Advice to Youth
by David Magie, Published by the American Tract Society
in 1855.
ERROR—its Causes and Consequences.
"I envy no man his learning, his wit, his eloquence, or
his imagination, but of all possible possessions, there is none I prize so
highly as a firm and well-established religious belief." Who, think you,
made this remark? It was not a disappointed and desponding man turning in
disgust from a world which had refused him its pleasures, nor was it a
minister of the gospel, called by his very office to speak of the Bible and
eternity. No! these are the sober and well-considered words of one courted
by the great and the gay—a man of high distinction in the scientific world,
for years in succession President of the Royal Society of Great Britain, and
the inventor of the Safety Lamp, of such inestimable benefit to miners. The
language is that of Sir Humphrey Davy—a name of renown. No man in the early
part of the present century stood higher as a practical philosopher; and his
lectures were attended by brilliant audiences, attracted as well by the
results of his experiments, as the eloquence of his manner and the clearness
of his expositions. Such a man has a right to speak. From him it is we
learn, that a well-established religious faith is to be prized above all
other attainments and possessions.
Weighty sentiment this—and happy will it be for us if it
exerts its proper influence! The times are full of peril. We see the minds
of people wandering through every grade and form of skepticism, from the
more dignified and manly infidelity of the last century, down to the lying
wonders of Spiritism. Such is its chameleon face that we can scarcely sketch
its likeness, before it assumes some new form. The only stability about it
is, its contrariety to the simple truths of the Bible—its rejection of the
claims of God and divine truth.
But why is it so? The CAUSES of every sort of infidelity
are three—Ignorance, Pride of understanding, and a Bad Life.
That ignorance is a fruitful source of infidelity,
especially in our day, there can be no reasonable doubt. The time seems to
have gone by when men of talents and learning, like Hobbes, and Collins, and
Bolingbroke, and Shaftesbury, are willing to be ranked among open and avowed
unbelievers. One full experiment of what wit and erudition could do to put
the Bible down was permitted, but it is not repeated and probably never will
be. The thing has been tried and failed, ignominiously and forever. It is
seldom now that we find real learning and lofty intellect enlisted in the
work of overthrowing the Bible and the ministry of the gospel. The business
seems entrusted to feeble and unfledged hands.
Lord Bacon understood the matter well, and he has given
us his opinion in language which every school-boy should remember. "A little
learning," I quote the words of the distinguished sage and the profound
philosopher, "a little learning may incline a man to infidelity—but a good
deal is sure to bring him back to the Bible." This remark is well founded,
and seldom needs the least qualification. If infidelity is making
proselytes, and probably it is in some quarters, I venture to affirm it is
not among the well-educated, the deeply-read, the truly intelligent. It is
instructive to mark who they are, here and there, that take sides against
the Bible. What class of people is it, that rise up and say Christianity is
a failure; responsibility to God is a figment of the brain; and suffering in
the world to come is a bugbear? Men of respectability and station in society
no longer hazard such destructive assertions. The infidels of our cities and
larger towns, except foreigners and newcomers, are the young and
inexperienced people of little learning and less good sense. These are they,
who gather up and retail errors that have been exploded a thousand times
before.
I am well aware that in making this statement, I shall be
considered as treading on tender ground. Be it so. It is enough for me to
know where I stand, when I affirm fearlessly, and beg you to bring the
affirmation to the touch-stone of the most rigid scrutiny, that the
infidelity of our day is mainly the infidelity of ignorant pretense. What if
these people can start inquiries which their humble and pious neighbors are
unable to solve? A child of five years may ask questions about himself and
his destiny, about this world and the next, about the soul and God, which
the best educated men on earth are unable to answer.
Let nothing of this kind move you from your
steadfastness. Faith in the Bible, just as it reads, with all its duties and
precepts, is but believing in God, as a child believes in a fond father, or
a wife believes in a faithful husband, or a patient believes in a skillful
physician, or a soldier believes in a brave commander; and is no less
reasonable.
Pride of understanding, too, comes in to help on this
work of infidelity. Humility is a hard lesson for sinful men to learn.
There is something in the human heart that rises in opposition to inspired
truth, on a variety of subjects connected with God and sin, and law and
pardon, and justification and final punishment. These are subjects in
relation to which young men, more than any other class, are prone to cavil
and object. You would be surprised to hear any such doubts suggested or
denials made by those of the other sex. A young lady would lose her
respectability at once, if it were known that she could talk lightly about
the Scriptures, salvation, or the world to come.
