The Pulpit Commentary — Jeremiah — Volume 1 — Section 175

upon the love of ~he new, the tendency to be alway_s looking back upon the tenrlency to be_ always lookmg forward, and then the result 1s that men will come generally to practically act upon that prudent, though to many minds most prosaic, maxim which counsels- " Be not the first by whom the new is tried, Nor yet the last to ltLy the old aside." But in regard to the way in which God would have us go, our text teaches- !. THAT THERE ARE NO NEW WAYS. From the beginning that which the Lord God bath required of man has been, even as it yet is, that we should "do justice Jove mercy, and walk humbly with our God." The gospel of the Lord Jesus is r:ot to supersede or make void this eternal law, but to establish it as it never bad been or could have been before. " What the Law could not do in that it was weak through tho flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh," did," that the righteous- ness of the Law might be fulfilled in us." 1''or this end, by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the burden of guilt is ttLken off from us, and a new heart and a right spirit given. But the law of life is ever the same. It is the old and good way. II. NEVERTHELESS, MEN ARE CONTINUALLY DEVISING NEW WAYB. It was so in Jere- miah's time; it is so in our own. By denials of truths most surely believed amonast us for many generations, or by additions thereto, or by substitutions of other for~s of fait_b, m_en have done to-day as i°: th~ days of old. Every magazine and newspaper, besides mnumerable volumes ever 1ssumg from the press,-all alike are popular as they throw over old ideas and propound "some new thing." Science and secularism and superstition between them would, long ere this, have destroyed the good old way, had it not been so firmly constructed that all these powers combined are not adequate for such a task. III. lN THESE NEW WAYS WHAT IS TRUE WILL DE FOUND TO BE OLD, AND WHAT 18 NOT OLD WILL BE FOUND TO BE NOT TRUE. For there are tests by which new teachinas may be tried, and ought to be tried, and by which the prophets of God tried the ne~ teachings of their day. 1. The test of conscience. The human conscience confesses God. It is borne in upon the human heart that God is. Nothing can permanently stifle or destroy that confession, which Conscience, left to herself, would ever make. 'I'he very word "conscience" implies the recognition of some other being as with us, in us, around and about us. It confesses God. All teachings, therefore, that deny God, or explain him away as a blind force or law, or identify him with his universe, the pantheist's God,-these teachings by this sure test are tried, and found wanting. 2. The test of result. Note what is the result of any professed truth upon personal happiness. God, who has given us so many things richly to enjoy, must from his very nature purpose the blessedness of his children. But if a system be offered us, the inevitable result of which is to blo·t out hope, to shut us up to this often most miserable life, as all they would do who would fa.ke from us the Christian hope-then its drear and dread effect upon the heart of man proclaims it false. See, too, how any teaching tells upon character. Here is a surer test still. Whatever else is dark and obscure, goodness and truth must ever be right. But if any new doctrines tend to deteriorate character, as many of them do, to make sin easier and virtue more difficult; if they throw the reins upon our lower nature; if they take away the great motives to noble- ness of life ;-then again they are demonstrated false. And note their effect upon society _generally. Can the denial of God's existence, of the religious basis of morality, as Mr. Herbert Spencer denies it, of the authority of Holy Scripture, of the sanctity of the sabbatb, of the Divine mission of the Son of God, of the resurrection of the dead, the judgment and future blessedness or woe depending upon our lives here ;-can the denial of any of these things, which, alas! is common enough now, tend to the good of society~ Must not the general well-being of mankind be greatly threatened if such doctrines be generally accept.ad? But doctrines that would thus destroy good are ipso facto declared to have no part nor lot in the kingdom of truth. By these tests of con- science and result let the new ways be tried, and it will be seen that what in them is true is old, and what is not old is not true. IV. WHEREFORE, 1'HEN, DO MEN DEVISE THESE NEW WAYS? The ea.uses are some- times: 1. Intellectual. Mental restlessness on the part of some will lead men, even in the most perilous matters, to be doubting the old and devising what is new. And God cu. vi. 1-30.) THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET JEREMIAH. 173