BY THE REV. NORMAN MATHESON, HALKIRK, CAITHNESS.
“Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them.”—
HEBREWS vii. 25.
IN this verse the Apostle looks back upon what he has already stated concerning Christ and His priesthood, and declares what it means to true believers and worshippers of God. Believers under the New Testament dispensation have more light given them on the nature of their salvation by the coming of Christ and by the fulfilment of God’s will in His death and resurrection, than there was or could be under the Old Testament dispensation. Then the character of their salvation was held forth to them under types and outward ordinances. These types and outward ordinances were abolished by Christ. May grace be given us to gather strength and comfort from this most precious portion of God’s Word! We shall notice, in the first place, as we shall be enabled by the Spirit of the Lord, the Person spoken of in our text; then, in the second place, the power ascribed to Him; and in the last place, the effects of His power.
I.—Let us notice the Person spoken of in our text. This is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. He is referred to in the fifteenth verse: “After the order of Melchisedec, there ariseth another priest.” The name, “Melchisedec,” means “king of righteousness.” Christ is also King of Righteousness, or a righteous King. He rules in righteousness, and expects that all His subjects render homage to Him and obey His laws. Few there are who submit to His righteous rule, and these are made willing subjects in a day of His power. God the Father has appointed Him King. “Yet have I set my King upon my holy hill of Sion.” From the righteousness of Christ’s nature proceeds His righteous government, and as a righteous Governor He has a law that is consistent with His own nature—holy and just and good. He demands complete obedience to this law, which is summed up in these words: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy strength, and with all thy mind, and thy neighbour as thyself.”
This law was written on man’s heart when God created him, so it was no constraint upon him to obey it, but it was the delight of his soul; and it was so until he fell from his original state of righteousness by sin. Man, by his act of disobedience in eating of the forbidden fruit, which God commanded him not to eat, under pain of death, broke God’s law and covenant, and so incurred His wrath and curse. He brought temporal, spiritual,
and eternal miseries upon himself and his posterity, and became totally unable to deliver himself from them, but still God’s obligations upon him continued the same. He demands perfect obedience to His holy, just, and good law. “Do this and live,” was now as much as ever God’s command to the sinner. Yet He knew man of himself could never render satisfaction to Him for His broken law and clear himself of guilt. And where was the remedy found? The remedy was found in God Himself. God the Father appointed God the Son as substitute, to render complete satisfaction to justice and meet the just claims of a broken covenant. He laid help upon Him as one “mighty to save.”
The substitute for sinners is Christ, who is spoken of under the similitude of Melchisedec or King of Righteousness. As King of Righteousness Christ has the government upon His shoulder. As King of Righteousness He is sovereign in His dealings with the breakers of His law. He would be just in punishing eternally its transgressors. But because mercy was His delight and judgment His strange work, He willed in a very wonderful way to satisfy the claims of His law and to deliver many of the human race from the penalties of disobedience. As King of Righteousness He manifested the nature of His justice in a more glorious manner in His gracious dealings with sinners, than He could have done (speaking in the language of men) though man had retained his state of innocence. God takes just dealings with sin, for His own glory, when He imputes the sins of His own elect to Christ, who, as His willing servant, became obedient unto death—even the death of the Cross. He said, “Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me) to do thy will, O God.” It is He, who is King of Righteousness, who engaged to become the servant of the Father and a substitute for sinners. It was the obedience and death of Christ, “who is holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens,” that made an end of sin and the wrath of God against sin. In human nature—in which nature He could suffer—He rendered perfect obedience to God’s law, and that was His own law, and gave complete satisfaction to God’s justice, and that was His own justice. He is King of Righteousness in respect of the righteousness He wrought out for His people.
(2) He is spoken of under the similitude of “King of Salem,” which is “king of peace.” Christ is King of Righteousness and also King of Peace. Peace was a thing which God loved, but He could not speak peace to sinners without satisfaction being given to His offended justice. God the Father, as Judge, required this satisfaction from His Son as the sinners’ substitute. His Son rendered it by His obedience unto death, and said, “It is finished.” To procure reconciliation and peace for sinners meant death to the Lord of Glory. The sins of the elect children of men stood between their souls and peace, but an
end has been made of their sins and guilt by the atoning death of Christ, “the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the world.” He shed His blood for the remission of their sins.
Before peace is spoken to the guilty sinner he is condemned in his conscience by God’s law, and becomes truly conscious that he deserves death and cannot save himself. “The soul that sinneth, it shall die,” sounds with true, convincing power in the ears of his soul. He believes that God would be just in handing him over to eternal death. He looks to his own righteousness for salvation, and keeps looking until he is made to know that it is filthy rags. Then the righteousness that Christ wrought out on behalf of such a sinner as he is, is presented to his faith’s view. He sees it to be all-sufficient and suitable for such a condemned criminal as he is, and is made willing to be clothed in it. Then he is enabled to accept of Christ as His righteousness and finds peace of conscience.
Do we know that peace which the reconciled sinner has through the blood of Christ? If not, it is our unbelief in the righteousness and power of Christ that is the cause. One may be, indeed, a reconciled sinner, yet not always experience peace of soul owing to the strength of sin and unbelief. So the command is, “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves.” Christ is not only King of Righteousness; He is also King of Peace. May we know Him as our righteousness and peace!
