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I, of the old Civilization;

II, of the New:

the one of which Paul came to destroy-the other, to propagate.

I. The characteristic of the old civilization as displayed in Religion, Government, and Literature, may be termed trust in objective forms.

There was one principle underlying all the popular religions of the Orient; behind their last analysis, one cause. They were without God. Long before this humanity had proved itself that it was ignorance and weakness. It had put to its inner-self a thousand eager but fruitless inquiries of its being. A thousand times it had leaned on its great heart for support, and had fallen. From the exhibitions about it, nay, more from the strength of its own mystery, it argued the existence somewhere of the very soul of wisdom and power, upon which it might rely. Untaught to find it in a subjective condition, it sought it in the forms by which that existence was demonstrated. This was the travail of soul, by which Idolatry was produced. Polytheism and Pantheism were but the gradatory refinements of the old idea-exponents of the national mind by which they were originated and fostered. But whatever of corrupt ceremonial in adoration, or degrading custom in sacrifice; whatever of vice, or whatever of virtue were to be discovered here, all had an existence in the Greek, the great historic nation of the time. In it were two orders of social life, whose castes of thought and action were Antipodes. The Greek termed Οι πολλοι and Οι σπουδαιοι. The one applied to the many, who were ignorant and rude; the other to the few intelligent and refined. The distinction between them is obvious. The masses were eminently irreligious. Many had not yet risen above the grossest idolatry. To those who had, the earth seemed but a vast temple in which each Divinity had a shrine sacred to its worship. Their altars stood in the populous thorough-fare and the deserted highway. They consecrated mountain and vale; forestalling the eagle's eyrie and the song-bird's shade, to find fitting rest for their Gods. Cities, temples and seas, were their immediate care; Rome turned confidingly in her distress to Mars; and the Parthenon looked out on the wild waves of the Ægean, the one sacred to Minerva, the other, Neptune's home. They had not as yet learned the absurdity of any trust, and especially such trust, in such Saviours. Superstition was the distinguishing trait in this character. The other order owed its parentage to this. It was sprung from, and in its youth had been nourished by this. Under the action of external influences-sometimes, it may be, from a stronger innate force which would press upward to a nobler hope-it had attained a condition supe

rior in the accomplishments and graces of life, but one equally disastrous to that life. Intellectual culture had nearly taught them to despise their senseless images and manifold Gods, but it failed, as must human knowledge ever fail, to teach them the "one only God." Too learned for gross superstition, too ignorant for faith; wearied by unavailing search, bewildered in eternal doubt, they at last took refuge in unbelief, endeavoring to bolster themselves up with fictions of stoical indifference or sublimated philosophy. Of this class infidelity was the characteristic. As the extremes of heat and cold produce the same effect, so superstition and infidelity conduce to one end. They are each indications of an objective state of mind; the one, because it views Creative power not as working by visible agencies, but itself the visible agent; the other, because it originates in the lack of spiritual development.

As government always takes certain types from certain religious forms, from the first of these sprang monarchy; from the second, oligarchy: one pregnant with degrading despotism, the other with unending schism; interchanging, as the one or the other of these characteristics was in the ascendant. From the prevailing form, the social condition taking its complexion-for, in the normal state, the order of influence is God, the state, the individual-exerted upon it a powerful reflex influence. But, under the action of superstition and despotism, on the one hand; and on the other, infidelity and schism, society had fallen under its own degradation, bleeding from its strife with itself. In such a state only could monarchy and oligarchy exist; because they pre-suppose, as a necessity, a people in whom ignorance and failures have begotten distrust of the conclusions of their own minds, and a desire for a revealed will, of which their senses may take cognizance.

The history of Literature shows it to have ever been keenly sensitive to the influence of religion and government. Yet the Greek owed it to neither of these, that in it he attained his greatest subjectiveness. It had been affected to them only to its injury. The sensuous nature of the one, and the poorly developed spirit of the other, could but degrade it. To æsthetic culture it was indebted for its perfect expression, and whatever of spirituality it possessed. The purest subjectivity of the Greek arose, not from a contemplation of moral truths, as does the Christian's, but from a study of beauty and harmony in sensible objects, unable even to discover the divine principles shadowed forth by these symbols.

Poetry was to him the most attractive portion of literature. It was so because it treated of realities in the simple language of every day life; or, if it adorned, it was but the picture of a common scene-the echo of

a sound familiar to his ear. Hesiod and Sophocles alone can be regarded as having risen above this standard; and they accomplish it only at long intervals, sufficient but to serve as exceptions to the rule. The eloquence of the orators transferred to the parchment, took a higher rank than poetry. But they spoke little of abstract conditions. Isocrates and Demosthenes rose to their highest spiritual conceptions, to which they ever attained, when inspired by sensible occasions. The need of the Cyprian* prince excited one to the study and revelation of the immunities of power; and Macedonian lust stimulated the other to his triumphant vindication of liberty as a right, and a condition indispensable to virtue.

