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BUSHNELL ON CHRISTIAN NURTURE.*

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Since that time, there has been but little progress in the discussion, and as far as publications are concerned, the status belli is very nearly as we left it. The Committee of the Massachusetts Sabbath School Society have not seen fit to take any public notice of the "Argument" addressed to them. Meanwhile the author has assumed to himself the copyright which he never wholly relinquished, and has issued in a volume," the Discourses," the "Argument," and other productions that are related to the subject in discussion. These are, an article on the " Spiritual Economy of Revivals," first published in the Christian Spectator for 1838; another entitled "Growth not Conquest the true method of Christian Progress," which originally appeared in the New Englander for 1844, under another title; and two sermons, now published for the first time, one entitled "the Organic unity of the family," and the other, "the scene of the Pentecost and a Christian Parish." The design of this additional matter, was to explain, to vindicate, and to qualify the positions advanced in the Discourses and the Argument. The volume is substantially one, having one object and being sustained by the same considerations; all of which are suggested or implied in the original discourses. The discourses give us the substance of the entire volume. The additional essays, &c., are but an ex

Views of Christian Nurture, and of subjects adjacent thereto; by Horace Bushnell. 12mo, pp. 247. Hartford: Ed

win Hunt. 1847. VOL. VI.

16

pansion and defense of its principles and arguments.

We do not propose to give an extended account of this volume. Nor do we think it necessary for the purpose which we have in view in this discussion. That it shows on every page the attractions peculiar to its author, we need not say. Our constant readers are too familiar with these attractions to require that they should be commented upon by us. These readers also know that Dr. Bushnell, as one associated in the conduct of this journal, is a writer and a man whose aid we value most highly, and on whom we very much rely. We are very willing, too, to have them suppose, that we should be inclined to bestow a friendly and perhaps a partial criticism upon any of his productions. We should be quite ashamed to be supposed capable of any other feelings. At the same time, we are not willing to confess ourselves conscious of any deficiency in the purpose to judge of his positions and arguments in any other than the light of truth, or to withhold from them a full and unbiased scrutiny. Without premising any farther, we enter at once into the critical examination which we have proposed, following our own order of thought.

We inquire at the outset-What is the truth that is advanced and defended by the author? To this inquiry, he has given a distinct answer. The doctrine of the original discourses is thus announced in his own language. "Assuming then the question above stated, What is the true idea of Christian education ? I answer in the following proposi tion, which it will be the aim of my arguments to establish, viz: THAT THE CHILD IS TO GROW UP A CHRISTIAN. In other words, the aim, effort and expectation should be, not, as is commonly assumed, that the

child is to grow up in sin, to be converted, after he comes to a mature age; but that he is to open on the world as one that is spiritually renewed, not remembering the time when he went through a technical experience, but seeming rather to have loved what is good from his earliest years."-p. 6.

The proposition announced in these words seems to us to be sufficiently clear and intelligible. It speaks its meaning for itself. To avoid any possible debate or confusion, we add that it is in form a practical proposition, or a proposition concerning a duty. The duty is that Christian parents and teachers should aim, strive and expect, to realize a given result. That result is, that the child is to grow up a Christian." The reality and the obligation of the duty, will of course turn upon a question of fact. That question is, whether the result contemplated is both possible and attainable. This is the only question about which there is or can be any difference of opinion, and the whole discussion is entirely concerned with this question of truth or of fact. No man will deny or question, if the implied truth thus contended for by Dr. Bushnell is established, that the consequent duty will follow. The proposition actually discussed is one of fact. The author contends that a child can and may be expected to grow up a Christian. The great question about which he concerns himself, is the question of the truth or falsehood of this position.

We inquire next, whether there is any thing new or peculiar in this position which Dr. B. takes and defends? We raise this inquiry, because the author contends that it is peculiar, in distinction from that which he supposes his readers to hold-and in distinction also from the view current among the churches; and that therefore it will be considered by them as new, though inasmuch as it has been recognized in

other countries and at other times, it is not new. We raise it also for another reason. There is a cer tain class of critics, whose wisdom is often exhausted by the very pithy observation on a doctrine, which they are unable or are indisposed to canvass, that "whatever is new in it is not true, and whatever is true is not new." For this common decision of cautious and non-committal wisdom, we have very little respect, albeit it constitutes the entire stock of many who are cried up as oracles for safety and profoundness. It is with an eye to them that we propose the question, whether there is any thing peculiar and new in the posi tion of the author.

