DISCOURSE
III.
THE POWER OF SELFISHNESS IN PROMOTING THE HONESTIES
OF MERCANTILE INTERCOURSE.
"And if you do good to them which do good
to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same.. - Luke
vi. 33.
IT is to be remarked of many of those duties, the
performance of which confers the least distinction upon an individual, that
they are at the same time the very duties, the violation of which would confer
upon him the largest measure of obloquy and disgrace. Truth and justice do not
serve to elevate a man so highly above the average morality of his species, as
would generosity, or ardent friendship, or devoted and disinterested
patriotism. The former are greatly more common than the latter; and, on that
account, the presence of them is not so calculated to signalize the individual
to whom they belong. But that is one account, also, why the absence of them
would make him a more monstrous exception to the general run of character in
society. And, accordingly, while it is true, that there are more men of
integrity in the world, than there are men of very wide and liberal
beneficence-it is also true, that one act of falsehood, or one act of
dishonesty, would stamp a far more burning infamy on the name of a
transgressor, than any defect in those more heroic charities, and extraordinary
virtues, of which humanity is capable.
So it is far more disgraceful
not to be just to another, than not to be kind to him; and, at the same time,
an act of kindness may be held in higher positive estimation than an act of
justice. Ihe one is my right - nor is there any call for the homage of a
particular testimony when it is rendered. The other is additional to my right
the offering of a spontaneous goodwill, which I had no title to exact; and
which, therefore, when rendered to me, excites in my bosom the cordiality of a
warmer acknowledgment. And yet, our Saviour, who knew what was in man, saw,
that much of the apparent kindness of nature, was resolvable into the real
selfishness of nature; that much of the good done unto others, was done in the
hope that these others would do something again. And, we believe, it would be
found by an able analyst of the human character, that this was the secret but
substantial principle of many of the civilities and hospitalities of ordinary
intercourse that if there were no expectation either of a return in kind, or of
a return in gratitude, or of a return in popularity, many of the sweetening and
cementing virtues of a neighbourhood would be practically done away-all serving
to prove, that a multitude of virtues, which, in effect, promoted the comfort
and the interest of others, were tainted in principle by a latent regard to
ones own interest; and that thus being the fellowship of those who did
good, either as a return for the good done unto them, or who did good in hope
of such a return, it might be, in fact, what our Saviour characterizes it in
the text-the fellowship of sinners.
But if to do that which is unjust,
is still more disgraceful than not to do that which is kind, it would prove all
the more strikingly how deeply sin had tainted the moral constitution of our
species - could it be shown, that the great practical restraint on the
prevalence of this more disgraceful thing in society, is the tie of that common
selfishness which actuates and characterizes all its members. It were a curious
but important question, were it capable of being resolved - if men did not feel
it their interest to be honest, how much of the actual doings of honesty would
still be kept up in the world? It is our own opinion of the nature of man, that
it has its honourable feelings, and its instinctive principles of rectitude,
and its constitutional love of truth and of integrity; and that, on the basis
of these, a certain portion of uprightness would remain amongst us, without the
aid of any prudence, or any calculation whatever.
All this we have
fully conceded; and have already attempted to demonstrate, that, in spite of
it, the character of man is thoroughly pervaded by the very essence of
sinfulness; because, with ,all the native virtues which adorn it, there adheres
to it that foulest of all spiritual deformities-unconcern about God, and even
antipathy to God. It has been argued against the orthodox doctrine of the
universality of human corruption, that even without the sphere of the operation
of the gospel, there do occur so many engaging specimens of worth and
benevolence in society. The reply is, that this may be no deduction from the
doctrine whatever, but be even an aggravation of it - should the very men who
exemplify so much of what is amiable, carry in their hearts an indifference to
the will of that Being who thus hath formed, and thus hath embellished them.
