Chapter 39: A Protest Against False Teachers

Chapter 39.
A Protest Against False Teaching

Progress of the Tabernacle—Sermon on behalf of Young Women—Brown's "Divine Life in Man"—Protest of Spurgeon and Six Other Leading Ministers—Visit to Birmingham—Visit to South Wales—Tour on the Continent.

The Metropolitan Tabernacle being now in course of erection, great interest was naturally felt in its progress, not only by the congregation it was intended to accommodate but by the public at large. Hence, on Monday evening, April 2, a full meeting was held at New Park Street Chapel to report progress and to adopt measures for securing further subscriptions. Mr. Spurgeon himself presided, and was able to congratulate his friends on the success which had already been achieved. From what was further said, the audience inferred that the new Tabernacle was to a great extent a copy of the Surrey Gardens Music Hall. The panic in the latter building had taught some useful lessons. As Mr. Spurgeon remarked, "A great improvement has been made in the mode of access to the galleries, there being a staircase to each of them, so that no crush or inconvenience would be felt in the ingress or egress. It takes about twenty minutes for the people to get out of the Surrey Hall, but this building, though crammed, would be cleared in some five minutes." The great building was then described, and it was spoken of as a place which was being built with large intentions. The subscriptions to date were nearly £19,000, leaving over £12,000 to be subscribed before the sanctuary would be free from debt. On Thursday, April 12, Mr. Spurgeon preached at Bloomsbury Chapel on behalf of the Society for the Rescue of Young Women and Children, the text being St. John 8:10-11, "When Jesus had lifted up Himself, and saw none but the woman, He said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers?" etc. After making some references to the calamities which sin brought upon its victims, the preacher went on to speak of Christ's methods of dealing with particular sinners:—

"He did not condemn them but said, Go and sin no more. The reason He did this was because the condemnation against this sin had but a very feeble effect. Moses decreed stoning; but how ineffectual it was, seeing that a whole host of Pharisees indulged in it. The penalty had evidently failed to produce the desired effect. This one instance might be confirmed by all history. When any very stringent law was made against a crime, they had generally seen that that very crime increased. Forgery, horse-stealing, etc., were far more rampant when punished by execution than they were in their own day. Mere punishment, mere law and terror, had always failed in subduing the wickedness of the human heart. Certainly he did not deny that it had had a slight check on wickedness, but at the same time the thing had been a defeat and not a conquest. The conduct of the Lord was right towards the woman, because, unless they were prepared to say that Jesus Christ's motive was a mistaken one, they could not say He was mistaken in this act. But he (Mr. Spurgeon) did not see how Christ could have condemned the woman. There were two taken found committing adultery, and only one of the guilty persons brought before Him. If she had been before any judge, surely he would have said, 'Bring the other,' and when they saw the Christian Church acting as a mighty matron, looking down on the fallen daughters of Eve, did they not all say, 'Why does she not do so to the men?' because they were the ringleaders in sin, they first pulled their daughters from the stars and hurled them down to the depths of miry clay. Now that the law had proved a failure, let them try what the Gospel could do."

It was about this time that the late James Baldwin Brown published a volume entitled "The Divine Life in Man," which showed the author to be a disciple of Maurice. To this work, John Howard Hinton wrote an answer, and when these "Strictures" were reviewed in the Baptist organ, appearances showed that the writer of the review agreed with Baldwin Brown rather than with his critics:—"Mr. Brown's chief fault is inconsistency with himself, and it would have been better if Mr. Hinton had paid particular attention to this, and exposed his inconsistencies in detail, instead of conjuring up to himself a bugbear of heterodoxy beginning to be rampant in the churches which it shall be his 'mission' to destroy. We have no belief in this phantasmal hydra, and regret much that it so haunts the brain of some of our venerated and beloved brethren. We believe it to be a delusion of Satan's by which the great enemy has grievously succeeded in weakening the spirit of mutual confidence, and in destroying unity of action amongst the ministers of Congregational and Baptist churches."

