Page images
PDF
EPUB

offend through wilfulness and presumption. | when thou fastest. He taught theta to avoid all ostentation in duties, to which he alluded as already established. Be it observed-by the Saviour himself no attribute is so constantly enjoined or commanded as faith. His previous question to those who resorted to him to be cured, was not if they had virtue but faith; but never let it be forgotten, that as soon as the cure was performed, the man of faith was enjoined, as the surest evidence of his virtue, to sin no more.

6

If the inquirer be of the former class, only deficient, and not malignant, he may be brought to feel his deficiency, and is often in a very improvable state. It would therefore be well to let him see that you think him right as far as he goes, but that he does not go the whole length. If he professes to deny all ungodliness and worldly lusts,' this is no small step yet he may still require to be convinced that it is by the grace of God teaching him.' Here the two ideas expressed by your term of grace, and his of virtue, are brought into united action, with this difference, or if you please with this agreement, that your's being the cause, and his the effect, the Christian character attains its

consummation between you. You must, however, endeavour to convince him, that though the greater includes the less, the reverse cannot be true; that faith and grace in the Christian sense involve virtue and rectitude, but virtue and rectitude in the philosophical sense desire to be excused from any connexion with faith and grace. But the offence taken at terms creates hostility at the outset, blocks up the avenues to each other's heart, and leads men to be so filled with the things in which they differ, as to keep them in the dark as to the things in which they agree.

The more strict disputant will perhaps continue to insist that no such terms as virtue and rectitude are to be found in any Evangelist. Granted. Neither do we find there some other solemn words expressive of the most awful verities of our religion. The holy Trinity and the satisfaction made by the death of Christ, are not, I believe, in any part of the New Testament expressed by these terms, which were first used some ages after in the Byzantine church. But can it be said that the things themselves are not to be found there? They are not only con spicuous in every part of the Gospel, but make up the sum and substance of what it teaches.

CHAP. XIII.

Humility the only true greatness. HUMILITY is one of those qualities of which Christianity requires the perpetual practical exercise. It does not insist that we should be feeding or instructing others— that we should be every moment engaged in acts of benevolence to our fellow creatures, or of mortification to ourselves: but, whether we teach or are taught, whether we communicate our good things to others, or are dependant on others for the communication to ourselves, humility is required as the invariable, the indispensable, the habitual grace, in the life of a Christian. Pride being the radical distemper of the natural man; the business, the duty, the blessedness of the spiritual man is to be freed from it.

However valuable high intellectual attainments have been found in the vindication of religion, however beneficially talents and learning have been exerted in adducing the evidences and augmenting the illustrations of divine truth, yet for the most striking exemplification of genuine piety, To this man will I look, saith the Lord, who is of an humble spirit.' Christianity gives a new form to the virtues, by recasting them in this mould. Humility may be said to operate on the human character like the sculptor, who, in chiseling out the statue, accomplishes his object, not by laying on, but by paring off, not by making extraneous additions, but by retrenching superfluities; till every part of the redundant material is cleared away. The reduction which true religion effects, of swelling passions, irregu

duces at length on the human mind some assimilation to the divine image-that model by which it works-as the human resemblance is gradually, and at length successfully, wrought in the marble.

While each disputant then contends for his own phrases, let not the one suspect that Grace and Faith are the watch words of enthusiasm; nor the other conclude that infidelity skulks behind virtue, and pagan pride behind rectitude. St. Paul expressly ex-lar thoughts, and encumbering desires, prohorts his converts to add to their faith virtue,' and if the inverted injunction was never given, it was not because faith was unnecessary where virtue previously existed, but because virtue, Christian virtue, never could have existed at all without previous Christianity, though equally favourable to faith. In enjoining virtue, the Apostle, upon the loftiest as to the lowest condition of life, his own uniform principle, supposes the was not intended to make man great, but to Christian to be already in possession of make him contented to be little. Though faith; this he ever considers the essential no enemy to the possession and cultivation substance, virtue the inseparable appendage. of the highest mental powers, but affording, Thus the divine preacher on the Mount, in on the contrary, the noblest objects for their his prohibition of an hypocritical outside, investigation, and the richest materials for does not say, Give alms, fast, pray; he con- their exercise; yet she rests not her truth cluded that his followers were already in the on their discussions, nor depends for making practice of those duties, and on this convic- her way to the heart on their reasonings. tion grounded his cautionary exhortation, While the cheering approbation of an humwhen thou doest alms, when thou prayest, ble faith is an encouragement repeatedly VOL. II.