(3) Melchisedec is a suitable type of Christ, being spoken of as “priest of the Most High God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him.” Christ is Priest of the Most High God. As Mediator between God and men, He exercises the offices of Prophet, Priest, and King. It is through Him as Priest that sinners draw nigh unto God, and through faith in His atoning blood they obtain the pardon of their sins. Any who come pleading the merits of Christ’s finished work are welcome to the throne of grace and are admitted into the presence of the Lord. “He will in no wise cast out” any who come in Christ’s name. The sinner who confesses his sins before Christ as Priest gets forgiveness and acceptance before God. We are not asked to come to an earthly, sinful priest to confess our sins, but to a heavenly Priest, “who is holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens.” Christ, as High Priest over the house of God, has kingly authority to speak forgiveness to those whom He has loved. He is appointed by the Lord a Priest for ever, and is exalted to His right hand a Prince and a Saviour, “that repentance and remission of sins might be preached in His name among all nations.”
Melchisedec blessed Abraham as he returned from the slaughter of the kings. So does Christ bless sinners with all spiritual blessings. He makes those who come unto God by Him perfect
as to their privileges. Melchisedec was ordained a priest to the Gentiles. So is Christ ordained a Priest to the Gentiles. He is able to speak peace through His blood to those who were excluded under the law from “the covenants of promise.” And now Jew and Gentile are invited to peace with God through Christ as their Mediator. “Even us whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles.”
II.—We shall notice the power ascribed to Christ. Christ, as king-priest, exercises all power on behalf of those whom He loved in the covenant of grace. That power He has founded upon His life and work as mediator and intercessor. “He ever liveth to make intercession.” He lives at the Father’s right hand, pleading the merits of His atoning blood for “the election of grace.” The power of His love He puts in exercise for them on the ground that He wrought out their complete redemption by His death, and ever liveth to make intercession.
It was God’s purpose from eternity that the power of His love would take effect upon the objects of His love by the obedience and death of His Son, who offered Himself up as victim upon the altar of sacrifice. His Son had the same love to the elect as the Father, and His love was such that many floods could not quench. He was willing to endure all the persecutions that come from men and devils. The hatred and scorn of the proud Pharisees He patiently endured, and no sooner did He begin His public ministry than He was tempted of the devil. He endured the forsaking of His disciples, who all left Him in His agony in Gethsemane’s garden. He was also forsaken of God when suffering unto death on Calvary’s cross, because our sins separated between us and God. All that He suffered was in human nature, in which nature He was upheld by His Godhead. Death was the penalty that sinners deserved, and to make an end of their sins, Christ laid down His life unto death, even the death of the cross. He manifested the strength of His love in His death.
But not only does He manifest His love by His death, He manifests it also by His resurrection from the grave of death. He said, “I have power to lay down my life and power to take it again, this commandment have I received of my Father.” He rose from the dead by the power of God. The resurrection of Christ was a certificate bearing testimony to the worth and efficacy of His finished work, to satisfy justice, and to save the objects of His love. He died and rose and revived, that He might be Lord both of the dead and the living, so that the dead bodies of His people, as well as their souls, might be quickened. “I am, He said, “the resurrection and the life.” Christ, in His resurrection, raised His Church with Him. In regard to all other sacrifices, there was need of their continuance, because, once slain, they could not live again, and there was also need for their continuance to keep the Church of God in remembrance of the one great
sacrifice that alone could render complete satisfaction to God. “For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh” (Rom. i. 8).
III.—The effects of the power Christ has as Priest. “He is able also to save to the uttermost them that come unto God by Him, seeing He ever liveth to make intercession.”
In saving His people, Christ saves them perfectly. Not only are they delivered from sin and the wrath of God, but they are made recipients of all divine blessings. The blessings that are bestowed upon them by Christ in this world are an earnest of the blessings they shall have in heaven. The blessings Christ purchased by the obedience and sufferings of His life and death were for those whom He loved from before the foundation of the world. He did not love them because of anything good He foresaw in them. They were rebellious sinners, children of wrath, as well as others, and they deserved no deliverance from their state of sin and wrath. What a wonder that He would ever think of the salvation of such enemies of His glory, but this He purposed from eternity in the covenant of grace! Christ makes His power known in saving “to the uttermost” the objects of His love.
(1) Their salvation to the uttermost consists in blotting out their sins from the book of God in a day of His power. They stand as guilty criminals before the bar of God. If they are to be dealt with according to their sins, they shall be cast away for ever from His presence. But God the Father, as Judge, looks upon the righteousness of Christ, which He, as His righteous servant, wrought out for them, and justifies them on that account. Their sins are pardoned, and their persons accepted as righteous before Him. It is not merely the guilt of their past and present sins that is wiped away when they are justified, but also of their future sins. As justified sinners they are for ever set free from condemnation. “There is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit.” They are saved perfectly as regards their justification.
(2) Their salvation to the uttermost consists in Christ overcoming, by His grace, the corruptions of their evil nature. They feel the power of the carnal mind, which is enmity and death, and their own weakness and helplessness in overcoming its power. Some of the Lord’s people are more harrassed by the temptations of sin and the carnal mind than others of them, but however great their temptations and the assaults of Satan, God’s grace is sufficient for them, and His strength is made perfect in weakness. They come to know more and more that unless sin is made an end of by the power of grace, sin will make an end of them. Their cry is, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from this body of death?” Christ pleads on their behalf for their complete deliverance from the remainders of sin in them, and by His word
and Spirit He subdues their corruptions. Christ prayed to the Father—”Sanctify them through the truth: thy word is truth.”
