A REVIEW OF De Zekerheid des Geloofs*

DE ZEKERHEID DES GELOOFS.  By PROF. DR. H. BA VINCK

(8 vo, pp. 78), Kampen: J. H. Kok, 1901.

By B. B. Warfield

In this delightful booklet Dr. Bavinck gives us not so much a scientific investigation into the nature and sources of certitude in religion as a popular discussion of the whole matter of certitude with reference to Christianity.  "Inquiry into the certainty of faith," he tells us, "is of importance not merely for scientific theology but also for practical religion.  It concerns not only the theologian but equally the layman; it has a place not alone in the study but in the household sanctuary as well.  It is a question not more of theory and the schools than eminently also of practice and life."  The particular subject of investigation which he proposes to himself in this discussion is the determination of "where and how that divine authority is to be found which has the right to demand from us recognition and obedience" (p. 50).  In the interests of orderly development, however, he prefixes to the answer offered to this main inquiry some account of "what is to be understood by this certainty of faith, and how it has been sought by various schools of thought" (p. 12).

The first part of the discourse is devoted therefore to defining the nature of the certitude of faith that is under discussion.  Certitude, we are told, is the complete resting of the spirit in an object of knowledge.  Even the Greeks recognized various varieties of it -- distinguishing between the certitude produced by sense-perception and that produced by thought, and in the latter further between the immediate certainty we possess of the first principles of science and the mediate certainty we attain by reasoning and demonstration.  Alongside of these universally recognized varieties must be placed, he urges, the further variety known as the certitude of faith -- which is not the result of either sense-perception or of scientific proof, but differs from all certainty so reached in two respects:  it is objectively weaker, it is subjectively stronger.  Objectively weaker, because it does not rest on grounds of common reason, valid for all, to which therefore compelling appeal may be made; but is the fruit of a faith, the possession of the individual alone.  Subjectively stronger, because it is rooted in the very heart of man and is intertwined with all the fibers of his being, expressing not merely an intellectual judgment but a movement of the whole soul.

In the second part a rapid but illuminating survey is given of the history of certitude of faith in the Church.  Here come under review Rome's renunciation of all individual assurance of salvation; the recovery of it by the Reformers, and its gradual loss again in the seventeenth century; pietistic legalism with its renewed renunciation of personal assurance; the different one-sided efforts of Moravians and Methodists to regain it; its virtual disappearance from modern Christendom. This section is notable for the genial and yet clear-sighted judgments it expresses. Apropos of the effort to attain a sense of safety through an ascetic life, which is represented as one side of the Romish development, for example, Protestants are sharply warned not to content themselves with the facile condemnation that it all is the result of a false principle -- the false principle of work-righteousness.  This is true enough, Dr. Bavinck remarks, but it becomes Protestants to consider that Romish work-righteousness is at least preferable to that doctrine-righteousness to which Protestants are prone: work-righteousness, usually at least, advantages somebody, while doctrine-righteousness produces no fruit but loveless pride.

Again, nothing could be more just than the criticism passed upon the diverse attempts of the Moravians and Methodists to restore assurance to the Christian heart.  "Both movements," we read, "have exerted a strong influence on the Christian life.  They have aroused believers out of their self-engrossment and recalled them from their retirement to the conflict with the world.  Home and foreign missions have been vigorously taken in hand under their direction.  Sunday schools and associations of all kinds and for all sorts of purposes have been established through their initiative.  Bible and tract distributions, evangelizing and philanthropic enterprises and numerous other Christian activities have been since- their rise set on foot for the extension of God's Kingdom.  The whole of Christendom has been aroused from its slumber and awakened to a new and energetic life."  "Nevertheless," he adds, "both movements indubitably suffer from a great one-sidedness.  Neither of them reckons sufficiently with the first article of our common undoubted Christian faith, that God the Father Almighty is the Maker of heaven and earth.  The earthly spheres of art and science, of literature and politics, of domestic and social economy are underestimated in value and significance by them, and are consequently not reformed and regenerated by the Christian principle.  To 'rest in the wounds of Jesus' or 'to be converted and then go forth to convert others' seems to constitute the entire content of the Christian life. Sentimentality and unhealthy emotion seem often to mark the one, excitement and zeal without knowledge frequently to characterize the other movement.  The intellect is repressed in the interests of the feelings and will, and the harmony of all the faculties and powers is destroyed.  The liberty of the children of God, their dominion over the world, the thankful enjoyment of every good gift that comes down from the Father of lights, the faithful discharge of the earthly vocation -- the open eye, the wide outlook, the expanded heart -- these things do not come to their rights. The Christian life stands here alongside of-sometimes above, in some instances even hostilely in opposition to -- human life.  Christianity is here not like the leaven that trans- fuses the whole lump and leavens it all" (pp. 45-46).