23

held out in the Gospel, there is not one com-ous judgment about things comparatively ob mendation of talent, except for its applica-vious and intelligible. This temper will bring tion-not the least notice of rank or riches, us to credit with fuller cordiality the testimoexcept to intimate their danger-not any ny which God in his word gives of himself, mention of the wisdom of this world, except and cure us of the vanity of rejecting it, on to pronounce its condemnation. the mere ground that we cannot comprehend it. It will deliver us from the desire of being, wise above what is written,' and is the sole antidote to the perils of that promise of unhallowed knowledge, with which the grand seducer tempted his first credulous victim.

[ocr errors]

Humility stands at the head of the beatitudes, and incorporated with them all. And the gracious injunction, Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart,' is a plain intimation, that our Redeemer particularly intended that portion of his own divine character for the most immediate object, not of It is not till humility has practically made our admiration only, but of our imitation. known to us how slowly religion produces its It is the temper which of all others he most effects on ourselves, that we cease to marvel frequently commends, most uniformly en- at its feeble influence and slow-placed efficajoins, and which his own pure and holy life cy on those around us. As a consequence, most invariably exhibits. If we look into this principle leads the humble Christian to the Old Testament, we see that God, after be severe in judging himself, and disposes having described himself as the high and him to be candid in judging others. When holy One which inhabiteth eternity, by a he compares himself with worse men, it furtransition the most unexpected, and a conde-nishes a motive, not for vanity, but gratiscension the most inconceivable, immediate- tude; when with better for additional selfly subjoins, that He dwelleth with the abasement. contrite and the humble;' and this from a St. Paul seems to have been fully aware of motive inexpressibly gracious, to revive the lagging movement which even Christians the spirit of the humble, and to revive the make towards the complete attainment of this heart of the contrite.' heavenly temper. In his address to the CoIs it not incredible that, after these re-lossians, after having expressed his firm hope peated declarations and examples of the Almighty Father, and of the Eternal Son, pride should still be thought a mark of greatness, an ebullition of spirit; and that humility should be so little understood to be the true moral dignity of Christians? While in the religion which they profess, there is no excellence to which it is not preliminary, and of which it is not the crown; nor are other virtues genuine but as they are accompanied with this grace, and performed in this spirit. No quality has acquired its perfection, till it is clarified and refined by being steeped in humility.

of their sincere conversion, in that they had put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created him,' he yet finds it expedient to exhort them; and, for this very reason, to put on,' together with other christian qualities which he enumerates, humbleness of mind.'

[ocr errors]

He might have pressed this duty under the supposition of two cases, and, in either, the injunction would be just. As they had made a public profession of Christianity, he intimates, that there was no surer way of evincing that their profession was sincere, and their conversion radical, than by this unIt is indeed essential to the very reception equivocal mark, the cultivation of an humble of Christianity, for, without this principle, spirit. Or, on the other hand, however deepwe shall be disposed to cavil at divine reve-ly rooted they might be in faith and piety, he lation, to reject, at least, every truth revolt- might feel it necessary to remind them, that ing to human pride; we shall require other they should not consider themselves as havground for the belief in God than his reveal- ing attained a perfection which left no room ed word, other evidence of his veracity than for improvement. So far was this deep prothe internal conviction of our spiritual ficient in divine wisdom from thinking that wants, and the suitableness of that remedy all was done when the convert had entered which the Gospel presents to us. This principle, therefore, is indispensable; without it, we shall be little inclined cordially to receive Christianity as a light, or to obey it as Without it we shall not discover the evil of our own hearts; and, without this discovery, we shall by no means value the grace of the Holy Spirit; we shall exercise no habitual dependance on the promised assistance, nor seek for a support of which we do not feel the want.

a rule.

But humility, by leading us to form a just estimate of ourselves, teaches us to discern the narrowness of our capacities. It reminds us, that there are many things even in the works of God's natural creation far above our comprehension; that from the ignorance and blindness of our minds we make frequent mistakes, and forth a very errone

on his new course, he enjoins them, ever after this effectual change, that they should, as a consequence as well as a proof, therefore, put on this christian grace; and produces their conversion as a motive, because you are already renewed.' He does not recommend any specific act, so much as a general disposition of mind,' implying, according to his uniform practice, that growth was necessary to life, and progress to perfection.

