66 human nature. It was observed by the celebrated Maimbourg, that although the Priscillianists began in the spirit, they ended in the flesh." They began with saving souls, and, it is to be feared, ended with losing them. Fanaticism is like a rock which rolls from the summit of a mountain - it not only falls lower and lower, but acquires an increased impetuosity with its progress. It has been sometimes maintained, that benefit arises, on some occasions, from an unusual degree of religious enthusiasm. It will certainly be produced by a calm and serious investigation of Divine truths; but the moment it passes into disorder, it ceases to be permanently advantageous. But if it were admitted, that some advantage had arisen from religious uproar; (and many there are who will maintain that the amount has not been small; for in all cases where the judgment is perverted, and the passions are excited, men will contend for what a person in his sober senses would reject ;) yet the practice is not sanctioned by Jesus Christ, nor the precepts of the Gospel: and this is enough for any reasonable man; we must act consistently, and leave the result to the Almighty. The great Teacher of mankind came to seek and to save sinners; that is, to turn them from idolatry to the worship of the true God; from ignorance of the Almighty to a knowledge, esteem, and obedience of his sacred laws. There certainly was, in all his actions, a commanding dignity, and in all his precepts a love for the human race; but where do we discover fanaticism or rant? Where do we find an account of uproar, or powerful sympathetic feelings, which were excited by him in the minds of his auditory? Shall it be fancied, that the mission of Christ was merely an experiment to discover the dispositions of men? and has it happened that, on returning to his Father's mansion, he has thought proper to adopt some other measures for the conversion of mankind? Or will it be imagined, that Jesus Christ employed one method, and the superior lights of later ages have exhibited a better method? Let us not suppose that the Creator was ignorant of what he had formed; that the Redeemer knew not what was in man. Let us not fancy that men can discover a more effectual method for producing genuine reformation in morals and religion than Christ himself adopted. Those who act differently from the pattern which he has exhibited insult him who left his life as an example, that we might walk in his steps. It has not been denied, that some good may have arisen from fanaticism; but it is not a new occurrence for good to be brought out of evil: it is not, however, an argument for the allowance of that evil. Nor will it follow, that because the excess of zeal occasions disadvantage, no zeal or interest must be felt for religion. One baneful effect of extravagance is to connect disgrace with true piety, and to lead men into carelessness or contempt of their duty. It is like a whirlpool in the midst of a channel, which occasions a great stir in that particular part of the waters, but hinders the progress of the main current. The happy art of sailing on the great ocean of life is so to avoid Scylla as not to be lost in Charybdis; so to avoid fanaticism as not to become indifferent; and so to avoid careless CHAP. VI. ON SUPERNATURAL INFLUENCE AND APPEARANCE. THE term supernatural appearance applies to every visible object which does not arise agreeably with the laws of nature. Many things are deemed supernatural which are not so. An eclipse, a meteor, the aurora borealis producing the forms of swords or men, have been deemed supernatural; but this term is usually applied to spiritual existences, which take the semblance of material beings. These may be heavenly spirits in the likeness of men, or they may be the souls of departed persons; they may be good spirits or bad ones; their purpose may be beneficent or otherwise. I shall endeavour to show, that a belief in the existence of supernatural beings has been almost universal. This belief has been founded on natural deductions from acknowledged facts. For, as it has been believed, that there are spiritual beings superior to man, it has been inferred that they may sometimes hold intercourse with man: as the soul was believed to be separated from the body at death, it was thought not unlikely that it might occasionally visit this earth and as a superior being could not be known except by a visible representation, so it was fancied that a spirit might take somewhat of the form of humanity traced out in lines of light; and the ghost of a mortal man might resume his original appearance. The question of supernatural appearances is an interesting one, for herewith are connected many important consequences. The Egyptians believed that the souls of dead men came back from the grave, and clad themselves in the forms which they had been accustomed to wear; that they frequented the temples and the dwellings of mortal men; that they were sometimes seen on the mountains and sometimes in the clouds; sometimes on the hills, in the valleys, by the sea-side, and on the ocean. They believed, also, that there were genii of rivers. When Bruce was in Egypt, a priest informed him that he had seen the genius of the Nile; that he was an aged man, with a long silvery beard, and he leant on a staff. The Greeks believed that every man possessed three souls. The first they termed manes; this, they supposed, went into Tartarus or Elysium: the second, spiritus, which they believed ascended into the skies: the third, umbra, which hovered about the tomb, and sometimes appeared to men. Dido threatened Æneas that she would torment him with her umbra. Sequar atris ignibus absens; VIRGIL, book iv. The Greeks believed also in the existence of Nereids, Dryads, Uraniæ, and other beings, which Roman writers - whether poets, moralists, or historians allow the universality of the belief in supernatural appearances. The Arabians, and some other Oriental nations, maintained that the souls of dead men sometimes appeared; and they believed in the existence of spiritual beings, who had been unconnected with matter, and who sometimes frequented the earth, and sometimes the heavens; these they termed Peri and Dives: the former were beautiful and beneficent, their only object was to impart favours to human beings; the latter were ugly and malevolent, they stirred up discord and war, they brought on the people plague, famine, and death. In Palestine a belief in spectres was very prevalent. In the Apocrypha we are told that Heliodorus with his guard had surrounded the temple at Jerusalem, for the purpose of plundering and carrying off the treasures; and behold "a mighty apparition appeared," a rider clothed in armour of gold, and he rode a fierce and stately horse; and the horse smote Heliodorus, and struck him to the earth, and all the guards fainted. When one of the Maccabees was engaged with Timotheus, behold there were five horsemen in the heavens; they were covered with armour of burnished silver, and the bridles of the horses were gold; and they descended and came about Maccabeus, and preserved him from the fury of his enemies but they shot arrows of fire and lightning among his foes. After Christ had risen from the dead, he said, in answer to some enquiries, "Handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have." This was as much 66 |