Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again

J >> Joseph Barker >> Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again

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MODERN SKEPTICISM: A JOURNEY THROUGH THE LAND OF DOUBT AND BACK AGAIN.

A Life Story

by

JOSEPH BARKER.

Philadelphia:
Smith, English & Co.
1874.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1874, by
Rev. Joseph Barker,
In the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.
Jas. B. Rodgers Co.,
Printers and Stereotypers,
Philadelphia.

CONTENTS.

PREFACE, 7

CHAPTER I.

Introduction.--My early life.--Enter the Church.--The Ministry.--Happy
days.--Sad change.--How happened it? 17

CHAPTER II.

Causes of unbelief.--Vice.--Other causes.--Constitutional tendencies to
doubt.--Disappointed expectations about Christianity.--Mysteries of
Providence.--Misrepresentations of Christ and Christianity in human
creeds.--Church divisions.--Ignorant advocates of Christianity.--Wrong
principles of reasoning.--False science, 19

CHAPTER III.

Another cause of unbelief.--Bad feeling between ministers or among
church members.--Alienates them from each other.--Then separates them
from the Church.--Then from Christ.--How it works.--My case, 26

CHAPTER IV.

Origin of the unhappy feeling between me and some of my brother
ministers.--Tendencies of my mind.--Rationalizing tendency.--Its
effects.--Reading.--Investigations.--Discoveries, 30

CHAPTER V.

Modification of my early creed.--Unscriptural doctrines
relinquished.--Scriptural ones adopted.--Some doctrines
modified.--Theological fictions dropped.--Eager for the pure, simple
truth as taught by Jesus.--Doctrine of types given up.--Other notions
relinquished.--Alarm of some of my brethren at these changes, 44

CHAPTER VI.

How preachers and theologians indulge their fancies on religion.--John
Wesley.--His resolution to be a man of one book.--What came of his
resolution.--His sermon on God's approbation of His works,--unscriptural
and unphilosophical throughout.--Illustrations and proofs.--And Wesley
was one of the best and wisest, one of the most honest and single-minded
of our theologians.--What then may we expect of others?--Evils of
theological trifling.--Mischievous effects of mixing human fictions with
Divine revelations, 55

CHAPTER VII.

Further theological investigations.--Unwarranted statements by
preachers.--John Foster's Essay on Some of the Causes by which
Evangelical Religion is Rendered Distasteful to Persons of Cultivated
Minds.--Introduction of similar views to the notice of my ministerial
brethren.--The reception they met with.--No Church has got all the
truth.--Most Churches, perhaps all, have got portions of it, which
others have not.--My attempts to gather up the fragments from
all.--Freedom from bigotry.--Love to all Christians.--Judging trees
by their fruit.--Reading the books of various denominations,
like foreign travel, liberalizes the mind.--I found truth
and goodness in all denominations.--Appropriated all as part
of my patrimony.--Results.--Suspicions and fears among my
brethren.--Mutterings: Backbitings: Controversy. Bad feeling, 65

CHAPTER VIII.

My style of preaching.--Decidedly practical.--Using Christianity as a
means for making bad people into good ones, and good ones always
better.--Reasons for this method.--A family trait.--Hereditary.--Great
need of practical preaching.--Folly of other kinds of
Preaching.--Littleness of great Preachers.--Worthlessness of great
sermons.--The Truly Great are the Greatly Good and Greatly Useful.--My
Models.--The Bible.--Jesus.--My Favorite Preachers.--Billy Dawson, David
Stoner, James Parsons.--My Favorite Books.--The Bible--Nature.--Simple
Common Sense, instructive, earnest, moving books.--How my preaching was
received by the people.--Its effects on churches and
congregations.--Uneasiness of my colleagues.--Fresh mutterings; tale
bearings; controversies; and more bad feeling, 82

CHAPTER IX.

Extracts from my Diary.--A strange preacher.--Horrible sermons.--Lights
of the world that give no light.--Theological mist and
smoke.--Narrow-mindedness.--Intolerance.--T. Allin,--Great preaching
great folly.--A. Scott,--A good preacher.--Sanctification.--Keep to
Scripture.--R. Watson: theological madness.--Big Books on the way of
salvation; puzzling folks.--Antinomian utterances about Christ's work
and man's salvation.--Preachers taking the devil's side; and doing his
work.--Scarcity of common sense in priesthoods, and of uncommon
sense.--The great abundance of nonsense and bad sense.--Common religious
expressions that are false.--Favorite Hymns that are not
Scriptural--Baxter's good sense, 98

CHAPTER X.