Allow me to illustrate my idea by a reference to the life
of the late excellent Dr. Dwight. When he entered upon the presidency of
Yale College, no small portion of the students, we are told, were bold and
declared infidels. Indeed, so proud were they of this distinction, that they
assumed the names of the principal Deists of England and France. Full of
confidence in themselves, they resolved to bring the matter to an early
issue, and overwhelm the new president at the very outset of his course.
Accordingly the first question which they proposed for public debate was,
"Are the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments the word of God?" They
were told to select which side of this inquiry they chose, and bring forward
all the facts and arguments which were supposed to bear on the subject.
Most, if not all, who were expected to take part in the debate, appeared as
the open champions of infidelity. But what was the result? When they had
ended, and were congratulating themselves on having gained a victory, the
president took up their arguments one by one, and succeeded in showing them
that they did not at all understand the subject. From that day skepticism
began to go down in the college, until it became universally unpopular.
A story very similar to this is told of the learned and
venerable Chief Justice Marshall. Much in the same way did he silence a
company of forward and boastful young men at a public inn, who had just been
making out to their own satisfaction, that the Bible is not the book of God.
That venerable man, in a strain of simple and convincing eloquence, such as
he well knew how to employ, went over the whole ground of the Divine
authority of the Scriptures, as they all sat together by the fireside, and
so clearly did he make out the case, that not one of them had another word
to utter. But what is it except pride and self-confidence that makes such
people infidels? Instead of being really distinguished for free and liberal
thought, these are the men of all others, whose minds are hampered, and
whose horizon is narrow. Notice it when and where you will, real superiority
is always connected with modesty and self-distrust. The great Sir Isaac
Newton was a pattern of modesty.
But, above all, skepticism has its origin in a sinful
life. Nothing has such an influence in leading men to break loose from
the Bible and the Savior—as the love of sin. Thousands are against religion
for no other reason than because it condemns their wicked practices. You
never heard of an individual that was humble and holy and prayerful—who
rejected the Scriptures, denied an hereafter, and called in question the
being of a God. This is the fruit which grows only on the brambles and
thorns of vicious indulgences. A person must have a reason for wishing there
were no final account and no eternal retribution, before he can believe that
there is none.
The principles and practices of men will exert a powerful
influence over each other. Those who do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly
with God, are never forced to raise an outcry against the doctrine of human
depravity, or the judgment of the great day. If this be done at all, it is
almost sure to be done by such as cast off fear and restrain prayer before
God. The heart is led to adopt some false scheme of religious opinion and
practice from a consciousness—a painful consciousness—that the life will not
abide the test of the true one. Look around you and see if these things are
not so. When you find people rejecting the gospel, decrying the most sacred
institutions, and seeking to cut away the cords which bind our country to
the throne of God, you may conclude of a certainty, that there is something
wrong in themselves. Good men never sow such seeds of bitterness. This is
the work of an enemy—an enemy as really to human welfare, as to the
government of Jehovah.
The matter is every now and then brought to the decision
of actual experiment. Let some skeptical lecturer come along, and what class
of the community will be drawn around him? As a general thing, be assured,
you will not see the steady, the sober-minded, the church-going part of the
people there. If there be open sinners and drunkards in the vicinity, they
will be likely to be attracted to the spot; and if there be men of loose
habits and unkind to their wives, they will be sure to make a portion of the
audience. You may know the man and his message, from the character of his
followers.
If anything be established beyond contradiction, it is
that a sinful life is a fruitful source of wrong beliefs. A
clergyman of my acquaintance tells of a boy, not over ten years of age, who
stood up and looking wise among his associates declared that he did not
believe the Bible. I myself have seen a man, but a few degrees removed from
idiocy, avowing his belief in universal salvation. What principle was at
work here? Why, the very same that led the infamous Rousseau to become an
infidel after he had resolved to lead the life of a profligate. We have it
from his own lips that the rejection of the Bible made him feel comfortable
in his wicked courses. After conscience was thus lulled to sleep, it was
easy to "work all uncleanness with greediness."
Ponder this, beloved youth, and you will be prepared to
look at some of the CONSEQUENCES of embracing error.