(3) Their salvation consists in being delivered at last perfectly from the world. Sin in the Lord’s people sides with the world, its ways, and practices, but the more they die to sin, the more they die to themselves and the spirit of the world. “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.”
(4) They are delivered from the power and dominion of Satan, “the god of this world.” Satan claimed them as his own when they were in a state of nature, and they remained in his service as willing dupes until they were made to believe it would be death. Death was the wages they were to obtain in his service. But Christ claimed them as His own and took them from Satan, having cast him out by His death. He that overcame sin and death overcame him that had the power of death, that is, the devil. But though his power is taken from him and destroyed by Christ’s death, he is still permitted to tempt the Lord’s people, and shows more of his enmity to them now in their regenerate state than ever he did in their unregenerate state. Satan bears the same hatred to the Lord’s people that he did to Christ. He is the accuser of the brethren. But Christ intercedes for them, that they might be delivered from the temptations of Satan. “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat, but I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not.”
(5) Their salvation to the uttermost consists in their being delivered from death. Death shall have no dominion over their mortal bodies. The bodies of the saints of God who shall be in their graves at Christ’s second coming, shall be raised from the dead. Death is the king of terrors, but Christ has conquered him. As a proof of His power, many of the bodies of the saints came out of their graves after His resurrection. And so shall it be at the last day. The bodies of His elect shall be raised out of their graves. Their bodies shall be joined to their souls and made suitable for their heavenly abode. He that can quicken the dead can quicken our dead souls. May we know His power in quickening us to “newness of life.”
(6) Christ’s power takes effect upon the objects of His love; they are referred to as coming unto God by Him. Not only do they by faith embrace Christ as their righteousness, but they come by Him as worshippers to the throne of grace. The latter sense is what is principally intended. If they come as true worshippers, they must come through Christ as their sacrifice. Their faith must have an eye to Christ as their propitiation before their worship can be accepted. Faith on His atoning blood cleanses their consciences from dead works to serve the living God. It is then they have true boldness in coming to the throne of grace. In regard to the sin-offering under the law the guilt of the worshipper, whether it was the priest or the congregation, was
atoned for by the blood of a bullock without blemish, signifying that it was a wholly perfect sacrifice that God required to make perfect atonement for sin. God found in Christ a wholly perfect sacrifice, and through His shed blood atonement is made for all who come to God by Him. As the Israelite needed the intercession of the priest to obtain forgiveness of sins, so does the believing worshipper who comes to God by Christ need Christ’s intercession to take away his guilt and imperfections. “For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh: How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God.” Oh! to experience this cleansing, so that we might have true boldness in worshipping the Lord. Our unbelief in the power of His intercession “to save to the uttermost them that come unto God by Him” is the cause of our bondage. May we be set free from the power of sin and unbelief!
(7) Christ manifests His power now towards the objects of salvation in making continual intercession for them at the Father’s right hand. “He ever liveth to make intercession.” He continues without any intermission to present His atoning sacrifice before the Father. The prayers of His people may cease for the interests of Christ’s kingdom, but Christ’s prayers never cease for His cause and people. Even in their backslidings He cares for them. He chastens them because of their sins, but He does not cast them utterly away. They cost too dear to Him, that He would cast them off. They are engraven on the palms of His hands. He interceded for them even when they were His enemies in a state of nature, and now that they are reconciled to Him by the power of His love, much more shall He manifest His interest in them by His life of intercession. Their love gets cold towards Him, but His love never changes. He is “the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever.” What a wonder it is that Christ makes intercession for sinners at all! Even when suffering the agonies of death He made intercession for sinners. When His cruel persecutors were nailing Him to the cursed tree, He cried out, “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.” He is now interceding for sinners at the Father’s right hand as the exalted Saviour. He continues to intercede for sinners as long as there are any who come to Him, and if He intercedes for sinners who have not yet found repentance or faith, will He not manifest His power in interceding for His own whom He has redeemed from sin and the world by His grace? He has given every reason to His own to exercise confidence in Him. Have we confidence in His intercession?
Do we come with all our needs before Him and believe that “He is able to save to the uttermost them that come unto God by Him?” The leper who came for healing to Christ said,
“Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean,” and the answer that Christ gave him was, “I will, be thou clean. And immediately the leprosy left him.” There may be a sinner who does not deny Christ’s power to save others, but doubts His power to save him, but the same power that saved others is able to save you, and in the day that the Lord will make you believe in His power to save you, a hell-deserving sinner, He will give you also to believe in His willingness to save you, and cleanse away all the guilt of your sins.
These words in our text, though specially referring to the perfecting of salvation and the continual care that Christ has of those in whom He began the good work of grace, yet there is a voice in them to the consciences of those who are yet without Christ and unsaved. Your question, then, should be, “Am I sensible that I am a guilty, lost sinner, standing in need of the obedience and intercession of Christ?” Shall my sins be blotted out in His atoning blood, or shall they bring me to eternal woe? If you have become truly anxious in regard to this most important matter, you are invited to come to the throne of grace, though not in the first instance as a spiritual worshipper, yet in the sense of reasoning with the Lord regarding your case. The invitation to other great sinners is the same to you: “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.” May the Lord bless His word. Amen.
“Rutherford’s “Lex Rex.”
BY THE REV. D. BEATON, WICK.
