CHAPTER II.

MAN A FALLEN BEING.

THE Bible is not true, if man is not prone to evil. The holy page has two modes of expression in holding up the fact of man's depravity. The first is his hatred towards God; the second is his love for falsehood. Let us look at each of these assertions.

1. The carnal mind is enmity against God.

This seems to the unconverted man as though it must be false. He is not conscious of any enmity against God. He thinks usually that he loves his Creator. Of course, if we talk of his hatred, we do not gain his assent. The reason it seems to him that he loves where he really hates, is simply this: he does not hate that which he calls God. He well approves the character which he himself has given to the Creator; but this character always differs in one or more traits from that which is drawn of God in the Bible. It always resembles, more or less, the character of the individual who has drawn it. A part of the character accords with the sacred page; but a portion of it, more or less, belongs to the man who draws it; of course he does not hate it. This has been true in every age; and is now a fact, wherever men are living.

EXAMPLES. Could you have asked the ancient Scandinavian, as he stood before you with a purse in one hand and a spear in the other, "Do you love

God?" he would have answered you in the affirmative. Then had you inquired, "Who is God?" he would have replied, "Thor, the god of battles and of plunder." The warrior loved such a deity-a part of the character belonged to the barbarian. Omnipotence and other traits were correct, and were received from true tradition; but holiness and purity the man did not love, and therefore did not receive into his creed as belonging to heaven. Could you have asked the Greek, at Athens, two thousand years ago, if he loved God, he would have replied, Yes. "Who is God?" Answer, "Bacchus, Venus, or Mars." A deity of wine, or revelry, or sensuality, or war, he did not hate; but if you had placed before him the full character of the God of the Bible, as the apostles did, he would have turned away in anger. Go, now, and converse with the enfeebled Asiatic concerning his enmity to God, and he will look astonished at your assertion. He is willing to give up his life in the service of his god. But ask after this deity, and he will name one of lust, cruelty, and pollution; one resembling, to a great extent, the man who stands before you. If you claim his notice to the God who loves justice and humility, purity and peace, he cannot bear to hear you. Just so it is in the land of Bibles and of light, so it is in England or America. Go to that Universalist, and ask him if he hates God. He is indignant at the question. He thinks he loves his kind Creator ardently; he thinks he never did hate God. And it is true that he does love a god whose character resembles that of the man before you, in some prominent traits. But

place before him the God of the Bible-one who will say, Depart, to the wicked; one who will not take pollution and the rejecters of mercy into heaven; one who will see the smoke of their torment ascend up for ever and ever; and the Universalist will tell you earnestly that he hates such a God as that. Just so it is with the Deist. He gives to God a character which he thinks rational; he loves that character; it resembles, in some main points, the man who frames it. He cannot think that "the carnal mind is enmity against God," for he esteems God a being who has done, and will do very much, in accordance with a plan which he himself esteems rational and proper.

It is true, we cannot exhibit the case of deists, as to what they love or hate, as plainly as the case of others, because there is such an unending variety in their creed. Go to one hundred deists, and you will rarely find two of them believing alike. They all agree in rejecting the Bible; but on many very important considerations-whether God will or will not punish the wicked-whether the soul goes out, or certainly lives on after death-whether the world. is to meet ruin, or continue for ever-if the wicked are to be chastised, what sins are most dangerous-they have no sameness in their plans. Many deists, on questions of breathless interest, will refuse to give you any answer: they will tell you they do not know; they have no belief on the point, however interesting. At other times, you will find them maintaining that man's reason was given him as a lamp to enlighten, and as a guide to direct him in these

matters. But ask them what kind of conduct here will most add to, or detract from happiness hereafter, or what kind of life we may certainly look for in the next existence, and no two of them will give you the same replies to these inquiries. The reason of a thousand of them seems to have led in as many different directions. That Christian denominations should differ, appears to them exceedingly absurd and reproachful; but that reason, which they say God has given as our only teacher, should give either no opinions, or very different opinions among their own number, does not call forth a bitter remark. If the Bible is disclaimed, thus far they all agree; further than this they do not ask after agreement, or regret it should there be a thousand different creeds. A God according to the Bible, they do not love; one conformed to their own vague ideas, they do not hate.

2. Man's love of falsehood.

"Men have loved darkness rather than light." In this assertion, light stands for truth; and the word darkness means falsehood. It does not seem to any one that he prefers falsehood to truth. The most prejudiced man thinks himself impartial. It is so on any subject. The most vehement politician thinks himself unbiassed in his judgment; the most deadly enemy, in speaking of the one he hates, will tell you that his views are not the offspring of passion, yet he certainly would believe evil of his neighbor more readily than good, even when this good is true. We might then very certainly expect, that the man who wishes to live for ever, to whom anni

hilation has no pleasing look, and who even wishes strongly to believe the Bible, would be far from feeling, or believing, that on this subject he would cherish darkness rather than light. Nevertheless it is true. Although not in a situation as deplorable as the man who gnashes his teeth on religion, still it is true, that one small cunningly devised falsehood will influence him further than one hundred plain and forcible arguments in favor of revelation. A man may stand on the side of a precipitous mountain, and long for the top, yet the impetus of an ounce will push him further down than many times that force will cast him up. One who desires the valley below, can go there without a struggle. The man who has sinned may desire the summit of truth, but he stands on the declivity of a sinful nature. Every transgression or sensual indulgence has added to the darkness of his soul without his knowing it. Some examples of this must be given in the following chapter, to make the fact easily understood.