But it would be a heavy deduction indeed, not from the doctrine, but from its
hostile and imposing argument, could it be shown, that the vast majority of all
equitable dealing amongst men, is performed, not on the principle of honour at
all, but on the principle of selfishness - that this is the soil upon which the
honesty of the world mainly flourishes, and is sustained; that, were the
connexion dissolved between justice to others and our own particular advantage,
this would go very far to banish the observation of justice from the earth;
that, generally speaking, men are honest, not because they are lovers of God,
and not even because they are lovers of virtue, but because they are lovers of
their own selves - insomuch, that if it were possible to disjoin the good of
self altogether from the habit of doing what was fair, as well as from the
habit of doing what was kind to the people around us, this would not merely
isolate the children of men from each other, in respect of the obligations of
beneficence, but it would arm them into an undisguised hostility against each
other, in respect of their rights. The mere disinterested principle would set
up a feeble barrier, indeed, against a desolating tide of selfishness, now set
loose from the consideration of its own advantage. The genuine depravity of the
human heart would burst forth and show itself in its true characters; and the
world in which we live be transformed into a scene of unblushing fraud, of open
and lawless depredation.
And, perhaps, after all, the best way of
arriving practically at the solution of this question would be, not by a formal
induction of particular cases, but by committing the matter to the gross and
general experience of those who are most conversant in the affairs of business.
There is a sort of undefinable impression that all have upon this subject, on
the justness of which, however, we are disposed to lay a very considerable
stress - an impression gathered out of the mass of the recollections of a whole
life - an impression founded on what we may have observed in the history of our
own doings - a kind of tact that we have acquired as the fruit of our repeated
intercourse with men, and of the manifold transactions that we have had with
them, and of the number of times in which we have been personally implicated
with the play of human. passions, and human interests. It is our own
conviction, that a well exercised merchant could cast a more intelligent glance
at this question, than a well exercised metaphysician; and therefore do we
submit its decision to those of them who have hazarded most largely, and most
frequently, on the faith of agents, and customers, and distant correspondents.
We know the fact of a very secure and well warranted confidence in the honesty
of others, being widely prevalent amongst men; and that, were it not for this,
all the interchanges of trade would be suspended; and that confidence is the
very soul and life of commercial activity; and it is delightful to think, how
thus a man can suffer all the wealth which belongs to him to depart from under
his eye, and to traverse the mightiest oceans and continents of our world, and
to pass into the custody of men whom he never saw. And it is a sublime homage,
one should think, to the honourable and high.minded principles of our nature,
that, under their guardianship, the adverse hemispheres of the globe should be
bound together in safe and profitable merchandise; and that thus one should
sleep with a bosom undisturbed by jealousy, in Britain, who has all, and more
than all his property treasured in the warehouses of India - and that, just
because there he knows there is vigilance to defend it, and activity to dispose
of it, and truth to account for it, and all those trusty virtues which ennoble
the character of man to shield it from injury, and send it back again in an
increasing tide of opulence to his door.
There is no question, then, as
to the fact of a very extended practical honesty, between man and man, in their
intercourse with each other. The only question is, as to the reason of the
fact. Why is it, that he whom we have trusted acquits himself of his trust with
such correctness and fidelity? Whether is his mind, in so doing, most set upon
our interest or upon his own? Whether is it because he seeks our advantage in
it, or because he finds in it his own advantage? Tell us to which of the two
concerns he is most trembhingly alive - to our property, or to his own
character? and whether, upon the last of these feelings, he may not be more
forcibly impelled to equitable dealing than upon the first of them? We well
know, that there is room enough in his bosom for both; but to determine how
powerfully selfishness is blended with the punctualities and the integrities of
business, let us ask those who can speak most soundly and experimentally on the
subject, what would be the result, if the element of selfishness were so
detached from the operations of trade, that there was no such thing as a man
suffering in his prosperity, because he suffered in his good name; that there
was no such thing as a desertion of custom and employment coming upon the back
of a blasted credit, and a tainted reputation; in a word, if the only security
we had of man was his principles, and that his interest flourished and
augmented just as surely without his principles as with them? Tell us, if the
hold we have of a mans own personal advantage were thus broken down, in
how far the virtues of the mercantile world would survive it? Would not the
world of trade sustain as violent a derangement on this mighty hold being cut
asunder, as the world of nature would on the suspending of the law of
gravitation? Would not the whole system, in fact, fall to pieces, and be
dissolved? Would not men, when thus released from the magical chain of their
own interest, which bound them together into a fair and seeming compact of
principle, like dogs of rapine, let loose upon their prey, overleap the barrier
which formerly restrained them?
