Insufficiency of Natural Religion

THE

INSUFFICIENCY OF NATURAL RELIGION

IN TWO SERMONS,

BY ABRAHAM TAYLOR,

MINISTER OF THE GOSPEL.

SERMON I.

1 Corinthians 11:14.

The natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

This is the method of man’s salvation, which the Scriptures teach; and as it is the only way of thinking which man can fall into, in order to glorify all God’s perfections, it must be concluded to be the most rational scheme in the world. The design of God was to glorify his own perfections, to exalt Christ, to stain the pride of man’s glory, and to show the necessity of holiness; therefore, as the Holy Scripture declares and reveals this wonderful plan, it is no marvel that it should be ridiculed, as a huddle of foolish opinions, by the vain and proud pretenders to reason, who make what surpasses their shallow capacities the subject of their scorn, and treat with contempt all that is above their contracted apprehensions. As the design revelation is to thwart the pride of fallen man, it is no wonder that insolent creatures, who would be independent on God, and who imagine that they are wise enough to find out their duty, and able enough to pursue their own happiness, should rise up with rancor and malice, against what crosses their corrupt reason, and has a tendency to throw down the lofty bulwarks of their vain imaginations The contempt which is cast on revelation is not new; for the great apostle Paul, after he had told us that he spake or declared the things that are freely given us of God, not in the words which man’s wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual, has presently subjoined these words: "The natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." By the natural man, is not to be understood one wallowing in lust, and sunk in the mire of sensuality, but the man of bare reason; he who will use no other helps than what he can procure by mere rational attainments, such a man, though possessed of a good share of natural light, yet if he is without a spiritual discerning, or without wisdom afforded him from above, brands the doctrines and mysteries of pure revelation with folly, because he cannot fully comprehend them; not considering that the mysteries of reason, such as the being and perfections of God, can no more be fully comprehended by him, than those of revelation. If we consider man as renewed, and as such having his mind enlightened, it must be owned, that the mysteries of reason and pure revelation have such great depths in them, that they are not to be sounded by the line, even of a sanctified understanding: nay, it may be justly said, that the perfections of God are not to be fully grasped by any created mind. It is no wonder, then, that such as are left to bare reason in a corrupt state, should as brute beasts contemn the sacred verities which are not suited to their depraved lust.

Thus Scripture is pillaged, in order to its being represented as a needless useless thing; for if a man can be so silly, as to be brought to think, that those points which artful men pick out from Scripture, which has nothing inconsistent with reason, though it contains much above mere human reason, are things to be known without the help of it, they will easily give it up as unnecessary; and the more, because it reveals matters too high for their low understanding, and so thwarts their pride. It is not fair then to call that natural religion, the defects of which are supplied by truths taken from the oracles of God; neither is it just to recommend it as a perfect scheme, when it cannot be put in any tolerable dress, without the necessary help of that very thing, to make which seem unnecessary, so much pains are taken to deck it. All this must be understood of natural religion, when it is set off in the best manner; but it must be owned, that some of its recommenders are so infatuated, as not to borrow that help they might, in order to make it agreeable, and are so ignorant, as to show its imperfection, by making it resemble Atheism. We are told, that the distinction of right and wrong, virtue and vice, is entirely independent of the will of God, and that it arises from the nature of things, by which senseless jargon may be meant fate, chance, the animating soul of the world, or any other unmeaning thing, or hard word, without an idea annexed to it. It is pretended, that men are not made by God for himself, and that he has no motive, on his own account, to give them laws, or to punish the breach of them, and that consequently they are not accountable to him; but that such fully answer the end of their creation, as contribute all they can to their own and others’ happiness. This is to suppose, that God has power to create rational creatures, and it is a favour that this is allowed, but that he has no authority to prescribe for them laws, seeing the rules of justice rise from the nature of things, and he is confined to act by them, as much as those he has created; that he has no justice to glorify when he is provoked, but is obliged to be kind to all his creatures, whether they obey him, or rebel against him: in short, that he is an indolent Being, such as was the God of the Epicureans; that man is independent of him who created him, and preserves him; that he is to be his own judge, whether he answers the end of his creation, by promoting his own happiness, and that of others.

