that term to everything that is not in agreement with their own views. And if this is the standard by which they judge of this matter, their assertion may possibly be in part correct; for converts to this doctrine are multiplying at a rapid rate. But giving to infidelity its legitimate definition, we call upon all those who claim that this doctrine makes infidels, to give some proof of their assertion before they again repeat it. This matter can be easily tested. The friends and advocates of this doctrine are neither few nor obscure. Men from all the walks of life, public and private, are daily swelling the ranks; and if this doctrine makes infidels, the infidels of our day should be found among those who receive it. But do we find them there? If one solitary individual can be found who repudiates the Scriptures as the revealed will of God, because he has been made to believe that they do not teach eternal misery for the lost, we would be glad to see him, or even to learn of him. This is not what causes infidelity, it is what cures it. What do we find in the ranks of the friends of this doctrine? Not the criminal and vicious classes, not those who have thrown off all restraint, not rejecters of divine revelation; but we find those who were formerly skeptics, rescued from their skepticism, and infidels recovered from their infidelity. We find multitudes who can now rest down with sweet assurance on the word of God, the perplexities with which they had been troubled respecting God’s dealings with his creatures all cleared from the mind, and whose feelings may be well expressed in the following language from Henry Constable, A. M.:— “For myself, I cannot express my sense of the value I place on the view I now seek to impress on others. It has for me thrown a light on God’s character, and God’s word, and the future of his world, which I once thought I should never have seen on this side of the grave. It has not removed the wholesome and necessary terrors of the Lord from the mind, but it has clothed God with a loveliness which makes him, and the eternal Son who represents him to man, incalculably more attractive. I am no longer looking for shifts to excuse his conduct in my own eyes and those of others, and forced to feel that here at least I could never find one to answer my object. I can look at all he has done, and all he tells me he will hereafter do, and, scanning it closely, and examining it even where it has most of awe and severity, exclaim with all my heart and with all my understanding—‘Just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints.’” These are among its general good effects. But there exists a special reason at the present time why men should be made acquainted with the true teachings of the Bible on this question. It is the only antidote against modern spiritualism, that master-piece of Satanic cunning and deception, and the climax of his corrupting work in the earth. In what horrid blasphemies has this delusion arrayed itself! To what corruption does it lead its votaries! How utterly it debauches the moral natures of all those who suffer themselves to receive its polluting touch! And notwithstanding it carries in its train all these terrible evils, how rapidly is it spreading through the land, and at what a fearful rate is it swelling the catalogue of its victims! Why is this? It is because the way has long and thoroughly been prepared for it, in the doctrine of the conscious state of the dead, and the immortality of the soul. This is its foundation; its life and spirit. Take away this, and it is robbed of its vitality. For if it be true, as the Bible declares, that when a man goes into the grave, his thoughts perish, his love and hatred and envy are no longer exercised, and he knows not anything, then whatever spirit comes to us from the unseen world, professing to be the spirit of a dead man, it comes with a lie in its mouth, and thus shows itself to be of the synagogue of Satan. This is the Ithuriel spear that transforms this lying system, which at its best showing is as low and ugly as the blotchiest toad that ever lived, into the real devil that it is. Then let this truth be spread abroad on all the wings of the wind, that in the hands of the people may be placed some safeguard against this ghastly embodiment of falsehood, pollution and death. With the truth clearly stated, as to how God will deal with the sinner and finally dispose of sin, we can appeal with confidence to the calm reason and the better nature of every child of Adam. We can second the tender entreaty which God extends to every wayward soul, “Turn ye, turn ye, for why will ye die?” “As I live saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that he turn from his way and live.” Life and death are set before you. The Saviour bids you look unto him and live. Mercy entreats you to destroy not yourself. The Spirit and the bride bid you come and partake of the water of life freely. You can no longer take refuge from an awakened conscience under the idea that the threatenings of the Lord are not understood, and may not therefore be so terrific as supposed. The sinner’s doom is unmistakably declared; and in the justness of that sentence, however slightly you may now realize the heinousness and just desert of sin, your own reason can but heartily concur. Will you then plunge headlong to ruin? or will you turn and accept the immense gratuity of eternal life? Of course you do not mean to perish. We accuse you not of this. The shining form of Hope is dancing on before you in the path of life—hope that ere it is too late, ere the silver cord be loosed or ever the golden bowl be broken, you will make sure a treasure and inheritance in Heaven. We would impress upon your mind that this hope may deceive you. Ere you reach the delusive phantom, the earth may suddenly open61beneath your feet, and Hades receive you to its fixed embrace. Ere you overtake the beckoning form, ere the good intention be carried out, ere you grasp the prize, now held only by the uncertain tenure of good resolve, the glory of the coming Judge descending through the parting and dissolving heavens, may suddenly burst upon your unprepared soul. Yes! the great voice from the temple of Heaven crying, “It is finished!” may suddenly arrest you in the midst of your delaying and dallying career! The heavenly court of mercy may cease its sitting, ere you have made a friend of the great Advocate who alone can plead your cause! “Procrastination is the thief of time.” It may be the thief of your eternal bliss. Its every moment is high-handed and insane presumption. Its path is a path of unseen and innumerable dangers. You have no lease of your life. The present state is one of exposure and peril. The shafts of death are flying thickly about you. Time is short and its sands are swiftly falling. The bliss of heaven, or the blackness of darkness forever, will soon be yours. With the saved or lost you must soon take your position. There is no intermediate ground. Choose then, we beseech you, the enduring portion. Choose for eternity, choose wisely, choose now. And may it be ours to join the great song of salvation at last, ascribing blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, unto Him who sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb who poured out his soul an offering for sin, that whosoever would believe on him might not perish but have everlasting life.