The author, as we have said, thinks his views are new and pecu liar. "But unhappily the public mind is preoccupied extensively by a view of the whole subject, which I must regard as a theoretical mistake, and one which must involve, as long as it continues, practical results systematically injurious. This mistaken view it is necessary, if possible, to remove. And accordingly what I have to say will take the form of an argument on the question thus put in issue."-pp. 5,6. What the mistaken view is, with which he joins issue, he indicates in his formal proposition, as already quoted. He does it in the words, "not as is commonly supposed that the child is to grow up in sin, to be converted after he comes to a mature age." With the view thus stated he holds a vigorous argument. He expands this view. He dwells upon it. He attempts to show its absurdity and inconsistency with the nature of things, with other received principles, with the methods of God in nature and in grace, with his declarations in his word and with the experience of other nations and other times. The fact that the view against which he contends is really held, he does not discuss. This he takes for granted. Is he right in

this assumption? Is the opinion against which he contends the prevailing opinion, and is his own opinion peculiar in being different from that which generally prevails?

In undertaking to answer this question, we can only speak of that which is more generally received, and which is recognized as the current doctrine. For a doctrine may be current, and yet not be universally received. The writer of these remarks has always believed and preached the doctrine advanced by Dr. Bushnell. He has even preach ed it in the same antagonistic form which he has adopted, as being different from the theoretical views of the great mass of the Christian community, and from the practical aims of the most of his hearers. It is to be supposed that not a few have held and taught, and sought to act upon the same opinion. Many too may have felt dissatisfied with the current doctrine, and have felt and strongly felt that there must be a truth that differed from that doctrine, and yet have not reached any settled conclusions. All this is quite consistent with the fact that the view of these discourses differs from that which is generally received.

What then is the generally received opinion in respect to Christian nurture? It is generally held, we believe, that there is a nurture which is peculiarly Christian-that there are methods of discipline and instruction which are the appointed means of spiritual blessings, and that to fulfill the measure of duty which rests upon the Christian parent, is a most serious obligation. We do not believe that there exists a Christian parent in New England, who does not suppose that he owes important duties of this kind to his children, and that the training which they shall receive from him has much to do with the question, whether they shall be Christians at all, and also with the question, what sort of Christians they shall be. We

believe it is also true, that the majority of New England Christians view this training as a process preparatory to the possession of the Christian character by their children, and that as a preparatory discipline, 'a schoolmaster to bring them to Christ' it is generally to be long continued, and patiently prosecuted for years, before the result shall be realized that the main design of so slow and gradual a development of the powers of the infant into childhood and youth, is to provide for a long course of this discipline, which may be expected to result in conversion, when the child attains that reflection which shall fit it to understand and receive the Gospel. This it is thought must be the ordinary history of the Christian life. Exceptions are admitted to be possible by all. It is allowed that now and then, there may grow up the rare and blessed spectacle of a child that shall have never known the time when prayer and praise were not exhaled from its spirit, as naturally and as constantly as the sweet breath of the morning rises from the dewy bosom of the eartha child into the history of whose intellectual and moral life, kind affections and virtuous resolutions, conscientious services and religious hope, have been so closely intertwined, as to seem a part of that life itself. But these children are spoken of as special and strange exceptions to the ordinary method of God-as sanctified of God by a special act of his favor-children around whose cradle bright angels of grace have watched, and into whose infantile dreams they have breathed gentler and purer influences than fall to the lot of ordinary mortals. The blessing of such a child is looked upon as peculiar, to hope for which would be presumptuous by ordinary mortals, and to attempt to train which would be to commit an audacious effrontery, by asserting a claim sure to be dis

honored, upon the secret and reserved gifts of God's sovereign pleasure. Accordingly such children are looked for in the hut of some widowed mother in Israel, as the rare comfort in sorrow patiently and meekly endured, the only flower left to cheer her along her desolate pathway or perhaps in the house of some patient and noble laborer for Christ, the earnest of the reward for which he hopes-or perhaps in the line of a long series of eminent Christians, as the memorial of prayers that in past generations went up to God-or, which is last and rarest of all, as sent into some house of godlessness and sin, a child of innocence in the midst of corruption, to carry the remembrance, the reproofs and the attractions of heaven, into the very precincts and among the very defilements of hell.

We do not say that the existence of such a character is deemed a miracle, for it would not be true; but we do say, that as far as the hope to rear such a child by efforts appropriate to the result, is concerned, so far it is viewed as though it were a miracle. It is treated as a miracle, so far as not to be labored for, because labor for it is thought to have no propriety. Nay, it is not even prayed for with any faith, because it is a gift of so rare and sin. gular a character, that even to pray for it to be wrought by concealed methods of grace, is thought to be presumptuous.

