withstanding all the schism, all the inconsistency, and all the uncharitableness which obscure the light and intercept the influence of visible Christianity in respect to unbelievers, there is religion enough in the world existing within reach of familiar observation, to leave without excuse the infidel who refuses to examine its Divine claims. If it amount only to a presumptive argument in its favour, it is enough; for there are other means of direct proof. But we cannot but regard this as what was designed to come in place of miraculous attestations of the truth of Christianity. Any obscurity which attends this species of evidence, is chargeable, not upon Christianity, but upon the professors of religion who fail to realize its genuine character; and upon them rests an awful responsibility. The efficient nature of this most striking and persuasive sort of presumptive proof, will be evident to him who reflects, that the absence or deficient measure of it in the lives of professed Christians, has in every age presented the greatest stumbling block to the irreligious, and been one of the most fruitful sources of infidelity. When the miraculous effusion of the Spirit ceased, fresh miracles not being requisite in order to give credibility to the Christian doctrine, or to invite attention to a religion no longer new and strange, but disseminated throughout the Roman world,→ the ordinary influences of the same Spirit were not withdrawn from the Church: the "fruits of the Spirit" were attestations not less convincing than the "gifts of the Spirit," of a Divine power attendant upon the ministration of the Gospel. It is remarkable that the Apostle seems in one passage to attribute to the ordinary services of the Church a superior efficacy in this very respect, when, contrasting the ambitious exercise of miraculous endowments, which were intended as "a sign to them "who believe not," with prophesying or preaching, which was for the benefit of believers, he represents the unbeliever as coming in, and, smitten with conviction, falling down to worship God, and reporting that God was in them of a truth.*

Notwithstanding all that the sceptic may urge in disparagement of the force of testimony, it is undeniable, that simple testimony has, constituted as human nature is, a tendency to inspire belief, and that the credibility of the testimony is not measured, in the matters of common life, by its accordance with our individual experience. And it will be easy to shew that this is consistent with sound reason. If a man believes a thing to be true, we may conclude that it is upon some degree of evidence, or at least, the semblance of evidence; his believing it affords, therefore, a presumption, which, in the absence of suspicious circum

* 1 Cor. xiv. 25.

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stances, amounts to a reasonable probability, that the thing is true. How low soever the degree of probability which this affords, it is sufficient to render disbelief previous to examination unreasonable, unless we are in possession of actual knowledge which warrants our dismissing the proposition as prima facie untrue. If the thing be believed in by ten men of competent understanding, instead of by an individual, here is a still stronger presumption that there exists, as the foundation of their. belief, some evidence, more or less convincing, of its truth. The concurrent belief of thousands of men in successive ages, of individuals of the most distinguished learning and acumen, renders the probability in favour of the unexamined doctrine indefinitely greater. There must be a high degree of evidence attending the matter of so general a belief, and I must at least be in possession of the whole of that evidence before I can be excused for my incredulity. The mere fact, therefore, of Chris-. tianity's having been so extensively believed in, not as an unexamined system of dogmas, but by men possessed of every means. of eliciting the truth, and actuated by a spirit of inquiry,-by men whose worldly interests were prejudiced by the belief which they avowed, and who had therefore every motive for detecting imposture, if it does not afford a reason for my believing in its truth, renders disbelief previous to examination in the highest degree irrational, and indicates a state of mind absolutely insusceptible of the due impression of whatsoever direct evidence. would be found to attend the doctrine itself.

It

There is, however, a force in testimony which is adapted to bring the mind into the state and attitude favourable to the reception of evidence. Were it not for this, we should be indeed left without any adequate means of combating the influence of scepticism, because, till this state of mind, this disposedness to believe, be produced, we have shewn that even the highest de gree of moral evidence is insufficient to compel conviction. is obvious, too, that the greater part of mankind are not at leisure to attend to the external evidence with which Christianity is accompanied, nor even to appreciate it when laid before them. If only that belief were rational which is arrived at, after a state of previous doubt, by a process of argumentative deduction, the majority of mankind would have no better alternative than to remain sceptical, or to be compelled to an irrational exercise of belief, which is only another name for credulity. But it is so far from being necessary, to render belief reasonable, that it should originate in an immediate perception of the grounds of belief, that a belief resting purely upon testimony, is the basis of almost all our knowledge, and, in all the ordinary_transactions of life, regulates our practice. Our knowledge of the results of scientific experiment, of geographical discovery, rests purely

upon testimony. No one in his senses, unless his previous knowledge supplied a reason for his scepticism, would think of suspending his belief till he had personally verified the accuracy of the information so transmitted to him. Life would be too short, and the opportunities of the individual too circumscribed, to allow of his scepticism being thus in every instance satisfied by the production of the appropriate evidence. The certainty of science arises, it is true, from the proveable and incontestible nature of the propositions of which it consists; but the proof is not within the reach of every one, and in the minds of most persons, therefore, the whole of science has no other basis than simple testimony. Nor is a belief in a proposition once proved, and generally admitted to be proveable, considered as any mark of credulity. On the contrary, a scepticism as to admitted truths in science, is justly regarded as attributable rather to ignorance; and a man who should oppose a priori speculations, or rather prejudices, which seemed to him to be justified by his own narrow experience, to the demonstrated truths of science, although those demonstrations have come to him only in the shape of testimony, would be justly chargeable with an arrogant perversity of intellect. And is a similar scepticism in reference to the truth of Christianity, when its doctrines are conveyed to us by means of human testimony, to be regarded as less irrational?