The doctrines of Christianity, and the discourses of its divine Author, are rather pointed against certain radical evil principles, than extended to their lesser ramifications. When the powerful artillery of the Gospel was more especially levelled against the strong holds of pride, it included in the attack all the minor offences resulting from it; implying, that if the citadel be conquered.

the intimidated forces in the outworks will make but a feeble resistance.

rise at the bare suggestion that we are not perfect. We had perhaps been guilty of a Even the worldly and the careless, who hundred faults before, of which, as others are perhaps too inattentive to perceive that took no notice, they made little impression humility is the predominating feature in the on ourselves. We commit a smaller error, truly religious character, as well as the most which draws the eyes of the world upon us, amiable and engaging part of it, yet pay it a and we are not only dejected but almost sort of involuntary homage in adopting its hopeless. The eye of God was equally witoutward appearance. Many among the ness to our preceding faults, yet from their more elegant classes of society, who cannot being secret, they produced little compuncbe brought to adopt the principle, assume tion, while that which is obvious to human the form, as the most unequivocal mark of inspection produces sorrow on the mere their superior condition. But while the ground of producing shame. Perhaps we well-bred exhibit the polished exterior of were permitted to fall into this more notorihumility in manner, they are called, as Chris-ous error that we might be brought to advert tians, to cultivate the inward and spiritual to those of which we had been so little sensigrace. In spite of the laws against egotism ble; and though the depression consequent which the code of good breeding has issued, upon this fault is rather the consciousness of a nearer intimacy sometimes discloses the mortified pride, than of pious contrition, yet self-satisfaction which politeness had thinly God may make use of it to awaken us to a veiled. While we are prone to carry our feeling of our general corruptions, to warn virtues in our memory, we cannot be always us not to depend on ourselves, and to put us on our guard against producing them in our on our guard against 'secret faults,' as well conversation. Such virtues, for the most as against open and presumptuous sins.' part popular ones, caught our taste perhaps from the applause with which they were received, or the eloquence with which they were set forth in our presence and as we acquired them in public, and by hearing and reading, we shall be contented to exercise them in profession and talk. Many, and very many of these qualities may be grafted on the old stock, and look green and flourishing, whilst they have no root in themselves;' but genuine humility springs out of a root deeply fixed in the soil of a renewed heart, and takes its first ground on the full conviction of our apostacy from God.

As we make a proficiency in this humbling knowledge of ourselves, our confidence in our own virtues proportionably diminishes. The delight we once received in the contemplation is first abated by self-distrust, and finally abolished by self-acquaintance Then we begin to profit by the deep sense of our own weakness, and to send forth the genuine fruits of a strength and a virtue derived from higher sources. And thus, the Sound conviction of our own frailty, though purchased at the expense of a great error, may prove, if we might venture to say it, of more real benefit to our own mind, than the performance of a splendid action, if of that action all the use we had made had been to repose added confidence in our own strength, er to entertain higher notions of our own goodness.

Even a good man is not entirely exempt from the danger of occasional elation of spirit; even a good man does not always judge himself so rigorously as he ought; yet, though he makes too many partial allowances, is too much disposed to softenings and abatements, to apologies and deductions, still he is, on the whole, suspicious of himself, distrustful of his own rectitude, on his guard against habitual abberrations from humility. Though tremblingly alive to kindness, his sincerity makes him almost ready to regret commendation, because his enlightened conscience tells him, that if the panegyrist knew him as he knows himself, it would have been bestowed with much abatement; and he is little elated with the praise which is produced by ignorance and mistake.— Though he has fewer faults than some others, yet, as he must know more of himself than he can know of them, his humility will teach him to bear patiently even the censure he does not deserve, conscious how much he does deserve for faults which the censurer cannot know.

There is, however, no humility in an excessive depreciation of ourselves. We are not commanded to take a false estimate of our own character, though a low would be too frequently a just one. While the great Apostle St. Peter was contented to call himself the servant of Jesus Christ, his self-constituted successors, by an byperbole of selfabasement, have denominated themselves servants of the servants of God. And yet they have not, it is to be feared, always surpassed the disciple they profess to follow, in the display of this apostolic grace.

Yet, while we ought to be deeply humbled at every fresh detection of evil in our hearts, to be discouraged at the discovery from proceeding in our Christian course is so far from being an effect of humility, that it is rather the result of pride. The traveller who Nor is the appearance of this quality any meets with a fall, does not recover his ground infallible proof of its existence. Nothing is by lying still and lamenting, but by rising more common than to hear affability to the and pursuing his journey. Joined with this poor produced as an undoubted evidence of faulty despondency, or still more frequently the humility of the affluent. The act, inpreceding it, is to be traced the operation of deed, is always amiable, whatever be the a blind and morbid pride. Particularly, if motive; but still the expression is equivocal. the intimation of the fault we have commit- Does it not sometimes too much resemble ted comes from others, the heart is found to that septennial exhibition of humility which