This wide-minded conception of the mission of Christianity in the world is, as it should be, characteristic of Dr. Bavinck's teaching as of that of the whole school to which he belongs.  He has given beautiful expression to it in a separate tractate on De Algemeene Genade, published in 1894 and reviewed in this Review for January, 1897 (Vol: VIII, p. 155); and Dr. A. Kuyper has sought to work it out in all its details in a long series of articles on Common Grace printed in De Heraut and just now being gathered into volume form.  It is reverted to more than once in the present brochure, and especially most eloquently near its close, where the pietist is blamed for withdrawing from the world and treating all earthly employment -- even the care of husband, wife, or family -- as only so much time and effort withdrawn from "the one thing needful"; and the Christian is exhorted to remember that all things are his, because he is Christ's and Christ is God's, and to enter into his dominion as king of the whole earth-loving the flowers that bloom at his feet and admiring the stars that shine above his head, not despising art, which is a noble gift from God, or sneering at science, which is a bequest from the Father of lights, but believing that every creature of God is good and is not to be rejected but received with thanksgiving.  We miss in this only the explicit correlation of this noble and truly Reformed conception of the Christian's relation to the world with the organic character of the redemptive work and its eschatological outlook.  For it is only as we realize that God is saving the world and not merely one individual here and there out of the world, that the profound significance of the earthly life to the Christian can be properly apprehended.  And the deepest distinction between the attitude to the world alike of the Pietist, Moravian, and Methodist and that of the Reformed Christian turns just on the fact that the point of view of the former is individualistic and atomistic and that of the latter is organic.  Missing explicit reference to the organic character of the redemptive process, in the reformation of the world after the plan of God and its gradual transmutation into his Kingdom in which his will shall be done even as in heaven, the uninstructed reader may fail to catch the ground of the significance to the Christian of the earthly life which is so eloquently described, and may even mentally pass the unintelligent criticism which is so often pressed against the Reformed conception, that with its doctrine of predestination it leaves the earthly life without significance -- a criticism which obviously is without meaning save on the extremest individualistic presuppositions.

To the third part of the essay is committed the task of explaining how Christian certitude is to be attained.  Here the, stress of the exposition is thrown on the assumption that it is to be reached in neither of the two ways in which it is most commonly sought -- which may be called the apologetical and the experimental ways.  Men cannot reach Christian certitude, we are told, as the result of a process of reasoning -- proving first of all on rational grounds that God exists and there is such a thing as the soul and it is immortal; and then that the apostles are trustworthy witnesses of truth, that the prophecies of Scripture were really spoken and its miracles really occurred, and that Jesus really lived and worked and taught as he is represented to have done; and the like.  All such reasonings leave the truth of Christianity not yet raised above all doubt and cannot be said to supply ground for an absolute certitude.  Neither can it be attained, however, by the method introduced by Schleiermacher, which throws men back for certitude on what each has individually experienced.  The greater part of what enters into the Christian religion has not been and cannot be "experienced" by the individual Christian:  it comes to him from without, and only as so coming to him works "experiences" in him -- and somewhat similar "experiences," including the experience of passionate conviction, are wrought by the teachings of every religion.  It is very easy to say with Zinzendorf, "My heart tells me it is true; it is true for me."  But what is there that the human heart may not, under appropriate circumstances, tell us is true?  And how can a scientific certitude be attained along this pathway?

How then is certitude of faith to be attained?  There remains nothing to be said except that it is the fruit of faith itself.  Faith, it must be remembered, is a moral act and not merely an intellectual assent.  It is the response of the whole being to its appropriate object:  and when the soul of man thus goes out to and finds satisfaction in an object presented to it, it carries its assurance in the very act.  How the believer comes to this act, he cannot himself explain.  He only knows that an object is presented to him, to which his whole being goes out in loving trust.  This is not to make faith the ground on which the truth rests, or the fountain from which the knowledge of it comes, but only the organ of the soul by which truth, which is in itself objective and rests on itself, is recognized.  There is always a correlation between the object and the faculty by which it is laid hold of.  The eye in perceiving the sun knows that the sun exists no less than that it perceives it.  So the believer in receiving the truth knows that it is the truth that he receives.  There is involved in this obviously also an assurance of salvation.  Here, too, it is with faith as with knowledge.  It belongs to knowledge to be assured not only of its object but also of itself.  When we know something, we know along with this that we know it. Real, true knowledge excludes all doubt of itself; not by a logical process but directly and immediately.  "So it is also with faith.  The faith that really deserves the name brings its own assurance with it.  When we from the heart believe the promises of God revealed in the gospel, say, for example, the forgiveness of sins, we believe at the same time that we are ourselves personally by grace sharers in the blessing of forgiveness; the former is impossible without the latter.  Certitude as to the truth of the gospel is never to be attained except along the path of personal saving faith.  And just like knowledge, faith does not come to certitude regarding itself by logical reasoning, by making itself the object of investigation and meditating on its own nature:  the 'criticism of pure reason' is seldom useful for establishing our certitude.  But certitude flows to us immediately and directly out of faith itself; certitude is an essential quality of faith, it is inseparable from it and belongs to our nature."  The practical rule for acquiring certitude of faith is, then, to keep our thought on the object of faith.  It is this object that works through faith on our nature and produces certitude.  "Let the plant of faith then only root itself in the soil of the promises of God and it will of itself bear the fruit of certitude.  And the deeper and faster its roots are buried in the soil, the more strongly will it shoot up, the higher will it grow and the richer will be the fruitage."

