done for economics, and Willian James for philosophy; he made it speak the language of the man in the street'. He represents the very essence of the common sense of the intelligent classes of the time, and this probably explains the unusual popularity of his philosophical writings. His chief theological writing, for our present purpose, is the Reasonableness of Christianity (1695), although much of the Essay Concerning Human Understanding is also relevant. He believes in revelation, and that it may enable us to know things that reason itself could not discover. But reason must be the test of revelation. So that he that takes away reason to make way for revelation, puts out the light of both.'Reason must be our last judge and guide in everything.' We must prove what claims to be revelation by the reason which God gave us for that purpose.1 Natural religion by itself is not sufficient for man to know God's forgiveness and salvation, positive religion also is necessary, and as Locke grew older he emphasized its necessity more. He was one of the last English philosophers of the front rank who thought it possible to give a logical and exact demonstration of the existence of God. He thought he could prove that God is, as conclusively as he could show that three angles of a triangle equal two right angles.2 In this he differs from the Deists, who barely touch upon the point. He accepted miracles as events which actually took place, and emphasized their evidential value. They are the ultimate proof of any revelation, and in particular of the Messiahship of Jesus. He was essentially a reverent 1 Locke, Essay, iv, xvii. 24; xviii. 5, 6, 7, 8; xix. 4, 14. 2 Ibid., iv, x. 2, 3, 4. 3 Locke, Essay on Miracles, written 1703, published after his death. and devout enquirer, as far removed as possible from the temper of the more radical of the Deists. Hefelbower has shewn that it is a misunderstanding to think that the Deists derived their views from Locke. Many of the points of similarity which are usually noted between Locke and the Deists are common to almost all the theologians, both orthodox and liberal, of the period. Locke argued that Christianity is reasonable, the Deists claimed that the mysterious is not part of Christianity. There is a vast difference between the two positions. The plain, simple language which makes Locke's philosophy easy to read is characteristic of the period. Apart from the influences already mentioned, Descartes and the decay of scholasticism, three forces may be mentioned tending to the same end. In an age when science enjoyed great prestige, the practice of the Royal Society was important. They have exacted from all their members,' says the first historian of the Society, 'a close, naked, natural way of speaking, positive expression, clear senses, a native easiness, bringing all things as near to mathematical plainness as they can, and preferring the language of artisans, countrymen, and merchants, before that of wits and scholars.' The influence of Archbishop Tillotson, the most popular preacher and divine of the period, told in the same direction. He changed pulpit oratory. The elaborate and conscious scholarship of preachers like Bishop Andrews and Bishop Jeremy Taylor gave way to a clearer and less ornate style. Tillotson, and the preachers of his time, shew the influence of such books as Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. And, thirdly, there was the influence of the coffee-house, and the habit of discussion and criticism of all subjects, even the most profound, that the coffee-house produced. It is difficult to realize how largely such debates figured in the life of the time. Tindal's reconversion from Romanism was said to be due to an argument he had heard in a coffee-house. A character in one of Berkeley's dialogues says that in a drawing room, a coffee-house, a chocolate house, at the tavern and the like fashionable places of resort, it is the custom for polite persons to speak freely on all subjects, religious, moral, or political.1 And Bishop Butler, in his Charge of 1751, speaks of sceptical and profane men bringing up the subject of religion at meetings of entertainment, and such as are of the freer sort. 2 This coffee-house debating-society atmosphere tends to simplification, sometimes to an undue simplification. The argument has most weight which is, not necessarily most true, but most readily apprehended, and most easily expressed in few words. Towards the middle of the eighteenth century the growth in importance of the middle classes tended to increase the plainness of speech of those who took part in theological controversy. Argument about religion does not make men more devout, nor bring into fuller consciousness what in religion is most valuable and most characteristic. A sterile rationalism makes God the conclusion of an argument. Every other faculty but the logical faculty becomes suspect. Faith becomes a dead assent to merely external formulæ. Immediate religious experience is ignored and forgotten.3 The inner light' is a will-o'-the-wisp. When religion is anything more than words, it becomes identified with morality, a moral 1 Berkeley, Alciphron, Dialogue, i, § 11. 2 Works, i, 288. 3 William Law's mysticism is the necessary reaction from eighteenth century rationalism. system on a theistic background. It became in the eighteenth century, even for the most religious, a system of government by rewards and punishments.' Poetry, mystery, and the love of God are forgotten. The view of God's relation to the world (denying His immanence) which is usually associated with the name 'Deist',1 was not held by the most prominent members of the school. Tindal, for example, holds that God preserves the world by His continual all-wise Providence. 2, But there seems to have been a multitude of writers of books and pamphlets, whose writings, and even names, have not survived. The development of the movement from Toland, through Antony Collins, to Tindal and his successors was increasingly negative and critical. These three names mark the three main stages of Deism. John Toland (1670-1722) published in 1696 (the year after Locke's Reasonableness of Christianity) a little book with the title Christianity not Mysterious; or a Treatise Showing That There is Nothing in the Gospel Contrary to Reason, nor above it, and That No Christian Doctrine Can Be Properly Called a Mystery. The title describes his general position. Toland had been brought up a Roman Catholic. He was an attractive, disreputable figure, travelled, wellread, a writer of begging letters, and a political spy. His attitude to the deep things of the Faith is that what he cannot understand ought not to be believed. The mysteries in Christianity came partly from Judaism, but mostly from paganism. He never dreams that religion may be an unique experience that makes no real appeal except to a similar experience. He accepts 1 See Encyclopædia Britannica, art. 'Deism'. 2 Christianity as old as the Creation, p. 314. Christ's miracles as proof of His mission, and takes the divinity of the New Testament for granted. But his almost arrogant belief in the reason of his own time gave great offence. An Irish peer gave as his reason for not attending church that once he heard something there about his Saviour Jesus Christ, but now all the discourse was about one John Toland.1 Later, he grew more liberal and more outspoken. In conversation in coffee-houses he spoke of the Old Testament miracles with flippant scepticism. By the time that Nazarenus (1718) was published he had become a Unitarian and a Pantheist. Anthony Collins (1670-1729) was the most conspicuous of the Deists who relied chiefly on Biblical criticism. His Discourse on Free-thinking (1713) claims that the only safeguard against superstition is that every one should use his right of thinking freely. He repudiates the very conception of orthodoxy, and complains that the clergy do not study divinity, but how best to defend certain accepted conclusions. He makes reason our only source of religious knowledge, and believes that a 'natural duty' is of more certain obligation than any command of positive religion. Those who live by reason are Christians, and Socrates and the like are of this number. Collins made many slips in his book, and Bentley gained a great popular reputation by his reply to him. But it was upon the weak points in the case, the mistakes in scholarship, that Bentley concentrated; the strong points in the argument he largely ignored. Later, Collins went further.2 He explained away some of Christ's miracles and attacked the argument from prophecy. He held that it was only when prophecies 1 Hunt, Religious Thought in England, ii, 244. |