Sydney Smith's Spiritual Character [pp. 291-304]

Sydney Smith's Spiritual Character.
session of them. A man must be deplorably ignorant of the Bible, who has
not seen the disclosures of this vivid experience all through its pages. Judaism
abounds with them, and Christianity presents them as common facts in the New
Testament; but, apart from that, it is
certainly amazing that any one, who has
ever had a single religious thought to
penetrate his brain, or a solitary religious
emotion to enter into his heart, has not
instantly and clearly recognised the power
of Christianity to awaken intense conviction and profound feeling. Such a one
cannot forget the very approach of Christianity, as if a mysterious agency moved
in advance of its footsteps, transferred
him suddenly to a new position, and
created a sense of relationships to the
invisible and eternal, that he had not before imagined. It does not act on the
senses, nor does it seize the imagination
half as potently as a thousand objects
around us; and yet, with a thrill that the
nerves of sense never felt, and with a
living realization that imagination never
approximated, it impresses, at the same
moment, and in equal fulness, our whole
nature, and changes it into a being of infinite fears and hopes. The slightest contact with Christianity, if it is nothing
more than an intellectual exercise, is assuredly sufficient to indicate its line of
nmovement, and to convince one that awe,
dread, anxiety, terror, as they operate in
common minds, by reason of common sensibilities, and through the announced
agency of God's special Spirit, are the inseparable attendants of its presence.
Methodism did nothing more than express
these vast and momentous facts. It took its
tone and language from the Bible; it was
untaught of man; its original institutions
grew out of its prominent thoughts; its
bond of union was simple brotherhood
in Christ; its usages shaped themselves
out from its instincts; and in all its relations it showed, to right-minded men,
that it bore the stamp of God.
If Sydney Smith's discernment had
not utterly failed him, it would have satisfied his judgzaent, that those things in
Methodism, which he found so much
cause to condemn, were striking illustrations of its divine origin. Could any
exhibition of pungent thought, deep convict;on, poignant sorrow, truthful confidence, inspiring rapture, be more natural,
taken in connexion with the circumstances then existing? Consider the
parties, the time, the occasion; view all
the antecedents; and these peculiarities,
if such they can be called, are a most
significant, reliable, and impressive testimony in its favor. Ilad they been absent; had these occasional hyperboles,
extravagant attitudes, and wild outb)ursts,
never appeared, the evidence would not
have been so strong and convincing, that
Christianity was working mightily on the
hearts of the people. There were no
irreconcilable phenomena in these manifestations. If they had never run into
excess; never transgressed the bounds of
sober propriety; never provoked a smile,
or suggested an apprehension, that would
have been an unaccountable phenomenon.
With such large draughts upon the
Methodist Quarterly we might be content,
and beg indulgence of its Editor for the
freedom we have taken with his pages,
but the conclusion of the article is so eloquently written, and contains such admirable reflections upon the influence of the
home circle upon English literature, that
we cannot forbear making use of it here.
The writer says.
Whatever fault may be found with
Sydney Smith's course in those connexions which have been mentioned, and
whatever failures he may have made in
measuring up to the standard that his office and position pledged him to meet, it
is delightful to dwell on what he did, and
the means by which hlie accomplished so
much for his age and country Commencing life with almost every thling
against him, he augmented the difficulties
in his way by advocating principles that
drew upon him neglect and suffering.
The peculiar talents which nature had
lavishly given, and study, with its associate arts, had most effectively trained,
were serious drawbacks to preferment and
honour. The traditions of England, as
England then was; the patronage of the
aristocracy; the favourite privileges of
place and prerogative; the decisions of
courts, and the verdict of public opinion,
were against his principles. A young
man, without fortune, and destitute of
available friends, he projected the Edlinburgh Review, and gathering a select
group of sturdy spirits around him,
breathed a soul into its pages, that finally
made it the fountain of a new life, and a
new hope to England. The great measures that are associated with his genius
and fame, emancipation acts, game laws,
relief of debtors, and other parliamentary
movements, are mainly indebted for their
success to his fine sense, cutting irony,
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