At the beginning of the present dispensation this character of the world was not so distinctly legible. For the mercy of God in Christ was proclaimed, and it remained to be proved that the world would reject it. Public proof was soon given. He in whom was life, whose life was the light of men, was despised: His holy person was assailed when here in humiliation, but in grace, “Behold a gluttonous man and a winebibber.” And more than this, the blasphemer dared to say. “He hath a devil; why hear ye Him?” The Jew was in the van of the world's array against Christ. It was the person, no less than the truth, that was denied, when the priests bid the Roman guard say, “His disciples stole Him while we slept.” It was the denial of His inherent power to break the bonds of death, of His Godhead; it was the denial that His shed blood was atonement for sin. Paul says, “if Christ be not risen, ye are yet in your sins.” If the disciples stole His body, if He did not rise from the dead, then there is no atonement, no salvation, no mercy. The character of God is belied, His love denied, His willingness to receive sinners a mere fable. But the truth was too strong for the malice and cunning of Satan. This foundation—fact rests upon evidence—apart from divinely given faith—as irrefragable as any fact in the world's history. The mercy of God has ordered it, so that upon the lower ground of the credibility of human testimony the infidelity of man is without excuse. Afterward truth was assailed more insidiously. Portions of the declared Word, and specially those relating to the person of our Lord, were sought to be undermined; the enemy well knowing that, if but one stone of foundation truth were removed, the whole building would inevitably and quickly collapse and fall.
Nothing is more subtle than infidelity: it penetrates every form of religious thought, every shade of opinion of which the Word is not the source. It is not confined to the bold deniers of revelation, but is found sometimes in creeds. Every creed, or confession of faith, that has not for its basis the full truth as to the person of Christ, in short, the whole Bible as given of God, is infidel in character. True believers are sometimes touched with it, through adherence to an unscriptural creed; not vitally, of course, but hurtfully; for wherever it penetrates, its baneful influence is seen in evil doctrine and evil practice.
The human mind is infidel in the abstract; but infidelity as a fact could not be till a revelation had been given. In like manner the aspect and form of infidelity will be according to the character of the truth revealed. The grace that was revealed in and by Christ made man plead for law; so that the Galatians, who had been converted from idolatry, thought it right to adopt the law as equally necessary with the gospel of grace. But the worst aspect of infidelity is in its assaults upon the person of our Lord; and this, not as seen in men unconnected with the church of God, but in those who were prominent, or who aimed at prominence, among the saints of God. We see the wretched and absurd theories of those who entirely thrust the Bible aside as a book of God. The theories—if they deserve that title—of the men who have attempted to blend the theogony of heathen philosophers with the truth of Christ, are still more absurd; and, while exceeding the wildest dream that ever came from the head of a pagan, they add insult and blasphemy.
The heresies that first troubled the church are characterized by the introduction of Eastern philosophy, not a little modified by Grecian, into the assemblies, and mingling it with the truth. In this teaching were combined two things which at first seem incompatible, but which, when fully examined, are complementary: viz., the denial of the essential Godhead of Christ, and also of His proper humanity. The Christ of God—the true Savior of the Bible—disappeared, and, in place thereof, the wanderings of a dark but vain mind, the worthless speculations of science falsely so called. Against these heresiarchs both John and Paul wrote. The evil had begun while the apostles were yet here. Satan began immediately his attempts to hide from man (who so needs it) the knowledge, the immense fact, that He who had been here was “the true God and eternal life.”
It was a strange compound—oriental philosophy and divine truth. It would seem as if the philosopher of that day sought to enlarge the range of his view by borrowing from truth, but perverting what he found, to make it fit into his own system. But he was no nearer the truth; he was a worse man; for he had heard the truth, and loved not but made merchandise of it. How much greater the guilt, and the evil consequences, of teaching as truth of God the vain speculations of men! This was done in the first ages of the church; and they who did it pretended to be the only ones who had knowledge and true understanding of the word. Hence their name—Gnostics. Tinder this, as a general term, very many different parties arose; but they all united in this, they denied the Son. Infidelity was the true name of their philosophy. The leading idea, that is the starting point (which is very like that of Brahminism), is “absolute unity,” a something which was both spirit and matter: from this unity was evolved the whole universe of manifold beings. Matter became separate from spirit, and so in consequence the principle of evil. The spiritual beings emanating from the original monad became imperfect through contact with matter, and were held in thrall by it. Does it not occur to us that the inventor of this fable had seen the Mosaic account of Creation and of the Fall, but had so distorted the facts that the truth was lost?