“And the Lord said unto Moses, How long will this people provoke
Me? and how long will it be ere they believe Me, for all the signs
which I have showed among them?”—Numbers xiv. 11.
Nothing, I suppose, is more surprising to us at first reading, than
the history of God's chosen people; nay, on second and third reading,
and on every reading, till we learn to view it as God views it. It
seems strange, indeed, to most persons, that the Israelites should have
acted as they did, age after age, in spite of the miracles which were
vouchsafed to them. The laws of nature were suspended again and again
before their eyes, the most marvellous signs were wrought at the word
of God's prophets, and for their deliverance, yet they did not obey
their great Benefactor at all better than men now-a-days who have not
these advantages, as we commonly consider them. Age after age God
visited them by Angels, by inspired messengers, age after age they
sinned. At last He sent His beloved Son; and He wrought miracles before
them still more abundant, wonderful, and beneficent than any before
Him. What was the effect upon them of His coming? St. John tells us,
“Then gathered the Chief Priests and the Pharisees a council, and said,
What do we? for this Man doeth many miracles. . . . . Then from that
day forth they took counsel together for to put Him to death[1].”
In matter of fact, then, whatever be the reason, nothing is gained
by miracles, nothing comes of miracles, as regards our religious views,
principles, and habits. Hard as it is to believe, miracles certainly do
not make men better; the history of Israel proves it. And the only mode
of escaping this conclusion, to which some persons feel a great
repugnance, is to fancy that the Israelites were much worse than other
nations, which accordingly has been maintained. It has often been said,
that they were stiff-necked and hard-hearted beyond the rest of the
world. Now, even supposing, for argument's sake, I should grant that
they were so, this would not sufficiently account for the strange
circumstance under consideration; for this people was not moved at all.
It is not a question of more or less: surely they must have been
altogether distinct from other men, destitute of the feelings and
opinions of other men, nay, hardly partakers of human nature, if other
men would, as a matter of course, have been moved by those miracles
which had no influence whatever upon them. That there are,
indeed, men in the world who would have been moved, and would have
obeyed in consequence, I do not deny; such were to be found among the
Israelites also; but I am speaking of men in general; and I say, that
if the Israelites had a common nature with us, surely that
insensibility which they exhibited on the whole, must be just what we
should exhibit on the whole under the same circumstances.
It confirms this view of the subject to observe, that the children
of Israel are like other men in all points of their conduct,
save this insensibility, which other men have not had the opportunity
to show as they had. There is no difference between their conduct and
ours in point of fact, the difference is entirely in the
external discipline to which God subjected them. Whether or not
miracles ought to have influenced them in a way in which God's dealings
in Providence do not influence us, so far is clear, that looking into
their modes of living and of thought, we find a nature just like our
own, not better indeed, but in no respect worse. Those evil tempers
which the people displayed in the desert, their greediness,
selfishness, murmuring, caprice, waywardness, fickleness, ingratitude,
jealousy, suspiciousness, obstinacy, unbelief, all these are seen in
the uneducated multitude now-a-days, according to its opportunity of
displaying them.
The pride of Dathan and the presumption of Korah are still instanced
in our higher ranks and among educated persons. Saul, Ahithophel, Joab,
and Absalom, have had their parallels all over the world. I say there
is nothing unlike the rest of mankind in the character or conduct of
the chosen people; the difference solely is in God's dealings with
them. They act as other men; it is their religion which is not
as other men; it is miraculous; and the question is, how it comes to
pass, their religion being different, their conduct is the same? and
there are two ways of answering it; either by saying that they were
worse than other men, and were not influenced by miracles when others
would have been influenced (as many persons are apt to think), or (what
I conceive to be the true reason) that, after all, the difference
between miracle and no miracle is not so great in any case, in the case
of any people, as to secure the success or account for the failure of
religious truth. It was not that the Israelites were much more
hard-hearted than other people, but that a miraculous religion is not
much more influential than other religions.