It is a very poor way of arguing, for any [1] to tell us, "That the true preference of Christianity is (not that reason, in any state of men, is insufficient in itself to virtue and happiness, but) that Christianity is a clearer and more powerful guide, having improved the light of reason by the supernatural evidence and declaration of God’s will, and final intention of saving sinners, by the free pardon of them for the sake and merits of the death of Christ, which mere reason was not able to discover or determine, and which plain declaration of the means of man’s redemption is a more powerful motive and obligation to universal obedience, than reason could ever with certainty propose." This is a mere heap of confusion and inconsistency. It is very likely there is a juggle in using that odd expression, "Reason in any state of men;" but if it means any thing, it must have respect to reason in man’s present corrupt state: Now, if reason, of itself; is a sufficient guide to virtue and happiness, can man need any thing more sufficient than a sufficient guide? can he need to be guided to any thing better than to virtue and happiness? certainly not. If so, then there is no necessity for a clearer and more powerful guide, or for its being improved by the supernatural declaration of God’s will, relating to things which it could not discover, or for more powerful motives to obedience, than it could ever with certainty propose. On the other hand, if there was need of the Christian revelation to be a more sure light, and a more powerful guide than reason; if there was room for the defects of the light of nature to be supplied, by the declaring the wonderful plan of the salvation of sinners, on the account of the merits of the death of Christ, which was a mystery that was out of the ken of bare reason; and if there was cause to make use of a more powerful motive to universal obedience to the will of their great Creator, than natural religion could ever with certainty propose; if these things are true, as they certainly are, and are allowed to be by the advocates for reason, it will inevitably and invincibly follow, that reason in men, in their present state, is not a sufficient rule to guide them to virtue and happiness; and it may justly be asserted, that the pleaders for its sufficiency are stupid enough to contradict themselves, in saying, in the same breath, that it is sufficient, and yet there is need for its being still made more sufficient.

It is not agreeable to truth to say, that the reason of any finite being is perfect or sufficient, in an absolute sense; but if this could be allowed, it does not alter the case as to us, who are the descendants of apostate Adam: our nature, as we are fallen, sinful creatures, is corrupt, and consequently our reason is no sure light to guide us, because there is in our understandings much darkness, mingled with a little light. We need not desire a more plain proof of the imperfection of reason, in our corrupt state, than what we may gather from the consideration of the errors men have run into, who have set up their reason in opposition to the mysteries of nature and revelation. Many who have done this, have fully come to what the apostle Paul said of the Gentiles, Rom. i.22. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. When their pride has been so great, that they would not be content with owning the great mysteries of natural religion, without explaining the manner how they are, and when their insolence has risen so high, as that they have set up their reason in opposition to the mysteries of revelation, they have showed what short-sighted creatures they are, in venting opinions as most rational, which are entirely inconsistent with right reason. Some have not been able to bring themselves to own, that the distinction of right and wrong is dependent on the will of God, they therefore have laid down this nonsensical paradox, that there are moral fitnesses in the reason and nature of things, which must be conceived as prior to the will of God; and hence it is argued, that God is as much bound by the rules of justice as any of his creatures. That there is an essential difference between right and wrong, is most certain; for if we conceive of God as an infinitely good, just, and perfect Being, all which is agreeable to his will must be right, and all which is contrary to him must be wrong: but it is perfect nonsense and self-contradiction to conceive of any thing prior, in order of nature, to the first cause; it is most shocking to imagine, that the independent Being should be circumscribed by moral fitnesses; and it is monstrous to affirm, that the sovereign Lawgiver, because he can do nothing inconsistent with his own perfections, is bound by the laws he gives, as the rule of his rational creatures’ acting. Moral fitnesses rising from the nature of things, are only the old Pagan notion of fate revived; and such as are fond of this unintelligible jargon, make very large advances towards the worst sort of Atheism. It is a dictate of right reason, which, in this case, is abundantly confirmed by revelation, that there is only one supreme, living, and true God, who is the sole Creator of all things: the Scripture confirms the voice of natural light, that there is but one God: but it most clearly reveals, that in the Unity of this Godhead, there are three divine Persons of the same substance and perfections, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit: how these can be three Persons, and yet can be one God, is a thing that is not revealed, and consequently not necessary for us to know; it is above the grasp of our narrow, corrupt reason: and, in all probability, as it relates to the substance of the infinite God, it surpasses the understanding of the most perfect creatures, for that is only finite. Against this great and adorable mystery, the proud pretenders to reason rite; with rage and rancor; they charge it with nonsense and contradiction: but what have these masters in buffoonery, as well as proficients in blasphemy, offered to us in the room of the true Scripture doctrine of a Trinity in Unity? In reality, nothing which will stand the test of good sense, or is agreeable to right reason. Such as have supposed the Son and the Spirit to be different names, or to be two faculties, attributes, properties, or powers of the Father, have run into a scheme, which, if it was true, the Scriptures might be said not to be written with good sense; seeing it would be strange in narrations of facts, and in the course of reasoning and debate, to speak of the Son and Spirit in the strongest language of personality that can be invented, if they were only personalised by bold metaphors, high allegories, or strong figures of speech. But the abettors of this scheme are not those whom I principally have regard to; I chiefly refer to the patrons of the Arian heresy, who make the Son and the Spirit two creatures. These sons of darkness contradict, in the most daring manner, the fundamental doctrine of natural and revealed religion, that there is but one infinitely blessed God; for they suppose two creatures to be true and proper Gods, or to have all the characters of divinity, except supremacy, independence, and necessary existence, and so endeavour to graft upon Christianity the heathenish jargon, which it was designed to militate against, that though there is but one supreme God, there may be subordinate divinities. They most irrationally allow, that creatures may be employed with the supreme God, in creating the world, or in bringing all things besides themselves into being out of nothing, and so run into the greatest of absurdities, in supposing created creators. They likewise follow the Gentiles, who were vain in their imaginations, and whose foolish hearts were so darkened as to worship the creature besides the Creator, who is God blessed for ever; for though they degrade the Son and Spirit into the rank of dependent beings, yet they offer up to them subordinate worship. It is certain, from reason and Scripture, that man could never create himself, but that he is the product of the Supreme Being, who by his providence sustains him, and by his bounty supplies his wants, and consequently that he is obliged to live to the glory of the Author of his being, and is accountable to him for the actions of his life: in this there is nothing but what is agreeable to the highest reason, yet such is the infatuation of the asserters of the sufficiency of the light of nature, that they reject this natural doctrine, and pretend that God did not make man for himself is not concerned about his breaking his laws, and that he is not accountable to the Most High; so that the living God must be supposed to be an indolent being, not mindful what those who are the product of his hands do, in contempt of his authority.