Reforming tendencies.--Corruptions in the Church.--Bad trades.--Faults
in the ministry.--Toleration of vice.--Drinking
habits.--Intemperance.--The Connexion.--Faulty rules.--Bad
customs.--Defective institutions.--All encouraged to suggest reforms and
punished for doing so.--Original principles of the Connexion set aside,
and persecution substituted for freedom.--My simplicity.--My
reward.--The Ministry.--Drunkenness.--Teetotalism.--Advocacy of
Temperance.--Outcry of preachers.--My Evangelical Reformer.--Articles on
the prevailing vices of the Church; On Toleration and Human Creeds;--On
Channing's Works; On Anti-Christian trading, &c., get me into
trouble.--Conference interference.--Conference trials.--The state of
things critical.--No remedy.--Matters get worse and worse.--Exciting
events: too many to be named here.--Envy, jealousy, rage, strife,
confusion, and many evil works.--Conspiracies: Fierce
conflicts.--Expulsion, 117

CHAPTER XI.

Explanations about the different Methodist Bodies.--Grounds of my
reformatory proceedings.--About immoralities.--Christianity not to blame
for the faults of professors and preachers.--My own defects, 153

CHAPTER XII.

Story of my life continued.--Results of my expulsion.--Fierce
fighting.--Desperation of my persecutors.--Great excitement on my
part.--Rank crop of slanders.--Monstrous ones.--And silly ones.--Bad
deeds as well as wicked words.--Hard
work.--Exhaustion.--Powerlessness.--Three days' rest.--Long
sleep.--Wonderful,--delightful,--result.--Public debates.--Remarkable
occurrences; seemed Providential.--A lying opponent unexpectedly
confronted and confounded.--New Body,--Christian Brethren.--My church at
Newcastle.--Change in my views, and fresh
troubles.--Losses.--Poverty.--Learn the Printing business.--Follow it
under difficulties.--Want of funds.--Generous friends. Family on the
verge of want.--Pray.--An unlooked-for cart-load of provisions.--Trust
in Providence.--False friends.--True ones.--A mad utterance.--A worse
deed.--Theological Conventions.--Free investigations and public
discussions.--Change of views, 103

CHAPTER XIII.

Approach to Unitarianism.--Kindness of Unitarians.--Preaching and
lecturing in their pulpits.--Ten nights' public discussion with Rev. W.
Cooke.--Subjects.--Results.--Publications.--Now periodicals.--Unitarian
invitation to London.--Public reception.--Liberal contributions to Steam
Press Fund.--Press presentation.--Dr. Bateman; Dr.-Sir-John
Bowring.--Pleasurable change from intolerance and persecution to
friendship and favor.--Discoveries.--Unitarianism has many
phases.--Channingism.--Anti-supernaturalism.--Deism.--Atheism.--Gradually
slid down to the lower, 191

CHAPTER XIV.

The Bible.--My earliest views of its origin and authority.--Changed as I
grew up.--Further changes.--Important facts about the Bible.--False
theories of its Divine inspiration.--The true--the Bible's
own,--doctrine on the subject.--Needful to keep inside of this.--No
defence outside either for the Bible or for Bible men.--Explanations:
illustrations: testimonies of celebrated writers.--The PERFECTION of the
Bible--in what does it consist.--Foolish and impossible notions of
perfection.--No absolute perfection in any thing.--No need for
it.--Foolish talk about infallibility.--Other important testimonies, 202

CHAPTER XV.

Enters politics.--Advocates extreme political
views.--Republicanism.--Foretells the French Revolution of 1848.--Great
political excitement in England.--Government alarmed.--Get
arrested.--Lodged in prison.--Trial.--Triumph over Government.--Great
rejoicings.--Elected member of Parliament for Bolton, and Town
Councillor for Leeds.--Exhaustion from excess of labor.--Health
fails.--Terrible Pains.--Voyage to America and back.--Removes to
America.--Objects in doing so.--Settles on a farm.--Gets into fresh
excitement.--The Abolitionists.--Women's Rights.--All kinds of wild
revolutionary theories.--Go farther into unbelief instead of getting
back to Christ.--A mad world, with strange unwritten histories, and
awful, nameless mysteries, 241

CHAPTER XVI.

