Christian Love,
or the Influence of Religion upon Temper
By John Angell James, 1828
THE PRE-EMINENCE OF LOVE
"Now abide these three, Faith, Hope, Love;
but the greatest of these is Love."
Such is the triune nature of true religion, as described
by an inspired penman; of that religion about which myriads of volumes have
been written, and so many controversies have been agitated. How short and
how simple an account; within how narrow a compass does it lie; and how
easily understood, might one have expected, would have been a subject
expressed in terms so familiar as these. This beautiful verse has furnished
the arts with one of their most exquisite subjects—poets have sung
the praises of faith, hope, and love; the painter has exhibited the
holy three in all the glowing colors of his brush; and the sculptor
has given them in the pure and almost breathing forms of his marble; while
the orator has employed them as the ornaments of his eloquence. But
our orators, poets, sculptors, and painters have strangely misunderstood
them, and too often proved that they knew nothing of them but as the mere
abstractions of their minds—what they presented to the eye were mere earthly
forms, which bore no resemblance to these divine and spiritual graces—and
multitudes have gazed with admiration kindling into rapture, on the
productions of the artist, who at the same time had no taste for the virtues
described by the apostle.
True religion is a thing essentially different from a
regard to classic elegance; not indeed that it is opposed to it. For as
piety refines the heart, it exerts a favorable influence on the
understanding, and by correcting the moral taste, it gives a still
clearer perception of the sublime and the beautiful. It is greatly to be
questioned, however, whether true religion has not received more injury than
benefit from the fine arts; whether men have not become carelessly familiar
with the more dreadful realities of truth by the exhibitions of the poet,
the painter, and the engraver; and whether they have not mistaken those
sensibilities which have been awakened by a contemplation of the more tender
and touching scenes of revelation, as described upon the canvass or the
marble, for the emotions of true piety. Perhaps the "Paradise Lost" has done
very little to produce any serious concern to avoid everlasting misery; and
"The Descent from the Cross," by Rubens, or "The Transfiguration," by
Raphael, as little to draw the heart to the great objects of Christianity.
Innumerable representations, and many of them very splendid productions too,
have been given of faith, hope, and love—and doubtless by these means many
kindly emotions have been called temporarily into exercise, which after all
were nothing but a transient effect of the imagination upon the feelings. It
is of vast consequence that we should recollect that no affections are
entitled to the character of true religion—but such as are excited by a
distinct perception of revealed truth. It is not the emotion awakened by
a picture presented to the eye, nor by a sound addressed to the ear—but by
the contemplation of a fact, or a statement laid before the mind, that
constitutes piety. We now proceed to the subject of this chapter.
It will be perceived, that although these three graces
are in some respects very different, yet there are others in which they have
points of strong resemblance. Faith has something of the expectation of
hope, and hope something of the desire of love. Hope touches faith at the
point of expectation—love touches hope at the point of desire—and thus, like
the colors of the rainbow, they maintain their distinction, while, at the
same time, they soften down into each other by almost insensible degrees.
But how are we to understand the apostle, when he says,
"there remain these three?" He here alludes to the miraculous
operations of the primitive church, and contrasts with their transient
existence the permanent continuance in the Christian church of these
cardinal virtues. Miracles were introduced to establish the credibility of
the gospel testimony, and having delivered their evidence, retired forever;
but faith, and hope, and love, are to remain as the very essentials of true
religion. Particular forms of church government are only the attire which
piety wears, or the habitation in which it dwells—but these graces are the
body, soul, and spirit of vital religion. When these are no longer to be
found upon earth, godliness may be said to be retired and gone.
But are these the only Christian virtues which have
outlived the age of miracles, and which are destined still to live and
flourish on the earth? Certainly not. Penitence, temperance; yes, whatever
things are true; whatever things are honest; whatever things are just;
whatever things are lovely; whatever things are of good report—are as
permanent and as strong in their obligations, as faith, and hope, and
love—but these three cardinal virtues either represent, or imply, or excel
all others. They are the main trunk, from which all others issue as the
branches, and by which they are supported.
"Now abides faith, hope, love; but the greatest
of these is love!" Love among the Christian virtues is, as poets have
described Gabriel among archangels—a seraph loftier than all the seraph
entourage. But we are not to suppose that it was the apostle's intention to
depreciate the value and importance of the other two. What can be more
important and necessary than the FAITH by which we are united to Christ, and
justified in the sight of God; by which we purify our hearts, and overcome
the world? Turn to the eleventh chapter to the Hebrews, where the sacred
writer seems to conduct you into the temple of Christianity; and after
exhibiting the names, and the statues, and the recorded deeds of the heroes
of the church, and displayed before you the spoils they have won in the
battles of the Lord, says to you, "Behold the triumphs of faith!" Faith is
the means of love—hence said the apostle, "Faith, which works by love."