Does not this prove, that selfishness,
after all, is the grand principle on which the brotherhood of the human race is
made to hang together; and that he who can make the wrath of man to praise him,
has also upon the selfishness of man, caused a most beauteous order of wide and
useful intercourse to be suspended? But let us here stop to observe, that,
while there is much in this contemplation to magnify the wisdom of the Supreme
Contriver, there is also much in it to humble man, and to convict him of the
deceitfulness of that moral complacency with which he looks to his own
character, and his own attainments. There is much in it to demonstrate, that
his righteousness are as filthy rags; and that the idolatry of self, however
hidden in its operation, may be detected in almost every one of them. God may
combine the separate interests of every individual of the human race, and the
strenuous prosecution of these interests by each of them, into an harmonious
system of operation, for the good of one great and extended family. But if, on
estimating the character of each individual member of that family, we shall
find, that the mainspring of his actions is the urgency of a selfish
inclination; and that to this his very virtues are subordinate; and that even
the honesties which mark his conduct are chiefly, though perhaps insensibly,
due to the selfishness which actuates and occupies his whole heart ; - then,
let the semblance be what it may, still the reality of the case accords with
the most mortifying representations of the New Testament. The moralities of
nature are but the moralities of a day, and will cease to be applauded when
this world, the only theatre of their applause, is burnt up. They are but the
blossoms of that rank efflorescence which is nourished on the soil of human
corruption, and can never bring forth fruit unto immortality. The discerner of
all secrets sees that they emanate from a principle which is at utter war with
the charity that prepares for the enjoyments, and that glows in the bosoms of
the celestial; and, therefore, though highly.esteemed among men, they may be in
his sight an abomination.
Let us, if possible, make this still clearer
to the apprehension, by descending more minutely into particulars. There is not
one member of the great mercantile family, with whom there does not obtain a
reciprocal interest between himself and all those who compose the circle of his
various correspondents. He does them good; but his eye is all the while open to
the expectation of their doing him something again. They minister to him all
the profits of his employment; but not unless he minister to them of his
service, and attention, and fidelity. Insomuch, that if his credit abandon him,
his prosperity will also abandon him. If he forfeit the confidence of others,
he will also forfeit their custom along with it. So that, in perfect
consistency with interest being the reigning idol of his soul, he may still be,
in every way, as sensitive of encroachment upon his reputation, as he would be
of encroachment upon his property; and be as vigilant, to the full, in guarding
his name against the breath of calumny, or suspicion, as in guarding his estate
against the inroads of a depredator.
Now, this tie of reciprocity,
which binds him into fellowship and good faith with society at large, will
sometimes, in the mere course of business, and its unhooked-for fluctuations,
draw one or two individuals into a still more special intimacy with himself.
There may be a lucrative partnership, in which it is the pressing necessity of
each individual, that all of them, for a time at least, stick closely and
steadily together. Or there may be a thriving interchange of commodities struck
out, where it is the mutual interest of all who are concerned, that each take
his assigned part and adhere to it. Or there may be a promising arrangement
devised, which it needs concert and understanding to effectuate; and, for which
purpose, several may enter into a skilful and well ordered combination.
