Miscellaneous.

From the New York Observer.

THE HEAD OF THE CHURCH.

The church is represented in the Scriptures as a body. Of course therefore it must have a head; and that same blessed book tells us who the head is. And who, think you, is the head of the church? Who but Christ himself? Who else is fit to be its head-its source of influence and government? I will produce the passages of Scripture in proof of Christ's headship presently.

But the Catholics say that the Pope is the head of the church. Ah, is he? Where is the proof that he is? Now there is nothing which irritates a Catholic so soon as to ask him for proof. "Proof indeed!" he says. "Do you ask proof of an infallible church? What is the use of infallibility, if we must prove every thing? These are truly most degenerate days. The time was when nobody demanded proof; but now every little sprig of a protestant must have reasons to support assertions. He calls for proof. And he must have it from the Bible. He will not believe any thing in religion unless some text can be cited in support of it. Things have come to a pretty pass indeed." It is even So. We plead guilty to the charge. For every thing alleged to be a doctrine of Christianity, we confess we do require some proof out of the writings of some evangelist or apostle. And since our Catholic brethren will not gratify us by adducing the Scriptural warrant for believing the Pope or Bishop of Rome to be the head of the church, we will do them the favour of consulting the Scriptures for them. Well, we begin with Genesis, and we go through to Revelation, searching all the way for some proof that the Pope is the head of the church. But so far are we from finding any evidence that he is the head of the church, that we find not a particle of proof that he is that or any thing.

We find no account of any such character as a Pope-not a word about him. The subject of the proposition, i. e. the Pope, does not scem to be known to that book at all. I really do not wonder that it frets a Catholic when we send him to the Bible for proof that the Pope is the head of the church.

But though we discover nothing in the Bible about a Pope, yet we find much about the head of the church. In Ephesians i. 22, 23, Christ is said to be "the head over all things to the church, which is his body." Now, if the church is his body, surely he must be the head of it, as well as head over all things to it. Will any one say that the Pope of Rome is the head of Christ's body? That is shocking. And yet the Catholics are told that they must believe it; and seing they cannot help it, they do somehow or other contrive to believe it. In Eph. v. 23, it is explicitly declared that" Christ is the head of the church.' "The same is repeated in Col. i. 18: "He (i. e. Christ) is the head of the body, the church."

Our brethren of the Catholic church have long been in the habit of asking where our religion was before the reformation. They may see where one doctrine of it was 1500 years before the reformation. One would suppose from the way they talk that they supposed the Bible was written a considerable time after the reformation, and it was then got up to support the Protestant heresy! I might ask them, but that they do not like to be asked questions lest they should not be able to answer them, where their doctrine of the Pope's headship of the church

1834. On Paternal and Conjugal Authority in Matters of Religion. 207

was when the New Testament was written, i. e. some 1750 or 1800 years ago. But I will withdraw the question. It may seem unkind to press it.

Now, since the Bible says that Christ is the head of the church, if the Pope also is, there must be two heads of the church. But there is only one body. Why should there be two heads? Is the church a monster? Besides, if there had been another head, Christ would have been spoken of in the Scriptures as one of the heads of the church, or as a head of the church. But he is called the head of the church. The article is definite, denoting only one. There is not a syllable in the Bible about another head. Indeed the language of the Bible does not admit of there being another. Yet the Catholics say there is another; and it is their Pope. "Christ being absent, they say it is necessary there should be a visible human head to represent him on earth." Now the Pope, they say, is this visible head of the church-the head that you can see. But is their assumption correct, that Christ is absent? Is he absent? Hear: "Lo I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." "Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them." Was he absent from Paul? He says: "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me."-A visible head! What do we want of a visible head? Of what use to us-the part of the body here, is a head a way off at Rome? It is no better than a caput mortuum to us.

But what if we admit the possibility of a visible human head of the church; who made the Pope that head? Did he inherit this also from St. Peter? Was Peter head of the church? He, more modest than his pretended successors, does not any where claim that title. I know the Catholics hold him to be the rock-the foundation of the church, but I really did not know that they regarded him, whom, however they exalt, they still consider but as a mere man, as capable of being head of the church too. It is not too much to speak of Christ as both the foundation and head of the church, but to speak of Peter, poor Peter, as we are accustomed to call him, when we think of the scene of the denial, as both foundation and head of the church, is really carrying the matter rather far. How little Peter thought he was both, "when he went out and wept bitterly!" How little he knew of himself.

The pope the head of the church!! Then the church is the Pope's body!! Alas for the church!