[ocr errors]

calls forth so much smiling condescension hears another extolled for the very quality from the powerful, while it conveys an on which he most values himself-commendhour's importance to the poor man's heart?' ed for something in which he would, if he The one enjoys the brief, but keen delight, dared, monopolize commendation-it is tried of reviling his superiors with impunity, with when he sees that a man of merit has prozthe better gratification of conferring favours pered in an enterprise in which he has failed, instead of receiving them; the other, like or when he is called upon for the magnanDryden's Achitophel, bowing popularly imity to acknowledge one who, though below,' wins by his courtesy, that favour, which low him in general character, is still his suhe would not perhaps have obtained by his perior in this particular respect-it is, when, merit. But the curtain soon closes on the in some individual instance, this competitor personated scene:-the next day, both fall has promoted the public good by a means back into their natural character and condi. which he had declared to be totally inapplition. The periodical condescension at once cable to the end. reinstates itself into seven years' dignity, while the independent elector cheerfully resumes his place in his dependent class, till the next Saturnalia again invite to the reciprocal exchange of character.

Where the difference of condition is obviously great, nothing is lost, and something may be gained by familiarity; the condescension is so apparent, that though it properly excites both admiration and gratitude in the indigent, it does not infallibly prove the lowliness of the superior. The impassable gulf which separates the two conditions, the immoveable fences which establish that distance, preserve the poor from encroachment, and the rich from derogation: no swellings of heart arise against the acknowledged dependant, no dread of emulation against the avowed inferior. Even arrogance itself is gratified at seeing its train augmented by so amiable a thing as its own kindness. Notice is richly repaid by panegyric, and condescension finds it has only stooped to rise. If we give pleasure in order to be paid with praise, we had better be less liberal that we might be less exacting. The discreetly proud are aware, that arrogant manners bar up men's hearts against them; their very pride, therefore, preserves them from insofence; the determined object being to gain hearts, and their good sense telling them that a haughty demeanor is not the way to gain them, they know how to make the exterior affable in proportion as the mind is high; for the ingenuity of pride has taught it, that popularity is only to be obtained by concealing the most offensive part of itself. Thus it can retain its nature and gratify its spirit, without the arrogant display by which vulgar pride disgusts, and, by disgusting, loses its aim.

The true Christian will be humble in proportion to the splendor of his endowments. Humility does not require him to stupify or disavow his understanding, and thus disqualify or indispose him for great active duties. If he possesses talents, he is not unconscious of them, but, instead of exulting in the possession, he is abased that he has not turned them to better account, he is habitually thinking how he can most essentially serve God with his own gift. Sensible that he owes every thing to his divine Benefactor, be feels that he has not made him the return to which he was bound, and that his gratitude bears little proportion to his mercies; so that the very review of his abilities and possessions, which inflates the hearts of others, only deepens his humility, only fills his mind with a fuller sense of his own defect of love and thankfulness. Every distinction, instead of intoxicating him, only augments his sense of dependence, magnifies his weight of obligation, increases his feeling of accountableness. His humility has a double excitement: he receives every blessing as the gift of God through the merits of his Son; it is increased by the reflection, that such is his unworthiness, he dares not even supplicate the mercy of his Creator but through the intercession of a Mediator: where is boasting then? it is excluded."— Not only on account of any good he may have, but also on account of evils from which he has been preserved, he acknowledges himself indebted to divine assistance; so that his escapes and deliverances, as well as his virtues and successes, are subjects of gratitude rather than of self-exultation.

It will not be departing from the present object, if we contrast the quality under consideration with its opposite. While humility The true test is, how the same person is never at variance with itself, pride is a feels, and how he conducts himself, towards very inconsistent principle. It knows not him whose claims come in competition with only how to assume the garb of the attrihis own-who treads on his heels in his pre-bute to which it is opposed, but even detensions, or surpasses him in his success-scends to be abject, which humility never is. who is held up as his rival in genius, in re- Consider it on one side, nothing is so selfputation, in fortune, in display_who_runs supported; survey it on the other, you the race with him and outstrips him. More will perceive that nothing is so dependent, severe will be the test, when the competitor so full of claims, so exacting, so incapable is his own familiar friend,' who was his of subsisting on itself. It is made up of exequal, perhaps his inferior, in the contest for academical honours, but is now a more fortunate candidate for the prizes which the world distributes, or his decided conqueror on the professional Arena.