We are neither saying that this is very general in the mercantile
world, or that it is in the slightest degree unfair. But all must be sensible,
that, amid the reelings and movements of the great trading society, the
phenomenon sometimes offers itself of a group of individuals who have entered
into some compact of mutual accommodation, and who, therefore, look as if they
were isolated from the rest by the bond of some more strict and separate
alliance. All we aim at, is to gather illustration to our principle, out of the
way in which the members of this associated cluster conduct themselves to each
other; how such a cordiality may pass between them, as, one could suppose, to
be the cordiality of genuine friendship; how such an intercourse might be
maintained among their families, as might look like the intercourse of
unmingled affection; how such an exuberance of mutual hospitality might be
poured forth, as to recall those poetic days when avarice was unknown, and men
lived in harmony together on the fruits of one common inheritance; and how
nobly disdainful each member of the combination appeared to be of such little
savings, as could be easily surrendered to the general good and adjustment of
the whole concern.
And all this, it will be observed, so long as the
concern prospered, and it was for the interest of each to abide by it; and the
respective accounts current gladdened the heart of every individual, by the
exhibition of an abundant share of the common benefit to himself. But then,
every such system of operations comes to an end. And what we ask is, if it be
at all an unlikely evolution of our nature, that the selfishness which lay in
wrapt concealment, during the progress of these transactions, should now come
forward and put out to view its cloven foot, when they draw to their
termination? And as the tie of reciprocity gets looser, is it not a very
possible thing, that the murmurs of something like unfair or unhandsome conduct
should get louder? And that a fellowship, hitherto carried forward in smiles,
should break up in reproaches? And that the whole character of this fellowship
should show itself more unequivocally as it comes nearer to its close? And that
some of its members, as they are becoming disengaged from the bond of mutual
interest, should also become disengaged from the bond of those mutual
delicacies and proprieties, and even honesties, which had heretofore marked the
whole of their intercourse ? - Insomuch, that a matter in which all the parties
looked so fair, and magnanimous, and liberal, might at length degenerate into a
contest of keen appropriation, a scramble of downright and undisguised
selfishness?
But though this may happen sometimes, we are far from
saying that it will happen generally. It could not, in fact, without such an
exposure of character, as might not merely bring a man down in the estimation
of those from whom he is now withdrawing himself, but also in the estimation of
that general public with whom he is still linked; and on whose opinion of him
there still rests the dependence of a strong personal interest. To estimate
precisely the whole influence of this consideration, or the degree in which
honesty of character is resolvible into selfishness of character, it would be
necessary to suppose, that the tie of reciprocity was dissolved, not merely
between the individual and those with whom he had been more particularly and
more intimately associated - but that the tie of reciprocity was dissolved
between the individual and the whole of his former acquaintanceship in
business.
Now, the situation which comes nearest to this, is that of a
man on the eve of bankruptcy, and with no sure hope of so retrieving his
circumstances as again to emerge into credit, and be restored to some
employment of gain or of confidence. If he have either honourable or religious
feelings, then character, as connected with principle, may still, in his eyes,
be something; but character, as connected with prudence, or the calculations of
interest, may now be nothing. In the dark hour of the desperation of his soul,
he may feel, in fact, that he has nothing to lose: and let us now see how he
will conduct himself, when thus released from that check of reputation which
formerly held him. In these circumstances, if you have ever seen the man
abandon himself to utter regardlessness of all the honesties which at one time
adorned him; and doing such disgraceful things as he would have spurned at the
very suggestion of, in the days of his prosperity; and, forgetf.ul of his
former name, practising all possible shifts of duplicity to prolong the credit
of a tottering establishment; and to keep himself afloat for a few months of
torture and restlessness, weaving such a web of entanglement around his many
friends and companions, as shall most surely implicate some of them in his
fall; and, as the crisis approaches, plying his petty wiles how to survive the
coming ruin, and to gather up of its fragments to his family.
0! how
much is there here to deplore; and who can be so ungenerous as to stalk in
unrelenting triumph over the helplessness of so sad an overthrow! But if ever
such an exhibition meet your eye, while we ask you not to withhold your pity
from the unfortunate, we ask you also to read in it a lesson of worthless and
sunken humanity; how even its very virtues are tinctured with corruption; and
that the honour, and the truth, and the equity, with which man proudly thinks
his nature to be embellished, are often reared on the basis of selfishness, and
lie prostrate in the dust when that basis is cut away.
