IS it possible that any intelligent Protestant of our days has the least confidence either in the theology or the method of the Mystics? Are we to believe that that system which we have seen springing up among the earliest corruptions of the Church, and culminating in the age of its grossest darkness--a system whose uniform tendency has been to supplant the plain truths of the Bible by the speculations of philosophy or the fancies of a morbid imagination--is still cherished and respected in the midst of the effulgent light of this nineteenth century? No. As a system it is distinctly repudiated. Its postulates are rejected, and its conclusions laughed at. It is not to be supposed that we could have seen the hundreds of eminent philosophers and theologians it has wrecked upon the hidden rocks of a specious infidelity, and have taken no warning from their fate and learned no wisdom from their example. On the contrary, an open avowal of confidence in the system would excite the mingled commiseration and ridicule of every man whose judgment would be worth regarding.

      Why, then, have I introduced it as one of the existing impediments to the acquisition of truth? Why have I occupied so much space in tracing its origin and progress? what practical value can there be in anything I have yet written on the subject? My answer is, that notwithstanding [72] the distinct repudiation of the Mystic Theology as a system, and the emphatic condemnation of its method as the sole and exclusive guide to truth, that method is still employed to an extent varying with the necessities of every several sect. But being commingled with other methods, and being kept as much as possible out of sight, it would have been difficult to have shown its presence, its influence, and its dangerousness, without having first pointed to its portrait as it stands out in bold relief upon the canvas of history. Now I hope to be able to identify it, even in its present form and surroundings, with a known and recognized enemy.

      The change has been one of degree, not of kind. Protestants would be indignant at the idea of interpreting all Scripture upon Mystic principles; they think that only a part of revelation is to be thus construed. They have in this taken one step, and a very important one too, in the right direction. We now believe--and let us keep this in mind, and be thankful that we do believe it--that the "internal sense and marrow" of only a part of Scripture is concealed "under the vail of the outward letter;" and let us show all becoming contempt for the absurd Origen, who so ridiculously presumed to extract this "marrow" from every passage! How monstrous, for him to think that all Scripture had a double meaning, when it is so evident that this is true of only a part! Ay, but what part? What chapters, what verses, what particular forms of expression, are we to look upon as containing this deep and hidden sense? And what is that sense? How is it to be known? [73] How are we to reach it? How prove it? Here, it seems to me, we are all adrift, without chart or compass.

      Still, I grant you, the Mystic Theology is walled out, if we may so express it, by Protestantism. And let us give thanks that our fathers, and our cotemporaries, with ourselves, have had the ability and the manliness to complete so herculean a work. For it is indeed a great work. And now, as we stand upon this mighty wall, and gaze upon the slimy and pestilential waters with which our ancestors sought to purify the healthful stream of truth, let us drop a tear for the weakness of poor human nature, and then come down and examine the stream on our side of the wall. Why seems it so dark and turbid? What mean those particles of filthy green that we see floating on its surface? Why is it not clear and sparkling as when it gushed at first from the fountain-head? It is because our fathers left a flood-gate in the wall, which we have never had the courage to close. In fact, we find it very useful as a means of communication between the present and the past; and there are, besides, many other important uses connected with it, which we will try to make you understand.

      Just observe, if you please, while I shut down this floodgate. The water very soon, you perceive, becomes clear as crystal, and seems to be fresh and living. But do you not see that it has retired into a narrower channel? To this your attention is particularly directed; because, although it is a very small matter in itself, "our church," as you must have noticed, is built upon such high ground, that the water is beyond our reach when it gets so low. And look [74] all along down the stream at the various denominational establishments--some upon higher and some upon lower ground--but none of them in reach of the water when the whole of this mystic current is shut out!