His humility is put to the trial, when he

trinsic appendages; it leads a life of mendicity; it stoops to beg the alms of other men's good opinion for its daily bread. It is true, the happiness of a proud man, if he have rank, arises from an idea of his own importance; but still, to feed and maintain

pride; especially if the person accused possess those distinctions and accomplishments, the possession of which would make the accuser proud. Men full of themselves, are disposed to fancy others deficient in attention to them; and as it never occurs to them why those attentions are withheld, they have no other way of accounting for the neglect, but to charge the neglecter with being en

this greedy self-importance, he must look around him. His pleasures are derived, not so much from his personal enjoyments as from his superiority to others; not so much from what he possesses, as from the respect his possessions inspire. As he cannot entirely support his feelings of greatness by what he finds in himself; he supplies the deficiency by looking backward to his ancestors, and downward upon his train.vious of their qualities, or vain of his own. With all his self-consequence, he is reduced With that deep humility, which is the groundto borrow his dignity from the merits of the work of his profession, the Christian alone one, and the numbers of the other. By thus attains to real dignity of character. If we multiplying himself, he feels not only indi- reckon those men great who rise high, and vidually, but numerically, great. These make a distinguished figure in the world, foreign aids and adjuncts help him to enlarge how much higher is his claim to greatness the space he fills in his own imagination, who looks down on what the others glory in ; and he is meanly contented to be admired for what is, in effect, no part of himself.-This sentiment is, however, by no means limited to rank or riches.

.If the penury of pride drives it to seek its aliment in the praise of others, it is chiefly because we want their good opinion to confirm us in that which we have of ourselves. When we secretly indulge in reckoning up the testimonies we have collected to our worth, it is because we like to bring as many witnessess as we can muster, that we may have their approving verdict in additional proof that our judgment was right. In fact, we think better of ourselves in proportion as we contrive to make more people think well of us. But, however large the circle which high imaginations' draw round the individual self in the centre, we can really occupy no more than our allotted space; we may indeed change our position, but, in shifting it, we fill no more than we filled already, for by the removal we lose as much as we gain.

who views with indifference the things to which the world accounts it greatness to aspire, and the consummation of greatness to

attain.

The proud man, by not cordially falling in with the Christian scheme-which, if he thoroughly adopted, would shrink to nothing these bloated fancies-contracts, in effect, the duration of his existence, and reduces to almost nothing the sphere in which his boasted dignity is to be exercised. The theatre on which he is satisfied to act, is limited to the narrow stage of this world; and even on this vanishing scene, how far are the generality from being considerable actors! Pride, therefore, is something worse than fatuity, for whether the stake be high or low, it is sure to play a losing game. It is difficult to say which lot will be most terrible; his, who, having performed an obscure and painful part in this short drama, and having neglected to seek that kingdom promised to the poor in spirit, closes his life and hopes together; or his, who, having had a conspiIt is an humbling truth, that the most pow-cuous part assigned him here, submits, when erful talents are not seldom accompanied the curtain drops, not merely to be nothing; with vehement passions, that a brilliant im- but oh! how much worse than nothing! agination is too frequently associated with Absorbed in the illusions and decorations of ungoverned appetites. Neither human rea- this shifting spectacle, or intoxicated with son, nor motives merely moral, are common- the plaudits of the spectators, the interminaly found to keep these impetuous usurpers ble scenes which lie beyond the grave, in order; the strength of men's passions though, perhaps, not absolutely disbelieved, tempting them to violate the rules which the have been totally neglected to be taken into strength of their judgment has laid down.- his brief reckoning. Nature cannot operate without its own Now, if pride were really a generous prinsphere. What is natural in the intellect, ciple, if its tumour were indeed greatness, will not, of itself, govern what is natural in surely the soul which entertains it would exthe appetite. If the lower part of our na-ert its energies on a grand scale! If ambiture is subdued, it is not without the holy spirit assisting the higher. Wit, especially has such a tendency to lead astray the mind which it embellishes, that it is a striking evidence of the efficacy of grace, when men, whose shining talents make virtue lovely in the eyes of others, reject themselves high thoughts engendering pride;' when they, on whose lips the attention of others hangs with delight, can, themselves, by this divinely infused principle, bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.

[ocr errors]

There is no quality so ready to suspect, and so prompt to accuse, as that which we are considering; there is no fault which a proud man so readily charges upon others as

tion were indeed a noble sentiment, would it not be pointed to the noblest objects; would it not be directed to the sublimest end? Would not the mind which is filled with it, achieve a loftier flight? Would it stoop to be cooped up within the scanty precincts of a perishing world? True ambition would raise its votary above the petty projects which every accident may overturn, and every breath destroy; which a few months may, and a few years must, terminate. It would set him upon reflecting, that all the elevation of intellect, all the depth of erudition, all the superiority of rank, all the distinction of riches, is only held by the attenuated thread that attaches him to this world-a world

« PreviousContinue »