But other
instances may be quoted, which go still more satisfactorily to prove the very
extended influence of selfishness on the moral judgments of our species; and
how readily the estimate, which a man forms on the question of right and wrong,
accommodates itself to his own interest. There is a strong general reciprocity
of advantage between the government of a country and all its inhabitants. The
one party, in this relation, renders a revenue for the expenses of the state.
The other party renders back again protection from injustice and violence. Were
the means furnished by the former withheld, the benefit conferred by the latter
would cease to be administered. So that, with the government, and the public at
large, nothing can be more strict, and more indispensable, than the tie of
reciprocity that is between them. But this is not felt, and therefore not acted
upon, by the separate individuals who compose that public. The reciprocity does
not come home with a sufficiently pointed and personal application to each of
them. Every man may calculate, that though he, on the strength of some
dexterous evasions, were to keep back of the tribute that is due by him, the
mischief that would recoil upon himself is divided with the rest of his
countrymen; and the portion of it which comes to his door would be so very
small, as to be altogether insensible. For all feeling he will just be as
effectually sheltered, by the power and the justice of his country, whether he
pay his taxes in full, or, under the guise of some skilful concealment, pay
them but partially; and, therefore, to every practical effect, the tie of
reciprocity, between him and his sovereign, is in a great measure dissolved.
Now, what is the actual adjustment of the moral sense, and moral
conduct, of the population, to this state of matters? It is quite palpable.
Subterfuges which, in private business, would be held to be disgraceful, are
not held to be so disgraceful in this department of a mans personal
transactions. The cry of indignation, which would be lifted up against the
falsehood or dishonesty of a mans dealings in his own neighbourhood, is
mitigated or unheard, though, in his dealings with the state, there should be
the very same relaxation of principle. On this subject, there is a connivance
of popular feeling, which, if extended to the whole of human traffic, would
banish all its securities front the world giving reason to believe, that much
of the good done among men, is done on the expectation of a good that will be
rendered back again; and that many of the virtues, by which the fellowship of
human beings is regulated and sustained, still leave the imputation unredeemed,
of its being a fellowship of sinners; and that both the practice of morality,
and the demand for it, are measured by the operation of a self-love, which, so
far from signalizing any man, or preparing him for eternity, he holds in common
with the fiercest and most degenerate of his species; and that, apart from the
consideration of his own interest, simplicity and godly sincerity are, to a
great degree, unknown; insomuch, that though God has interposed with a law, of
giving unto all their dues, and tribute to whom tribute is due, we may venture
an affirmation of the vast majority of this tribute, that it is rendered for
wraths sake,. and not for conscience sake. Of so little effect is
unsupported and solitary conscience to stem the tide of selfishness. And it is
chiefly when honesty and truth go overbearingly along with this tide, that the
voice of man is lifted up to acknowledge them, and his heart becomes feelingly
alive to a sense of their obligations.
And let us here just ask, in
what relation of criminality does he who uses a contraband article stand to him
who deals in it? In precisely the same relation that a receiver of stolen goods
stands to a thief or a depredator. There may be some who revolt at the idea of
being so classified. But, if the habit we have just denounced can be fastened
on men of rank and seemly reputation, let us just humble ourselves into the
admission of how little the righteous practice of the world has the foundation
of righteous principle to sustain it; how feeble are the securities of
rectitude, had it nothing to uphold it in its own native charms, and native
obligations; how society is held together, only because the grace of God can
turn to account the worthless propensities of the individuals who compose it;
and how, if the virtues of fidelity, and truth, and justice, had not the prop
of selfishness to rest upon, they would, with the exception of a few scattered
remnants, take their departure from the world, and leave it a prey to the
anarchy of human passions - to the wild misrule of all those depravities which
agitate and deform our ruined nature.