For I repeat, though it be granted that the Israelites were much
worse than others, still that will not account for the fact that
miracles made no impression whatever upon them. However sensual and
obstinate they may be supposed to have been in natural character, yet
if it be true that a miracle has a necessary effect upon the human
mind, it must be considered to have had some effect on their conduct
for good or bad; if it had not a good effect, at least it must have had
a bad; whereas their miracles left them very much the same in outward
appearance as men are now-a-days, who neglect such warnings as are now
sent them, neither much more lawless and corrupt than they, nor the
reverse. The point is, that while they were so hardened, as it appears
to us, in their conduct towards their Lord and Governor, they were not
much worse than other men in social life and personal behaviour. It is
a rule that if men are extravagantly irreligious, profane, blasphemous,
infidel, they are equally excessive and monstrous in other respects;
whereas the Jews were like the Eastern nations around them, with this
one peculiarity, that they had rejected direct and clear miraculous
evidence, and the others had not. It seems, then, I say, to follow,
that, guilty as were the Jews in disobeying Almighty God, and blind as
they became from shutting their eyes to the light, they were not much
more guilty than others may be in disobeying Him, that it is almost as
great a sin to reject His service in the case of those who do not see
miracles, as in the case of those who do; that the sight of miracles is
not the way in which men come to believe and obey, nor the absence of
them an excuse for not believing and obeying.
Now let me say something in explanation of this, at first sight,
startling truth, that miracles on the whole would not make men in
general more obedient or holy than they are, though they were generally
displayed. It has sometimes been said by unbelievers, “If the Gospel
were written on the Sun, I would believe it.” Unbelievers have said so
by way of excusing themselves for not believing it, as it actually
comes to them; and I dare say some of us, my brethren, have before now
uttered the same sentiment in our hearts, either in moments of
temptation, or when under the upbraidings of conscience for sin
committed. Now let us consider, why do we think so?
I ask, why should the sight of a miracle make you better than you
are? Do you doubt at all the being and power of God? No. Do you doubt
what you ought to do? No. Do you doubt at all that the rain, for
instance, and sunshine, come from Him? or that the fresh life of each
year, as it comes, is His work, and that all nature bursts into beauty
and richness at His bidding? You do not doubt it at all. Nor do you
doubt, on the other hand, that it is your duty to obey Him who made the
world and who made you. And yet, with the knowledge of all this, you
find you cannot prevail upon yourselves to do what you know you should
do. Knowledge is not what you want to make you obedient. You have
knowledge enough already. Now what truth would a miracle convey to you
which you do not learn from the works of God around you? What would it
teach you concerning God which you do not already believe without
having seen it?
But, you will say, a miracle would startle you; true; but would not
the startling pass away? could you be startled for ever? And what sort
of a religion is that which consists in a state of fright and
disturbance? Are you not continually startled by the accidents of life?
You see, you hear things suddenly, which bring before your minds the
thoughts of God and judgment, calamities befall you which for the time
sober you. Startling is not conversion, any more than knowledge is
practice.
But you urge, that perhaps that startling might issue in amendment
of life; that it might be the beginning of a new course, though it
passed away itself; that a miracle would not indeed convert you, but it
would be the first step towards thorough conversion; that it would be
the turning point in your life, and would suddenly force your path into
the right direction, and that in this way shocks and startlings, and
all the agitation of the passions and affections, are really the means
of conversion, though conversion be something more than they. This is
very true: sudden emotions—fear, hope, gratitude, and the like, all do
produce such effects sometimes; but why is a miracle necessary to
produce such effects? Other things startle us besides miracles; we have
a number of accidents sent us by God to startle us. He has not left us
without warnings, though He has not given us miracles; and if we are
not moved and converted by those which come upon us, the probability
is, that, like the Jews, we should not be converted by miracles.
Yes, you say; but if one came from the dead, if you saw the spirit
of some departed friend you knew on earth: what then? What would it
tell you that you do not know now? Do you now in your sober reason
doubt the reality of the unseen world? not at all; only you cannot get
yourself to act as if it were real. Would such a sight produce
this effect? you think it would. Now I will grant this on one
supposition. Do the startling accidents which happen to you now,
produce any lasting effect upon you? Do they lead you to any
habits of religion? If they do produce some effect, then I will
grant to you that such a strange visitation, as you have supposed,
would produce a greater effect; but if the events of life which now
happen to you produce no lasting effect on you, and this I fear is the
case, then too sure I am, that a miracle too would produce no lasting
effect on you, though of course it would startle you more at the time.