Story of my descent from the faith of my childhood, to doubt and
unbelief.--Bad theological teaching in my early days.--Dreadful
results.--Perplexity.--Madness.--Survive all, and get over it.--The
first arguments I heard for the Bible.--True basis of religious
belief.--Reading on the evidences.--Effects.--Unsound
arguments.--_Their_ effect.--_Internal_ evidences best.--Negative
criticism, long continued, ruinous both to faith and virtue.--Moving
ever downwards.--The devil as a theologian, a poet and a
philosopher.--Bible Conventions.--W. L. Garrison, A. J. Davis.--Public
discussions in Philadelphia with Dr. McCalla.--The Doctor's disgraceful
failure.--Great,--mad,--excitement.--Narrow escape from murder.--Eight
nights' debate with Dr. Berg.--The good cause suffered through bad
management.--The Doctor took an untenable position.--Undertook to prove
too much and failed.--Substantially right, but logically wrong.--Other
debates in Ohio, Indiana, England and Scotland.--Mean and mischievous
opponents.--Honorable and useful ones.--Bad advocates of a good cause,
its worst enemies, 269

CHAPTER XVII.

Continuation of my Story.--Lectures on the Bible in
Ohio.--Trouble.--Riot.--Rotten eggs.--Midnight mischief.--Had to
move.--Settlement among Liberals, Comeouters.--_Too_ fond of
liberty.--Would have my share as well as their own.--Fresh
trouble.--Another forced move.--Settlement in the wilds of Nebraska,
among Indians, wolves, and rattlesnakes.--Experience there.--A change
for the better.--How brought about.--Quiet of
mind.--Reflection.--Horrors of Atheism.--Destroys the value of
life.--Deceives you; mocks you; makes you intolerably
miserable.--Suggests suicide.--Prosperity not good for much without
religion: adversity, sickness, pain, loss, bereavement
intolerable.--Strange adventures in the wilderness; terrible dangers;
wonderful deliverances.--Solemn thoughts and feelings in the boundless
desert.--Solitude and silence preach.--Religious feelings
revive.--Recourse to old religious books.--Demoralizing tendency of
unbelief.--Lecture in Philadelphia.--Cases of infidel depravity.--You
can't make people good, nor even decent, without religion.--Infidelity
means utter debasement.--A good, a loving, and a faithful wife, who
never ceases to pray.--Return to England.--Experience there.--Unbounded
licentiousness of Secularism.--Total separation from the infidel
party.--My new Periodical.--Resolution to re-read the Bible, to do
justice to Christianity, &c.--A sight of Jesus.--Happy results.--Change
both of head and heart.--Happy transformation of character.--A new
life.--New work.--New lot.--From darkness to light,--From death to
life,--from purgatory to paradise,--from hell to heaven, 310

CHAPTER XVIII.

Parties whose Christian sympathy, and wise words, and generous deeds,
helped me back to Christ, 345

CHAPTER XIX.

The steps by which I gradually returned to Christ.--Lectures and sermons
on the road.--Answers to objections against the Bible and
Christianity.--Spiritualism.--Strange phenomena.--Answers to objections
advanced by myself in the Berg debate.--The position to be taken by
advocates of the Bible and Christianity.--Additional remarks on Divine
inspiration.--What it implies, and what it does not imply.--Overdoing is
undoing.--Genesis and Geology.--The Bible and Science.--Public
discussions,--explanation.--At Home in the Church.--Sorrowful, yet
always rejoicing.--Joy unspeakable, 355

CHAPTER XX.

Lessons I have learned.--1. Men slow to learn wisdom by the experience
of others.--2. Danger of bad feeling.--3. Of a controversial spirit.--4.
Old ministers should deal tenderly with their younger brethren.--5.
Young thinkers should be prayerful, humble, watchful; yet faithful to
conscience and to truth, trusting in God.--6. With Christian faith goes
Christian virtue.--The tendency of unbelief is ever downwards.--7.
Unbelievers are not irreclaimable.--We should not pass them by unpitied
or unhelped.--8. Converts from infidelity must look for trials.--They
must not expect too much from churches and ministers. Paul's case.--9.
They must risk all for Christ, and bear their losses and troubles
patiently.--10. They should join the Church, right away.--Not look for a
perfect Church.--Keep inside.--Bear unpleasantnesses meekly.--Stones
made smooth and round in the stream, by the rubbing they get from other
stones.--Reformers should move gently, and have long patience.--The more
haste the worst speed.--Killing rats.--12. Unbelief, when not a sin, is
a terrible calamity: a world of calamities in one, 406

CONCLUDING REMARKS, 437

PREFACE.

The object of this Book is, First, to explain a portion of my own
history, and, Secondly, to check the spread of infidelity, and promote
the interests of Christianity. How far it is calculated to answer these
ends I do not pretend to know. I have no very high opinion of the work
myself. I fear it has great defects. On some points I may have said too
much, and on others too little. I cannot tell. I have however done my
best, and I would fain hope, that my labors will not prove to have been
altogether in vain.

