PRE-EXISTENTS
504
PREFACES
The doctrine of pre-existence first found its advocates in the ' Ihristian Churcb in the 2d century. The fathers Justin Martyr. Origen, and minis espoused it, particu- larly Origen, who became its principal exponent and
advocate. It was a belief very prevalent anciently, and is still widely spread throughout the Last. The Cn, I, philosophers, too, especially those who held the doc- trine of transmigration (q. v.), as the Pythagoreans, Empedocles, and even Plato — if with him pre-existence is not simply a symbolical myth were familiar with the conception ; and so were the -lews, especially the
cabalists. It is generally received by the i [era
Jews, and is frequently taught in the writings of the rahhins. One declares that "the soul of man had an existence anterior to the formation of the heavens, they being nothing but fire and water." The same author asserts thai " the human soul is a particle of the Deity from above, and is eternal like the heavenly natures." A similar doctrine is believed by the Persian Sofia (i|. v.). With the pre-existents should also be classed tie metempsychosists, for pre-existence is connected with the idea of metempsychosis (q. v.), according to which doctrine the soul was, in a former life, in punish- ment for sin. united with a human body, in order to expiate, by the miseries of earthly existence, anterior transgressions. Therefore St. Augustine, invoking Cice- ro's authority, says (Contra Julian, iv. l5):"Ex quibus humanse vita- orrorihiis et aerumnis tit. ut interdum veteres illi sive vates sive in sacris initiisque tradendis divinse mentis interpretes, qui nos ob aliqna scelera Buscepta in vita Buperiori pcenarum luendarum causa esse natos dixerunt, aliquid vidisse videantur." Ne- mesius, as a philosopher, and Prudentius, as a poet, seem to have been the only defenders of the pre-existence theory, which was condemned formally in the Council • ■I t onstantinople, in A.D. 540. lint the doctrine, has been embraced by mystics (q.v.) generally, both in an- cient and modern times; and has since heen revived, in a modified form, in German theology, by Julius Midler, and forms the hasis of ids work on The Christian Doc- trine "/Sin. one of the deepest works in modem theol- ogy. Iii American theology it has its aide advocate in Dr. Edward Beecher (Thi Conflict of Ages), but the Christian Church generally has thus tar failed to give its assent to it. In the domain of philosophy, direct in- tellectual interest m this doctrine has nearly ceased in modern time-: yet the dream —for, whether true or false, it is and can he nothing hut a dream in our pres- ent -tale, and with our present capabilities id' knowl- edge— has again and again haunted individual thinkers. Wordsworth has given poetical expression to it in his famous ode. Intimations of Immortality from Recollec- tions of Early Childhood:
"Onr birth is but a sleep and a forgetting. The soul that rises with as— our life's star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And coineth from afar. Not in entire forgetfnlneRS, And not in utter nakedness, Dm trailing clouds of glory do we come
Prom God, who is onr home."
The latest philosophy of Germany- that of Hegel and of the younger Fichte (Psychology | 1864]) has moder- ately revived the doctrine, and, with the alliance of such theologians as .Midler, may crowd it into prominent consideration upon the Church. It remains for us to say here that the name Preexistiani was given to the advocates of this belief to distinguish them from the
Creatiani, those who hold to the immediate creation ol the human soul at the moment of the production of the body; and to distinguish them from the Traducianists, who held that children received soul a- well as l.od\ from their parents. See Cudwortb, Intellectual Devel- opment of tht Universt ; Delitzsch, Biblical Psychol \>. •11 hi; Lawson, Church of Christ; Goodwin, Works ; Register, Sludien ». Kriliken, 1829 -'17. s.v. SeeL ; West- minster /.'•'•.April. 1865; Bibliotheca Sacra, Jan. 1855, p. 15G; Methodist /:■ <: Oct, 1853, p. 567. (J. H.W.)
Prefaces (Immolaiio; the Gallican Contestatio
)<ii.<.«r : the priest's witness to the vert dignum of the people; the Mo/.arabic and Gallican iUatio or inlatio), certain short occasional form- in the communion-service ot ile i burch of England, which are introduced in par- ticular festivals, more esj>eeially Christmas, Easter, As- cension, and seven days after; also Whit-Sunday and six days after, together with Trinity-Sunday. They are introduced by the priest immediately before the an- them beginning, "Therefore with angels, archangels," etc. "This anthem i- a song of praise, or an act id' profound adoration." -a\ 3 dean Comber, "equally proper at all times: but the Church calls upon us more espe- cially to use it on lnr chief festivals, in remembrance of those events which are then celebrated. Thus, on Christ- mas-day, the prior, having said ' It is very meet, right, and our bounden duty that « e should at all times, and in all places, give thanks unto thee, O Lord [ Holy Fa- ther] Almighty, everlasting God,' adds the proper pref- ace which assigns the reason for peculiar thankfulness on that particular day, viz.: 'Becaust thou didst give Jesus Christ, thine only Son, to be horn as at this time for us; who. by the operation of the Holy Ghost, was made very man. of the Virgin Mary his mother, and that without spot of sin. to make us clean from all .-in; therefore? with angels,' etc.