      But why not remove those establishments down to the stream? Softly, my clear sir--let us not cast reproach upon our ancestors! These all stand where they placed them; and it is not well to interfere with existing institutions! Let us maintain our consistency! We occupy a high place in the world, which has been gained at much cost of labor, money, and talents, and we must not sacrifice it to an experiment. Besides--and now I will raise this gate again--do you not see that it does not deprive us of a single particle of truth? We have the whole of the water of life flowing by us, while this gate is merely a contrivance for elevating it to our level. I declare to you, so admirable is this arrangement, that I have not language to express my abhorrence of the gross and corrupting plan adopted by Clemens and Origen. They, instead of moderately using mysticism for good, and bringing it to the support and enlargement of the truth, carried the truth into it, where its stream was soon lost in the immensity of the horrible gulf which received it. But here, examine this swelling current, analyze it, and you find truth in every particle of it! And say what you will, as human nature now is, the success of the Church is not to be expected in any other way. We have known several small parties of very fastidious tastes, spiritually, who seemed not to relish this mixed water of life, and who colonized far up above this [75] flood-gate, but low down by the fountain-head of the stream. They never seemed, however, to attract much attention, and their movement was generally regarded as a presumptuous insinuation that the water below this is unwholesome; a sentiment which, whether expressed or implied, has been decided by the best and ablest men to be heterodox! And in this decision the world has almost unanimously acquiesced. We must, my very dear sir, keep pace with the upward and onward progress of the world!

      I am sorry to hear you ask me how we manage to agree upon the height this gate is to be raised; for, to be frank with you, this matter has given us a good deal of trouble. Now and then a captious radical insists upon closing it altogether; but in the main, our difficulties are of a different kind. Several short-sighted denominations, not making allowance for the influence of this flood-tide in changing the place of the original current, have spent a great deal of time in watching the direction of the current above the gate, and in making calculations to ascertain where it should be at any given point below, as they think that part of the mixed stream must be rather purer and more delicious than any other. And hence they have built as near the point indicated by their calculations as the nature of the case would admit. But the elements of these calculations are so various that they have reached very different conclusions; and the consequence is, that while some are nearly flooded by the stream, and are using every exertion to lower the gate, others are barely within reach, and are becoming clamorous for its higher elevation; while [76] "our church" is just situated as it should be, and I trust we have sufficient influence to prevent any change being made for many years to come.

      But it is a lamentable fact, that ignorant and thoughtless persons, who seem to have at heart neither the beauty of Zion nor the well-being of the world, have often tampered with this gate after the most shameful sort--some jerking it up to an alarming height and letting in whole floods of Arianism and Antinomianism, while others have slammed it down so recklessly as to shut out the ritual of the law, and the covenant of circumcision, and have thus made sad havoc of the peace and prosperity of the Church. To prevent such misfortunes in the future, we have succeeded in constructing a gauge, which we call "Evangelicalism," by which we can determine precisely how high the gate is to be raised; and if any one ever ventures to elevate it more or less than he should, we have able and skillful men at the head of affairs, who instantly rush to the rescue, and, by means of a powerful lever we have invented, called "Orthodoxy," they very soon succeed in getting it back to its proper and evangelical elevation.

      This is the way the work goes on. Every new interpreter, if he will but put his hand upon that lever, however lightly he may bear, and keep his eye fixed upon that gauge, which has various degrees marked on it to suit the different tastes of those who adopt it, will be honored by some and tolerated by all. But he who presumes to lift the gate higher than the prescribed limits, is an enthusiast and a fanatic; while it any one dare to my the hand of common [77] sense upon it, and shut it altogether, he, forsooth, is an uncharitable exclusive--an unmitigated bigot--a radical and a heretic!

      But perhaps the reader would like to have this matter exhibited without a figure; to see it in its native, unadorned shape and coloring. If so, though we cannot, without changing our fixed plan and purpose, enter into specifications which might excite the ill-will of some whom we hope to benefit, we will do the best we can to gratify him in the way of general allusions.

