The Literary Remains of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Volume 4Coleridge, Samuel Taylor
Religion
The Literary Remains of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Volume 4
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor
Literature -- History and criticism
He will preface it with the solemn and woful communication of the
Evangelist John, in order to show how exactly they accord, how clearly
the doctrines of the one are deduced from the Revelation of the other,
and how justly, therefore, it assumes the exclusive title of
evangelical. 'And I saw the dead * * * and the dead were judged out of
those things which were written in the books, according to their
works. And the sea gave up the dead * * and they were judged every man
according to his works'. Rev. xx. 12, 13. Let us recall to mind the
urgent caution conveyed in the writings of Paul * * 'Be not deceived;
God is not mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also
reap'. And let us further add * * the confirmation * * of the Saviour
himself:--'When the Son of Man shall come in his glory, * * * but the
righteous into life eternal'. Matt. xxv. 31, 'ad finem'. Let us now
attend to the Evangelical preacher, (Toplady). "The Religion of Jesus
Christ stands eminently distinguished, and essentially differenced,
from every other religion that was ever proposed to human reception,
by this remarkable peculiarity; that, look abroad in the world, and
you will find that every religion, 'except one', puts you upon 'doing
something', in order to recommend yourself to God. A Mahometan * * A
Papist * * * It is only the religion of Jesus Christ that runs counter
to all the rest, by affirming--that we are 'saved' and called with a
holy calling, 'not' according to our works, but according to the
Father's own purpose and grace, which was 'not' sold to us 'on certain
conditions to be fulfilled by ourselves', but was given us in Christ
before the world began." Toplady's Works: Sermon on James ii. 18.
'Si sic omnia'! All this is just and forcible; and surely nothing can be
easier than to confute the Methodist by shewing that his very
'no-doing', when he comes to explain it, is not only an act, a work, but
even a very severe and perseverant energy of the will. He is therefore
to be arraigned of nonsense and abuse of words rather than of immoral
doctrines.
Ib. p. 84.
The sacred volume of Holy Writ declares that 'true' (pure?) 'religion
and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit the
fatherless and widow in their affliction, and to keep himself
unspotted from the world'. James i. 27
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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