AMONG the great men who fought, prayed, and struggled for Christ’s Crown and Covenant in Scotland, there is probably none whose memory is so fragrant and whose name is so well beloved as Samuel Rutherford’s. Posterity knows him as the Samuel Rutherford who wrote the famous Letters, Christ Dying and Drawing Sinners to Himself, and the Trial and Triumph of Faith, rather than the Samuel Rutherford who wrote the Exercitationes Apologeticae pro Divina Gratia, Lex Rex, and the Due Right of Presbyteries, and other works written in the same strain. “It looks sometimes as if there were two men in him,” says Taylor Innes in his masterly essay.1 “One was the man whom all know in his letters—ardent, aspiring, and unworldly; impatient of earth, intolerant of sin, rapt into the continual contemplation of one unseen Face, finding his history in its changing aspect and his happiness in its returning smile. The
1 Samuel Rutherford in his second series of lectures, entitled The Evangelical Succession (MacNiven & Wallace, Edin., 1885). This is decidedly the most successful attempt as an analysis of Rutherford’s character that we have.
other man was the intellectual gladiator, the rejoicing and remorseless logician, the divider of words, the distinguisher of thoughts, the hater of doubt and ambiguity, the scioner of compromise and concession, the incessant and determined disputant, the passionate admirer of sequence and system and order in small things as in great.” It is with Rutherford in this latter aspect that we have to deal in considering his famous book Lex Rex.
Born about 1600 at Nisbet in Roxburghshire, even in early childhood that element of romance which was to rest as a halo on the head of Rutherford in after years was not lacking. Playing one day with his sister, as Wodrow informs us, he fell into a well several fathoms deep. The sister immediately ran for help, and on her return with her parents found young master Samuel sitting on the grass beside the well, and in answer to anxious enquiries as to how he had escaped, replied, “A bonnie white man came and drew me out.” He received his early education at Jedburgh, a town four miles distant from his birthplace. In 1617 he entered Edinburgh University, and four years afterwards graduated, and soon afterwards was appointed Regent of Humanity. It is probably some time after this that his conversion took place, at least, there is a reference in one of his letters that indicates it was not in early youth he was converted.1 In 1627 he was ordained minister of Anwoth, situated on the River Fleet, and began his remarkable and consecrated ministry by preaching from John ix. 39, “For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and they which see might be made blind.” For nine years he laboured here, and men bore testimony to him that he seemed to be “always praying, always preaching, always visiting the sick, always catechising, always writing and studying.” During the years of his banishment at Aberdeen, his thoughts went out continually to his parishioners at Anwoth. “My day-thoughts,” he says,2 “and my night-thoughts are of you: while ye sleep I am afraid of your souls, that they be off the rock. Next to my Lord Jesus and this fallen Kirk, ye have the greatest share of my sorrow, and also of my joy; ye are the matter of the tears, care, fear and daily prayers of an oppressed prisoner of Christ.” And again,3 “I fear that the entering of a hireling upon my labours there will cut off my life with sorrow. There I wrestled with the angel and prevailed. Wood, trees, meadows, and hills are my witnesses, that I drew on a fair meeting between Christ and Anwoth.” It was while he was minister of Anwoth that Rutherford received a distinguished but unexpected guest in the person of Archbishop Usher. The
1 Letters, clxxvii. (Bonar’s edit.), “Like a fool as I was, I suffered my sun to be high in the heaven, and near afternoon, before ever I took the gate by the end.”
2 Letters, ccxxv.
3 Letters, cclxxix.
tradition1 is that the pious and famous Irish Prelate passing through Galloway turned aside to enjoy the society of Rutherford. Coming in disguise, however, he was not recognised, and when the time for catechising the members of the family came he was asked, “How many commandments are there?” “Eleven,” was the answer. And for such ignorance he was corrected by being reminded that there were only ten. When Sabbath morning came Rutherford, as was his wont, went out to meditate and pray, but found that he had been forestalled in these heavenly exercises. Rutherford listened for a time to the voice pleading with the eternal, and as he listened, his heart was drawn to the stranger whose acquaintance he had made on the previous evening. Prayer being ended, the two entered into conversation, when the stranger made himself known as Archbishop Usher. That Sabbath-day he preached in Rutherford’s pulpit from the words, “A new commandment give I unto you, that ye love one another.”
But Rutherford was not only an ideal pastor, he was a great student as well. In distant Anwoth the mighty problems agitating the theological and ecclesiastical worlds were reviewed, and judgments formed on the great questions at issue. His first work Exercitationes Apologeticae pro Divina Gratia was published at Amsterdam in 1636. It was so highly esteemed that in the same year a second edition was called for. In this work he discusses the chief points in the Arminian Controversy. It established Rutherford’s position as a theologian, and repeated invitations came to him from Holland to fill Divinity Chairs. In this same year he was called before the High Commissioners’ Court, and sentence of deprivation of his ministerial office was passed on him with banishment to Aberdeen. It was from “Christ’s Palace” in Aberdeen that so many2 of his letters were written. And during two years of banishment he fought his battle right nobly, battling with discontent and unbelief, until he overcame by being submissive to that Lord he loved so well. In 1637 matters took a turn in Scotland. The action of Jenny Geddes set a nation astir which resulted in the signing of the National Covenant, and the calling of the famous Glasgow Assembly of 1638, and Rutherford was released from his “silent and dumb Sabbaths” to preach again in his beloved Anwoth.
