REVIEW

Of an Article in the June number of the Christian Spectator, entitled, "Inquiries respecting the Doctrine of Imputation."

In our number for January last, we presented our readers with a condensed view of the early history of Pelagianism. In the course of that article, it fell in our way to express our belief in the doctrine of imputation, our conviction of its importance, and of its being generally received among orthodox Christians. This doctrine, our readers are aware, has long been, nominally at least, rejected by many of our New England brethren. Without much argument on the subject, it has been discarded as intrinsically absurd; and it has not unfrequently been presented as an unanswerable argument against other doctrines, that they lead to all the absurdities of this exploded dogma. We have long been convinced, that the leading objections to this doctrine, arose from an entire, and to us, an unaccountable misapprehension of its nature as held among Calvinists. We, therefore, thought it proper, and adapted to remove prejudices, to state the common views on this subject, that our brethren might see that they did not involve the absurdities which they imagined. Unfortunately, as far as the author of the article under review is concerned, our object has not been answered. The writer, who signs. himself A Protestant, is evidently much dissatisfied with our opinions. His object, in his communication to the Spectator, is to impugn several of our statements, and to present his difficulties with regard to the doctrine itself. To our surprise, these difficulties are almost all founded on the very misapprehension which it was our object to correct. Although our readers, we think, will sympathize with us in our regret at many of the statements of this author, and feel hurt that he should have allowed himself to make the unguarded imputations contained in his piece, we are not sorry that we are called upon, by this direct appeal, to state more fully our views on this subject, and the grounds on which they rest.

Before proceeding to the doctrine of imputation and of the protestant's difficulties, there are one or two subjects on

which we would make a passing remark. This writer attributes to us great subserviency to the opinions of the fathers. Such expressions as the following clearly convey this imputation. "Can any one inform me to what age this 'orthodoxy' belongs; and where the history of it is to be found among the fathers whose authority is so much relied on by this historian?" Page 340. "Can the historian honestly say, with all his attachment to the fathers, &c." "Last of all, I would particularly request, if any writer should favour me with an answer to these inquiries, that reasons, and not names, may be given in support of his statements. If it be suggested that none but a heretic could ask such questions, I would reply, that there are minds in our country which are not satisfied that calling hard names is argument; or that the argumentum ad invidiam is the happiest weapon which a meek and humble Christian can use. Men are apt to suspect that such arguments would not be employed, if better ones were at hand in their stead. I only add that I am A Protestant.” And so are we, however unworthy that gentleman may think us of the title. We would not knowingly call any man master upon earth. We profess to believe, with him, that the Bible is the religion of protestants; and that it matters little what men have taught, if the word of God does not support their doctrines. As we agree with him in these leading principles, we hope that he will agree with us in certain others. While we hold that the opinions of men are of no authority as to matters of faith, we, at the same time, believe that much respect is due to uniform opinions of the people of God; that there is a strong presumption in favour of any doctrine being taught in the Bible, if the great body of the pious readers of the Bible have from the beginning believed and loved it. We are free to confess, that it would startle us to hear, that there was no antecedent probability that the doctrines of the deity of Christ, atonement, native depravity, are really taught in the word of God, if it can be made to appear that the church, in all ages, has believed these doctrines. And we think that a man places himself in a very unenviable situation, who undertakes to prove to the men of his generation, that the great body of the good and pious before him, were utterly mistaken, and that he alone is right. Here is a phenomenon, which any man who assumes this position is bound at the outset to account for, that the Bible, a plain book, as protestants call it, should have been utterly misunderstood

for more than a thousand years, by its most careful and competent readers. It will not meet this case, to tell us, that this man or that man has held this or that absurdity; or that whole ages or communities of men, who neither read nor loved the scriptures, believed this or that heresy. This is not the question. It is simply this, is it not probable that what the vast majority of the most competent readers of a plain book, take to be its plain meaning, really is its meaning? We take it for granted, that the protestant would answer this question in the affirmative; and that, if arguing with Unitarians, he would not scruple to appeal to the fact, that the unprejudiced and pious en masse of every age have understood the Bible as teaching the divinity of Christ, as a presumptive argument in its favour. We suspect that he would go further, and that in giving the exposition of any passage he would fortify his own conclusions, by stating that he did not stand alone, but that others of the accurate and the learned had arrived at the same results. Now we think that a man who would do this, ought not to sncer at us on this very account. We know that it is easy to ring the changes, on want of independence, subserviency to the fathers, slavery to a system, and so on, but what effect does all this produce? It may excite prejudice, and lead the superficial to join in a sneer against men whom they suppose to a pitiable extent inferior to themselves; but does it convince any body? Does it weaken the legitimate force of the argument from the concurrence of the pious in any doctrine? Does it produce any favourable impression on that class of readers whose approbation a writer should value?

