THE LIFE OF PRINCIPAL
HARPER D.D.
CHAPTER IV.
IN THE STUDY.
Leith Past and Present - Early Rising - Doddridge -
Preparation of Discourses - Choice of Texts - Courses of General Study - System
- Habits - Commonplace Books - Conversation - Harvests - Science and Literature
- Favourite Books - Edinburgh Review - Influence - Experience reflected in
Counsels to Others - Extracts.
THE Leith of the present day has almost ceased to be
distinguishable from Edinburgh. A stranger looking down from the Calton Hill,
would find it impossible to determine where the beautiful capital ends and the
busy seaport begins. But sixty years ago, when Mr. Harper entered on his
ministry in Leith, the two places scarcely touched at any point. Gardens and
nurseries, and old family mansions in enclosed parks, where the sheep grazed
peacefully, intervened. Leith Walk, the connecting link between city and
seaport, had still its long unbroken hedgerows in many places on either side,
and the 'Half-way House ' was a familiar and welcome resting-place. Not many
years earlier, it was no very rare experience for footpads to track the steps
and lighten the purses of travellers hastening to catch the early boat to
Burntisland or Pettycur, and the few streets in North Leith straddled their way
in irregular lines in front and in rear, very much in the style of a Portuguese
or Spanish town of the present day. Things had already changed much for the
better before our young minister entered on his pastorate, in the midst of a
population that more than once doubled itself before his work was
ended.
He was accustomed to be in his study every morning at six
o'clock, kindling his own fire, in respect to which he was accustomed playfully
to boast, that he was ' quite an expert in the art of fire-raising ;' and the
first two hours were spent in devotional exercises and reading the Scriptures,
his Hebrew Bible and his Greek New Testament being always open at his side.
Many an artisan passing in the cold winter mornings to his work, knew by the
lighted window that the earnest student was at his labours before him. This
practice was continued without interruption for a period of more than sixty
years, when at length 'the keepers of the house began to tremble.' It will be
remembered that Doddridge pursued a similar custom; and we have his own strong
testimony that, practically, it added ten years to his life, putting it in his
power to do an amount of work as an author, which must otherwise have been left
undone; and that one outcome of it was his valuable Family Expositor, the whole
of which was written in the silent morning hours. To much of Mr. Harper's
success as a Christian minister, and of his influence and usefulness as a
public man, we have the key in this one life habit. It gave him opportunity for
secret prayer and calm reading and meditation when his faculties had been
freshened by the night's rest, and when he knew that for two precious hours he
was fenced round and secured from those interruptions against which no minister
in a large town is safe in later hours of the day. And it afforded him leisure
to sketch the programme of his day's duties, accounting for the fact which many
noticed but could not explain, that while he was always, one of the busiest
workers, he never seemed driven, or in haste.
A large portion of every
week was conscientiously devoted to the preparation of discourses for his
Sabbath ministry ; for he held it as a sacred conviction that no minister
serves his flock as he might, who does not give them the best sermon that his
powers of composition, and of careful adaptation to their case, will enable him
to produce. His texts for the following Sabbath were usually selected, and his
course of thought planned and sketched, on the previous Sabbath evening, in
order that he might have ample time to ruminate on his subject during the
intervening days, gathering material and illustration alike from nature and
art, in company and solitude, and not least in pastoral intercourse with his
people. His constant aim was to have his written preparations finished on the
Friday evening, in order to secure the Saturday not only for physical rest, but
for bringing his mind into full sympathy with the Divine messages and lessons
which he was to bear to his pulpit on the Lord's day. He sought to enter his
pulpit, not from the heat and hurry of composition, but with his mind unruffled
and settled as the high priest's robes. He did not believe that the proper
frame for preaching and presiding in the worship of the Church, could be put
on, as a thing of course, along with his gown and bands.