The very same exhibition of our
nature may be witnessed in almost every parish of our sister kingdom, where the
people render a revenue to the minister of religion, and the minister renders
back again a return, it is true - but not such a return, as, in the estimation
of gross and ordinary selfishness, is at all deemed an equivalent for the
sacrifice which has been made. In this instance, too, that law of reciprocity
which reigns throughout the common transactions of merchandise, is altogether
suspended; and the consequence is, that the law of right is trampled into
ashes. A tide of public odium runs against the men who are outraged of their
property, and a smile of general connivance rewards the successful dexterity of
the men who invade it. That portion of the annual produce of our soil, which,
on a foundation of legitimacy as firm as the property of the soil itself, is
allotted to a set of national functionaries - and which, but for them, would
all have gone, in the shape of increased revenue, to the indolent proprietor,
is altogether thrown loose from the guardianship of that great principle of
reciprocity, on which we strongly suspect that the honesties of this world are
mainly supported. The national clergy of England may be considered as standing
out of the pale of this guardianship; and the consequence is, that what is most
rightfully and most sacredly theirs, is abandoned to the gambol of many
thousand depredators; and, in addition to a load of most unmerited obloquy,
have they had to sustain all the heartburnings of known and felt injustice; and
that intercourse between the teachers and the taught, which ought surely to be
an intercourse of peace, and friendship, and righteousness, is turned into a
contest between the natural avarice of the one party, and the natural
resentments of the other.
It is not that we wish our sister church were
swept away, for we honestly think, that the overthrow of that establishment
would be a severe blow to the Christianity of our land. It is not that we envy
that great hierarchy the splendour of her endowments - for better a dinner of
herbs, when surrounded by the love of parishioners, than a preferment of
stalled dignity, and strife therewith. It is not either that we look upon her
ministers as having at all disgraced themselves by their rapacity; for look to
the amount of the encroachments that are made upon them, and we shall see that
they have carried their privileges with the most exemplary forbearance and
moderation. But, from these very encroachments do we infer how lawless a human
being will become, when emancipated from the bond of his own interest; how much
such a state of things must multiply the temptations to injustice over the face
of the country; and how desirable, therefore, that it were put an end to - not
by the abolition of that venerable church, but by a fair and liberal
commutation of the revenues which support her - not by bringing any blight on
the property of her ecciesiastics, but by the removal of a most devouring
blight from the worth çf her population- that every provocative to
injustice may be done away, and the frailty of human principle be no longer
left to such a ruinous and such a withering exposure.
This instance we
would not have mentioned, but for the sake of adding another experimental proof
to the lesson of our text; and we now hasten onward to the lesson itself, with
a few of its applications.
We trust you are convinced, from what has
been said, that much of the actual honesty of the world is due to the
selfishness of the world. And then you will surely admit, that, in as far as
this is the actuating principle, honesty descends from its place as a
rewardable, or even as an amiable virtue, and sinks down into the character of
a mere prudential virtue - which, so far from conferring any moral exaltation
on him by whom it is exemplified, emanates out of a propensity that seems
inseparable from the constitution of every sentient being and by which man is,
in one point, assimilated either to the most worthless of his own species, or
to those inferior animals among whom worth is unattainable.
And let it
not deafen the humbling impression of this argument, that you are not
distinctly conscious of the operation of selfishness, as presiding at every
step over the honesty of your daily and familiar transactions; and that the
only inward checks against injustice, of which you are sensible, are the
aversion of a generous indignancy towards it, and the positive discomfort you
would incur by the reproaches of your own conscience. Selfishness, in fact, may
have originated and alimented the whole of this virtue that belongs to you, and
yet the mind incur the same discomfort by the violation of it, that it would do
by the violation of any other of its established habits. And as to the generous
indignancy of your feelings against all that is fraudulently and disgracefully
wrong, let us never forget, that this may be the nurtured fruit of that common
selfishness which links human beings with each other into a relationship of.
mutual dependence.
This may be seen, in all its perfection, among the
leagued and sworn banditti of the highway; who, while execrated by society at
large for the compact of iniquity into which they have entered, can maintain
the most heroic fidelity to the virtues of their own brotherhood; and be, in
every way, as lofty and as chivalrous with their points of honour, as we are
with ours; and elevate as indignant a voice against the worthlessness of him
who could betray the secret of their association, or break up any of the
securities by which it was held together.