It almost appeared as though this reviewer wished to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds: he favoured or corrected each side in turn; for while Mr. Hinton's production was "most objectionable." the doctrines it advanced were "important to be upheld." Accordingly the next number of the paper contained what was not only a protest against Brown's erroneous teaching, but a condemnation of the bias of The Freeman itself, this being signed by Mr. Spurgeon and six other foremost men in the denomination. The passages singled out by Mr. Hinton are spoken of as containing "pernicious error," and Mr. Hinton was held to have rendered "valuable service to Evangelical Christianity" by the publication of his "Strictures ":—

"We are no more lovers of controversy than your reviewer, but if errors subversive of the Gospel are advocated by some of her ministers, it is the duty of others to withstand them.... Without conjuring up any 'phantasmal hydra' of heterodoxy, as your reviewer speaks, and imagining that it is beginning to be rampant in our churches, which we do not for a moment suppose or believe, we take the liberty of saying that we trust our ministers will continue to be students of Howe and Charnock and Hall and Fuller rather than draw their theology from Maurice, Professor Scott, and others of the same school whom Mr. Brown so strongly recommends." The preacher thus publicly reprimanded wrote a short note to The Freeman, complaining that Mr. Spurgeon had joined six others in an endeavour to prejudice his ministry. The apologist for T. T. Lynch during "The Rivulet" controversy also preached in his own defence at Clayland Chapel, Kennington, on April 22. The matter, too, was mentioned in the pulpit at New Park Street Chapel on April 15. The Nonconformist devoted a leading article to the subject, and thought that a mistake had been made, and to this Dr. Angus wrote a vigorous reply. The Freeman also referred to the subject again at length; and it was in reply to this that Mr. Spurgeon wrote a letter which filled over two columns of The British Standard of May 25. After some introductory remarks as regarded the reasons which led to the sending forth of the Protest, Mr. Spurgeon asked:—

"How, think you, was this admirable document received p Why, sir, it was supplemented by an editorial postscript, the marrow of which consisted in a joke upon the juvenility of three of the brethren, who are yet old enough to know some who are their juniors in years, and a few who are far more their juniors in decency. A ghastly smile, like that which flickers upon the face of a man who is confused and confounded, but who longs to conceal his fears with the mask of levity, was the only answer we received. "We were dealing with divine realities, and with verities which concerned the very basis of our holy religion; the reply was a play upon a harmless sentence, highly appropriate in the mouths of most of the seven, and not indecorous upon the lip of any one of them. This absurd trifling was esteemed to be so terrible a piece of artillery that it must needs be fired off again at Exeter Hall on the Missionary occasion, to the disgust of many of the audience, by a gentleman who was so alarmed at the stupendous engine with which he was entrusted that the echo of his own voice seemed to startle him, and one word from an indignant hearer extorted a trembling apology. Was he the reviewer who caused all the mischief? Did an uneasy conscience blanch that cheek, and cause that grim sarcasm which received a cheer or two because it was not understood? If it be so, it is time that the incognito of reviews should be rent away, when common decency cannot restrain a man from stepping forward to be his own champion, to defend in his public position a deed which he dares not avow to be his own." This refers to the speech of one who was easily recognised. The controversy shifted somewhat from the book complained of to, the conduct of a newspaper. At all events, it is the paper which Mr. Spurgeon is chiefly concerned with in his memorable letter to Dr. Campbell's journal. One more passage may be quoted:—

"The Freeman affirms that some of us had never read the book to which we referred. I am sure I had both read and marked it, but as to inwardly digesting it, I am not nearly enough allied to an ostrich to be able to accomplish that feat. Next, it unfairly takes it for granted that the letter of Dr. Angus was a joint affair, although it is his writing, and his alone. Admirable as it is, that letter is no more the composition of the whole seven than is this epistle, which the Editor will take care to observe is mine, and mine alone. A worse act than this imperiously demands inquiry. The Freeman must make good a statement to which I am now about to refer, or tacitly admit that its courage and truthfulness have vanished. It dares to say that one of us had previously approved of Mr. Brown's booh. Name the man. Why stab the whole seven in the dark? In the name of common honesty, not to say religion, point out the individual. None of us would take the pains to deny an accusation so indefinitely worded. The charge is so serious that, to whomsoever it may be falsely applied, it will be his duty, for the protection of society, to visit the author of the libel with the fullest punishment the laws of his country can enforce, unless an ample apology be forthcoming. The imputation is tantamount to calling a man dishonest, if not a liar; and what remains to any of us when such charges are allowed to pass unchallenged?"