But all the
while, during every week, he was pursuing separate courses of study in Theology
and Biblical Exegesis, appreciating the more, the longer he lived, the maxim of
Dr. Arnold, that the mind which is constantly giving out, needs, like the
running lake, to be constantly receiving. His custom was to select an important
subject for study, and to treat it exhaustively. The results of his reading and
meditation were recorded and preserved in a condensed form, in a succession of
portable common-place books written in shorthand, one of which he always
carried about with him. One topic after another was in this way matured and
mastered, and a reference to one of these books, which were carefully indexed,
refreshed his memory and gave him back in a few minutes the results of the
reading of many days or weeks. We have before us a page of one of these
manuscript books, which evidently contains the gathered fruits of weeks of
investigation in reference to the opinions of the early Christian fathers on
the Divinity of Christ. The whole of these condensed jottings, which range over
a very wide and varied field, if printed, would fill at least a dozen octavo
volumes. In another set of books, he was accustomed to note the comments of
eminent biblical scholars, especially those of foreign Universities and
Churches, on important or difficult passages of Scripture, occasionally
intermingling with these an independent exegesis of his own. The following
specimens are selected from a few of his note-books : -
CHURCH
HISTORY.
CENTURY I. - The Sabians, a sect who professed to be disciples
of John Baptist, setting him before Jesus Christ. Agreed in many points with
the Gnostics. Particularly concerning this sect, see Michaelis'
Introduction.
CENTURY II. - Irenaeus' account of LXX. translation as quoted
by Eusebius, lib. v. cap. 8. Care and fidelity of the primitive Christians in
transcribing sacred books. Irenseus' solemn adjuration on this subject, Euseb.
lib. v. cap. 13. Early Unitarians, not only the Ebionites of the second
century, but Artemon, Theodotus, etc. An early work against them, quoted by
Eusebius, replies to their pretensions, and shows that the apostolical and
primitive faith of the Church was according to Trinitarian views, by affirming
that the writings of Justin, Miltiades, Tatian, and Clement repeatedly declare
that Christ is God. Same work accuses these heretics of abridging the tone of
Scripture and of corrupting it in many places, Euseb. lib. v. cap.
27.
EXEGETICAL NOTES.
1 COR. in. 22. - ' All are yours,' belong to
you, as they minister to your good. You belong to Christ, as He hath bought you
with a price. Christ is God's, as the Mediator or medium through whom all
things are made yours. It is as being Christ's that all things are made
yours.
1 COR. VIII. 7. - The heathen worship idols as the shrines of Deity,
'with conscience of the idol.' This probably describes a belief or
acknowledgment of some spirit-power residing in the idol to whom the worship is
paid, and to whom the person would feel committed by sitting at meat in the
idol's temple. This view appears to be confirmed by ver. 6. It is the one God
and one Lord of whom the persons spoken of had not the knowledge. Does not this
plainly imply that the ' conscience of the idol' was a lingering belief that it
was the shrine of some invisible power ?
2 COR. XI. 17-28. - Paul defends
himself against the charge of being a pretender and a fool. "If any of you
consider me in this character, then give me the indulgence which I claim, while
I plead for myself in this capacity. What I am going to say in the way of
confident boasting, is in this character; not as a servant of Christ, but in
the assumed character of a fool (ver. 16), as indeed on the carnal ground of
which many boast, I may glory also (ver. 18). In seeking this indulgence, I ask
no more than you extend to others who are fools and pretenders indeed, ver.
20." Then follows a description of these men, skilfully put so as to expose the
folly of the Corinthians in becoming their dupes. "I speak in relation to the
reproach thrown on me, as if I were a weak and witless person, unable to make
good my claims; but in whatsoever thing any is bold, hear what I can say for
myself on the same, and on better grounds". In vers. 21, 22, he reminds them
that he speaks in the character which his enemies imputed to him, and which,
for the sake of argument, he for the moment assumes, to show them that, on
their own principles, his claims were beyond theirs. In the latter part he
shows that, as a servant of Christ, his claims were also superior in respect of
the labours which he underwent and was still enduring.