M. S.

ON PATERNAL AND CONJUGAL AUTHORITY IN MATTERS OF

RELIGION.

Translated for the Christian Advocate, from the Archives du Christianisme of 3d February last.

The authority of a father over his children, and the authority of a husband over his wife, are sacred rights. On this point the divine law agrees with human laws: it commands children to obey their parents, and the wife to obey her husband; attaching great promises to the performance of the duty, and terrible threatening to its violation. When sophists have attempted to break or to change these relations between the head and the several members of a family, the public sentiment has covered them with merited disdain.

But if the public is unanimous in the recognition of these rights, it is not less so, in prescribing to them certain moral and social limits,

which they can never be permitted to overleap. Suppose a father should order his son to commit a crime, or a husband should order his wife to perform a dishonourable act-is a son or a wife, in such a case, to obey? No, certainly-answers the public voice, unanimously. But why is obedience, in such a case, no longer obligatory? Because-it is answered with the same unanimity-paternal and conjugal authority are never to transcend the moral and civil laws. When a father, or a husband, does not respect these inviolable bounds, he abdicates his power; and criminality, in such an event, would consist in obedience, and not in disobedience. This is so true, that human legislation renders a wife or a child (if the latter is above a certain age) responsible for their actions, although they should even allege in their defence, the orders of a father, or a husband-The divine Legislator subjects them to the same responsibility.

These points being established, I demand whether, if paternal and conjugal authority has moral and civil limitations, has it not also religious limitations? In other words, if a father, or a husband, has not the right to cause a child, or a wife, to transgress the maxims of conscience, and the limitations of the penal code, has he the right to cause the one or the other to violate the duties of religion? In still other terms-If obedience ceases to be due to a father, or a husband, when he enjoins what would be criminal, or infamous, in the eyes of man, is obedience due to him, when he attempts to impose the profanation and contempt of the commandments of God?

There is but one answer to these questions among Christians. To them the Bible appears, to say the very least, to be worthy of as much respect as the penal code; the will of God, as obligatory as the prescriptions of the civil law; the practice of religion as essential as obedience to the rules of social order; the salvation of the soul as important as the preservation of individual liberty; and they think that if they ought not to expose themselves to be put in prison, for obeying a father or a husband, they certainly ought not to expose themselves to the everlasting condemnation of God."

These ideas carry with them the most perfect evidence of truth; they may be calumniated by exaggeration, but they cannot be fairly refuted.

Here, nevertheless, is apparent, one of the most lamentable wounds which has been sustained by our religious manners; and it would be little to say that it affects us, for indeed it fills us with terror. Ask the greater part of those about you, not only those notoriously irreligious, but those who entertain a good opinion of their pious feelingthey will tell you that children and wives ought implicitly to obey their fathers and husbands, in every thing that relates to religion. But suppose a husband should order his wife not to set her foot in a church, because the truths of Christianity are displeasing to him-What then? She ought to obey him, is the answer. And what if a father should order his children to profane the Lord's day, in the grossest manner? They ought to obey him. But what would you say, if a father and a husband should forbid all the members of his family ever to open the Bible, the book of God? They ought to submit. Then it follows that the authority of a father and a husband is supreme, over all the duties and all the acts of religion. Yes, without doubt it is;-the peace of the household is above every other consideration. What then, if the head of a family should order his wife, or his children, to steal something from a neighbour? Ah! that is a very different matter.-How

1834. On Paternal and Conjugal Authority in Matters of Religion. 209

so? would not the peace of the household be disturbed by disobedience, in this instance, as well as in the other? O, sir, that question is not to the point. I understand you. We ought not to preserve the peace of a household at the price of a theft; but what matter is it, though the law of God should be violated by the grossest transgressions?

The most frightful materialism lies at the bottom of these maxims, which reign throughout almost the whole of France, and which every one may prove to exist, wherever he pleases to make an investigation. They exist even among men of reflection; yea, even among persons who esteem themselves sufficiently pious. These maxims, however, are nothing else than a version of the following language" All religions are equally true, equally false, and equally useless. It is a matter of indifference whether any one of them is followed, or not followed. As long as my wife and my children choose to conform to one of them, and that conformity cause me no uneasiness, it is very well. But if religion occasions me the least trouble in the world-if one of my children, for example, adopt ideas or practices which do not accord with my own, then perish religion! I will forbid that child to go to church; I will take his Bible from him; I will prevent his ever hearing a word of religious exhortation. If he resists me, I will see in him nothing but a disobedient, rebellious, fanatical child, who is forgetful of my just authority."