In 1638 the Church decided that he should be appointed Professor of Divinity in St. Andrews. Every effort was made by his congregation to retain his services, but the Assembly insisted on carrying out its demand, and very much against his own will Rutherford left Anwoth for St. Andrews, where he became
1 Sketch of Samuel Rutherford by Dr. A. A. Bonar prefixed to his Edition of the Letters, page 9.
2 Of the 365 letters which appear in Dr. Bonar’s edition, 219 were written from “Christ’s Palace” in Aberdeen.
Professor of Divinity and Principal of the New College. When the Assembly sent Commissioners to the Westminster Assembly, Rutherford was one of those appointed. In his own characteristic way he refers to this in one of his letters1: “My heart beareth me witness, and the Lord who is greater knoweth, my faith was never prouder than to be a common rough country barrowman in Anwoth; and that I could not look at the honour of being a mason to lay the foundation for many generations, and to build the waste places of Zion in another kingdom, or to have a hand or finger in that carved work in the cedar and alnug trees in that new temple.” And during those days of high debate, Rutherford still maintained sweet converse with heaven. In a remarkable sermon, preached before the House of Commons in 1644, in a heavenly ecstasy he cries, “O for eternity’s leisure to look on Him, to feast upon a sight of His face! O for the long summer day of endless ages to stand beside Him and enjoy Him! O time, O sin, be removed out of the way! O day, O fairest of days, dawn!”2
It was during this period that his Lex Rex was published, and also the Due Right of Presbyteries. And from 1645 until 1649 every year saw a new book from his pen. The Trial and Triumph of Faith (1645); The Divine Right of Church Government and Excommunication, with an appendix; A Dispute touching Scandal and Christian Liberty (1646); Christ Dying and Drawing Sinners to Himself (1647); A Survey of the Spiritual Antichrist, with an appendix; A Modest Survey of the Secrets of Antinomianism (1648); A Free Disputation against Pretended Liberty of Conscience (1649); and The Last and Heavenly Speeches of John Gordon, Viscount Kenmure (1649). In 1651 appeared his Disputatio Scholastica de Divina Providentia. This is probably the most scholastic of Rutherford’s works. The student of modern times, even with a fair knowledge of Latin, is repelled by its learned discussions and distinctions.3 These were the most important of his works published in his lifetime.4 The Letters were not published until 1664. In 1651 the painful controversy between the Resolutioners and the Protesters broke out. Rutherford espoused the cause of the Protesters with great enthusiasm, and showed, perhaps, unnecessary keenness.
1 Letters, cccvi.
2 This Sermon, along with the one preached before the House of Lords, was reprinted in 1879.
3 Dr. James Walker says:—”Good Mr. Wodrow looked into it, and he seems to have been terror-stricken. Over more than six hundred closely printed pages, bristling with references to Thomas, and Scotus, and Bradwardine, to the great Jesuit and Arminian writers, he debates as though in his very element: ‘What is the nature of God’s permissive will?’ ‘Whether under God’s permission sin comes necessarily about by a necessity of consequences, though not by a casual bond?’ ‘Whether there is such a thing as Christian fate?'” Scottish Theology and Theologians, 2nd ed., p. 9.
4 A full list will be found in Dr. Bonar’s edition of the Letters, pp. 31, 2.
The concluding incidents in his life will be woven into the account that is now to be given of Lex Rex.
The work, as has been noticed, appeared in 1644 under the title Lex Rex: The Law and the Prince. Dr. Bonar informs us that in Fullarton’s Scottish Nation (1822) mention is made of another work, which is in reality the same. It was published in 1657 under the title of Civil Policy. It is not a separate work, but only one of the editions of Lex Rex published in 1657 under the title of Lex Rex; a Treatise of Civil Policy: being a Resolution of Forty-three Questions concerning Prerogative, Right and Privilege, in reference to the Supreme Prince and People. It was reprinted in 1846 in the third volume of the Presbyterian’s Armoury. Different opinions have been entertained of the value of Lex Rex. Dr. James Walker1 speaks highly of it, while Hill Burton2 refers to it with a kind of undisguised contempt; but as he is by no means an authority, either on the ecclesiastical or theological literature of Scotland, his opinion need not materially alter the verdict given to Lex Rex by competent students such as Dr. Walker. The immediate cause of the appearance of Lex Rex was the publication by the Bishop of Ross (John Maxwell) of a book entitled Sacro-Sancta Regum Majestas, or the Sacred and Royal Prerogative of Christian Kings, in which the divine right of kings and passive obedience from the subject were strongly asserted. Rutherford, it appears, had already given some attention to questions of constitutional government, but was strongly advised by his friend, Robert Blair,3 to leave off publishing his conclusions for seven years, and to busy himself with works that would be more for the good and edification of souls. Rutherford took the advice of his friend, but, on the appearance of Maxwell’s Sacro-Sancto, he began his studies afresh, the result of which we have in Lex Rex. Contemporary opinion reckoned it of a very high order. King Charles, when he saw it, said it would scarcely ever get an answer—a prophecy which was fulfilled. As for the deep interest it awakened among the clergy, we have the testimony of Bishop Guthrie, who informs us that “every member in the General Assembly had in his hand that book lately published by Mr. Samuel Rutherford, which was so idolised that, whereas Buchanan’s treatise De Jure Regni apud Scotos was looked upon as an oracle, this coming forth, it was slighted as not anti-monarchical enough, and Rutherford’s Lex Rex only thought authentic.”
