ART. V. Charles Elwood; or, The Infidel Converted. By O. A. BROWNSON. Boston: Charles C. Little & James Brown. 1840. 1 vol. 16mo. pp. 262. THE position, that Mr. Brownson has for some time occupied in our community, has prepared us to look with interest upon whatever may come from his pen. There is much, too, in the nature of the book before us, to commend it to the attention of the thoughtful. It purports to be an account of the conversion of an infidel to Christianity. For this reason alone it would deserve serious attention. But, when we further consider that the Author gives what has been substantially his own experi the book has a still stronger claim upon our consideration. It is written in the form of a Novel; but it makes no great pretensions to merit as a work of that class. The Author was aware that his book would not stand very high, when judged of by the rules of criticism by which productions of this kind are usually tried. It has but few characters and little incident. It is but a short time since there was a large number of persons in our neighborhood, who professed to be infidels, and in the same state as to faith in the supernatural, that Elwood was at the commencement of the experience related in the book before us. It would be interesting to see how far Mr. Brownson's arguments have been successful in converting this class of infidels to Christianity. He came to Boston some five or six years since, with the express design of gathering around him the doubting, who were then flocking to Abner Kneeland. What has been his success? We are not aware that Mr. Brownson has converted them into his followers. But has he, or has he not, broken up and destroyed the Kneeland organization? It is the opinion of many, who know much more about it than the writer of the present article, that he has. The fact is certain, that with all the advantages of being persecuted and imprisoned for opinion's sake, this party has been decreasing for several years. Kneeland has gone to the West. We give the following extracts from a letter of his, published in the Investigator for March 25, 1840. The letter is dated Salubria, (I. T.) Jan. 29, 1840: "Alas! what a change has one year made! Our numerous, not to say innumerable friends, where are they? But I fear the Investigator, which has been such a bold and zealous advocate for free inquiry, must die for want of patronage.... If I am correctly informed, the paper has gone behind-hand more during this volume, than it has done in any one volume since its commencement, even the first." This, he thinks, however, is partly owing to the "scarcity of money, and the non-payment of dues." If this result, or any part of it, has been brought about by Mr. Brownson, and such views as he has given us in this book, then certainly we ought to consider how far it may be a means of converting those, who still doubt or disbelieve, to a serene faith. Infidelity is thought by many, and we suppose rightly, to be a characteristic of our age. As it manifests itself, it is a serious evil. We believe that it is felt to be so by many of those who are its victims, as well as by those most interested in upholding the institutions of Revealed Religion. They feel their want of faith to be their misfortune rather than their fault. Whether we think so or not, it is quite certain that they do; and it is nearly as certain that we cannot exert much if any good influence upon them, if we begin by contradicting them. Besides, if they are right in this opinion, it would not only be unjust, but cruel, to charge to their fault an evil, the worst part of which they themselves suffer. These men are some of the most shrewd and thoughtful of our citizens, as we suspect almost any one, that has tried logic with them, must have found. We do not say that they are the soundest and best informed men that we have, though many of them are very well read. We think, therefore, that their want of faith cannot be charged upon an obtuseness of intellect. Is it to be charged upon a depravity of heart? Without stopping to consider whether their moral sense and habits are as correct and pure as they should be, or not, we think that it will appear from the nature of their difficulties, that they could not arise from a corruption of the heart. They are intellectual difficulties, difficulties, which the heart has nothing to do with. This, at least, is the case with many persons. For our present purpose, we may consider mankind as divided into three classes, according to their manner of receiving their religious faith, and the foundation upon which it rests during their lives. The first class consists of those whose pious parents gave them a careful religious education, and who have never been led, by the development of the philosophic element, or by the spontaneous activity of their minds, to doubt what their parents taught them. They have never sought for the philosophical grounds of what they received dogmatically, when, from their age, they could receive it in no other way. The book before us professes to give the philosophical grounds of faith, and, of course, it cannot interest those who have never felt the want of these grounds. Perhaps the immediate effect of this book upon their minds would be bad; for it might unsettle what has been, hitherto, a quiet, serene faith, and one that was abundantly adequate to all the wants of their souls. The book will shock and disturb such persons, for it will raise doubts and perplexities in their minds, which they might otherwise have escaped. Nay, we doubt not, that to persons of this class, that to which Elwood was converted, will appear to be no less infidelity than that from which he was converted. This, however, could not have been avoided, for it was the faith which these persons consider to be orthodox, and whose philosophical grounds they have never sought for, which, as it was presented by them, could not satisfy Elwood, and which, therefore, drove