Aids to Reflection; and, The Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit. Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Читать онлайн. Newlib. NEWLIB.NET

Автор: Samuel Taylor Coleridge
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directly favourable to our great design; and to avail ourselves of all the positive helps and furtherances which these circumstances afford. But neither dare we, as Christians, forget whose and under what dominion the things are, quæ nos circumstant, that is, which stand around us. We are to remember, that it is the world that constitutes our outward circumstances; that in the form of the world, which is evermore at variance with the Divine form (or idea) they are cast and moulded; and that of the means and measures which the same prudence requires in the forming anew of the Divine Image in the soul, the far greater number suppose the world at enmity with our design. We are to avoid its snares, to repel its attacks, to suspect its aids and succours, and even when compelled to receive them as allies within our trenches, we are to commit the outworks alone to their charge, and to keep them at a jealous distance from the citadel. The powers of the world are often christened, but seldom christianized. They are but proselytes of the outer gate; or like the Saxons of old, enter the land as auxiliaries, and remain in it as conquerors and lords.

      APHORISM XXII.

      The rules of prudence in general, like the laws of the stone tables, are for the most part prohibitive. Thou shalt not is their characteristic formula: and it is an especial part of Christian prudence that it should be so. Nor would it be difficult to bring under this head, all the social obligations that arise out of the relations of the present life, which the sensual understanding (το φρονημα της Σαρκος, Romans viii. 6.) is of itself able to discover, and the performance of which, under favourable circumstances, the merest worldly self-interest, without love or faith, is sufficient to enforce; but which Christian Prudence enlivens by a higher principle, and renders symbolic and sacramental. (Ephesians v. 32.)

      Comment.

      This then, under the appellation of prudential requisites, comes first under consideration: and may be regarded as the shrine and frame-work for the Divine image, into which the worldly human is to be transformed. We are next to bring out the Divine Portrait itself, the distinct features of its countenance, as a sojourner among men; its benign aspect turned towards its fellow-pilgrims, the extended arm, and the hand that blesseth and healeth.

      APHORISM XXIII.

      Comment.

      Herein the apostle places the pre-eminence, the peculiar and distinguishing excellence, of the Christian religion. The ritual is of the same kind, (ὁμοουσιον) though not of the same order, with the religion itself—not arbitrary or conventional, as types and hieroglyphics are in relation to the things expressed by them; but inseparable, consubstantiated (as it were), and partaking therefore of the same life, permanence, and intrinsic worth with its spirit and principle.

      —— γενετ Ουρανος, Ωκεανος τε Και Γη.

      [26] James i. 25. Ο δε παρακυψας εις νομον τελειον τον της ελευθεριας. The Greek word, parakupsas, signifies the incurvation or bending of the body in the act of looking down into; as, for instance, in the endeavour to see the reflected image of a star in the water at the bottom of a well. A more happy or forcible word could not have been chosen to express the nature and ultimate object of reflection, and to enforce the necessity of it, in order to discover the living fountain and spring-head of the evidence of the Christian faith in the believer himself, and at the same time to point out the seat and region, where alone it is to be found. Quantum sumus, scimus. That which we find within ourselves, which is more than ourselves, and yet the ground of whatever is good and permanent therein, is the substance and life of all other knowledge.

      N.B. The Familists of the sixteenth century, and similar enthusiasts of later date, overlooked the essential point, that it was a law, and a law that involved its own end (τελος), a perfect law (τελειος) or law that perfects or completes itself; and therefore, its obligations are called, in reference to human statutes, imperfect duties, i.e. incoercible from without. They overlooked that it was a law that portions out (Νομος from νεμω to allot, or make division of) to each man the sphere and limits within which it is to be exercised—which as St. Peter notices of certain profound passages in the writings of St. Paul, (2 Pet. iii. 16.)—oι αμαθεις και αστηρικτοι στρεβλουσιν, ὡς και τας λοιπας γραφας, προς την ιδιαν αυτων απωλειαν.

      APHORISM XXIV.

      Morality is the body, of which the faith in Christ is the soul—so far indeed its earthly body, as it is adapted to its state of warfare on earth, and the appointed form and instrument of its communion with the present world; yet not "terrestrial," nor of the world, but a celestial body, and capable of being transfigured from glory to glory, in accordance with the varying circumstances and outward relations of its moving and informing spirit.

      APHORISM XXV.

      Woe to the man, who will believe neither power, freedom, nor morality; because he nowhere finds either entire, or unmixed with sin, thraldom and infirmity. In the natural and intellectual realms, we distinguish what we cannot separate; and in the moral world, we must distinguish in order to separate. Yea, in the clear distinction of good from evil the process of separation commences.

      Comment.