106 geance. But besides these, prefectures of good angels are distributed throughout the cities and nations of the world, according to the divine and primitive orders. 107 And, as a shepherd gives the whole flock his general attention, but nevertheless, bestows his especial care upon the sheep that promise the most abundant reward of his labour, so the angelic ministrations are principally lavished upon those individuals of the human race, that give the finest promise of regal and philosophic mental powers. Over these, a particular angel was deputed to watch, and upon the diligent discharge of his duty, their progress in wisdom greatly depended.108 By the ministration of these national angels, philosophy was revealed to the Greeks: 109 and generally, it was an important part of their function, to instil good and holy desires into the minds of men. But this last duty was performed by them, in entire subordination to another order, which occupied a much more exalted rank in the angelic hierarchy. The Christian graces (as we have seen) were ministered by angels of this high class, an individual presiding over each of them; and the same arrangement obtained also, with the Christian ordinances; each had its peculiar angel, whose ministrations 106 Angelus executionis.-Idem c. 35. 107 Clem. Alex. 7 Strom. § 2., where he copies his namesake of Rome, ad Cor. c. 29; they, as well as Irenæus, lib. 5. c. 12. p. 230., were misled by the Septuagint, which renders Deut. xxxii. 8., in utter defiance of the Hebrew; "he" God “appointed the bounds of the nations according to the number of the angels of God." 108 6 Strom. § 17. Clement supposes that the Greeks derived their philosophy from three sources: from the inspiration of the Logos ministered by angels, which Tatian calls, sympathy with the breath of God; (see Note 80) from the unhallowed revelations of the fallen angels: and from the writings of Moses and the prophets; whence he endeavours to show that they drew largely, 1 Strom. § 3, 4.; 5 Strom. § J. were indispensible to the efficacy of the rite. Tertullian casually mentions the angel of baptism,110 and the angel of prayer: and we cannot doubt but that, in his system, the other Christian ordinances were similarly presided over. Thus we perceive that the doctrine of the church in the second century, regarding the holy angels, as well as the impure demons, was altogether impatient of the narrow bounds to which revelation had confined it, and that a system of demonology, perfect and complete in all its parts, was as zealously propounded for universal belief truth which that word contains. as any We need not institute any detailed comparison of the two schemes of angelic existence which are now before us, to discover, not only a want of harmony and coherence in their several parts, but, that there is really no affinity whatever between them. Certain facts it is true are common to both; but all these are evidently foreign to the latter scheme, and have been fitted into it afterwards; often clumsily enough. They set out upon notions of the Supreme Being, altogether at variance with each other. The one supposes a God omnipotent and omniscient, who impresses, equally on the minutest and the greatest of his works, the infallible signs of his existence, as a proper act of his own Godhead. The brightest seraph that burns in his heaven, and the meanest mite that crawls upon his earth, are both the tokens of his creative power and the objects of his providential care; to him, and to him alone, they, and all that infinite range of existences whereby these two extremes are ultimately connected, are indebted for life, and breath, and all things. This, his glory, he gives 110 Angelus baptismi.-De Baptismo, c. 6. 111 Angelus orationis. De Oratione, c. 12. not to another; he accomplishes no part of his purposes by delegating his divine power; he rules no where by deputy. As to the heavenly host that encircle his presence in innumerable multitudes, they are his ministers that do his pleasure: they do his commandments, hearkening unto the voice of his word. They know no other motive. Instinct with his will, they are as much the passive instruments in his hand for the fulfilment of his high behests, as the powers of inanimate nature. It matters not, whether he cut off in judgment by the blast of the pestilence, or by the sword of the destroying angel in either case, the act is his own. Can there be evil in the city and the Lord hath not done it? Or does he save in mercy? He converts the sinner by the instrumentality of his accredited minister, thereby giving joy to the angels of his presence. By the faithful admonitions of his earthly ambassador, and by the agency of "ministering spirits sent forth to minister unto the heirs of salvation," the convert is kept, amid many difficulties, in the narrow way that leadeth unto life; and in God's good time his ransomed soul is released from the burden of mortality, and wafted, on the wings of its guardian angel, to his presence in glory. But the minister that labours on earth, and the angel that flies in mid heaven, and the beatified spirit that sings in paradise, all combine their voices to proclaim to the universe-"This hath God wrought." The agency of the man and of the angel are lost. I, even I, am he; and beside me there is no Saviour. In the scheme of angelic existences we are now considering, God, is all in all !! Let us endeavour to collect the attributes of the God of the other system. We soon find that it is, in the nature of things impossible, that he can exercise either omnipotence or omniscience, consistently with the entire free agency of the countless myriads of spiritual existences, to whose responsible administrations he has committed the economies of providence and grace. For, whatever may be said of free agency under a dispensation like ours, where our God is a God that hideth himself and will be sought of them that find him, to talk of the free agency of sentient beings, dwelling everlastingly in the full blaze of their Creator's presence, and beholding the perfect manifestation of incessant displays of his omnipotence and omniscience, is absolute idiotcy. Whatever attributes, therefore, the God of the early fathers may have possessed, he never could show himself forth in any other character than that of the mere president, or, at most, monarch of the universe having a natural and imprescriptible right to the supremacy which is conceded, by an artificial one, to an earthly potentate, by his fellow men; but differing from him only in this particular. We readily grant, that these authors are happily inconsistent with themselves, in their perfect orthodoxy upon the subject of the divine attributes. But we refer to the passages we have quoted, wherein they ascribe to the angels powers which trench so painfully upon those of the Supreme Being,112 as proofs they were conscious of this inconsistency, and endeavoured thus to palliate it. Again; if it be true that innumerable multitudes of responsible angels administer the whole of our relations to the invisible world, both temporal and spiritual, if to their good will we must ascribe our mercies, and to their anger or malignity our afflictions,-what rational objection can be urged against our addressing our prayers and praises to them personally, as well as to the First Great Cause, from whom (it would appear) we are estranged by so many 112 See page 45. removes? `If they fulfil the commands of the Almighty, as responsible agents, punishable for disobedience; if the same abyss which has already swallowed up countless myriads of their compeers, still yawns for them, surely their acts of obedience are, as it regards us the receivers of the benefits thereof, highly meritorious, whatever they may be with their Creator; and call for our supplications when we need them at their hands, and our thanksgivings when they are granted, upon principles so plainly elementary to the relations of one being to another, that we hesitate not to assert, that the God of Infinite Wisdom cannot, because he will not, contradict them in any of his precepts. Yet, upon the scheme we are considering, we cannot at all reconcile to this principle, the stern prohibitions of angel worship, and of all attempts at communication with the spiritual world, with which his word abounds. For if our parents and our guardian angels are equally the voluntary and responsible dispensers to us of the bounties of the Universal Parent, what reason is there for honouring the one, which is not equally a reason for honouring the other? Or why is not he who honours his father and mother, in conformity with the divine precept, guilty of impiety towards God, as well as he who worships the angels; since both stand in exactly the same relation between God and himself? We are not surprised to find that the believers in such a system felt this difficulty to be insurmountable. Irenæus administers a very gentle rebuke to the practice of angel worship:113 and an irrefragable proof of its universal prevalence soon afterwards, 113 He merely says that such was not the custom of the church in his time. Nec in vocationibus angelis facit aliquid nec incantationibus.—Lib. 2. c. 57. According to the Romanists, Irenæus condemns the worship of evil demons only in this passage. |