I have spent considerable time with a view to bring my readers to
distinguish between the doctrines of Christ, and the theological
fictions which are so extensively propagated in His name. It is
exceedingly desirable that nothing should pass for Christianity, but
Christianity itself. And it is equally desirable that Christianity
should be seen in its true light, as presented in the teachings and
character, in the life and death of its great Author. A correct
exposition of Christianity is its best defence. A true, a plain, a
faithful and just exhibition of its spirit and teachings, and of its
adaptation to the wants of man, and of its tendency to promote his
highest welfare, is the best answer to all objections, and the most
convincing proof of its truth and divinity. And the truth, the
reasonableness, the consistency, the purifying and ennobling tendency,
and the unequalled consoling power of Christianity, _can_ be proved, and
proved with comparative ease; but to defend the nonsense, the
contradictions, the antinomianism and the blasphemies of theology is
impossible.

I have taken special pains to explain my views on the Divine
Inspiration of the Scriptures. I am satisfied that no attempts to answer
the objections of infidels against the Bible will prove satisfactory, so
long as men's views on this subject go beyond the teachings of the
Scriptures themselves. To the fanciful theories of a large number of
Theologians the sacred writings do not answer, and you must therefore,
either set aside those theories, and put a more moderate one in their
place, or give up the defence of the Bible in despair. I therefore leave
the extravagant theories to their fate, and content myself with what the
Scriptures themselves say; and I feel at rest and secure.

The views I have given on the subject in this work, and in my pamphlet
on the Bible, are not new. You may find them in the works of quite a
number of Evangelical Authors. The only credit to which I am entitled
is, that I state them with great plainness, and without reserve, and
that I do not, after having given them on one page, take them back again
on the next.

How far my friends will be able to receive or tolerate my views on these
points, I do not know. I hope they will ponder them with all the candor
and charity they can. I have kept as near to orthodox standards as I
could, without doing violence to my conscience, and injustice to the
truth. I would never be singular, if I could honestly help it. It is
nothing but a regard to God, and duty, and the interests of humanity,
that prevents me going with the multitude. It would be gratifying in the
extreme to see truth and the majority on one side, and to be permitted
to take my place with them: but if the majority take sides with error, I
must take my place with the minority, and look for my comfort in a good
conscience, and in the sweet assurance of God's love and favor.

_A Dream._

In looking over some manuscripts some time ago, belonging to a relation
of my wife's father-in-law, I found the following story of a dream. Some
have no regard for dreams, but I have. I have both read of dreams, and
had dreams myself, that answered marvellously to great realities; and
this may be one of that kind. In any case, as the Preface does not take
up all the space set apart for it, I am disposed to give it a few of the
vacant pages.

The dreamer's account of his dream is as follows.

'After tiring my brain one day with reading a long debate between a
Catholic and a Protestant about the Infallibility of the Church and the
Bible, I took a walk along a quiet field-path near the river, full of
thought on the subject on which I had been reading. The fresh air, the
pleasant scene, and the ripple of the stream, had such a soothing effect
on me, that I lost myself, and passed unconsciously from the World of
realities, into the Land of dreams. I found myself in a large Hall,
filled with an eager crowd, listening to a number of men who had
assembled, as I was told, to discuss the affairs of the Universe, and
put an end to controversy. The subject under discussion just then was
the Sun. I found that after the world had lived in its light for
thousands of years, and been happy in the abundance of the fruit, and
grain, and numberless blessings produced by his wondrous influences,
some one, who had looked at the Great Light through a powerful
telescope, had discovered that there were several dark spots on his disk
or face, and that some of them were of a very considerable size. He
named the matter to a number of his friends who, looking through the
telescope for themselves, saw that such was really the case.

'Now there happened to be an order of persons in the Land of dreams
whose business it was to praise the Sun, and extol its Light. And they
had a theory to the effect, that the Light of the Sun was unmixed, and
that the Sun itself was one uniform mass of brightness and brilliancy,
without speck, or spot, or any such thing. They held that the Head of
their order was the Maker of the Sun,--that He Himself was Light, and
that in Him was no darkness at all; and that the Sun was exactly like
Him, intense, unmingled, and unvarying Light. When these people heard of
the alleged discovery of the spots, they raised a tremendous cry, and
some howled, and some shrieked, and all united in pronouncing the
statement a fiction, and in denouncing in severe terms, both its author,
and all who took his part, as deceivers; as the enemies of the Sun, as
blasphemers of its Author, and as the enemies of the human race.

'This was one of the great controversies which this world-wide
convention had met to bring to an end.