      It may be remarked, then, of Protestant interpreters generally, that, in consequence, it may be, of early education, or in the absence of thorough investigation, or from some other cause, it matters not what, they are led to believe a certain doctrine, or system of doctrines, true. Let us do them the justice to admit that they are honest in this belief. Their opponents, however, call up before them an array of Scripture texts, the plain and obvious meaning of which is directly antagonistic to their cherished belief. There is now but one alternative: they must either abandon sentiments and doctrines to the advocacy of which they have long been publicly committed, or they must persuade themselves and others that the Scriptures adduced have a spiritual sense different from their literal signification; nay, so widely different that it harmonizes with doctrines confessedly the opposite of their literal meaning. And can we hesitate in deciding upon the course they would adopt in a case like this? Their genius is set to work; their imagination, their learning, all their powers, are called [78] into requisition, for the purpose of finding that in those texts which is already in their minds. They "ascribe an objective existence to the subjective creations of the mind's own faculties--to mere ideas of the intellect"--and this is mysticism. And now, the means which are made use of for the purpose of seeing, and of showing to others, that agreement between the subjective and the objective, whatever be their peculiarities, constitute the Mystic method. Such an effort as that we have supposed in the above case, would be singularly unsuccessful if it failed to involve the subject at least in doubt. It is no very difficult matter to weave almost any text into a sort of metaphysical web that can mean anything or nothing, pro re nata. Then some show of learning--an appeal to the original, and a quotation from the fathers--will be ample preparation for a climacteric stroke of ridicule,--and the work is done!

      Meanwhile their opponents have been treated to a catalogue of texts which, it is insisted, teach clearly and unequivocally that they are wrong. In self-defense, they leave the prosecution of their charges, and engage with pious courage to prove the consistency and scripturality of their church and doctrines. And here begins a new series of spiritual meanings. The commentators are called in; the critics are summoned to take part; the absurdity of the letter is insisted upon; while divers mortal dangers are discovered to be lurking in it by the light of Paul's second letter to the Corinthians;¹--and presently their case is [79] made out. Their assailants are hushed--awed into silence, mayhap, by the presence of the learned divines introduced--everybody sees that the passages might mean so and so--the debatants insist that such must be their meaning--and the point is settled.

      And thus the work proceeds. A third party, and a fourth, a fifth, and a tenth, each spiritualizes a part, and each contributes something toward the general uncertainty of all interpretation.

      In this way the door has been opened for the plausible introduction of all manner of crude and false interpretations; and when thus opened, no party has been able to close it, because each one has found it necessary to pass through it for a portion of its belief. Any one of them would gladly use the knife of common sense with which to cut off the spiritualized authority of its neighbors, if it were not conscious that the same instrument applied to itself, would deprive it of many fair proportions. All are, therefore, estopped by their own records, from exposing and eradicating a method which, in the case of others, they perceive to be false. Hence it is, that the wildest vagaries of the most ridiculous fanaticism can be supported by Scripture arguments analogous to those of our more sober and less visionary fellow-Christians.

      It is true, then, of Protestants, (although it may be less palpable, less open and avowed than in the case of Origen and his compeers,) that they too have their various philosophies as so many touchstones of biblical interpretation. It may be the real or the corrupted philosophy of Plato, that[80] of Aristotle, of Locke, or Cousin--or it may be a system fabricated by themselves--the effect is the same, the principle is the same, and the method engendered by it is the same. In every such case, their interpretation is but an effort to reconcile revelation with their favorite system of religious philosophy. When the literal meaning fits the pattern, that is accepted, and the excellent rules in our hermeneutics on the importance of abiding by the obvious sense, are quoted and applied with a hearty good will; but in all other cases resort is had to the Mystic method, under the specious and self-deluding pretense of spiritualizing the Scriptures, until the agreement is satisfactorily brought about. This is often done when men are unconscious of it themselves. They nearly all have their philosophies of conversion, for instance, or regeneration, or sanctification; and believing them to be true, they can hardly avoid viewing the Scriptures through them as a medium, and transferring them to the Scriptures as their meaning. Even in preaching the gospel, very few feel satisfied until they have shown its harmony, as they understand and proclaim it, with some recondite philosophy of the mind--its affections, will, power, and disability; while in nine cases out of ten, this can only be done by perverting or mystifying the Scriptures.