If these things are duly considered, it is as insolent as it is erroneous, in the patrons of reason, to stand up for the sufficiency of. it in matters of religion. However it may be in others, it is apparent that it is greatly debased in these muddy creatures, who will not make use of the common helps that are thrown in their way, to guard them against the most gross absurdities. They come under the judgment which Moses, by commission from God, threatened should come upon Israel, in case of disobedience, when he said, Deut. xxviii. 28, 29 "The Lord shall strike thee with madness, and blindness, and astonishment of heart; and thou shalt grope at noonday, as the blind gropes in darkness, and shalt not prosper in thy ways." Though reason improved by revelation proclaims, that the supreme God is our Judge and Lawgiver, that there is but one living God, who is our Creator, and who is to be worshipped by us, and that in him we live, move, and have our being, and to him must give an account of our actions; yet they shut their eyes against what light they might have, in their state of frailty and imperfection, and go about to palm upon the ignorant such irrational stuff as this, [3] that there is a cause prior to the first cause; that the independent Sovereign is himself dependent: that creatures may be subordinate deities, dependent creators, to be worshipped with inferior divine worship; that He who sits at the head of the empire of providence, has brought into being rational creatures, which he made not for himself, and which are not accountable to him. Let the pleaders for the sufficiency of reason of itself, without a revelation to be a guide in religion, blush, when they show it to be so insufficient in themselves, in bolting out such glaring absurdities; and let them no longer assume to themselves the title of men of reason, when reason is sunk so low in them. When we think on the irrational things they amuse themselves with, we cannot but see how God is secretly pleading his own cause, even by their folly; they receive not the truth in the love of it, and he in judgment gives them over to strong delusions, so that they are fond of the most senseless figments which appear in the garb of novelty. When they, through pride, cry up their own reason, to the disparagement of Scripture, they are left to dote upon irrational vanities, which are a disgrace to that very reason, which they labour, by undue methods, to advance to a height to which it can never justly be raised.

It is insolently said, [4] that the doctrine of the sufficiency of human reason is the doctrine of the apostle Peter, who said thus, Acts x. 34, 35, with respect to Cornelius, "Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons; but, in every nation, he that fears him, and works righteousness, is accepted of him." From hence this strange inference is drawn, that it appears, that, in every heathen nation, they who followed the light of their natural reason and conscience, feared God; whence it follows, that in the judgment of the apostle, every heathen, by the light of natural reason, had a sufficient guide to lead him to the religious fear of God. Now, nothing can be more contrary to the apostle’s sense than this: he did not speak of heathen, who were left to the bare light of nature, being able, by the help of that, to fear God; but he owned his conviction, that salvation by Christ was not to be confined to the Jewish nation, but was to be made known to the Gentile world. Cornelius was one of good report among the Jews, or one who was a proselyte to the Jewish religion, but was not circumcised, being one of those who were called proselytes of the gate, and so he had the Scriptures of the Old Testament to instruct him, and was not left to the bare light of nature. Besides, when he, under some doubt, prayed for illumination, he was directed, by an angel appearing to him to apply himself to the apostle Peter for instruction, which is a certain evidence, that his natural light was not a sufficient guide: in all probability the thing he desired to be informed in, was the truth of the Messiahship of Jesus of Nazareth; because, when Peter came to instruct him, Acts x. 36, 41, 42, he declared Christ’s supreme Deity, or that he is Lord of all; he asserted the truth of his resurrection, of which he had been an eyewitness, having ate, drunk, and freely conversed with his risen Master; and he showed him, that this Jesus who died, rose and revived, was ordained to be Judge of the quick and dead. These were things which the light of nature never taught; yet they were matters in which the great apostle thought it was necessary to instruct Cornelius and his friends. A man must then have a very odd turn of head, who can bring himself to fancy, that Peter judged the light of nature was sufficient to guide those whom he instructed in things above it, into the religious fear of God. Had the case been so, Cornelius would not have needed to have been directed by an angel to send for Peter, in order to show him what it was that God would have him to do.