I say, I fear that what happens to you, as it is, produces no lasting
effect on you. I mean, that the warnings which you really have, do not
bring you to any habitual and regular religiousness; they may make you
a little more afraid of this or that sin, or of this or that particular
indulgence of it; but they do not tend at all to make you break with
the world, and convert you to God. If they did make you take up
religion in earnest, though in ever so poor a way, then I will grant
that miracles would make you more in earnest. If God's
ordinary warnings moved you, His extraordinary would move you more.
It is quite true, that a serious mind would be made more serious by
seeing a miracle, but this gives no ground for saying, that minds which
are not serious, careless, worldly, self-indulgent persons, who
are made not at all better by the warnings which are given them,
would be made serious by those miraculous warnings which are not given.
Of course it might so happen in this or that particular case,—just
as the same person is moved by one warning, not by another, not moved
by a warning to-day, moved by a warning to-morrow; but I am sure,
taking men as we find them, miracles would leave them, as far as their
conduct is concerned, very much as they are. They would be very much
startled and impressed at first, but the impression would wear away.
And thus our Saviour's words would come true of all those multitudes
who have the Bible to read, and know what they ought to do, but do it
not:—“If they hear not Moses and the Prophets,” He says, “neither will
they be persuaded though one rose from the dead.” Do we never recollect
times when we have said, “We shall never forget this; it will be a
warning all through our lives”? have we never implored God's
forgiveness with the most eager promises of amendment? have we never
felt as if we were brought quite into a new world, in gratitude and
joy? Yet was the result what we had expected? We cannot anticipate more
from miracles, than before now we have anticipated from warnings, which
came to nought.
And now, what is the real reason why we do not seek God with all our
hearts, and devote ourselves to His service, if the absence of miracles
be not the reason, as most assuredly it is not? What was it that made
the Israelites disobedient, who had miracles? St. Paul informs
us, and exhorts us in consequence. “Harden not your hearts,
as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness .
. . take heed . . . lest there be in any of you” (as there was
among the Jews) “an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the Living
God.” Moses had been commissioned to say the same thing at the very
time; “Oh that there were such a heart in them, that they would fear
Me, and keep My Commandments always!” We cannot serve God, because we
want the will and the heart to serve Him. We like any thing better than
religion, as the Jews before us. The Jews liked this world; they liked
mirth and feasting. “The people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose
up to play;” so do we. They liked glitter and show, and the world's
fashions. “Give us a king like the nations,” they said to Samuel; so do
we. They wished to be let alone; they liked ease; they liked their own
way; they disliked to make war against the natural impulses and
leanings of their own minds; they disliked to attend to the state of
their souls, to have to treat themselves as spiritually sick and
infirm, to watch, and rule, and chasten, and refrain, and change
themselves; and so do we. They disliked to think of God, and to observe
and attend His ordinances, and to reverence Him; they called it a
weariness to frequent His courts; and they found this or that false
worship more pleasant, satisfactory, congenial to their feelings, than
the service of the Judge of quick and dead; and so do we: and therefore
we disobey God as they did,—not that we have not miracles; for they
actually had them, and it made no difference. We act as they did,
though they had miracles, and we have not; because there is one cause
of it common both to them and us—heartlessness in religious
matters, an evil heart of unbelief, both they and we disobey and
disbelieve, because we do not love.