GAL. ii. 20. - ' Dead
to the law' in the previous verse, explained by 'crucified with Christ' in
this. "Nevertheless I live, because living unto God. Christ is the author and
sustenance of this life by His Word and Spirit; and the principle and practice
of it is explained thus: The life which I now live in the flesh I live because
He lives, I live as He lives. I am under another power, I have entered on a new
existence, and all this through my union to Christ and participation in His
benefits".
Nor was Mr. Harper's knowledge always gathered from books. He
sought to make conversation tributary. Whenever he met with a man who was
reputed as a master in some particular subject, he took eager advantage of his
opportunity ; and with apt questions, assuming the posture of a disciple,
enriched himself from the stores which were readily laid open to so acute a
questioner. But woe to the man who in such circumstances was discovered to be
pretentious and superficial, as sometimes happened. The humiliation was
terrible, to have the poverty discovered and the reputed wealth shown to be all
in the windows, and the extemporized pupil revealed as knowing a great deal
more on the very ' speciality,' than the master.
In much the same
exhaustive manner in which our minister studied theological questions, did he
give himself to the study of some of the popular sciences, such as astronomy,
geology, and physiology, endeavouring to keep pace, as far as possible, with
the rapid march of modern discovery, and sometimes presenting the results of
this, or of the reading of some instructive book of travels, in week-day
lectures to his people, whose interests were always near to his heart. In our
own rich English literature, though no stranger to the great books of any of
its great periods, he was particularly at home with the best writers of the age
of Queen Anne, familiarity with whose writings no doubt helped to give to his
style that classic purity and elegance, as well as Saxon energy, which were its
marked qualities. Tine Spectator was a life companion ; and, belonging to a
following age, Cowper's poems, and yet more his Letters, which, with their
simplicity, felicity, playful humour, and sweet reflection of pure and placid
domestic life, were associated with his early recollections, and held him to
the last, spellbound. He liked the old wine of our literature, though he was
very far indeed from despising the new.
No modern publication was waited
for by him with greater expectation, or read with keener zest in his younger
ministry, than the earlier numbers of the Edinburgh Review. Not that he had any
sympathy with its sneers at Methodism, or with its slighting references to
missions to the heathen and kindred subjects; but that he enjoyed its hearty
aspirations after liberty, the extraordinary vigour and freshness of many of
its papers, its tremendous castigations of dull and stagnant commonplace, and
its fearless exposures of official corruption and exclusiveness in high places.
The Edinburgh Review did much to make him a confirmed Liberal in politics for
life. We remember his telling us, not many years since, in proof of his
enthusiasm in this direction, of his having obtained the privilege of reading
the proof-sheets of the earlier numbers of the Review as they were passing
through the press. Still, it was theology and the preparation of his weekly
discourses for his pulpit that engrossed by far the greater part of every week;
and of the spirit in which these congenial labours and studies were pursued, we
cannot present a more accurate description than is to be found in his counsels
to his students in this very matter, after he had become a Professor of
Theology. His advices to them had, many a time before, been addressed to
himself in his self-communings and often-renewed resolutions.
How the
sense of peace mth God helps the student and the minister - "Among the
influences calculated, if not to distract the attention, certainly to depress
the inquirer, may be mentioned as none of the least, the unquietness and the
despondency of being more fearful than believing respecting our state before
God. I assume that the case is one in which the individual has made this matter
the subject of earnest consideration. What means your profession of faith in
the Gospel - your profession of following Christ - your profession of giving
yourselves to the study of Divine truth for the benefit of others, if these
things do not imply that the care of your own salvation has been a matter of
concern with you ? If this concern has ended happily, if you have found joy and
peace in believing, then remark the cheering and healthful influence of such
tranquillity on the studies in which you are to be engaged. You are in the
joyful circumstances of one who has got a burden off his mind. Thus freed, the
mind acquires its firmest tone. So far as itself is concerned, its most
momentous business is in a sense settled. Its prospect is bright. It enjoys the
sunshine and the light of God's favour. Whatever stimulus therefore can be
found in present joy and in the prospect of a far higher blessedness, animates
you in your course. There is in it the pleasantness of an employment in which
you feel at home, and to the accomplishment of which you can apply your mind
with the uninterrupted bent of its faculties.