APPLICATION.

Seeing pride is at the bottom of all the opposition which is made to the revelation afforded us by God, and seeing it is this makes vain and conceited men cry up reason as a perfect rule, to the disparagement of revelation, it cannot be an unseasonable admonition to professed Christians, nay, to all who pretend to be searching after truth, to be careful how they give way to a proud conceit of their own understandings. The high thoughts which creatures have entertained of their own intellectual abilities, have been the source and spring of all the apostasy and rebellion against the Most High, which we have been acquainted with. Whatever was the particular sin, which occasioned the thrusting of Satan, and all the legions of the heavenly hosts, which banded under his ensigns against the Highest, down from Heaven, it is pretty certain that it took its rise from pride. This we may easily gather from a passage of the apostle Paul, wherein he prescribes it as a standing rule, that a bishop, or pastor of a gospel church, must not be a novice, which is not so much meant of one young in years, as of one who had newly taken up a profession of the Christian faith, and was but raw in the knowledge of the doctrines of revelation. The reason why a pastor ought not to be a novice is, 1 Tim. iii. 6, "Lest being lifted up, or blown up, with pride, he should fall into the condemnation of the devil." If pride was the cause of the devil’s condemnation, it must be twisted with his first sin. It was a proud imagination, that they could make their condition better than that in which the wisdom of a beneficent Creator had placed them, which drew a great number of the potentates of heaven to rise in rebellious arms against the God from whom they received their being; and it was a vain desire of being higher than they were made by the sovereign Lord of nature, that engaged thousands of angels in impious league against their King, for which they were cast out of heaven, and are doomed to spend eternal ages in wo and pain; they are now suffered to range about the world, but still they are, as it were, in chains: but, at the last and the great day, they will receive fulness of torment; and, being shut up in hell, they will groan for ever under the weight of almighty vengeance, which will glorify itself in punishing them for their pride and rebellion. It was also pride which was the source of the wo we feel, by reason of the fall of our first parents. It does not appear, from the Scripture account of the first apostasy of man, that the devil could plant any temptation on our progenitors, till he had blown them up to a proud conceit, that they could make their condition happier than it was, by transgressing the law of their Creator. When the tempter attacked our general mother, Gen. iii. 56, as he endeavoured to work her up to an imagination, that it was through envy that God had debarred her husband and her from eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge, lest they should be like him in knowledge, he laboured to raise pride in her by assuring her, that if she once tasted of the fruit which she feared to touch, she should tower to divinity, or be like God in knowledge. What he urged was this: "God knows that in the day you eat of it, then your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." It was this sly suggestion that made the first of women look with eager longing eyes on the goodly fruit, which hung on the forbidden tree and it was a persuasion that she should rise in knowledge, which induced her, in an evil hour, to reach forth her rash hand, to pluck and eat what plunged her into ruin. And it is very likely, by urging the arguments which the devil had used to induce her to undo herself; that she prevailed on our common father to follow her example, out of a vain conceit of having a part with her in her imagined happiness, and so to complete the first transgression.

SERMON II.

Romans 1:22.

Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.