'As I took my place in the Hall, one of the Professors of the Solar
University was speaking. He said the story about the spots was a wicked
calumny; and he went into a lengthy and labored argument to show, that
the thing was absurd and impossible. 'The Sun,' said he, 'was made by an
All-perfect Artificer,--made on purpose to be a Light, the Great Light
of the world, and a Light it must be, and nothing else but a Light; a
pure unsullied Light all round, without either spot, or speck of any
kind, or any varying shade of brilliancy in any part.' He added, 'To say
the contrary, is to do the Sun injustice, to dishonor its All-glorious
Author, to alienate the minds of men from the Heavenly Luminary, to
destroy their faith in his Light and warmth, to plunge the world into
darkness, and reduce it to a state of utter desolation. If the Sun is
not _all_ light, he is _no_ Light at all. If there be dark spots on one
part of his face, there may be dark spots on every part. _All_ may be
dark, and what seems Light may be an illusion; a false Light, 'that
leads to bewilder, and dazzles to blind.' He is not to be trusted. Every
thing is uncertain.' And he called the man who said he had seen the
spots, an impostor, a blasphemer, a _scavenger_, an ass, a foreigner,
and a number of other strange names.

'The man he was abusing so unmercifully, stepped forward, and in a meek
and quiet spirit said, 'I saw the spots with my own eyes. I have seen
them scores of times. I can show them to you, if you will look through
this glass.' 'Your glass is a cheat, a lie,' said the Professor. 'But
others have seen them,' said the man, 'as well as I, and seen them
through a number of other glasses.'

''It is impossible,' answered the Professor. 'A Sun made by an
All-perfect God, and made on purpose to be a Light, cannot possibly be
defaced with dark spots; and whoever says any thing to the contrary is
a ----.'

'Here the Professor rested his case;--'A Sun without spots, or no Sun.
Light without variation of shade, or no Light. Prove that the Sun has
spots, and you reduce him to a level with an old extinguished lamp, that
is fit for nothing but to be cast away as an unclean and worthless
thing. The honor of God, and the welfare of the universe all hang on
this one question,--Spots, or no spots!'

'His fellow professors took his part, and many spoke in the same strain.
But the belief in the spots made its way, and spread further every day,
and the consequence was, the obstinate Professors were confounded and
put to shame. Facts were too strong for them, and their credit and
influence were damaged beyond remedy.

'After the Professors of the Sun were silenced, the Man in the Moon
arose and spoke. He contended that both Sun and Moon were free from
spots, but said, that no one could see the Sun as it really was, unless
he _lived_ in the Moon, and looked at it from his standpoint. 'The
Moon,' said he, 'like the Sun, is the work of the All-perfect Creator;
and its face is one unchanging blaze of absolute and unvaried
brightness.'

'Now all who had ever looked at the Moon, had noticed, that no part of
her face was as bright as the Sun, and that some portions were of a
shade considerably darker than the rest. And I noticed that even the
Professors who had spoken extravagantly about the Sun, looked at each
other and smiled, when they heard the statements of the Man in the Moon.
Indeed there was such a tittering and a giggling through the Hall, that
the meeting was broken up.

'I hastened out, and found there were a hundred discussions going on in
the street. Many of the disputants seemed greatly excited. I felt
melancholy. A quiet-looking man, with a very gentle expression of
countenance, came up to me, and in tones of remarkable sweetness, said,
'You seem moved.' 'I feel troubled,' said I. 'I don't know what to
think; and I don't know what to do.' He smiled, and said, 'None of these
things move me.' Then lifting up his eyes towards Heaven he said,--'The
Sun still shines; and I feel his blessed warmth as sensibly as ever. And
the millions of our race still live and rejoice in his beams.' 'Thank
God,' said I: 'Yes, I see, he still shines; and I will rest contented
with his light and warmth.' 'The spots are there,' said he, 'past doubt;
but experience, the strongest evidence of all, proves that they do not
interfere with the beneficent influences of the Great and Glorious Orb,
or lessen his claims to our respect and veneration, or diminish one jot
our obligations to his great Author. They have their use, no doubt. The
Sun might be too brilliant without them, and destroy our eyes, instead
of giving us light. Too much light might prove as bad as too little. All
is well. I accept plain facts. To deny them is to fight against God. To
admit them and trust in God is the true faith, and the germ of all true
virtue and piety.

''I have no faith in the kind of absolute perfection those professors
contend for, either in Sun or Moon, Bible or Church; but I believe in
the SUFFICIENCY, or _practical_ perfection of all, and am as
happy, and only wish I were as good and useful, as ----'

'Just as he spoke those words, I awoke. He seemed as if he had much to
say, and I would fain have heard him talk his sweet talk till now; but
perhaps I had heard enough, and ought now to set myself heartily to
work, to get through with the business of my life.'

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