The grounds for this opinion are manifold. There is first, the view of the Christian scheme as necessarily beyond the reach and compre hension of the mind of the infant. The child, it is reasoned, must be saved by the Gospel. The Gospel to exert its influence on the character, must be understood. In order to be understood, the character of God, the evil of sin in its demerit and danger, the work of Christ as a justifying Savior, must be reflected upon and believed. These are the

fewest truths, and this the simplest scheme of doctrine, that can be thought of, to furnish the basis of faith. But a mind to understand these truths, must be trained to reflection, and must be so far devel. oped as to comprehend them. It is well even, if more than this is not supposed essential to conversion. Too often is it thought necessary that the Gospel should be expanded into an intricate metaphysical statement, and embarrassed by the subtleties of scholastic distinctions, and assent is demanded to all this in order that the Christian character may have a beginning. For this a mature mind is requisite-a mind not only mature enough for the ordinary processes of thought, but one spe cially disciplined in the niceties of dogmatic theology. But to such a comprehension of Christian truth, the mind of the child is entirely unequal, and on the theory which makes it necessary, it is cut off from the Christian character, simply be cause it is not sufficiently mature; and no effort, no prayer, and no hope is put forth, till the child shall be old enough to comprehend the Christian scheme. All the efforts that are used have a prospective reference. They all look to a date pushed for ward in the history of the child. The prayers even, are all drafts on time upon the treasury of heaven. In order to hasten the time of pos sible conversion, great pains are ta ken to simplify the doctrines of Christianity down to the capacity of the child. Metaphysical disqui sitions on the nature of the soul, the attributes of God, the evidences of Christianity, and almost on the ori gin of evil, are amplified and diluted. They are spiced with stories and illustrated by pictures, in order to steal a year or two upon the appoint ed time for the development of reflection, and to shorten the dreary season of necessary impiety.

Another cause akin to the one just named, is the very prevalent

conviction that the Christian life must begin by regeneration experienced as a conscious change of character. This supposes the capacity for reflection distinctly developed, and the power to scrutinize closely and clearly the inner self, in order to observe and record its internal processes. Now inasmuch as the child is intellectually incapable of such an experience, it is thought in vain to hope for it. The child lives in the outward. Its inner self is unknown as an object of reflection. Its very joys and sorrows, its passions, hopes and fears, are all projected upon the outward objects that excite them. It hardly knows that it has a heart, a conscience, affections, or a will, and the teaching that it must have a new heart to begin with, and that it will do no good to begin till it has first aimed to have a new heart and succeeded in this aim, is paralyzing to the parent, and if nothing worse, is Chinese to the child. The parents are aware that such a conversion, as a conscious event to the mind reflecting on itself, is beyond the years and the powers of the infants that prattle on their knees. To alleviate this difficulty, the same effort is used to force the mind to an unnatural precocity, and to drive it into itself by most unnatural and revolting efforts at self-reflection. The child is set to the metaphysical study of the question, how to get a new heart,' by a treatise or story that is supposed to dilute this complex subject down to its infant understanding.

Last of all, the prevalent view is confirmed by a reference to the actual history of early conversions. It now and then happens that in a season of excited religious activity, or perhaps stimulated by the warn ings and entreaties of faithful parents, one or many children seem to begin the Christian life, and the hope is feebly ventured that they have true Christian feelings. But the sea. son of present excitement is soon

passed. Childhood and youth return to their sports and their thoughtless moods, and because the Christian convert does not show his piety by the gravity of premature manhood-because he does not moralize like a sage of seventy, or look out upon life with the sadness of one who has had experience of life's unguish and its tears, its early promise of goodness is at once set down as a "false conversion," and this severe conclusion is written on the brow of parents and Christian friends. Nay, it is well if it do not stare out from the chambers of the soul, like the handwriting upon the wall, no hope,''the evil heart still remains.'

We ask next whether the view advanced in these discourses is true and justly stated. We quote the words a second time for the sake of clearness. "The aim, effort, and expectation should be-that he [the child] is to open on the world as one that is spiritually renewed, not remembering the time when he went through a technical experi ence, but seeming rather to have loved what is good from his earliest years." Is the fact taken for grant. ed in this proposition of duty, that a child may and may be expected thus to "open on the world," well grounded? Is the statement true or false. On this point we feel no hesitation. Of its truth, we doubt not in the least. And yet to guard against any possible misconstruction, we add the following explanations of what we suppose the author to have intended by his language. When he speaks of the child rightly trained as "not remembering the time when he went through a tech. nical experience,” we do not suppose him to mean that the child shall know nothing of reflection upon sin indulged or committed, with the honesty of hearty repentance and the relief of trusting faith. Such "experiences" are not unfrequent occurrences in the history of the best of men long after the first "tech

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