If we take for true the Scripture account of the fall of our first parents, we shall find, that the desire of knowing more than God had revealed, was the spring of that apostasy from the Author of blessedness, the sad effects of which defection we now feel, and shall feel as long as we continue our journey through this tiresome wilderness; where we meet with very little that is truly comfortable, but are forced, after climbing up rocks of perils, to descend and stray through vales of tears. Had our common parents been content with their happy lot, sin, and its concomitant, death, had never entered the world; we should have had no trouble to grieve us, nor afflictions to harass and distress us, but we should have spent our easy hours in blessing and praising the beneficent Creator, and our time would have pleasantly glided away in the service of our mighty Potentate, that gave us our being; who would have made every thing about us to have tended to our comfort. When man was clad in honour, and was a happy creature, he was not content with his desirable station, but aspired after an independence on his Maker; he was ambitious to be as God, knowing good and evil; he vainly thought, by gratifying his own will, to tower to divinity, and by transgressing the law of his supreme Lord, to be like him in knowledge: but, alas! he was greatly mistaken he lost the knowledge of what is good, and to his cost, found that he had acquired the experimental knowledge of what was evil. As we partake of the curse which be entailed upon us, so the temper which prevailed in him, when he first imagined that it was out of envy, lest he should become his equal, that God had debarred him the fruit of one tree, has the predominance in all his miserable posterity, if they are left to themselves, and are given up to the guidance of their imperfect reason. Pride so much possesses the heart of men, in their degenerate state, that though they can never bring themselves to believe they are stronger than God, and able to cast him from his throne, yet they evidence that they grieve to see his glory, and earnestly desire to be independent on him. Were not the disputers of this world swayed by obdurate pride, and were not their hearts filled with envy, hatred, and rancor against God, then would they ever suggest that they are not accountable to that Supreme Being who created them, who preserves them from outward harms and dangers, and whose goodness keeps them every moment from death and destruction? What detestable. arrogance is it for the contemptible reptiles of the earth to say, that he who formed out of nothing, has not any thing to do with those on whom he has bestowed an existence! Yet to such a height is daring infidelity come, that reason must be set up as a perfect rule, though men are granted to be more swayed by their passions than by reason, and the distinctions of right and wrong are given out to be independent on the will of God, and to be founded on we know not what nature of things.

We have a very pregnant and melancholy proof of the imperfection of the light of nature, since the fall, in the unworthy representations some of the heathen world gave of God, and the hideous and blemishing fictions they invented concerning him. Though they knew him in part from his works, they glorified him not as God, but grew vain in their imaginations, and introduced a rabble of inferior deities, whom they represented as not free from vicious passions, and they acted so much beneath the dignity of human nature, as to bow down before stones and logs. They worshipped the creature, besides the Creator, that is, with subordinate worship, and so invented the irrational scheme of subordinate gods, and inferior worship, which has been so much applauded for refined reason, by many of their foolish disciples, who call themselves Christians. The picture of the ancient heathens is most admirably drawn by the apostle Paul, that great demolisher of paganism, in the following words, Rom. i. 19, 23, 25; "What may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has showed it them; for the invisible things of him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things which are made, even his eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were they thankful, but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened; professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four footed beasts, and creeping things. They changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature besides the Creator, who is God blessed for ever." What can show more the insufficiency of the light of nature, to be a rule to men in matters of religion, than this, that such as were convinced from the works of God that there was a supreme God, of eternal power, should venture to worship with him, and besides him, idols, and that not only images of men, the noblest creatures of the lower world, but besides these, logs of wood, and blocks of marble cut into the shapes of the most contemptible creatures, such as serpents, nay, of monsters, such as are only the creatures of fancy, and have no existence in nature. And this was done not only by the rude vulgar, but by the politest men among the pagans.

