THE CHRISTIAN EXAMINER AND RELIGIOUS MISCELLANY. JANUARY, 1848. seat ART. I. COQUEREL'S EXPERIMENTAL CHRISTIANITY.* It is a common opinion, and one which we regret to see so prevalent in our own country, that the French nation is a nation without religion, and even without religious aspirations. If any horrible crime is committed in France, there are hundreds to be found who will exclaim, What else could be expected in a country where there is no religion? These are grave imputations, and, as it seems to us, require some proofs to support them. That the French do not willingly accede to the present religion of France is a fact which we would not even wish to deny, for it is on this fact we found our belief that religious feeling is not extinct in that country. The time when Catholicism could exercise any real influence over the French people has passed away, never more to return. Catholicism is but nominally the religion of the majority of the French nation. Does it, however, follow, that in the hearts of those who have deserted the altars of the Church of Rome the pure flame of religion has become extinct? By no means. It is, indeed, impossible for man to eradicate from his breast that religious instinct which God himself has implanted within it. He may, for a time, seem no more to hear its voice, but he will sooner or later be again obliged to acknowledge its existence. So, too, a nation may, during a period of religious * Le Christianisme Expérimental. Par ATHANASE COQUEREL, l'un des Pasteurs de l'Eglise Réformée de Paris. Paris. 1847. 12mo. pp. 527. 1 -4TH S. VOL. IX. NO. I. VOL. XLIV. and social convulsion, no longer obey the dictates of this impulse, and abandon itself entirely to all the uncertainty and horror of skepticism and materialism. But when the revolutionary storm has subsided, when a nation has obtained that political or social freedom for which it struggled, it will feel, that, to enable man to bear the sorrows and disappointments which await him in this world, a cold and lifeless philosophical system is inadequate. It will then, once more, seek for an altar where it may offer up its prayers to God. This has been the case in France. Since that revolution, which was caused, perhaps, as much by the skepticism of the eighteenth century as by the vices of the Regent or of Louis XV., the French begin to feel the necessity of a religion in harmony with their real spiritual wants. If this view of the present condition of France is not often taken, it is because we are apt to form our idea of the moral and social condition of a people from the extremes of society. This is unjust. It is not by what we see among a gay and heartless aristocracy, or in those classes that are plunged into the depths of misery, and of vice, the necessary companion of misery, that an opinion of this kind is to be formed. If such were the only means of judging of the morality of a people, how low would England stand in our estimation! It is from the condition of the middle classes, that is to say, the majority of the nation, that we must judge of the whole nation. If these classes are content with their imperfect form of worship, or if they are devoid of religious sentiment, then, and then only, may we despair of the future religious progress of a nation. If we look at the middle classes in France, we shall not, however, find any cause of despair. We shall there find many thousands of Catholics, who, were it not for that mysterious sympathy which binds every man to the faith of his fathers, and to that mode of worship which he was taught to profess when a child, would abandon their religion and become members of some Protestant church. We have ourselves known some who, although truly religious, never had taken the sacrament, because they were unwilling to conform to the usage of their Church preparatory to this ceremony, - unwilling to confess their sins to a sinner like themselves. We have known others, again, who did not believe in the Trinity, or who denied the infallibility of the Pope. And yet all these persons sincerely and honestly believed themselves Catholics. Tranquillize the conscientious anxi 1848.] Religious System. 3 eties of such persons, convince them that it is not only not wrong to abandon a church to which one does not truly belong, but that it is the duty of every Christian to join the church whose doctrines are the most in harmony with his own, and they would soon be found, we doubt not, at the foot of some Protestant pulpit. M. Coquerel's work is intended to present to these Christians, who have renounced the religion of the past, but who are still doubtful as to the path which they shall now follow, a complete religious system, which may serve as the foundation of their future faith. Firm and tranquil in his belief that France will one day be a Protestant country, M. Coquerel has devoted all his powers to the realization of this, his most ardent wish. The energies of a highly gifted mind, an impassioned and touching eloquence, and the treasures of a truly Christian heart, have been alike directed towards this great object. After thirty years of uninterrupted labor as a preacher, first in the French Protestant Church at Amsterdam, and afterwards as one of the pastors of the Reformed Church of Paris, he has at last published the work we have before us. M. Coquerel belongs to that class of Christians who think, that, as there were reformers before the Reformation, so too there may be reformers in every age; and that, however much we may be indebted to those immortal men who first freed the world from the yoke of Romanism, we may differ widely from them in their manner of interpreting the Scriptures. An intolerant Protestantism, that is to say, a religious system in which liberty of conscience is the first