1 Scottish Theology and Theologians, p. 12.
2 “This book was published in 1644, and in the present day its aspect would not excite any alarm that it should achieve a popularity productive of pernicious influence on the public mind. It would rather be anticipated that, for all the notoriety given to it by the conflagration, the vulgar would find it a tough literary morsel. No doubt a principle may be extracted from it by much labour—the principle that kings are responsible to their people for their righteous dealing.” Hist. of Scotland, vol. vii., p. 155.
3 Gilmour’s Samuel Rutherford, p. 175.
The principles advocated in Lex Rex were not new to the Scottish people. George Buchanan’s De Jure Regni apud Scotos went along the lines laid down by Rutherford in Lex Rex. In fact, Lex Rex discusses the questions that lay behind the great revolution, that ended in the tragedy of Whitehall in 1649, when a royal head paid the penalty that a nation asked. The work has been described as the political text-book of the Covenants, and as a discussion of some of the great questions involved in constitutional law it is by no means an unimportant contribution. The subject is of the deepest interest, and he who can take us by the hand, and instruct us of the true prerogatives of king and people, is a benefactor of the body politic. This is Rutherford’s great aim, but his style is unfortunate. With painful minuteness he pursues his argument with all the subtlety of a schoolman, lit up here and there with that fire of genius that could not be hid on whatever subject he wrote. He begins first of all by asking, “Whether government be by a divine law?” which he answers in the affirmative. Then he asks the question, “Whether or no government be warranted by the law of nature?” And in answering this question he draws a distinction between natural or primary laws of nature and artificial or secondary laws. Civil society is natural in radice, voluntary in modo. Civil society springs from an instinct of nature, but in the delegation of power to an individual we are obeying not so much a natural as an artificial law. For all men are born equally free, and in the nature of things there is no reason why one man should be king over his fellows. From whence, then, does the king receive his authority? Has he it by divine right or from the people? This, of course, was a question that the practical politics of the succeeding years kept continually before the country. It was the people’s answer to this question that was to ultimately wreck the high ambitions of the House of Stuart. Samuel Rutherford solves the problem scholastically, but in after years, through blood and fire, with the grim accompaniments of the scaffold and instruments of torture, the problem was to be worked out to a practical issue. The king’s authority comes from God, for “the powers that be are ordained of God,” but the question to be settled is, “Whence has this particular man a right to reign?” It is because of the people’s choice, and the royal power is thus invested in the people. Here is Rutherford’s scholastic reasoning on the point—”The royal power is three ways in the people: first, radically and virtually, as in the first subject; second, Collative vel communicative, by way of free donation—they giving it to this man, not to that man, that he may rule over them; third, Limitate—they giving it so as these three acts remain with the people; (1) that they may measure out by ounce weights so much royal power and no more and no less; (2) so as they may limit, moderate, and set banks and marches to the exercise; (3) that they give it out, conditionate upon this and that condition, that they may take again to themselves what they gave out upon condition, if that
condition be violated.” The power of creating a man king is, therefore, from the people.
The ninth question deals with the subject of a tyrannical king reigning. Self-defence is a natural law, and in the case of tyranny the people are entitled to use means for their own preservation. But who is to judge between the king and the people when the latter allege that the king is a tyrant? And his answer strikes at the very foundation of absolute monarchy and tyranny:—”There is a court of necessity (he says), no less than a court of justice; and the fundamental laws must then speak; and it is with the people in this extremity as if they had no ruler.” In the course of his argument Rutherford discusses many important questions, such as “whether the king be above the law;” “whether or no wars raised by the estates and subjects for their own just defence against the king’s bloody emissaries be lawful;” “whether monarchy be the best kind of government;” “whether the king of Scotland be an absolute prince having a prerogative above law and parliaments.” The principles asserted in the book are now universally acknowledged as the very basis of constitutional government. But the Royalist party only saw in them the very antithesis of their own principles, and though many of them may have had the same opinion as Charles about the book that it would never get an answer, set about answering it in the only way they could by burning it. It was condemned as “inveighing against monarchy and laying ground for rebellion.” The hands of the common hangman consigned it to the flames at Edinburgh. And under the windows of Archbishop Sharpe at St. Andrews, and also at London, it met with a similar fate.
The Parliament summoned Rutherford to appear before them on the charge of high treason. “Tell them,” he said to the messengers, “I have got a summons already before a superior Judge, and it behoves me to answer my first summons, and ere your day arrives I shall be where few kings and great ones come.” The Parliament, afraid that their victim should, after all, escape punishment, voted that he should not be allowed to die in the New College. One brave man among that craven band delivered his soul from their deed. “Ye have voted that honest man out of the College, but ye cannot vote him out of heaven,” said Lord Burleigh. “He would never win there,” came back an answer; “hell was too good for him.” “I wish I were as sure of heaven as he is,” said Burleigh. “I should think myself happy to get a grip of his sleeve to haul me in.” While these courtiers held high debate as to the final destination of Samuel Rutherford’s soul, his thoughts were turned to Immanuel’s land, and the sentiment, so beautifully expressed by Ralph Erskine, would have ravished his seraphic spirit:—
“I long to share the happiness
Of that triumphant throng
That swim in seas of endless bliss
Eternity along.”
The Diary of Dugald Buchanan.
PERIOD II.
(Continued from page 64.)