These are numerous, and they have been in part
anticipated, but we may go somewhat more into detail. "As truth," to adopt
the beautiful language of Jeremy Taylor, "has its origin and dwelling-place
in the bosom of God," no one can renounce the truth and embrace error
without harming himself. The following effects are sure to be produced by
such a course—it bewilders the mind—it affords no support in the day of
trial—and it stands in the way of salvation.
There is something in error which has a direct tendency
to bewilder and enthrall the mind. We often speak of infidels as
"free-thinkers," but if by free-thinking is meant, real, conscious liberty,
the term is egregiously misapplied. If there be anything like mental
bondage—a bondage servile and degrading, a bondage worse than that imposed
by the tyrants of Egypt, it is theirs. What do such men know, and what
indeed can they know of thought so emancipated from everything dark and
earthly, as to be able to lift itself up to God and commune with eternity?
The man who renounces the Bible and its Savior, has descended into a cavern
where no light can reach him with its healing beams. All the movements he
now makes are the mere groping experiments of one that has not a ray of the
Sun of Righteousness to guide his footsteps, or cheer his heart.
All error is downward, and the farther a person advances,
the darker does his path become. To go forward seems easy and natural, but
if he ever begins to think—and desires to return, he finds that he is
involved in a labyrinth, from which there appears to be no escape. This
accounts for the fact, that men so seldom renounce opinions which they
have once embraced and avowed before the world. We have had in our own
country an example of a clergyman running the whole round of loose opinions,
relinquishing this truth of the Bible and that, until at length he landed in
universal skepticism. Such facts should be held up as beacons to warn the
inexperienced and unwary. Once come to harbor the idea, that this and the
other great doctrines of the Scripture is not to be believed—and the
delusion will be very likely to go down to the grave with you. The false
notion will fix itself like a gloomy veil on the mind, and prevent your
seeing the force of any opposite evidence. What you embrace from ignorance
and pride, or a love of sin—will rivet fetters upon your soul never likely
to be broken, until death arrests you.
It has been my lot to witness an example of this sort of
mental thraldom. The individual referred to, had been in the habit, while a
mere youth, of reading infidel books, and what was still worse, had often
come under the influence of infidels themselves. In this way the poison had
taken effect, and it seemed impossible to expel it from the system. Though
he could see the evils of skepticism, and appeared really desirous to
exercise faith in Divine salvation, the shackles were too strong for him to
break asunder. Little does any one know, who has not made the trial, how
tenacious are the cords spun and twisted by infidelity. Nothing short of the
all-conquering grace of God can bring such a man to the knowledge and
acknowledgment of the truth.
Again, infidelity affords no sure support in the day of
trial. Skeptics, as a class, are generally unhappy men—uneasy in themselves,
and dissatisfied with everything around them. They act like people treading
on yielding and uncertain ground, unable to bear their weight. What indeed
can there be to cheer the heart and brighten the prospects of one who has no
Bible to rely upon, no God to go to, and no Savior to trust in? If he can
manage to be gay and volatile in the season of prosperity, it is far
otherwise when health fails, and property disappears, and friends die. Then
it is that we see the sadness of such as have no hope, and are without God
in the world.
Well may the Christian say, "their rock is not as our
rock, our enemies themselves being judges."
You have never heard of an humble and devout believer
who, in the day of sickness or on the bed of death, regretted that he had
confided too implicitly in the Scriptures. We may challenge the world to
produce a solitary case. But who has not heard of multitudes of skeptics,
that were filled with anguish as eternity approached, and were ready to
curse the hour when they began to forsake the right path? Such instances are
familiar in almost every part of the land. Of all the enemies of revealed
religion, in days gone by, Hume stands without a rival among those who
reason, and Voltaire among those who scoff. But who were these men, what
kind of life did they lead, and how did they die? Let these inquiries be
answered fairly and truthfully, and there will be found to be nothing
encouraging in their example. One of them left the world joking about the
boat which was to carry him over the dark river, and the other raving with
madness at the companions of his crimes. It is not necessary to dwell on the
spectacle of the poor, drunken, bloated Paine. There are people in our
country lost enough to self-respect to keep the anniversary of this man's
birth—but his death was awfully appalling.
If there be a sight on earth truly distressing, it is
that of an aged and feeble skeptic, neglected by men and forsaken of God.