We say, then, that the opinion of the church is entitled to respect, if for no other reason, at least as a presumptive argument for any doctrine, in favour of which this concurrent testimony can be cited. Whether the church has, with any important uniformity, held the doctrine of imputation, is a mere question of fact, and must be decided accordingly. If it can be fairly proved, let it pass for what it is worth. It binds no man's conscience; yet the protestant himself would hardly say, that it was to him or others a matter of indifference. He greatly mistakes if he supposes that the opinion of a man who lived a thousand years ago, has any more weight with us than that of an equally pious and able man who may be still living. His telling us, therefore, that some of

the men, who are called fathers, held sundry very extravagant opinions, is really saying very little in answer to the argument from the consent of the good and great as to the plain meaning of a plain book. We are not now assuming the fact, that the church has, with perfect unanimity, gathered the doctrine of imputation from the word of God; but exhibiting the ground and nature of the respect due to the uniform opinion of God's people.

There is another point of view in which, we presume, the protestant will agree with us in thinking this opinion entitled to respect. Truth and piety are intimately related. A man's moral and religious opinions are the expression of his moral and religious feelings. Hence there are certain opinions which we view with abhorrence, because they express the greatest depravity. Now we say, and the protestant doubtless will join us in saying, that it is no very desirable thing for a man to throw himself out of communion with the great body of the pious in every age, and place himself in communion of language and opinion with the opposers of vital godliness. We think that any man, who had any proper sense of the deceitfulness of his own heart, the weakness of his understanding, and of the vital connexion between truth and piety, would hesitate long before he avowed himself opposed to the views which have for ages been found in connexion with true religion, and become the advocate of doctrines which the opposers of piety have been the foremost in defending.

These are mainly the grounds on which our respect for the opinions of the church rest, and these remarks show the extent of that respect. So far the protestant would go with us; further we have not gone. If we have cited the concurrent opinion of the church improperly; if we have supposed the great body of the people of God to have believed, what they did not believe-let the protestant set us right, and we shall be thankful. But do not let him join men, with whom he would scorn to be associated, in running over the common places of free inquiry, minds that think, &c. &c.

A word as to the argumentum ad invidiam. We are of the number of those who agree with this writer in thinking that "this is not the happiest weapon which a meek and lowly Christian can use," nay, that it is utterly unworthy of his character to use it at all. We think, too, that the charge

of having used it should not be lightly made. Unless we are mistaken as to the nature of this argument, the charge, in the present instance, is unfounded. We understand an argumentum ad invidiam to be one, which is designed, not to prove the incorrectness of any opinion, but to cast unmerited odium upon those who hold it. Such was not the design of the article to which the protestant objects. Every one knows, that within a few years, there has been more or less discussion in this country respecting sin and grace. We thought it would be useful, to present our readers with a short historical view of the various controversies which have existed in the church on these subjects. We commenced with the earliest and one of the most important; and gave, to the best of our ability, an account of the Pelagian controversy. We called no man a Pelagian, and designed to prove no man such, and therefore made little application of the history to present discussions. So far as the modern opinions differ from the ancient, there was no ground for such application, and none such was intended. So far as they agree, it is no more an argumentum ad invidiam to exhibit the agreement, than it is to call Belsham a Socinian or Whitby an anti-Calvinist. If no man agrees with Pelagius in confining morality to acts of choice; in maintaining that men are not morally depraved, before they voluntarily violate a known law; and that God cannot prevent sin in a moral system, then is no man affected by the exhibition of the Pelagian system. But if there are those who assume this ground, and proclaim it, it does them no injustice to say that they do so. So long, however, as these brethren hold to a moral certainty that all men will sin the moment they become moral agents; that the first sin leads to entire moral depravity; and that an immediate influence of the Spirit is necessary in conversion, they differ from that system in these important points. Wherein they agree and wherein they differ, should be known in justice to them, as well as for the benefit of others. How far the assumption of the fundamental principles of a system has a tendency to lead to its thorough adoption, every man must judge for himself. For ourselves, we fear the worst. Because, we think consistency requires an advance, and because history informs us, that when men have taken the first step, they or their followers soon take the second. Now, we ask, what is there