word but which ends with the solemn and horrible declaration, that there is only one Church in which man can be saved, is as unfit for our age as the Roman Catholic faith. A new system is, then, to be sought. In this system, faith in God as a Father, in Christ as a Saviour, and in immortality as the continuation of our present existence, must be included. But faith will not alone be required. We are confident that man will be judged, not according to his belief, if that belief be sincere, but according to his actions. And must it not be so? If every Protestant has a right to read his Bible, and therein to find his faith, how can it be expected that all men should believe alike? Who can suppose that the simple-hearted laborer, who on the Sabbath reads the Bible to his family, should understand it and interpret it as a Luther or a Calvin, a Chalmers or a Channing? No. The time is fast approaching when there will be a large class of Christians, who, when asked to what religious denomination they belong, will simply reply, — We are disciples of Christ; Christ has taught us to love God as a Father, to love each other, and to do by others as we would wish to be done by; we are Christians, not theologians. And when, at last, the number of those who profess these liberal views shall have so increased as to spread all over the world, when all nations shall meet together to offer up prayers at the same altar, then, and then only, Christianity will have accomplished its object in this world. How beautiful is this anticipation of the future condition of the human race! How soothing to the heart of the Christian, amidst the dissensions which now agitate mankind and divide them into innumerable sects, each of which is willing to assert that it alone is possessed of the truth! There are many Christians, however, who may think that such a system savors too much of Rationalism. If they peruse M. Coquerel's volume, they will see, we think, that they are mistaken. They will see that the author, while he maintains our right to investigate, by the light of our reason, the various and difficult problems which surround us, at the same time shows that we shall necessarily, sooner or later, be stopped in our investigations, and be obliged to seek for another guide, or run the risk of remaining for ever in darkness and uncertainty. Such a system assigns to philosophy and to religion each its true place. Their respective positions have been often strangely misapprehended. They have been viewed, not as successive stages of the same science, but as rival methods of teaching the same truths. If this were the case, then either the one or the other would be useless. If with the light of our reason alone we could penetrate into the deepest recesses of our souls and solve the dark mysteries which envelope our existence, if philosophy could give a satisfactory answer to those questions which have perplexed the wisest,- What am I? Whence come I? Whither am I going? then might we not ask, To what purpose religion? Might not Christ have remained in his glory on the right hand of the Father, instead of taking a human form and submitting to all the evils attendant on a human life? Might he not have spared himself the sufferings of the most cruel of deaths? A correct view of our own nature will show us that philosophy is but the introduction to religion, the vesti 1848.] Nature of Man. 5 bule of the temple. Free to choose between good and evil, ignorance and knowledge, man may content himself with the imperfect and uncertain instructions of philosophy, or complete his knowledge by the aid of religion; he may read the first volume of his history, and neglect the second; he may pause in the vestibule of the temple as in a labyrinth, or take one step more, lift the veil which covers the sanctuary, and penetrate into the deepest mysteries of our being. A work, founded on this distinction between philosophy and religion, must necessarily begin with a minute and careful examination of the nature, the faculties, and the desires of Let us endeavour to follow M. Coquerel in this re man. search. Man has the consciousness of his own existence, and of his individuality. He alone, of all the animals that inhabit this earth, has a clear and distinct notion of himself and of what surrounds him. From this conviction naturally result two facts, that man has not always existed, and that the source whence his life has sprung is not within himself. Man knows that he has not always existed, because, as he has the consciousness of a present, he would, then, have also within himself the evidence of a past existence. He, moreover, knows that he did not create himself; for if he had the power of creation, he would also have the power of maintaining his existence. On a further examination, man discovers within himself different powers or tendencies, which may be thus classed: - 1. the intellectual power, the object of which is knowledge; 2. the moral power, the object of which is virtue; 3. the affective power, which leads man to desire to form certain relations with his fellow-creatures; 4. the feeling power, which tends to a complete satisfaction of man's desire, to perfect happiness; 5. the religious power, which induces man to seek for an object which he may adore. The ideal notion of knowledge, of virtue, of love, of happiness, and of religion, which man has conceived in all stages of civilization, is but the object of these powers or tendencies. To deny that such an ideal exists is to declare that all the faculties, all the powers, of man are directed towards an unattainable object. This ideal does exist; it is the object of our life; it must be attained. These few and simple observations on the nature and the desires of man at once destroy three of the most erroneous |