And, in like manner, may we
be the members of a wider combination, yet brought together by the tie of
reciprocal interest; and all the virtues essential to the existence, or to the
good of such a combination, may come to be idolized amongst us; and the breath
of human applause may fan them into a lustre of splendid estimation; and yet
the good man of society on earth be, in common with all his fellows, an utter
outcast from the society of heaven - with his heart altogether bereft of that
allegiance to God which forms the reigning principle of his unfallen creation -
and in a state of entire destitution either as to that love of the Supreme
Being, or as to that disinterested love of those around us, which form the
graces and the virtues of eternity.
We have not affirmed that there is
no such thing as a native and disinterested principle of honour among men. But
we have affirmed, on a former occasion, that a sense of honour may be in the
heart, and the sense of God be utterly away from it. And we affirm now, that
much of the honest practice of the world is not due to honesty of principle at
all, but takes its origin from a baser ingredient of our constitution
altogether. How wide is the operation of selfishness on the one hand, and how
limited is the operation of abstract principle on the other, it were difficult
to determine; and such a labyrinth to man is his own heart, that he may be
utterly unable, from his own consciousness, to answer this question. But amid
all the difficulties of such an analysis to himself, we ask him to think of
another who is unseen by us, but who is represented to us as seeing all things.
We know not in what characters this heavenly witness can be more impressively
set forth, than as pondering the heart, as weighing the secrets of the heart,
as fastening an attentive and a judging eye on all the movements of it, as
treasuring up the whole of mans outward and inward history in a book of
remembrance; and as keeping it in reserve for that day when, it is said, that
the secrets of all hearts shall be laid open, and God shall bring out every
secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.
Your
consciousness may not distinctly inform you, in how far the integrity of your
habits is due to the latent operation of selfishness, or to the more direct and
obvious operatiomi of honour. But your consciousness may, perhaps, inform you,
distinctly enough, how little a share the will of God has in the way of
influence on any of your doings. Your own sense and memory of what passes
within you may charge you with the truth of this monstrous indictment - that
you live without God in the world; that however you may be signalized among
your fellows, by that worth of character which is held in highest value and
demand amongst the individuals of a mercantile society, it is at least without
the influence of a godly principle that you have reached the maturity of an
established reputation; that either the proud emotions of rectitude which glow
within your bosom are totally untinctured by a feeling of homage to the Deity
or that, without any such emotions, Self is the divinity you have all along
worshipped, and your very virtues are so many offerings of reverence at her
shrine; If such be, in fact, the nakedness of your spiritual condition, is it
not high time, we ask, that you awaken out of this delusion, and shake the
lying spirit of deep and heavy slumber away from you? Is it not high time, when
eternity is so fast coming on, that you examine your accounts with God, and
seek for a settlement with that Being who will so soon meet your disembodied
spirits with the question of - what have you done unto me? And if all the
virtues which adorn you are but the subserviences of time, and of its
accommodations - if either done altogether unto yourselves, or done without the
recognition of God on the spontaneous instigation of your own feelings - is it
not high time that you lean no longer to the securities on which you have
rested, and that you seek for acceptance with your Maker on a more firm and
unalterable foundation?
This, then, is the terminating object of all
the experience that we have tried to set before you. We want it to be a
schoolmaster to bring you unto Christ. We want you to open your eyes to the
accordancy which obtains between the theology of the New Testament, and the
actual state and history of man. Above all, we want you to turn your eyes
inwardly upon yourselves, and there to behold a character without one trace or
lineament of godliness - there to behold a heart, set upon totally other things
than those which constitute the portion and the reward of eternity there to
behold every principle of action resolvable into the idolatry of self, or, at
least, into something independent of the authority of God there to behold how
worthless in their substance are those virtues which look so imposing in their
semblance and their display, and draw around them here a popularity and an
applause which will all be dissipated into nothing, when hereafter they are
brought up for examination to the judgment-seat. We want you, when the
revelation of the gospel charges you with the totality and magnitude of your
corruption, that you acquiesce in that charge; and that you may perceive the
trueness of it, under the disguise of all those hollow and unsubstantial
accomplishments with which nature may deck her own fallen and degenerate
children.