While his spirits were joyous and his anticipations bright, he could trifle
with the Bible and the Savior. But it is a very different thing now that the
frosts of many years are gathered on his head. With health gone, and a mind
debilitated, and days and nights devoid of comfort, where is he to look for
consolation, and to what refuge is he to betake himself? The heavens are all
dark above him, and the earth is all desolation around him. One foot is
already in the grave, and he feels himself drawn irresistibly forward toward
a judgment for which he is not prepared, and a world where he can hope for
no enjoyment. What a picture of despair! In vain does he cry aloud, "Come
back! my early days, come back!" Ah, young men, there is no power in error
to chase away the sadness of life's dark hours. In the midst of wine and
song and merriment, it may do to laugh at the Bible and deny that there is a
hell. But this is a poor resort for days of pain and nights of wakefulness.
When heart and flesh fail, God alone can be the strength of the heart, and
the portion forever.
Then, finally, skepticism of every sort stands directly
in the way of salvation. This is the worst effect of all, and it is one,
alas, which we have reason to fear is realized in thousands of instances. If
it be under God, the truth, the simple truth of the Bible which converts
men, how are they ever to be brought out of darkness into the marvelous
light of the gospel, while their hearts are full of unbelief? Nothing indeed
is too hard for Omnipotence, but such a state seems to me to be hopeless
above all others. Let a man once imbibe some favorite system of error, and
like a thick cloud it will be sure to shut out the light of heaven from his
mind.
This is a point which may be brought to the touch-stone
of every one's experience or observation. Tell a person that he is not lost
and ruined by sin, that he needs no regeneration to fit him for the kingdom
of heaven, that God is too merciful to cast off any of his creatures
forever, and that there is no demand for so much prayer and effort, and you
are doing all you well can to make his damnation sure. If he believes what
you say, each of these opinions will prove like a bar between him and the
path of life. How can he flee from the wrath to come, the very existence of
which he denies, or how can he fall into the arms of Christ as a Savior,
when he has no conviction that he needs such a Savior? Little do men think
what consequences a rejection of these doctrines of the Bible is sure to
involve. You will never find a man anxious about obtaining a new heart,
until he believes that a new heart is necessary, or desirous to be made
holy, until he believes that "without holiness no man shall see the Lord."
In matters of this nature, the conduct is controlled by the creed.
Take heed then how you yield to the beginnings of this
evil. If you give up the doctrine of total depravity, or the final
condemnation of the ungodly, you may for the very same reason give up any
other and every other truth which you happen to dislike. The whole is made
up of its several parts, and to blot out one chapter is to impugn the
character of the entire book. There is a process in the human mind, in the
reception of error, which you will do well to note. The man who begins by
doubting in regard to certain specified statements, will generally be found
after a while caviling at them; and soon the open and utter rejection of
them follows as a matter of course. These things naturally and almost
unavoidably follow each other. The steps are usually short which lead men
down from incipient skepticism—to bold and unblushing infidelity.
How then can I do otherwise than warn you against
listening to the instruction that causes to err from the words of knowledge.
Tell me, my young friend, when or where has infidelity enlightened, purified
or blessed a nation, tribe or family? Where has it taken up its abode in the
domestic circle to render parents more kind, or children more dutiful, or
brothers and sisters more happy in themselves, or in one another?
Where has it entered an individual bosom to soothe its
sorrows, establish its hopes, and expel its apprehensions? These are
achievements effected by the Bible, and the Bible alone.
I must urge you therefore to hearken to no one, be his
reputation or talent what it may, who would lessen your reverence for the
word of God. Never allow the beauty of language or the fascination of
eloquence to diminish your regard for simple, unadulterated truth. The pill
may be gilded, and yet contain arsenic. If the living teacher or the printed
page be found to give you diminutive views of sin, or hide the glory of the
Savior—you have heard and read enough. Take not another step in this
direction. No matter what pretense is set up, your peace of mind is of more
significance to you than all besides; and sooner than relinquish this
blessing, burn the book that would injure you, and sacrifice the friend who
would lead you astray.
But I forbear. There is one safeguard, and you will find
it in cherishing an habitual reverence for the Bible as the book of the
living and true God. Hold fast here, fail what may, and it will be well with
you in life, well with you in death, and well with you in eternity.