      What can be expected from pursuing such a course? If it should be adopted in the study of the book of nature, (as it once was,) we know full well the results that would follow. Science would be paralyzed. The facts which speak to us in the rippling stream, the falling shower, the [81] flashing spark, the changing seasons, and the revolving spheres--in all things above, beneath, around, and within us--would become as the fairy tale. Their voice would lose its distinctness; and their revelation of law and truth would be metamorphosed by this alchemic principle into a base counterfeit or an empty nothing. And can we expect a different result when it is followed in the study of the Bible? Will not its revelation of spiritual law and divine truth be lost upon one who refuses to see that law or to understand that truth otherwise than as they agree with the ideas which already fill his mind? Let a man but take to his soul the flattering conviction that in some sense and to a certain degree he is inspired to know the hidden mysteries of revelation, and he is lost to common sense. Every appeal made to him from the Bible falls powerless upon his ears, because he attaches a secret meaning to it. The pertinency and authority of the word are only recognized when his explanation is placed upon it, and his explanation, however far-fetched and absurd, favors his position. Question the correctness of his interpretation, and he speaks of the mysteries of the faith and the deep things of God, beyond the reach of vulgar sense. He knows that he is right--he has the consciousness of it within him. It would be next to infidelity for him to doubt the correctness of conclusions to which he has been guided under the gracious illumination of the Holy Spirit. And here are ten, twenty, fifty such men--all led to conclusions by the Holy Spirit, and all led to different ones!

      Such are the more striking characteristics of the Mystic [82] method, as pursued by Protestants. Not that they are all equally guilty; for the evil is almost infinitely various in the degrees of its manifestation. Some have seen the perverseness of the method, and have abandoned it. Others have perceived that its reckless employment was pernicious, and have sought to limit it by various precautionary rules, which, however, are generally too indefinite to be enforced, and too loose to be practically useful. While not a few recognize no limit to its employment but the necessities of their own foregone conclusions,--which, filling their minds and occupying all their thoughts, are transferred to every passage they read, and are seen everywhere in the fathomless deeps beneath the letter, be it what it may. They have thus become a sort of spiritual Bletonists, whose senses are so acute that they can perceive the presence of water far down beneath the surface, while ordinary mortals must either dig at random, or else remove to the springs which gush spontaneously from the bosom of the earth.

      We conclude, then, from facts which are of every-day occurrence, which are embodied in our standard theological works, and which are everywhere well known: 1. That Protestants do still resort to the Mystic method of biblical interpretation, some with reference to one text and some to another--some to a greater and some to a less extent. Though they do not, like Origen, turn the whole Bible into a mystery, they bring mystery into the Bible--which is an evil identical in kind, though different in degree. 2. That, while it is generally conceded that this method is only to be followed in the interpretation of a part of Scripture, still, [83] as there are no well-defined and controlling principles which regulate its pursuit, and decide what part of the Bible is to be thus construed, this limitation itself is of but little practical force. Hence, the method is used as we have seen, by the different parties, to pervert almost any text to the support of a foregone conclusion, or to be in harmony with a pre-existent idea; while the result has been that general indefiniteness and uncertainty of interpretation, which it should be the immediate object of hermeneutics to correct. 3. That this method is pursued simultaneously with others, both correct and incorrect, which results in the incongruous commingling of truth and falsehood. Hence every denomination can prove its doctrines true, because, by analysis, the truth may be found in them; while, as a system of doctrines, every one, perhaps, might be shown to be false--to give an incorrect and inconsistent exhibition of Christianity as a whole. The truth they contain gives them permanency, and supplies to their advocates arguments for their defense; while the error mixed in with it engenders opposition and multiplies divisions and sects. 4. And finally, that this state of things must continue, unless we can determine upon great and certain principles which shall effectually set aside the method that has produced it; for nothing can effect a permanent cure that does not eradicate the cause of the disease.

      It therefore becomes incumbent upon us, before proceeding to the discussion of other methods, to contribute what we may be able toward the settlement of those things in this, which are now left to every man's prejudices or [84] interests. And to facilitate our progress toward a clear comprehension of those important principles, the establishment of which we deem necessary to the completeness of the subject we have had under review, and which must be drawn from the nature of the Bible itself, we shall, for the time, arrange the communications of that book under two grand divisions or heads--the one embracing all those Scriptures which are literal, and the other those which are figurative; to each of which we shall devote a brief chapter, for the purpose of showing the inappositeness of the Mystic method to any text of Scripture. [85]

[TOOS 72-85]