him to renounce all faith in the supernatural, and avow himself an unbeliever. Persons of this class never avow infidelity. The faith and church of their fathers entirely satisfy their souls. This class of persons will not be benefited by the book before us. It is not for them. The second class is composed of those in whom the sentiments, and affections, the poetic element, predominate over thought and reflection, — the philosophic element. Such persons are seldom troubled about the philosophical grounds of their faith. They are never able to give any account of their faith, even when it is ever so strong, that will satisfy the philosophic mind. All that they can say amounts to nothing more than that they believe because their instincts and affections lead them to believe; because faith satisfies a want of their nature, and that the creed in which they believe suits their purest and best feelings better than any other that they have seen. Their faith is emphatically the faith of the heart; and while the heart is pure and virtuous, their faith is firm and serene. But when their heart becomes corrupted, all their faith is gone. Their sin reappears as a thick heavy mist, through which nothing can appear clear and beautiful. No one, while the dark cloud of remorse hung over him, ever saw the Father smiling through it. The cloud must be dispersed, before the sun will shine upon the individual. "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." We know very well, that "the wages of sin is death," and while the fire that is not quenched is burning the vitals, and the worm that dieth not is gnawing the heart, there can be no serene faith in God and immortality; there can be no beauty in Jesus, that he should be desired. The fountains of love and devotion are polluted in their very source. While an individual is in this state, any dissertation upon the evidences of revealed religion, or any argument addressed to the intellect, however sound and conclusive it may be in itself, will be as inefficient to give him a cheerful faith, as it would be to allay the fire of a fever while the disease is raging in every pulse and fibre of his system. Unbelievers of this class can be but little benefited by the book before us, or, indeed, by any book that does not make them better men. They should be reminded of the declaration of Jesus, that "if any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God." But, there is a third class, in whom intellect predominates over the heart and its affections. They are more philosophers than poets; whereas the last class mentioned are more poets than philosophers. This third class will not believe what they cannot understand, and give an account of that will satisfy the philosophic element of their souls. The first class that we spoke of do as they have been taught; the second act according to their feelings, their purest and divinest instincts, their consciences. They ask for nothing further than that their instincts, their consciences, should approve a thing, and then they will believe and act. But the third class will not do and believe as they have been taught, until they have examined and satisfied themselves that what they have been taught is right. They are not willing, either, to follow their instincts and feelings, until they have proved by an appeal to something that is beyond their influence, that these instincts and feelings are right. If you say to them, "if any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God," they will answer, yes, but then the question is, what is His will? this is what I must know before I can do it. If you refer to Revelation, they have not yet admitted its authority. If you refer to their consciences, they are troubled to decide what is conscience and what passion, selfishness, or mere blind impression. Hence they can neither receive anything dogmatically, upon outward authority, nor can they receive it poetically, as resting upon the sentiments and affections. There is now but one resource left them. They must build upon the intuitions of the reason, and when they have got a sound and correct philosophy, they can legitimate authority, and their sentiments and feelings, and henceforth these become grounds of faith. For this class Mr. Brownson's book is especially intended. Infidelity is a phenomenon no less interesting to the philosopher than to the philanthropist and Christian. It should be calmly and candidly studied. No one may pretend to have found the cause of its appearing at any given time or in any individual, until he can state the infidel's views and difficulties to the satisfaction of the infidel himself. When we can do this, we may feel sure that we have seen things from his point of view, and are in possession of the first and the indispensable prerequisite for confuting and convincing him. If we find its cause to be in the moral nature, if it proceed from a corruption and depravity of the heart, then the infidel must be made a better man before he can believe. He that understands this kind of infidelity will not insist, at first, upon the infidel's believing in God, in Christ, and Immortality. He will seek to make him believe in and practise truth and virtue, and the kindly and social affections. By faith in these things, the unbeliever will be prepared for a faith in God and Immortality. He must understand earthly things before he can understand heavenly ones. But we believe that infidelity, that is, avowed infidelity, seldom proceeds from this cause. When one is really an infidel from the corruption of his heart, he has an instinctive sense of shame, which leads him to conceal, as far as he can, his want of faith, though he be not perfectly conscious that it proceeds from his depravity. He, therefore, professes to believe in and honor the institutions of Christianity. Hence the avowal of infidelity is always a good symptom. It is the confession that there is a disease, and the - |