And this man, let it be observed, executes what he says, to the very letter. He vociferates that his paternal and conjugal authority are disregarded-however little his wife and child persist in reading the Bible and frequenting divine service, after he has given them his orders to the contrary. He cries aloud of the disobedience, of the rebellion of the members of his family; and thousands of voices, inclusive of those of a pharisaical spirit, are united with his own. They do not imagine that the authority of a father, or a husband, has sacred limits, in respect to the commandments of God. They would rise up with indignation against the head of a family, who should attempt to complain of his wife or his child, for not obeying a command he should lay upon them to commit an outrage, for which they would be amenable to a civil court; but if he complains of acts which are only a violation of the duty which is due to God, they, with one consent, encourage the head of a family to trample the religion of the whole family under his feet. If this is not a manifestation of the most astounding materialism, then tell us what is.

In general, (and we have very often the grief to make it prominent in our articles, entitled Religious Manners,) religion exists in scarcely more than in words, and in certain forms; as soon as we search into opinions and actions, materialism appears in its perfect form.

We shall put an end to these short reflections, by reciting an anecdote of very recent occurrence. A pastor was called to visit a young person who was rapidly approaching the end of her earthly pilgrimage. Notwithstanding the sufferings in which she was found, her father, who was present, complained bitterly that his daughter had disobeyed him. What then had been her fault? She had chosen to sanctify the day of sacred rest, according to the appointment of God! To reproaches so unjust, and so unseasonable at such a solemn period, the young woman answered nothing; but she opened the New Testament, and with her finger pointed her pastor to the first verse of the sixth chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians: Children, obey your parents, IN THE LORD.

Ch. Adv.-VOL. XII.

2 D

EDITORIAL REMARKS.

That paternal and conjugal authority have their limits, beyond which submission to them is not a duty but a sin, must be obvious to every reflecting mind; and we have never seen those limits more clearly and strikingly marked out, than in the first part of the foregoing essay. The undue exercise of parental and conjugal authority, in matters of religion and conscience is, we rejoice to say, far less frequent in the United States, than it appears to be in France; and for this we have much cause to be thankful to God, for a favourable allotment of his providence in our behalf. With us, we believe there are a hundred instances of pious parents finding a reluctance in their children to give a due attention to the concerns of their souls, for one, in which pious dispositions and a conscientious regard to duty, in a child, are frowned upon and interfered with, by parental authority or influence. Yet we know that cases of the latter kind, and some of a flagrant character, do exist among ourselves; and perhaps it is a thing of still more frequent Occurrence, that a pious wife finds it difficult to reconcile the duty which she owes to God with the wishes, and perhaps the commands, of an impious husband. Every such case demands much Christian sympathy; and as public sentiment with us, is certainly not as it is in France, in favour of, but in strong and direct opposition to, the unhallowed and tyrannical claim of a parent, or a husband, in the matter before us, the guilt of the offending party is peculiarly odious, as well as greatly aggravated.

We have reason, likewise, to be thankful, that materialism is much less prevalent in our country than in France. Yet of this also we have no inconsiderable portion. The Owenism, and Fanny Wrightism, which have more than a few admirers, not to mention the avowed atheism, which is organized, and openly defended in print, in a neighbouring city-all this is materialism, of the very worst character. Nor is it dormant and tolerant, but awake, active, and malignantly hostile to all religious and moral principle and action. We know, indeed, that atheists and materialists sometimes talk of morals; but their morality can have no other sanction than self-interest, and the opinion of society-feeble restraints, indeed, to the impulses of sensual appetite, impetuous passion, and insatiable cupidity. Morals, properly so called, always imply a lawgiver, whose laws they are, and who has given them to the subjects of his moral government, and to whom they are responsible for obedience, or disobedience. We never talk of the morals of dogs and horses, and the ground on which we tread; and the term can with as little propriety be applied to any being who differs from dogs and horses, and the dust of his feet, only in form, animation, or a larger measure of instinct; and yet such are materialists and atheists, according to their own reckoning. In sober truth, infidel materialism is a most appalling and horrible system; against the prevalence of which, not only every Christian, but every patriot, and every friend of his species, should use all his influence, as against that which, in its very nature, is destructive of all social happiness, all respectability, and all moral obligation, as well as all hope of future and eternal happiness.

There have been many materialists who professed to believe in the resurrection of the body, and a future state of rewards and punishments, and who have also avowed their full belief in the Christian religion. These, although deeply erroneous, are totally different from atheistic and infidel materialists.