But this is not all; in another respect we are really far more
favoured than they were, they had outward miracles, we too have
miracles, but they are not outward but inward. Ours are not miracles of
evidence, but of power and influence. They are secret, and more
wonderful and efficacious because secret. Their miracles were wrought
upon external nature; the sun stood still, and the sea parted. Ours are
invisible, and are exercised upon the soul. They consist in the
sacraments, and they just do that very thing which the Jewish miracles
did not. They really touch the heart, though we so often resist their
influence. If then we sin, as, alas! we do, if we do not love God more
than the Jews did, if we have no heart for those “good things which
pass men's understanding,” we are not more excusable than they, but
less so. For the supernatural works which God showed to them were
wrought outwardly, not inwardly, and did not influence the will; they
did but convey warnings; but the supernatural works which He does
towards us are in the heart, and impart grace; and if we disobey, we
are not disobeying His command only, but resisting His presence.
This is our state; and perhaps so it is that, as the Israelites for
forty years hardened their hearts in the wilderness, in spite of the
manna and the quails, and the water from the rock, so we for a course
of years have been hardening ours in spite of the spiritual gifts which
are the portion of Christians. Instead of listening to the voice of
conscience, instead of availing ourselves of the aid of heavenly grace,
we have gone on year after year with the vain dream of turning to God
some future day. Childhood and boyhood are past; youth, perhaps middle
age, perhaps old age is come; and now we find that we cannot “love the
thing which God commandeth, and desire that which He doth promise;” and
then, instead of laying the blame where it is due, on ourselves, for
having hardened ourselves against the influences of grace, we complain
that enough has not been done for us; we complain we have not enough
light, enough help, enough inducements; we complain we have not seen
miracles. Alas! how exactly are God's words fulfilled in us, which He
deigned to speak to His former people. “O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and
men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt Me and My vineyard. What could
have been done more to My vineyard that I have not done in it?
wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it
forth wild grapes[2]?”
Let us then put aside vain excuses, and, instead of looking for
outward events to change our course of life, be sure of this, that if
our course of life is to be changed, it must be from within. God's
grace moves us from within, so does our own will. External
circumstances have no real power over us. If we do not love God, it is
because we have not wished to love Him, tried to love Him, prayed to
love Him. We have not borne the idea and the wish in our mind day by
day, we have not had it before us in the little matters of the day, we
have not lamented that we loved Him not, we have been too indolent,
sluggish, carnal, to attempt to love Him in little things, and begin at
the beginning; we have shrunk from the effort of moving from within; we
have been like persons who cannot get themselves to rise in the
morning; and we have desired and waited for a thing impossible,—to be
changed once and for all, all at once, by some great excitement from
without, or some great event, or some special season; something or
other we go on expecting, which is to change us without our having the
trouble to change ourselves. We covet some miraculous warning, or we
complain that we are not in happier circumstances, that we have so many
cares, or so few religious privileges, or we look forward for a time
when religion will come easy to us as a matter of course. This we used
to look out for as boys; we used to think there was time enough yet to
think of religion, and that it was a natural thing, that it came
without trouble or effort, for men to be religious as life went on; we
fancied that all old persons must be religious; and now even, as grown
men, we have not put off this deceit; but, instead of giving our hearts
to God, we are waiting, with Felix, for a convenient season.
Let us rouse ourselves, and act as reasonable men, before it is too
late; let us understand, as a first truth in religion, that love
of heaven is the only way to heaven. Sight will not move us;
else why did Judas persist in covetousness in the very presence of
Christ? why did Balaam, whose “eyes were opened,” remain with a closed
heart? why did Satan fall, when he was a bright Archangel? Nor will
reason subdue us; else why was the Gospel, in the beginning, “to the
Greeks foolishness”? Nor will excited feelings convert us; for there is
one who “heareth the word, and anon with joy receiveth it;” yet “hath
no root in himself,” and “dureth” only “for a while.” Nor will
self-interest prevail with us; or the rich man would have been more
prudent, whose “ground brought forth plentifully,” and would have
recollected that “that night his soul” might be “required of him.” Let
us understand that nothing but the love of God can make us believe in
Him or obey Him; and let us pray Him, who has “prepared for them that
love Him, such good things as pass man's understanding, to pour into
our hearts such love towards Him, that we, loving Him above all things,
may obtain His promises, which exceed all that we can desire.”
[1] John xi. 47, 53.
[2] Isa. v. 3, 4.