The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 2, August, 1864 | Page 5

effect of this rebellion of the national mind against the Puritan
theories is seen in the almost yearly inauguration of some new sect in
religion, in a land which is already so crowded with diverse and
antagonistic religious organizations that it might be termed the land of
sects. However right or wrong in a religious point of view, the Puritans
committed the great social mistake of establishing a new church,
instead of working earnestly to reform the old in those respects in
which it seemed to them to have fallen into error, thereby destroying
the unity of the Christian world. Had the movement stopped here, less
harm would have been done; but it was not of the nature of things that
it should be so. The establishment of the principle that purity of

worship and of belief was to be sought, and diversity of religious
opinion to be gratified in separation and the erection of new
organizations, rather than in the endeavor to purify the old and
established form, at once threw wide open the door of schism, and with
it, in the end, that of scepticism. The movement once begun could
neither be checked nor controlled by any human effort. Others claimed
the right which they themselves had exercised, and the result was soon
seen in the separation of one after another denomination from the
Puritan Church, each, in its turn, to be divided into a score of sects,
according as circumstances should alter religious views. Were the
principles of true religion in themselves progressive, were the teachings,
of the gospel inadequate to or unfitting for all possible stages of human
progress, or were they capable of development, the world might then
have been the gainer. Or, again, were reason infallible, the separation of
the churches would be an incalculable blessing, by securing to all
minds a free investigation upon religious subjects. But infidelity desires
no more powerful coadjutor than human reason in its freest exercise,
because it is so liable to be led away by sophistry, and its invariable
tendency is to reject as myths and fables all things which it cannot
comprehend or for which it cannot see a material cause. Perfect reason
is the twin brother and strongest supporter of faith; but reason as it
exists in the present development of humanity is its most deadly
antagonist. The age of reason has fallen upon us, and its result is seen
in a practical scepticism pervading the whole of our society, which in
its extent and its injurious effects put to the blush the wildest
speculations of the most radical German metaphysicians. Every day we
see around us men of no religious profession, and little if any religious
feeling, calmly facing death without a tremor, without a thought of the
awful beyond. And though the application of the term infidel to such a
man would not fail to arouse his fiercest indignation, his indifference to
the events and the fate of the great hereafter can arise from nothing else
than an utter disbelief in the teachings of Holy Writ, in the truths of
Christianity. Such men are but types of a class, and that class a very
large portion of our population.
The evils of religious divisions are plain to be seen, even if they
consisted in nothing more than the division and consequent weakening

of Christian effort. The church of God, torn by internal dissensions,
becomes almost powerless for the spread of the gospel, the greater
portion of its strength and energy being exhausted in bolstering up its
different branches as against each other, and in proselytizing within
itself. Where, if united, a small portion of its wealth and energy would
suffice to support in a nourishing condition the worship of a great
people, leaving an immense surplus to be directed to the evangelization
of the heathen world, now, in its divided state, its power and immense
material resources are squandered in the support of innumerable
fragments, each one of which costs as much in labor and in means as
would suffice to sustain the religion of the whole country if united.
Worse than even this, the incessant bickerings of the Christian world
tend to invalidate, in the minds of the unbelievers, not only among the
heathen, but among ourselves, the teachings of that Word which is its
professed guide. The 'See how these Christians hate each other!' is to
reflecting minds outside the church's pale, an almost unconquerable
argument against that religion which professes to be founded upon love.
Hence arises a great portion of that practical infidelity of which we
have spoken, and which is the bane of our civilization. No nation can
be truly great or noble or progressive without religion, and by as much
as we are departing, in our every-day life, from the