p. 499 | Will versus Reason by Epsilon

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Aug 20, 1885

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 32.

Will versus Reason.

By Epsilon

REASON is king of a properly ordered mind. It is natural and right that we have a will, and a strong will; but it must be kept in its proper place, and be always directed by king Reason; for will, however strong, must always be subordinate, never the ruler.

But what is the will? Simply the preference, the choice of the mind, the wish, the desire. In an excitement about a newly discovered copper mine, an old gentleman remarked, "I do not believe what I hear about it; for people tell things the way they want them to be." Sure enough, the copper mine turned out to be what the old gentleman expected, a creature of the will, and nothing more.

When the will has usurped the throne of reason, the working of the mind is something like this: "I want the pope to be infallible; therefore the pope is infallible." "I want what my church teaches, to be truth, therefore, my church teaches only truth." "I want what is called present truth to be error; therefore it is error." "I want the Bible to teach so and so; therefore the Bible does teach so and so."

The devil and his angels have from the beginning inspired men with perverse wills, and men have in all ages set up their wills against "the will of God." The truth may be presented to such will-trammeled minds in the clearest light, and the error may be exposed in all its hideous deformity. Still the stubborn will upon the throne will not yield. It will silence reason, stifle conscience, call folly evidence, and evidence folly.

The Jews in the days of Jesus enthroned their will upon the seat of reason. They erected splendid tombs in honor of prophets whom their forefathers had murdered, and lamented the wrong deeds of their ancestors, just as this generation looks back sadly on the bloody scenes of Rome and her daughters. History has condemned these wicked deeds, and even the same class of will-trammeled men accepts the decisions of history. But those very Jews mocked the truth and persecuted its lovers as this generation is now doing.

All that the Jews asked was "a sign from heaven." The Saviour, not wishing to make a mere showman of himself, did not repeat any of his miracles, nor perform a new miracle in answer to their temptation. But he referred them to his resurrection, as the climax of just such proof of his Messiahship as they demanded, "a sign from heaven."

But this generation does not ask a sign from heaven. If they did they would be pointed to a future event as the Jews were. Men now say, "Give us Bible proof, and we will believe." But when clear and forcible Bible proof is presented, and the error exposed in open daylight, the stubborn will usurps the place of reason and says, "No, I will not have it so: for it is not as I want it to be." This generation has as clearly gone back on its own word as the Jews did at the resurrection of Jesus. But will a future event to which we point, as did Jesus, work a general change of belief? No, for human nature is the same to-day that it ever was.

The proverb,—

"Convince a man against his will, He'll have the same opinion still,"

Is true only of will-trammeled minds. Convince an honest mind against its will, and that mind will acknowledge its conviction; for an honest man cannot allow his will to decide for him.

Says the prophet, "The heart is deceitful above all things." We need not go to the lunatic asylum to see that the mind deceives itself. We may go to a neighbor who reasons correctly on mathematics and all ordinary affairs of life, and present proof on proof that "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord," and find that on that point the man violates every rule by which he acts in all other things. He allows his will, not his reason, to decide.

Says the psalmist, "I said in my haste, All men are liars." He had seen not only many willful liars, but many others who preferred a lie to the truth.

O poor fellow-man! Can you say more against the Bible than the Bible says against you? You ought to know that the Bible speaks the truth against you, however humbling the truth may be to your pride. But do not retaliate because the Bible speaks painful truth against you. Humble yourself "under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time." EPSILON.