LECTURE VIII.

EVILS TO BE AVOIDED IN CONNECTION WITH REVIVALS.

ROMANS XIV. 16.

Let not then your good be evil spoken of.

This direction of the Apostle was suggested by a particular case, which was the subject of controversy in the church at Rome, when this epistle was written. You will instantly perceive, however, that the rule here prescribed, is of universal application; and that it is founded in general principles of Christian prudence and charity. The design of it is not only to direct us in the practice of that which is good, but to lead us to unite wisdom with our pious activity; that we may, so far as possible, prevent incidental evils from being connected with our well meant efforts, and that our good may be inoffensive and irreproachable.

As there is no part of Christian conduct in relation to which this direction is not applicable, so, if I mistake not, it applies especially to the part which the church is called to take in a revival of religionindeed to the whole economy of a revival. For as

there is no department of religious action in which even good men are not liable to err, so there is no other field in which the Christian is called to labor, where there is greater danger of his being misled. There is in the minds of most men a tendency to extremes; and that tendency is never so likely to discover itself as in a season of general excitement. When men are greatly excited on any subject, we know that they are in far more danger of forming erroneous judgments, and adopting improper courses, than when they are in circumstances to yield themselves to sober reflection. Now as there is often great excitement in connection with a revival, there is the common danger which exists in all cases of highly excited feeling, that our honest endeavors to do right will result in more or less that is wrong; in other words, that we shall give occasion for our good to be evil spoken of.

The conclusion to which we should be brought on this subject from the very constitution of human nature, is in exact accordance with what we know of the history of revivals. There always has been, mingled with these scenes of divine power and grace, more or less of human infirmity and indiscretion; and in some cases, no doubt, in which there have even been many genuine conversions, there has been just reason to say, "what is the wheat to the chaff?" To say nothing of revivals in modern times-whoever will read the history of the early revivals in New-England, while he will find evidence enough that the presence and power of

God was in them, and if he be a Christian, will regard the record of them as occupying one of the most blessed chapters in the history of the church, will nevertheless find just cause to weep that they should have been clouded so much by the mistakes and infirmities even of good men. But those good men (some of them at least) lived to be satisfied that they were in the wrong; and it is to their honor that they acknowledged it; and it were impossible to read the record of their acknowledgment, without feeling a sentiment of veneration for their characters, and without wishing that the errors into which they fell, might, so far as they were themselves concerned, be blotted from the memory of the church.

I am aware, my friends, that in endeavoring to present before you the abuses to which revivals are liable, and with which they have always been, in a greater or less degree, connected, I am undertaking a task of peculiar delicacy; and I confess to you, that nothing but a strong and honest sense of duty would have led me to attempt it. I will state to you the considerations which have arisen to occasion this reluctance, and the manner in which I have felt myself obliged to dispose of them.

In the first place, I can hardly doubt that an attempt to expose these evils, may appear to some unnecessary. But so thought not the illustrious Edwards, when his discriminating and mighty mind was occupied in framing some of the most judicious treatises which the world has seen, for the very

purpose of guarding against the abuses of revivals. On the title page of those books the church has written her own name, and she claims them as her property in a higher sense than almost any thing else except the Bible. And is it not manifest that that illustrious man judged rightly in composing them; and that the church has judged rightly in the estimate she has formed of them? For who does not perceive that if revivals of religion become corrupted, there is poison in the fountain whose streams are expected to gladden and purify? And who that is competent to judge, will doubt that those treatises have done more than any other uninspired productions, to maintain the purity of revivals, from the period in which they were written to the present? If Edwards has rendered good service to the church by writing these immortal works, then surely it cannot be unnecessary for other ministers to direct their humbler efforts to the same end. It is just as necessary now to distinguish between true and false experience, and between right and wrong conduct in a revival of religion, as it ever has been in any preceding period; and the manner in which this duty is practically regarded, must always determine, in a great degree, the amount of blessing which any revival will secure.

But it may be said also that what I am about to attempt should be avoided, because it is fitted to awaken controversy. I acknowledge that controversy on the subject of religion is not in itself desirable; for it is exceedingly liable to wake up the bad

passions of men. Nevertheless, there are some cases in which we shall all agree that it is necessary to hazard the evils that may result from it. No being on earth ever awakened a more violent religious controversy than Jesus Christ; but if it had not been for this, where now would have been our blessed Christianity? So also Luther, and Calvin, and Zuingle, and Knox, and the whole host of Reformers, excited a controversy concerning religion which had well nigh set the world on fire; but if it had never existed, what evidence have you that the church would, to this hour, have witnessed the glorious Reformation. President Edwards published his "Thoughts on Revivals," and other invaluable works in connection with the same subject, at the expense of being denounced, even by some of his own brethren, as an enemy of revivals; but these publications have served to correct and prevent great abuses ever since; and if he had rendered the church no other service, for this alone she would have embalmed his memory. Controversy, then, though it is never to be desired for its own sake, cannot always be declined in consistency with Christian obligation; or without putting at fearful hazard the best interests of the church.

In the present case, however, permit me to say that I have no intention to excite controversy by attacking any man or body of men. The evils which I shall endeavor to expose, are none of them peculiar to any one denomination of Christians, or to any particular period of the church; but they have