It is easy to be amused, and interested, and intellectually
regaled, by an analysis of the human character, and a survey of human society.
But it is not so easy to reach the individual conscience with the lesson - we
are undone. It is not so easy to strike the alarm into your hearts of the
present guilt, and the future damnation. It is not so easy to send the pointed
arrow of conviction into your bosoms, where it may keep by you, and pursue you
like an arrow sticking fast; or so to humble you into the conclusion, that, in
the sight of God, you are an accursed thing, as that you may seek unto him who
became a curse for you, and as that the preaching of His cross might cease to
be foolishness. Be assured, then, if you keep by the ground of being justified
by your present works, you will perish; and though we may not have succeeded in
convincing you of their worthlessness, be assured, that a day is coming, when
such a flaw of deceitfulness, in the principle of them all, shall be laid open;
as will demonstrate the equity of your entire and everlasting condemnation. To
avert the fearfulness of that day is the message of the great atonement sounded
in your ears; and the blood of Christ, cleansing from all sin, is offered to
your acceptance; and if you turn away from it, you add to the guilt of a broken
law the insult of a neglected gospel. But if you take the pardon of the gospel
on the footing of the gospel, then, such is the efficacy of this great
expedient, that it will reach an application of mercy farther than the eye of
your own conscience ever reached; that it will redeem you from the guilt even
of your most secret and unsuspected iniquities; and thoroughly wash you from a
taint of sinfulness, more inveterate than, in the blindness of nature, you ever
thought of, or ever conceived to belong to you.
But when a man becomes a
believer, there are two great events which take place at this great turning
point in his history. One of them takes place in heaven even the expunging of
his name from the book of condemnation. Another of them takes place on earth -
even the application of such a sanctifying influence to his person, that all
old things are done away with him, and all things become new with him. He is
made the workmanship of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. He is not merely forgiven
the sin of every one evil work of which he had aforetime been guilty, but he is
created anew unto the corresponding good work. And, therefore, if a Christian,
will his honesty be purified from that taint of selfishness by which the
general honesty of this world is so deeply and extensively pervaded. He will
not do this good thing, that any good thing may be done unto him again. He will
do it on a simple regard to its own native and independent rectitude. He will
do it because it is honourable, and because God wills him so to adorn the
doctrine of his Saviour. All his fair dealing, and all his friendship, will be
fair dealing and friendship without interest. The principle that is in him will
stand in no need of aid from any such auxiliary but, strong in its own
unborrowed resources, will it impress a legible stamp of dignity and
uprightness on the whole variety of his transactions in the world.
All
men find it their advantage, by the integrity of their dealings, to prolong the
existence of some gainful fellowship into which they may have entered. But with
him, the same unsullied integrity which kept this fellowship together, and
sustained the progress, of it, will abide with him through its last
transactions, and dignify its full and final termination. Most men find, that,
without the reverberation of any mischief on their own heads, they could
reduce, beneath the point of absolute justice, the charges of taxation. But he
has a conscience both towards God, and towards man, which will not let him; and
there is a rigid truth in all his returns, a pointed and precise accuracy in
all his payments. When hemmed in with circumstances of difficulty, and
evidently tottering to his fall, the demand of nature is, that he should ply
his every artifice to secrete a provision for his family. But a Christian mind
is incapable of artifice and the voice of conscience within him will ever be
louder than the voice of necessity; and he will be open as day with his
creditors, nor put forth his hand to that which is rightfully theirs, any more
than he would put forth his hand to the perpetration of a sacrilege; and though
released altogether from that tie of interest which binds a man to equity with
his fellows, yet the tie of principle will remain with him in all its strength.
Nor will it ever he found that he, for the sake of subsistence, will enter into
fraud, seeing that, as one of the children of light, he would not, to gain the
whole world, lose his own soul.
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