027. CHRIST THE LIFE OF HUMANITY

CHRIST THE LIFE OF HUMANITY As I proposed to go back from our modern deism to Christ the Life of Nature, so I now propose to go back from our modern atomism to Christ the Life of Humanity. Atomism, in my use of the word, may be denned as that system of thought which regards men merely as individuals, and which ignores the organic unity of mankind on the one hand, and its connection with God on the other. The New England theology is a striking illustration of the lengths to which this atomism could go. It came to regard each human being as an isolated unit, completely detached from others. The members of the race, if indeed there could be said to be a race, were separated from each other as bricks set up on end that tumble only as they are influenced from without, or as grains of sand that have no other union than that of mere juxtaposition. A sign of this method of thought was creationism, with its origination of each human soul by separate divine fiat. Another sign was the maxim that all sin consists in sinning—a denial that there can be any corporate sin, or race responsibility, or organic unity in the primal transgression. And still another sign was the declaration that each man must make his own atonement, which means that there can be no atonement at all; for, unless Christ shares our humanity and we share his, there can be no escape from our own personal guilt and penalty.

Modern science and philosophy have been gradually undermining this atomistic system. Evolution, with its doctrine of the common origin of the race; traducianism, with its declaration that soul as well as body is derived from our ancestry; sociology, with its recognition of corporate good and evil ; political ethics, with its attribution to the State of a quasi-personality; all these have been working to the advantage of Christian theology. Visiting the sins of the fathers on the children was thought to be most irrational, so long as it was seen only in Scripture; but, now that it takes the name of heredity, it is just as vigorously applauded. It once seemed harsh to say that the soul that sinneth it shall die, but when this is called the reign of law, the only danger is that even God will be denied the power to save the sinner. We have taken at least this step forward: We see that humanity is one, that it has a common origin, a common evil, a common destiny. Realism has superseded the scheme of arbitrary imputation. Humanity is a great tree which is not to be viewed from above, as a collection of separate leaves rustling in the breeze, but from beneath, as the outgrowth of one trunk and root, and as throbbing with one common life.