"This does not imply that,
having found good hope through grace, you may withdraw your attention from
personal improvement and give yourselves up wholly to care for the things of
others. In the calm and undivided contemplation of Divine things, when you
study for others, you study for yourselves. The same truth instructs both. The
clear views of the objects of faith which qualify for impressing the conscience
of a hearer, are not lost to him who holds that truth up to view. It has been
performing its office in his own mind, before he brings it out of his treasure
for his brother's good. And the advantage which he has when his heart is at
rest in the faith of the Gospel, is, that whether for others' good or his own,
he can engross himself with such topics in the peaceful contemplation of them,
which another cannot do whose soul is yet groping in the twilight and is
harassed with many fears."
Connection between doing the will of God and
knowing the mind of God.-"Thus the tone of mind which is acquired in a state of
grace, constitutes a relish for the things known, and a thirst for a fuller
apprehension of them. It is here that, in a peculiar sense, we see the effect
of that congeniality which has been remarked upon in other departments of study
and of action. Without this congeniality no man can excel. The mind in a state
of alienation from truth, or of forced allegiance to study, wants ability to
learn. It is but partially the eyes are open. The understanding is sluggish and
lacks discernment. The memory retains not what is given. All this is owing to
mental aversion. But where there is relish there is mental capacity. Taste is
power. The faculties acquire an edge when in a state of pleasurable activity.
He "that is spiritual judgeth all things." Receiving the Spirit of God, he
knows the things that are freely given to him of God."
"Now, to every
child of God the Spirit is given in that state and disposition of mind which
the believer cultivates. Possessed of this divinely implanted faculty, to what
measures of attainment may not the student of sacred mysteries aspire ! The
capacity with which he is now endowed surmounts many obstacles to a spiritual
understanding of things, and creates none to its own discouragement and
hindrance. A mind otherwise disposed is an impediment to itself. It finds, or
makes endless obstructions to successful inquiry. Pride of understanding,
popular errors, a captious intellect, worldly-mindedness, and sensual
propensities are all so many sources from which the mind, in an unsubdued and
ungracious moral condition, draws objections to the truth and raises
difficulties in searching after it. To say that the spiritual mind is not
liable to such difficulties, at least in their prevailing form, is just to say
that he who learns of the Spirit is spiritual.
"How pleasant, then, to
find among self-evident truths, that a pious student of the Divine Word
possesses in the frame of his mind a facility of progress - a faculty to excel.
The affinities and sympathies of the mind are so many active forces which
assail the barriers of depraved reason - appetite, habit, sophistry ; and in
the vigour with which it clears them away, it indicates a preparedness and
disposition - a positive power for pursuing researches into the field of sacred
knowledge with perseverance and success. "If any man will do the will of God,
he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God." Limited as is the view he
can take, he is not by this cast down or discouraged. There is the
gratification of sanctified taste in what he does know, and there is the
pleasure of acquisition in learning more ; yea, and there is the pleasure of
exalted efforts to widen the boundaries of discovery. He would look into these
things now, rejoicing to believe that though here " he knows but in part, he
shall hereafter know even as he is known." Every additional view of Divine
things, is delightful to him as a glimpse of the glory that shall in due season
be revealed. How different this sentiment of holy aspiration from the cold
indifference that would say, Let these things alone for the present, as we
shall by and by know all about them with so much less trouble. This is the
frigid apathy of unbelief, not meek submission to unavoidable disadvantages.
Far from this is the zeal of the believing spirit as it glows with delight in
the things themselves, rejoices in strenuous effort to see them more clearly,
while according to promise he looks for the perfect day. And what he looks for,
he even now in some measure attains, for the frame of mind - the moral capacity
- which I speak of, has a present earnest in the promise annexed to it, of
receiving enlarged discoveries.'
How much Divine philosophy there is in
these elevating sentences ! Were ministers of the Gospel in general rising to
their grand apostolic level, we should speedily witness over all the Churches '
times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord.'
End of
Selection
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