It must be owned, that some of the pagans have spoken admirably well concerning the supreme God, [11] and have described him in a worthier manner, than many who might have used the advantage of a better light, who suppose that we are to have no further notion of God, than of one invested with dominion. This shows, that though the light of nature, by which men have a notion of God is much eclipsed, by the darkness introduced by the fall, yet it is not quite extinguished. But though the pagans have said a great many good things about the Supreme, yet they never had any notion how affronting it was to the universal and sole Potentate, to have any part of his glory given to others. We have many noble passages remaining, both of the poets and philosophers, which show that the knowledge of a God of infinite perfections, was not quite obliterated, which it would be endless to produce; but we do not find that this rational light, which, on some accounts, shined in them with great clearness, was sufficient to keep them from running into most gross absurdities. We may be contented, on this head, and on others, to take a view of the sentiments of Socrates, who has been styled a martyr for the unity of God; and has been, by a late writer, [12] whose pretended religion was only the Bible, very profanely set in the same rank with Job. This man, it must be owned, was a judicious observer of men’s actions; and, as he studied human nature exactly, so he did not set himself to frame schemes in private, which was the ruin of most of the other old philosophers: in this he took as good a method, as could be expected from one in his circumstances, and did not run into such great absurdities, as most other heathens. In a conversation with an atheist, he argued for the being of a God, from the wisdom and skill which are to be seen in the works of nature, especially in the formation of man’s body; and, when he came to a closer reasoning with him, he used this warm manner: "Have you any degree of knowledge? Do you think there is no superior knowledge elsewhere? Can you think that the great and innumerable wonders of your frame were put into such a beautiful order, merely by blind chance?" When the infidel objected that he could not see the author of nature, the philosopher answered, that the objector could not see his own soul, which animated and governed his body; so that he might as well say that it was merely by chance, and not by design, that he performed all rational, as well as animal functions. This disputer was not able to maintain that there was no God, but only would have insinuated that God had not made man for himself, or designed him to be accountable to him; he did not despise a God, but he thought he was too glorious a being to need his worship: he had a good answer to this, that the greater and more glorious the Being was which deigned to take care of him, the more he ought to honour him. When he replied, that he did not think that God took care of human affairs, he was well confuted by what might be seen of God’s care, concerning man, in ordering the members of his body in such a manner, as showed him to be more the favorite of providence than any of the brute creatures, in giving him an upright posture, and the use of speech; and, above this, by what might be observed of the divine kindness, in giving man a rational soul, of a noble nature? capable of discerning the works of providence, and the divine proceedings, as to worldly matters, and fitted to conduct the body, as to the common affairs of life; that man may guard against hunger, thirst, heat, cold, and sickness, that he may acquire knowledge, and keep in memory what he has attained. When it was objected, that it was not likely that God should see and know all things, it was well replied in these words; "Your soul, whilst in the body, governs it at its will, therefore it may be concluded that the wisdom which resides in the universe, governs all things at pleasure; your eye can take in the compass of some furlongs, and cannot the eye of God view all things at once? Your mind can think of the state of affairs in different parts of the world, and cannot the wisdom of God take care of all things? If you will wait for divine direction to guide you into things which carry an obscure face, you will know that the Deity is so great as to be able to see and hear all things, to be present every where, and to take the care of all things." Reason dictated to this man more than it does to some of our modern pleaders for its perfection, yet in him it was woefully deficient; for he joined in the worship of false gods, and pleaded for omens, divinations by sacrifices, and birds; and, when he came to die, for his having a little better notion of the divine Being than his contemporaries, he dishonourably finished his course, with desiring his friends to fulfill a vow for him, which was to offer a cock to the feigned power of health.

II. If men consult their own hearts, they must needs find in themselves too strong a bias towards what is evil, and so must conclude from experience, that man is in a state of corruption; seeing it cannot be thought, that he came at first out of his Maker’s hands, with principles of rebellion infused into him, by the power that bestowed on him his being. Though, by the light of nature, men have been convinced of their corruption, yet such as were left to it alone, had only confused notions about it, and so knew not how to reconcile the purity of God to the corruption of man. The pagans, no doubt, had some traditionary hints about the apostasy of the angels, and the primitive pure state of man, which gave birth to the fables of the giants’ war against heaven, and the golden age; but their notions were so confused, that every one reckoned himself at liberty to clothe them with what dress he pleased. Their fancy, that the golden age was ended, by the God that then ruled, as supreme, being driven from the reins of empire, by his son, shows how poor a light that of nature alone is. That we may not seem to charge those things as a defect in natural religion, which may be called dreams of the poets, let us examine the sentiments of Plato, the wisest and most penetrating philosopher among the heathens, on this head. He has told us, that in the primitive state, God governed the whole world immediately himself, and not as it is now, by inferior deities; that demons, or inferior spirits, as shepherds, had the care of the living creatures, which they ranged in due order; that there was then no ravaging or violence, war or commotion in the earth; that God was the common guardian of men, and took care of their sustenance; that there was no need of civil society in those happy days; that men sprung out of the earth as trees; that the fields yielded fruit without tillage; and that the air was so temperate, that there was no need of clothes. He has then acquainted us, that, after a time, the supreme God laid aside the reins of his empire, and retired, and with him all the inferior deities, who governed under him; that upon this the world was convulsed, and lost its beauty, and right and wrong were confounded; that these things will grow worse, till he who first governed the world, shall reduce it to a better state. This low and contemptible stuff is the utmost we can get, from such as were left to the light of nature, who yet had the help of eastern tradition. The same writer, in order to give an account of the origin of moral evil, has told us, that some of the inferior divinities, who fly after the chariot of the Supreme, taking up with sensual enjoyments, instead of contemplating truth, lose their wings, grow sluggish, and fall down to earth, in order to animate some human body; those who are least depraved, animate the bodies of philosophers, and those most depraved, the bodies of tyrants and oppressors; that after ten thousand years, the worst souls are restored, and recover their wings. Any one may perceive how unworthy these poor and mean fictions are of reason, when the least improved by the help of Scripture: yet these dreams, shocking as they are, were the amusement of men of the clearest heads in the pagan world. They show, however, that they were convinced that the present state of man was a state of corruption, and that it was not so with him in his first state, from which he fell, but they knew not how. It is from Scripture alone that we gain the knowledge that God made man upright, and entered into a covenant with him, to preserve him in happiness, in case of constant and perpetual obedience; but he, being left to the freedom of his own will, and desiring to be equal to, and independent of his kind and bountiful Creator, broke the law of his God, and, with the loss of all that was good, gained the experience of all evil, exposed himself to death, and procured to himself the desert of everlasting misery. If men are left without this knowledge, they are puzzled and confounded, when they compare themselves with God: if they believe that God is pure and holy, they may be apt to question, whether such impure beings, as they are, have their being immediately from God; if they are satisfied that they came from God, and yet see in themselves so much ill, they may be ready to suppose, with the gross of the ancient heathen, that the nature of God is not pure; in short, the more they inquire, the more they will be lost and bewildered in the fruitless search.