MUCH about this time, I met with one who was reputed a learned man, and enquired of him what he thought of a future state, and also of the punishment of the damned in hell. He said there was no such thing as everlasting punishment, and this he attempted to prove by several arguments, especially from a consideration of the goodness of God. For how could it consist with the goodness of God, he observed, to torment poor creatures through eternity; especially the heathen, who had never heard of Him? with many other such arguments. Hearing this new doctrine urged with so many arguments, I was very glad, and thought with myself that there was yet hope of coming out of hell, since it was not eternal, but only to last for a time. O sweet doctrine to such as I was, who looked for nothing but everlasting punishment, that I might now, although never so short, indulge some hope!
When I parted with this man, I began to persuade others to be of my monstrous opinion, by arguing with them as he did with me. But none would believe it, and indeed no wonder, for I did not fully believe it myself. I could not get a full persuasion of it fixed on my mind, only I wished it was true, but all my wishes were crushed by this consideration, viz., that there was a God, and that this God was a God of truth; that He said in His word, the punishment of the wicked in another world will be eternal, and that it was only a mere man like myself, who said it would be only for a time. Then I thought on these words, “Let God be true and every man a liar,” and said if God be true, I must be in hell through all eternity. Having no comfort from this doctrine, I began to think how I could dwell with devouring fire; and how could I abide with everlasting burnings; and how could this feeble back bear the heavy and unsupportable wrath of God, which burns to the lowest hell? Sometimes I thought that God would strengthen me to bear what He would inflict; and again, that I would do as well as others, and harden myself in sorrows. These were, however, but melancholy meditations, and therefore I endeavour to banish them from my mind.
There was another thing I found in myself, although it may appear very strange how it could possibly be, and that was, that I could never have full freedom in the company of wicked men, for although I was singular for wickedness myself, I could not love it in others, and frequently reproved them for their cursing, drinking, and other sins. And when any thing would cross me, I would think of enlisting in the army; but upon considering the way of living these men had, and how they indulged in every
kind of wickedness, especially in swearing and other sinful practices, my heart could not endure to think of being all my days in such company, and thought that, if I kept myself from such, I might sometime or other return. This was a secret thought which was suggested to my mind, but was crushed by my unbelief, so that it had no influence upon my conversation, for it did not come the length of saying, “There is hope in Israel concerning this thing.” However, I thought if I did enlist that every opportunity of repentance would for ever be lost, and by this faint consideration of mercy, I was kept from going into the army.
There was another thing that was very stumbling to me, and that was the loose conduct of many of the professors of religion, whom I knew; and also the unsuitable walk of some ministers. For I had a habit whenever I happened to be in company, either with ministers or professors, of diligently observing their behaviour, and discovering whether they conducted themselves agreeably to their profession; and when I found their conversation vain and about worldly concerns, which did not beseem them, then I concluded that they were either mere hypocrites, or that there was no such thing as that reality in religion which they affirmed; since I was satisfied that if these men believed the reality of those things which they pressed upon others, it would make themselves walk differently from what I observed them to do. I thought also, if I were within the reach of mercy, how I would walk in all holiness. Hence, the conclusion I drew from my observations was, that these people were, in all respects, in as bad a condition as myself. I served the devil publicly, and crowned him as my lord, and I appeared outwardly to be what I was inwardly; but they professed to serve God, and at the same time served the devil. These things were very stumbling to me.
I observe these two or three things from this passage. In the first place, I observe the great need the people of God have to study the Psalmist’s resolution, “I said, I will take heed to my ways, that I sin not with my tongue; I will keep my mouth with a bridle, while the wicked is before me” (Psalms xxxix). It is much to have the wisdom of the serpent, and the harmlessness of the dove; to walk so as that our good may not be evil spoken of, for many are waiting for our halting, that they may have somewhat to say to the reproach of religion.
Again, I see that there is great need to observe that precept, “Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt” (Col. iv. 5, 6). And seeing that, ministers and other persons, whose example is most likely to be imitated, ought to make it their study to walk as it becometh the people of God. For if those who are the salt of the earth lose their savour, wherewith shall they be salted? And if the light that is in them be darkness, how great must that darkness be? And as Solomon says, “Dead flies cause the
ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savour; so doth a little folly him that is in reputation for wisdom and honour” (Eccles. x. 1). I further observe, that by this the weak believer is stumbled, and the heart of the wicked hardened in the ways of sin; and the good way of our God evil spoken of on that account. “Thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme” (2 Samuel xii. 14). Which I have found to my sad experience.
I was one day hearing a sermon in our parish church, where I now very seldom went, unless it was for some by-end or other, when the minister observed that wearied backsliders were like iron once heated. This was so applicable to my case, that I concluded since I had been so often heated and cooled again, that I was turned like steel that could never be softened. For I found the truth of the observation by experience, having made several essays to serve the Lord, and drawn back as often. I remark this one thing in regard to my own backsliding; namely, that after the first time I drew back I was a degree worse than before I returned; and that, the second time I drew back, I was twofold the child of hell more than ever; and that the last time the unclean spirit returned, he brought seven other spirits more wicked than himself. And then my last fall was, without doubt, seven times deeper in the gulf of sin than my first.