Nor could it be his intention to depreciate HOPE, which
is called "the anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, which enters
within the veil," of which it is said, "We are saved by hope," and every man
who has this hope, "purifies himself, even as He is pure."
Much less are we warranted, from this expression, to
select love as the exclusive object of our pursuit, and to cultivate it
to the neglect of the other two. Separate from them, it can have no
existence. Any attempt to build it up without them, is like the effort to
raise a superstructure without a foundation. "Add to your faith,
brotherly kindness and love," says the apostle. It is only as we believe the
testimony of God's love to us, which is contained in the gospel, that we can
possess Christian love to our fellow men.
What the apostle means is, that there are some views
of love, in which it must be allowed to possess a higher degree of moral
excellence than either faith or hope.
1. Love is the END, which faith and hope are the MEANS of
producing. Love is what might be called an
ultimate virtue; but faith and hope subordinate ones. Justification
itself is but part of the divine means for bringing the soul of man into a
state of moral perfection. The ultimate end to be obtained by redemption is
the restoration of the image of God to the human spirit; and pardon is the
introductory and subsidiary means. Hence faith, by which we are justified,
is an exercise of mind, which produces, and is intended to produce, in us a
conformity to the divine character. It is not a grace which terminates in
itself, without being calculated or designed to originate and support
anything else, which is the case with love. Sanctity is the end of truth—so
our Lord teaches us "Sanctify them by your truth." The truth is received
into the mind by faith that it may impart sanctity, which includes love.
Similar remarks will apply to hope, of which it is said, "Every man who has
this hope in him, purifies himself." Christian love, then, attains its
eminence by being the ultimate virtue which the other two produce. Love is
that moral condition of the soul which it is the aim and purpose of faith
and hope to produce.
2. Love is a SOCIAL grace, while faith and hope are
exercised in reference to ourselves. We
believe and hope with an immediate regard to our own happiness; but in the
exercise of love, we regard the happiness of mankind. Christian love is a
constant efflux of benevolent feeling, from the pure fountain of a heart
devoted to the well-being of our race. Faith and hope are the channels by
which we receive the streams of peace and joy, from the fullness of God. By
the latter, we are recipients of happiness; by the former, we are its
distributors—by believing, we rejoice; by loving, we awaken the joys of
others—by one, we become the heirs of salvation, who are ministered to by
angels; by the other, we become ministering angels in our turn. What a
philanthropist must that man be who cultivates, and carries even to a
tolerable perfection, the disposition of love—so beautifully described in
this chapter, and who displays all its properties in his communion with
society. How must such an individual bless all with whom he has to do. As he
pursues his holy career, sorrow is alleviated, care is mitigated, need
supplied, wickedness reformed by his efforts; the groans of creation are
hushed, and the tears of humanity wiped away, by his divine love—and he
becomes in his measure, like that heavenly visitant in our world, of whom it
is said, "He went about doing good."
Survey, with admiration and delight, the mighty
operations and the splendid achievements of love—this powerful and
benevolent principle—as they are to be seen within, and only within, the
hallowed pale of Christianity. What are all the numerous and diversified
institutions in our own land, where houseless poverty has found a home;
craving hunger, a supply; forsaken infancy, a protector; helpless old-age, a
refuge; ignorance, an instructor; penitence, a comforter; virtue, a
defense—but the triumphs and glories of Christian love? What are all those
sublime combinations of human energies, property, and influence, which have
been formed for the illumination, reformation, and salvation of the human
race? What are Bible Societies, Missionary Societies, Tract Societies, Peace
Societies—but the mighty monuments of that love, "which seeks not her own,
and is kind?" What are the tears of commiseration, which flow for human
sorrows—but the drops which fall from the eye of love? What the joy that is
excited by the sight of happiness—but the smiles of love? What was it that
made the great apostle of the Gentiles willing not only to bear any
accumulation of suffering, indignity, and reproach—but to pour out his blood
as a offering for others, and even to be accursed from Christ, and from
mankind in general, for his kinsmen?—love! What is it that renders the
modern missionary willing to go into perpetual exile from the land of his
fathers and of his birth, to spend the future years of his life, and find at
last a grave amid the sands of Africa, or the snows of Greenland; willing to
exchange the society and polished communion of Europeans, for savages, whose
minds are brutishly ignorant, and whose manners are disgustingly
offensive—willing to leave the land of Sabbaths, and of Bibles, and of
churches, for regions over which the 'demon of superstition' has extended
his horrid sway, and beneath whose yoke nothing is to be seen—but orgies in
which lust and cruelty struggle for pre-eminence? Love!