While the excitement occasioned by this Protest was at its height Mr. Spurgeon visited Birmingham. He arrived in the great Midland town on April 24 and remained until the next day. "Without having to notify the fact of the services, 6,000 tickets were disposed of in a few hours; and the distributor of these is said to have had his bells broken down by the unceasing peals of applicants. Soon after this, Mr.

Spurgeon found rest to be necessary, and the commotion occasioned by the Protest against false doctrine died away.

It is evident that Mr. Spurgeon intended to write more on this subject, but he found more profitable employment, and does not appear to have given the matter further attention. On Wednesday, May 30, he visited South Wales, and preached in a field at Abercarn to 20,000 people. Lying in Mynyddyslwyn parish, this busy town has its tin-plate works as well as its great collieries; and the seat of Lord Llanover is the great house of the neighbourhood. "Among those present," says a local newspaper, "were the Lord-Lieutenant of Monmouthshire, and Mrs. Leigh; Lord Tredegar, Lady Tredegar, and family; Lord Llanover, Lady Llanover, and family; and a large number of the leading gentry of the county." No more pleasing sight could have presented itself to the preacher than such a congregation made up in large measure of the working classes, and an incident occurred which showed him to be above all else a preacher to the people. The personages of the county were there in great force; but their four-horse carriages were on the outside of the crowd, and not in the best place for hearing. A cry arose for the people to move aside so that the vehicles and their distinguished occupants might approach nearer to the preacher. When he discovered what was being attempted, Mr. Spurgeon at once called out, "I did not come here to preach to horses but to men; four horses and a carriage would occupy the ground of fifty people, and therefore the horses and carriages must remain where they are." After the service the Lord-Lieutenant sent for Mr. Spurgeon and asked him to visit Pontypool; but it appeared that such a visit would be impossible, as preaching engagements had already been made for two years.

It was now nearly seven years since Spurgeon had first appeared in London; and the hitherto unrelieved strain of his heavy labours at last began to produce symptoms which could not be ignored. He complained of weariness, such as had not been experienced before. Since the days of Wesley, there was no record of a preacher having gone through such a term of service; for during the seven years an average of ten sermons a week had been preached, the congregation occasionally showing a total of 30,000 persons. The only way to prevent a complete breakdown was to seek relaxation for a time from such exhausting toil; and accordingly, arrangements were made for a tour on the Continent. On Monday evening, June 4, a crowded meeting was held at New Park Street Chapel, several well-known friends giving addresses while the assembly took farewell of the pastor and his wife, and wished them God-speed on their travels. Arrangements were made for various eminent ministers to conduct the services both at Exeter Hall and New Park Street during the pastor's absence. It was also felt to be desirable that the erection of the Tabernacle should be proceeded with as rapidly as possible, so that a meeting might be held in the great building before the end of the summer. It was thought that such a meeting would not only be of general interest, but would stimulate the collection of the money still needed. But even this necessary break in the round of toil was not a complete holiday, for sermons were given in some of the chief cities of the Continent. After June 3, Mr. Spurgeon did not preach in London again until July 29. As the first holiday in seven years, this was not too long; and it would have ceased to be a holiday at all if he had responded to all the demands which interested persons would have made upon him. For example, there were publishers who would gladly have issued a book of travels by the popular preacher; but he felt that taking notes for such a purpose would be too irksome, and that it would be as profitable to continue work at home as to become a slave abroad.