It has been surmised by some, that the pagans had an obscure notion of God’s appearing in the world to restore it, because several nations have represented their supreme God as having a son, who, under various names, is represented as a deliverer of men. This might take its rise from some remains of tradition . but it does not seem that much can be made of this, for the gods and heroes, the sons of the Supreme, who were called deliverers, were represented to have done their work in past ages, which was only to kill monsters, and to dethrone tyrants. Here are no evident traces of the way of salvation by the Son of God. As this is the glory of the Scripture scheme, so it is revelation alone that could inform us of it. It is, therefore, extremely surprising that any [15]who profess themselves Christians, can venture to say that natural religion will show how men, being placed in the circumstances they are, full of passion, full of infirmities, and surrounded with variety of temptations of all sorts, may be reconciled to, and accepted by God. This is odd language to come out of the mouths of any who call themselves Christians. Were the case so, it might well be said, any divine revelation would be needless; but, alas! it is only insulting common sense to tell us so. It is only revelation can make known to us the way of our recovery from ruin; without this, endless doubts would infest our minds, and terrors would fill our thoughts. We may a little amuse ourselves with the notion of God’s being a God of infinite mercy and benevolence; or, as some take the insolent freedom to speak of their Maker, that he is a good-natured being: but this will yield little comfort to a guilty mind; for as his justice is provoked, right reason, if we attend to it, will convince us that must be satisfied, in a way worthy of a God of infinite perfection, before goodness is extended to us. The justice of God is as dear to him as his mercy; and can we think he will injure it, or make it clash with his mercy, merely to save such as have rendered themselves obnoxious to his displeasure, and unworthy of his favour? Scripture has declared to us that God has effected the salvation of men by sending his Son in our nature, that, by the obedience of his life and death, he might atone for our sins, and procure for us a right and title to the favour of our Judge. In this method, he has caused all his perfections to act in harmony; his justice is satisfied by the death of the Surety of men; his holiness is showed in his hating sin, so as not to remit it, without punishment; his truth is established, in that his threatening is fulfilled; and at the same time, his mercy, love, and goodness, appear in the fairest colors, in that apostate man is restored to greater happiness than was lost by the fall. These were things unknown to such as enjoyed no more than the bare light of nature, who could be in no other than a desponding state, as to pardon of sin, and the favour of God. Their condition must be unhappy, because they were convinced of their need of pardon, but knew not where to apply in order to obtain it.

It might have been thought, if men would have consulted their own experience, and would have looked into their own hearts, that they might have been satisfied that virtue was out of their own power. It must be granted that some who studied mankind with exactness, had a right conception as to this, and showed they had a larger share of natural light than the modern advocates for reason. Socrates, in one of his disputations, had showed that virtue came not by nature, or by teaching, and was asked how it was then that men became good: he answered, in this remarkable manner: "I do not think this can easily be made evident; but I am apt to conjecture it is a divine gift, and that men become good, as men become prophets; these are not so by nature, or art, but by divine inspiration. Good men declare to those who are members of the same civil society with themselves, things which are to be, by divine inspiration, more clearly than such as deliver oracles. It seems to me that virtue is neither taught, nor comes by nature, but is a divine gift to such as possess it." The same conclusion was made, after a long dispute, by Plato, in Socrates’ name, in the following words: "Virtue is neither by nature, nor by teaching; but it comes by divine distribution, to those who have it, without the help of human search and industry." These sagacious observers of human nature were convinced that goodness came neither by nature or by instruction, without a supernatural aid, but they had only some faint glimmerings of light as to this matter; they had no clear conceptions about it, and they only propose it as a matter of conjecture, or, at most, as a problem. There is hardly to be found in the heathen writers any thing more noble, and more agreeable to truth than this notion; yet some of those who might have improved it, if natural light had been a good guide, took care to slight it. Hence we have this absurd rant in Cicero: "No one ever reckoned himself indebted to God for virtue, and justly; for we are on good grounds commended for virtue, and glory in it, which could not be, if it was a gift of God, and we had it not from ourselves. Who ever gave thanks to the gods on account of his being a good man?" It must be granted that it thwarts the pride of fallen men to acknowledge themselves indebted to God for a power to do good; therefore it is no wonder that the generality of them have no notion of this matter.