What was it that breathed into the heart of Howard that
spirit which so filled and fired his mind with visions of human misery, and
which brought from so many dungeons the plaintive cry, "Come over and help
us!" that he could no longer rest in his own house, or in his own
country—but traveled, again and again, across the breadth of Europe, in
quest of wretchedness; descending into the captive's cell, that he might
weigh his fetters, and measure his narrow apartment, and examine his food,
to ascertain whether there was not more of misery in his hapless and
forgotten lot, than justice demanded for the punishment of his crime; who
inhaled the infected atmosphere of the lazaretto, to grapple with the
plague, that fell destroyer of the human race, to approach which seemed to
be courting death? It was love that formed the character of that illustrious
man, and presented him to the notice and admiration of the civilized world.
What was it that gave courage, confidence, and
self-denial to that extraordinary woman, who ventured among the furies of
Newgate; where, if she had not cause to fear that assassins would attempt
her life, she must have calculated upon finding a sort of demons, whose
malignity, excited by the purity and virtue which seemed to set in stronger
light, by the power of contrast, their own vices, would vent its rage on the
angel form which had disturbed them? If ever the shape and the beauty of
love were seen in one of our race, it was in Mrs. Fry when she entered the
cells of our metropolitan prisons, and called their vicious and loathsome
inhabitants around her, to be instructed and reformed.
And what is it that makes ten thousand holy men and women
employ themselves continually in all kinds of self-denying exertions, to
instruct the ignorant, to relieve the miserable, to reform the wicked?
These, O heavenly love, are your works, the displays of your excellences,
and the proofs of your pre-eminence!
3. It is a distinguished excellence of love, that it is A
LIKENESS TO GOD. We are not at all surprised
that the philosopher to whom the question was proposed, "What is God?"
should have requested a day to prepare his answer; and when that was
expired, should have asked a second, and a third, and should have at length
confessed to the reproving monarch who proposed the query, that the more he
examined the more he was confounded; and the farther he penetrated, the
deeper and deeper he seemed plunging into darkness and mystery. Revelation
has come to the aid of feeble reason, and compared with the latter, has
thrown a blaze of radiance on the all-important subject—and yet, with the
light of truth shining around us, so little do we understand of God, that he
may be said, as it respects us, to "make darkness his pavilion," for "who by
searching can find out God—who can find out the Almighty unto perfection?"
Of his essence we know nothing—of his eternity,
omniscience, and omnipotence next to nothing. His moral perfections are, it
is true, more easily understood by us—but as these are all infinite, it is
but little even of these we can understand, "He is a rock, his way is
perfect, without iniquity, just and right is he." Inflexible justice,
immaculate purity, inviolable truth, unimpeachable fidelity, belong to him;
but if this were all the view the Scripture gave us of his attributes, if
the delineation of the divine character stopped here, how much would be
lacking to the sinner's comfort! Can the trembling and condemned criminal
take much pleasure in contemplating the power, the justice, and the truth of
the judge, who holds his destiny in his hand—at least until he knows whether
that judge has mercy also in his heart, and in his prerogative? and
as little would it comfort us to know all the other attributes of Deity, if
we could not exultingly exclaim, in the language of the apostle, "GOD IS
LOVE!" Sublime and heart-reviving declaration! never was anything uttered
more calculated to delight the soul of man.
Such a view of Deity is peculiar to revelation. Idolatry,
in all her strange devices, in all her image-making processes, never
conceived of such a God—power, wisdom, justice, truth, have all received
their appropriate symbols of divinity, and have been worshiped under
material forms; but benevolence had no statue, no temple, no priest. It was
too pure a conception for the human heart, and too elevated an idea for
human reason.
"God is love!" This refers not, of course, to his
essence—but to his character. It means that benevolence is his whole moral
character—not only that his nature is one sum of infinite excellence—but
that his conduct is one mighty impulse to that which is good; in other
words, that the divine disposition is an infinite propensity to delight in
happiness, as already existing, or to produce it, where it does not exist.
But be it recollected that the benevolence of God is the love of a governor
or ruler, and not merely that of a philanthropist or a father; and who, in
the exercise of his good-will to any particular part, cannot sacrifice the
welfare of the whole; and, consequently, whose benevolence is not only
compatible with the exercise of retributive justice—but requires it.