This observation did me no other service than merely to let me see that to all appearance I would never be softened. And so to get some ease, I betook myself to my old trade of singing ballads and going into company. But in the midst of my mirth my conscience would stop my mouth by the consideration: there is an everlasting burning abiding you, and how can you be merry? I never, however, intended to let the trouble of my mind be known to any, for no man could help me, and God would not help me. I saw that in a short time I would go to my place, and soon be deprived of those common mercies which I enjoyed from that God who makes His sun to rise on the evil and on the good. I had continually a vehement thirst, and drank a great quantity of water, and when I got a drink, would say: “O! poor wretch, you will be, ere long, with Dives in the flames of hell, where you will not get so much as a single drop to cool your scorching tongue.” I was greatly afraid of death, and like Cain, said, “Every one who finds me will slay me.” If it was but a little pain in the head, I would look upon it as the messenger that was to end my heaven. Something of that curse which Moses pronounced against the children of Israel followed me, “The sound of a shaken leaf shall chase them. The wicked flee when no man pursueth” (Lev. xxvi. 36; Proverbs xxviii. 1). But it pleased the Lord that during these four melancholy years I never had one day’s sickness, and I believe if I had, the terror of my mind would have distracted me. Yet, I believe it was easy for the Lord to have prevented my fears by allaying my trouble.
PERIOD III.
Containing the further progress of convictions in my soul during the two following years.
TO divert myself I went out one day to shoot, and as I was watching some game, was surprised with strong impressions that my death was not distant. And, although I was then in perfect health, I stood still as one astonished; yea, confounded to think of eternity. Then I bewailed my sad condition, and said, How soon has my heaven fled! O how gladly would I be a dog or any other animal but a man! For in that case death would at once put an end to all my miseries. But now all my sorrows, which would know no end, were but beginning. I began then to consider in what way I might probably die; I thought I might die like Francis Spira, for although I succeeded hitherto in concealing all my troubles, yet that my trouble might increase my agony to that height that it would be utterly impossible for me to conceal it. Still I thought if my judgment remained, come what might, that I would conceal it. This thought was however superseded by another—What if Providence, as in justice He might, would take away my judgment, as I saw in the case of others who died stupid and senseless? In which condition I saw that I would die roaring and blaspheming.
My reason for being so desirous to conceal my trouble was, first, that if I could succeed in doing so till the day of judgment, I would have a numerous company of damned reprobates to stand beside me, so that I would not be singular. Another reason was, the loss of my good name, for although I had no good name to lose in reference to religion, yet I had in the estimation of the world a good name to lose, and if I died in raving despair, I was afraid that my name would become a byword and a proverb among all who should hear of it; but if I could succeed in getting matters concealed, there would no more be said of me than of any of the rest of the so-called honest men of the country who died like lambs, and yet in my opinion, went to hell as certainly as those who died in roaring despair.
Not long after this I went to a neighbouring congregation, where the Lord’s Supper was a-being dispensed, and where I heard the action-sermon with great attention, and was melted into tears for my sins. And when the table was fenced, I was ready to cry out for the anguish of my heart, when hearing myself, as it were by name and surname, upon my peril, debarred as a dog from touching the children’s bread. I was observed by others to be in great concern; yet, when I came out of the church and met my old companions, this sudden land-flood dried up and I was the same as before.
About this time the Lord threatened to visit me with a remarkable stroke of His displeasure for my horrid iniquity, even to write my folly in legible characters on my forehead, that he who ran might read it. I saw this stroke to be threatening me for
some time before, and also the justice of God in allowing it to fall upon me; for I knew that, how heavy and grievous soever it might be, I deserved it. A sense of guilt, and despairing to be heard, so closed my mouth that I could not plead with the Lord to avert it. Yet I thought that if the Lord would deliver me from my feared reproach, I never would do as I had done before. And it pleased the Lord to deliver me from this dreaded calamity, which I no sooner observed, than I turned to my old ways. O the long-suffering of God towards me, the chief of sinners!
Some time after this I had business to transact in Edinburgh, where I happened to be in a company where the conversation turned upon religion, when a certain individual seeing me in a Highland dress enquired “what were my principles;” to which I replied, “that as yet I was like a sheet of clean paper, and that he might write any thing he pleased upon me.” “Are you indeed?” says he, “if so, I will give you an advice—take good care that the devil does not scrawl something upon you, and then you will no more be clean.” I was so confounded by this answer that I did not know which way to look; for it pierced me to the heart to think of the truth of what he had said, and which indeed the devil had already done. I was also ashamed that I had spoken so irreverently of religion, and firmly resolved never to speak in such a manner again. When I came away, this man’s answer cleaved very close to me, nor could I by any means get it out of my mind. It also continually brought my former despairing thoughts fresh upon me, and how the devil had written his own law on my heart and placed his image on all my actions.
(To be continued.)
Disaster on Highland Railway.—Alarming occurrences have succeeded one another during recent weeks. On Thursday the 18th June, an unprecedented disaster took place on the Highland Railway a little north of Carrbridge, Inverness-shire, whereby five persons lost their lives and several were injured. There had been heavy downpours of rain, and through a sudden cloudburst, a tremendous spate of water, flowing down a small river or burn, first carried away an ordinary bridge, and then, with the debris, struck a railway bridge, over which, at that very moment, a train was passing in the early afternoon. Two carriages were derailed, and plunged into the flood, with the sad consequences mentioned. The painful event was clearly “the act of God”—no one could have foreseen what took place. At the inquiry one gentleman remarked that the Highland Railway had hitherto a remarkable immunity from accidents—had, in fact, “never killed a passenger.” Praise is due to Divine Providence for this. The Most High is speaking loudly to us at our very doors as to time’s uncertainty, and warning us to seek due preparation. Sudden death means sudden glory to some, but sudden misery to others. “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.”