In presenting Philosophy as evidence supporting our leading proposition, it is that we may rather consider it in the light of an exception; but as an exception, whose tendencies are all in our favor. Only that Philosophy which was most sensuous, was at all acceptable to the masses. The remainder was too subtle for them; and foiled in their attempts to comprehend, they turned away to condemn and hate it. There is evidence of this in the fact that Grecian Philosophy separated its votaries from the people, elevating the former to the dignity of an aristocracy; but settling the latter to a confirmed and more tenacious trust in their God. But though designed to be purely subjective,.comparatively speak. ing, it was still objective. It possessed none of the broad, deep, meaning spirituality, of that developed under the auspices of Christianity; but was contracted and superficial. Starting with what it deemed general principles, it never elevated itself to the conception of what was higher than it, because its reasoning was downward to fact. Such being the almost universal character of Grecian Philosophy, we are at no loss to discover its defect and its need. Oh! could this splendid image but have felt the breathing Deity, how excellent the life into which it would have awaked. But it was left for Him upon whom had fallen the mantle of a greater than Elijah, to rouse the dead progeny of Greece,-Greece widowed of her Spirit-spouse, after whom she called in oracle, strove by symbol, but in vain.

II. The civilization which Paul came to propagate, was that of which his own experience was a type, whose characteristic was faith in a subjective Creator. As polytheism took its rise in man's inability to conceive of a God infinite and indivisible, so it was overthrown when that

*Discourse to Nicodes II, Prince of Salamis.

+ Raising the son of the Shumanite-widow from the dead.

inability was removed, and a new power had furnished him with a perfect ideal. No longer, as of old, proffering useless adoration to a deity of his own fashioning,; but by faith communing with One, upon whom none could look and live; there perished the fictitious life of the senses, and a new one was begotten in the soul. As Aaron's rod swallowed the wands of the magicians, so this new spirit, by absorbing, destroyed the false and hurtful tendencies of humanity, and quickened its diseased powers into health. This development was full and symmetrical. Under the old religion individual qualities had been deified, and worshiped under individual forms. This partial worship destroyed the symmetry of the soul, a portion of whose faculties were unfolded to distorted proportion, while many, and its noblest capabilities, were left still slumbering germs. But in the new dispensation, so general and harmonious was action without and within, from the soul, as from an unfailing fountain, were pure emotions ever springing up. Reason, no longer cramped and dissatisfied, could act legitimately; judgment give in right verdicts; and will, whether influenced by these, or what was higher than these, was no longer a stern tyrant, but a generous prince. As under the old, so under the new dispensation, external action was a fair exemplification of the internal mind. Before, statesman and philosopher had vainly sought in reason and oracle a remedy for objective evil; now, humanity righted its own evils by inspiration. The precept, "Love thy neighbor as thyself," was diviner and mightier than the morality of Delphi.

As has been indirectly shown above, spiritual culture is accompanied by, or is a sure precursor of mental, and of consequent self-dependence. It is so, because its effect on mind is to demonstrate to it its capabilities, and to disembarrass the operation of all its faculties; thus affording resources for unlimited improvement. Its influence upon hope begets the highest possible stimulants to that improvement. In the experience of the ancient, where man "perished into utter nothingness," or, at best, awoke again to a life as sensual as it was enduring, knowledge was not sought for its intrinsic worth, or for its influence on the present or future life; but, as the plant in the darkened cellar creeps toward the light, so he sought knowledge, impelled by the necessities of his nature. But now, taught to anticipate eternal life and joy; and that unceasing improvement was a condition of that life and that joy, the mind and spirit of humanity pressed gladly and together onward in their unending way. Another evidence is found in the effect of spiritual culture upon external circumstances. The spirit of love, of meekness and gentleness, which is its "eternal

idea," eradicates the spirit of unnatural strife, and affords opportunity for mental discipline; for the nations, no longer disposed to struggle for the mastery in bone and sinew, compete for honest and honorable supremacy in mind. But the inevitable and necessary tendency of cultivated mind is, to free government. Inspired with confidence in its own operations and conclusions, it no longer seeks conformity with a master mind, but becomes its own responsibility. Since the preaching of Paul there have been no exceptions to this rule.

Esthetic culture had rendered the expression of Greek literature perfect. Complete mental and spiritual development in later times has not perfected expression only, but has originated truthful conception. The ancient found introspection a source of fruitless and harassing speculation, and turned to material nature, as that alone which could afford satisfaction. The modern comprehends and loves not material nature less, but the immaterial more; for he finds in it a broader, sunnier field for reason and imagination; a theatre for grander triumphs and serener joys. Immediately after Paul's advent in Athens, literature gave evidence of its tendency to subjectivity in the great increase of ethical compositions. In still later times, every department of it shows this tendency to be more and more decided. The "Raphael" of Lamartine, and "Scarlet Letter" of Hawthorne, are types of what are now her commonest forms. Poetry rises higher; for she has not only caught the meaning of the "impassioned expression in the countenance" of universal nature, but she addresses familiarly and by name every emotion of the soul. The one finds its representative in Wordsworth; the other in Shakespeare. But faith-subjective development, as the characteristic of the new era, is seen more especially in modern Philosophy. Her reasoning is no longer from principle to nature; but from nature and principle to God. Having analyzed the mind, distinguished its faculties according to the functions of each, and shown under what varied forms they all unceasingly attest their relations to power creative, she is no longer a chaos of shivered sculptures heaped about religion's sacred shrine; but, fashioned in fitting harmony, they together form a divine temple, whose pavement and pillars are the one; the other the sunlit dome.

Such are some of the reflections our subject suggests. Such, as they have been described, are the character of the occasion it involves; and the characteristics of the two civilizations, which by contrast it exhibits. If we would draw from it a lesson of practical good, it needs no inspira-tion to assure us which is the more excellent. Now and for evermore, over the deserted fanes of false religions, and the broken columns of

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