Such is the disposition of that divine mind, to which, by
Christian love, we are conformed—that benevolence of the Deity, which, in
its propensity to delight in happiness, and to create it, makes him infinite
in patience, to bear with the millions of crimes which daily insult and
provoke him; infinite in mercy, to pardon the most aggravated
transgressions; infinite in kindness, to provide for the needs and comfort
of his creatures. The highest pre-eminence in Christian love, the richest
gem in its crown of honor, is its resemblance to God. There is nothing even
remotely analogous to faith, or hope, in the divine nature. He who is
omniscient cannot be said to believe; nor he who is infinitely
blessed, and possessed of a divine fullness, be said to hope; but he
can and does love! Resemblance to God is the highest glory of man. We
should esteem it an honor to bear a faint impress of some of the more
distinguished of the human race. It would be thought a high compliment to
have it said that our genius resembled that of Milton, and our benevolence
that of Howard; that our faith was like Abraham's, or our meekness akin to
that of Moses. But how much greater is the distinction to bear, by love, the
image of God!
4. Love is ETERNAL in its duration —it
ascends with us to the skies, to live in our hearts, as the temper of our
souls, forever and ever. It is questioned by some whether the two other
graces will cease in the celestial state. It has been contended that as the
glories of the divine nature are illimitable and innumerable, and the
glorified mind will not attain to a perfect knowledge of these at once—but
be continually receiving fresh communications on this vast theme, there must
be both faith and hope in heaven; for as we successively receive these, we
must believe in the assurance of those which are to come, and must
perpetually look forward with expectation and desire. But does not this
assume what cannot be proved, that our knowledge of God and divine things
will be communicated in heaven by testimony, and not be acquired by
intuition? It is not at all necessary that our growing knowledge, our
eternally accumulating ideas, should be thus conveyed to us; for they may,
for anything we know, be the reward of pleasant study, or they may flow into
the mind, as the ideas of sensation do into the soul, without any effort,
and may also come with all the certainty of that intuition, by which we
perceive the truth of axioms. To say that this is belief, is to confound two
things essentially distinct—knowledge and faith. So that it does not appear
plain that faith, in any sense of the term, will exist in heaven.
But though it could be proved that, in some modification
of the term, it would be exercised in the celestial state, such a belief
would differ so materially from that which we now possess, and by which we
are justified and saved, that it may with propriety be said, faith will
cease in heaven. All the great objects to which faith now refers are
'absent'—we believe in their existence, through the report which is made of
them in the Word of God; but in heaven they will be immediately present to
the senses of our glorified body, or the perceptive faculty of our spirit
made perfect.
Nor as it respects hope, is it by any means certain that
this will exist in the heavenly state; for although it is difficult to
conceive how there can be otherwise than a futurity, even in eternity, and
how there can be a state of mind otherwise than the desire and expectation
of future good—yet, as in hope there is usually some degree of doubt and
uncertainty, the state of mind with which glorified spirits contemplate and
anticipate future good, may be an indubitable certainty which excludes the
restlessness of desire, and the incertitude of expectation.
In the hour of death, the believer closes the conflict
with his spiritual enemies, enters a world where no foe shall ever exist,
and where, of course, he no longer needs either defensive or aggressive
weapons. He takes off the helmet of salvation, for hope is not needed when
he is brought to full possession—he lays aside the shield of faith, for
seeing and knowing have succeeded to believing, and he will be beyond the
fiery darts of the wicked one—the breastplate of sincerity he retains, not
as a weapon—but as an ornament—not as a means of defense—but as a memorial
of victory—his feet are no longer shod with the preparation of the gospel of
peace, for he will no more have to tread on the snares of the destroyer, nor
be exposed to his missiles—the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of
God, shall be sheathed, and hung with the trumpet in the hall—praying will
cease, where there is no need to be supplied, no care to be alleviated, no
sin to be forgiven, no sorrow to be soothed—watchfulness will no more be
necessary, where no enemy is found, no danger arises—the means of grace will
all be useless, where grace is swallowed up in glory—submission will never
be called for, where there are no trials—and even many of the properties of
love itself will seem to be absorbed in its general principle—many of its
modifications and operations will cease, amid its eternal delight in perfect
excellence and happiness—for there can be no forgiveness of injuries where
none will be inflicted; no patience where there is nothing to suffer; no
concealment of faults where none can be committed; no self-denial where
there will be nothing to try us. Nothing of love will remain, nothing be
exercised—but a pure and unmixed delight in happiness! How should it
stimulate us to the exercise of mutual forbearance and commiseration now—to
consider that it is the only state where these virtues can be indulged!
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