Human testimony is often the sole means of our arriving at the knowledge of truths capable of being substantiated by the strongest evidence. It is indeed the actual source of a great part of our knowledge, of all traditional information, and of all the elementary parts of science. But what we wish now particularly to point out, is, its tendency to inspire rational belief. It is this tendency which renders the preaching of the Gospel a suitable means of disseminating the religion of Christ. This brings us to the very point to which we wish to conduct our readers. The only way in which the truths of the Gospel can be brought to bear upon the minds of men at large, is, through the medium of the conscience. It is not by the force of reasoning, but by the persuasive energy of testimony, not by the external evidence, but by the inherent authority of the truth, that we are to rouse the indolence, or to abate the hardihood of scepticism. It is, in fact, not by arguing from the evidences of Christianity the reasonableness of belief, but by holding out, in the terrors of the Law, and in the merciful proclamations of the Gospel, considerations adapted to act as motives for believing. The external evidence does not properly apply to the doctrines contained in the inspired Volume; it relates only to the vehicle of those doctrines: while, as respects that far more con vincing medium of proof, the internal evidences of Christianity, which form the real basis of devout faith, the intelligible ground

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of certainty to the believer,-these are undiscernible by the sceptic; they are only spiritually discerned ; and he is not, therefore, in a situation to judge of all the evidence, nor yet of the most important portion of the evidence, by which the religion of the Bible is substantiated. But in the testimony of the believers in that religion, he is presented with a rational presumption of its truth, the force of which he may cavil at, but be cannot altogether withstand. And it is this simple testimony, this “ foolish

ness of preaching,” which God bas employed in every age as the great instrument of bringing to pought the vain wisdom of buman philosophy, and of saving them that believe, well despair of arresting infidelity by other means, but we need Dever despair of the efficiency of this.

It may seem that we have left out of consideration, one circumstance, upon which the advocates of the innocence of mental error lay some stress ; namely, that the intellectual diversity existing among men, renders a different degree of evidence requisite to produce conviction in individuals of the same moral character. Allowing the evidence of Christianity to be sufficient to engage the faith of one honest inquirer, it may not amount to what another, in precisely a similar state of heart, might require in order to leave bim no excuse for bis incredulity. Or, if the degree be sufficient to leave without excuse; those whose constitutional bias most strongly predisposes them to doubt, it would seem to follow, that, with regard to by far the greater part of mankind, it must be redundant and compelling.

• More evidence,' says Mr. Fox,' would have included some who are Unbelievers ; less would have excluded some who are Christians, I could easily find aniongst you, two firm Christians, of whom the one had required twice as much evidence for his faith as the other. No man can indicate for another the mathematical point at which culpable credulity ends, and culpable scepticism begins.'

We make no remark upon the absurdity of supposing that culpable credulity and culpable scepticism run into each other in the manner this affirmation supposes ; or upon the fallacy of what it implies, namely, that our obligation to believe, depends on the measure of proof, or the degree of probability, upon which God has been pleased to constitute it our duty to act. It must be at once acknowledged, that it is not the measure of evidence really attaching to the matter of belief, or, in other words, its credibility as susceptible of proof, but our full perception of that evidence, which renders it available for our conviction. It by no means follows, that the degree of evidence with which a man contents himself, as sufficient to decide 'his conduct, is the highest degree of which the nature of the case admits. Supposing, therefore, that the full evidence of which Christianity is

susceptible, and which is discoverable upon a candid inquiry, is just sufficient to overcome the scepticism of the individual whose mental constitution leads him to make the largest demands, the partial apprehension of that full evidence, may be adequate to satisfy the common run of less philosophical believers, without their incurring the imputation of credulity. The terms of the supposition forbid our attributing the difference to any thing more than a diversity of intellectual character: the state of the heart is taken for granted to be the same. But if we do exclude the state of the heart, and ask for an intelligible reason why the one required for his faith twice as much evidence as the other, we should imagine that it must be because the knowledge of the one opposed greater difficulties in the way of his believing. For, as we are not to conceive, (the state of the heart in both being the same,) that there existed in either of these firm Christians a contempt previous to examination, or an indisposition to believe upon sufficient evidence, what rendered the same degree of evidence satisfactory to the one, and inadequate to the conviction of the other, must have been, some reasonable presumption against the truth, which justified the scepticism of the less facile believer: a presumption with which his more extensive knowledge supplied him, arising from his viewing all the difficulties and possible objections which lie in the way of an assured belief; or else from that keener perception of difficulties, which is induced by habits of severe abstract investigation. This made it requisite that the positive evidence should be more fully and distinctly apprehended by the one than by the other believer, in order to remove the suspicions awakened by these apparent indications of incredibility. That the defectiveness of our knowledge is the real occasion of any apparent inconsistency between the matter of our knowledge and that which is proposed to our belief, will not be disputed by any 'firm' or intelligent Christian; but still, it is important to bear in mind, that previous knowledge is the only rational ground for scepticism as to things unknown; that a discrepancy between things known to be true, and things testified to be true, affords the only pretence for disbelief; that it is a high degree of previous knowledge which alone renders the demand for higher degrees of evidence in the matter of testimony, reasonable, or which, in a right state of heart, opposes any difficulty in the way of believing. As to that shallow, flippant scepticism, therefore, which rests, not upon knowledge, but upon ignorance, which receives no check from the incalculably strong presumption in favour of the truth, which is supplied by the concurrent belief of the wisest and the best of men of every age, which makes its own limited perceptions, the measure of the object, and the test of the evidence submitted to it, and deems that incredible which allows of the alternative