It is the Scripture only which gives us a right notion of true morality and exalted virtue. It is from thence only that we are clearly and distinctly informed, that it is not sufficient for us to do what is materially good, unless we act out of a principle of love to that God to whom we are indebted for all the blessings we enjoy, unless we make his will our rule, and unless, in all our civil, moral, and religious actions, we aim at the advancement of his glory, "in whom we live, move, and have our being." It is in the lively oracles that we are taught, that we must not act from a selfish spirit, that we must not make our will and our humour the guide of our actions, and that we must not make vain-glory our end. It is from thence we learn, that we must repent of what we have done amiss, be filled with holy sorrow for our evil actions, watch our hearts, as well as our lives, and keep a guard upon our thoughts as well as upon our actions. It is only from the sacred volume that we are instructed to resign ourselves to the will of God; to practice self-denial, to mortify the lusts of the mind, as well as the lusts of the flesh, to be patient under afflictions, not through stoutness or sullenness, but out of expectation that all our troubles will turn to our good, and willingly to take up our cross, and follow Christ our Master, through much tribulation. These sublime virtues are not taught in nature’s school, and were never practiced by any who were left to bare natural light. We have sure instruction as to these heads given us iii the Scripture, which is the word of the ever-living God; and by that we are informed, that it is not in our power, who are fallen creatures, to render ourselves good and virtuous, but that we are enabled, by God, to will and to do according to his good pleasure, and are by his grace, assisted to choose what is for our profit, and to do what is well-pleasing in his sight. It is by supernatural light that we are enabled to conclude, that we are not our own, being called of God, and redeemed by Christ; that we should show forth the praises of him who calls us to honour, glory, and immortality, and of him who rescues us from wrath and condemnation, by his own blood; that when we have done all, we are unprofitable servants, having done no more than our duty; and that we are indebted for the power to do what we really perform, to the aids of the blessed Spirit, who makes us meet to see and enjoy God, in the happy realms of rest which are above.

APPLICATION.

When a celestial herald was sent to proclaim to some shepherds, near Bethlehem, the birth of the Lord of life, he called the message which he was to deliver, glad tidings of great joy, when he thus spake to them, Luke ii. 10, 11; "Fear not, I bring you glad tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people; for to you is born, this day, in the city of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord." As the harmless Shepherds were tending their fleecy care they were frightened at the sudden sight of an angel coming in a glorious majestic form; but the messenger of peace took care to inform them, that he came not as an executioner of divine vengeance, that therefore they should not be discouraged, since he was to proclaim in their ears the best news that ever mortals heard; which glad tidings were, that a Saviour was actually born into the world. These tidings occasioned great joy in the inhabitants of heaven; Luke v.13, 14, "for suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, and good will to men." The gospel was called glad tidings of great joy, eminently, as it made known the actual birth of the Saviour of the world to the shepherds; and, indeed, the divine revelation, in the gospel, of the whole method of man’s salvation, makes it a message of joy and peace, to all who have a value for their own interest. It is from the Scriptures of truth that we are informed that the divine Persons consulted about our welfare, and laid the plan of our happiness before the heavens were stretched over the empty space, and the earth was hung upon nothing. God the Father chose to salvation a number of the posterity of man, and entered into a covenant with God the Son, as the Head of the elect, and with all the elect in him, as his seed. The oracles of truth declare to us, that, according to the covenant of grace, the Son of God appeared as the Saviour of man, who had destroyed himself, and, that he might accomplish the great work he had undertaken, assumed the human nature into union with his divine person, lived a life of ignominy and disgrace, and died a shameful and a painful death on the cross: they assure us, in the most positive manner, that he who was born a child, who appeared as a mean man, and who died as a malefactor, was no less than the mighty God, one invested with infinite power; who consequently was able to bear the divine wrath, to offer up to infinite justice a proper satisfaction, and to make way for mercy to be glorified, without any other divine perfection being injured. The gospel reveals the perfect righteousness of this great Saviour, as the righteousness which, being imputed to the guilty, can justify them before God, or give them a right to forgiveness of sins, to the favour of the supreme Potentate, whom they have provoked, and to everlasting happiness. It is in this that the Holy Spirit is promised, to quicken, renew, and sanctify those for whom Christ died; to enable them to follow holiness, or to practice virtue, out of love to God, and with an aim to advance his glory; to strengthen them, and support them, that they may grow in grace, and persevere in true godliness; to comfort them by working in them peace, joy, and hope;