We are not sure we have done full justice to Dr. Bavinck in this transcript of his exposition.  We are sure the practical advice he gives is sound: it is the object of faith that is the main thing, not the faith itself; and it is on that object that we must keep the eyes of our heart set would we grow in strength of faith and in the joy that comes of believing.  But we are not at all sure we have fully apprehended his analysis of the rise of certitude in the soul.  Indeed we must confess to a certain confusion of mind as to the exact sense in which the word certitude is to be taken here and there.  If we understand Dr. Bavinck, he considers that the two things most commonly connoted by the term go always together:  that "certitude of the truth of the Christian religion'" and "assurance of faith" imply one another, and neither is ever present without the other -- both being the fruit indeed of one single act of faith.  This is itself a debatable point:  and in any case it will conduce to clearness if we endeavor to keep separate the two, certainly very separable, inquiries of how men can reach certainty as to the truth of the Christian religion and how they can reach assurance as to their own participation in the benefits secured by the work of Christ.  For ourselves, we confess we can conceive of no act of faith of any kind which is not grounded in evidence:  faith is a specific form of persuasion or conviction, and all persuasion or conviction is grounded in evidence.  And it does not seem obvious on the face of it that the evidence adapted to ground the conviction that the Christian religion is true, and the evidence adapted to ground the conviction that I am myself in Christ Jesus, need be the same:  so that the resulting acts of faith must necessarily occur together or even coalesce.  It is quite legitimate, of course, to endeavor to point out that there is nevertheless a point in which the two do coalesce:  to urge, for instance, that certitude of the truth of Christianity involves, if it does not consist in, assurance that God is in Christ reconciling the world with himself; and that likewise assurance that I am in Christ is at bottom nothing other than the conviction that God, is in Christ reconciling the world with himself, given a personal form:  so that it is only by the direct act of faith laying hold of Jesus as redeemer that we may attain either conviction of the truth of the Christian religion or the assurance of salvation.  We have no wish to minimize the value of this suggestion -- which, if we understand him, expresses more or less crudely Dr. Bavinck's position.  But it seems to involve certain assumptions that stand in some need of explication.

For one thing, the assumption that the direct act of saving faith underlies and is the necessary prerequisite of certitude of the truth of the Christian religion appears to reverse the natural order.  On the face of it, conviction of the truth of the Christian religion would appear to be the logical prius of self-commitment to the Founder of that religion -- who is also its Heart -- as the redeemer of my soul.  So to hold would not necessarily be to say that a man must be a learned apologist before he can become a Christian, and entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven can be had only through the lofty gateway of Science.  There are other evidences of the truth of the Christian religion besides the philosophical and historical ones; and the appeal to faith may not be an appeal to an unjustified and therefore irrational faith, because it does not require the marshaling of all the evidence by which it may be supported before it is obeyed.  We do not believe in the existence of the sun without evidence because we are not learned in astronomical science.  My conviction that the handwriting that lies before me is that of my dear friend is not a groundless conviction, because I am not capable of analyzing the nature of the evidence on which it is founded, and the conviction may seem to me therefore to be direct and without mediation through "reasons."  Our believing response to the appeal of the gospel may similarly not be ungrounded in sufficient evidence of the truth of the Christian religion merely because the evidence on which it is grounded is not all the evidence which might be adduced and works its affect of conviction in our hearts by so direct and subtle an operation that we do not stop, perhaps do not possess the skill, to analyze it.  Surely we believe in Christ because it is rational to believe in him, though it be irrational.

It is a natural result of the view we are discussing to make little of "the evidences." It is therefore characteristic of the school of thought of which Dr. Bavinck is a shining ornament to estimate the value of Apologetics somewhat lightly.  This is apparent in this essay also, although Dr. Bavinck is careful in it to point out the esteem in which he holds it and the high estimate he puts upon it.  The prophets, the apostles, Jesus himself, he tells us, used the method of "proofs."  It is wrong, therefore, in a spirit of doubt and suspicion, to abstain from them and retire behind the bulwarks of mysticism and agnosticism.  "Believers are rather called to give an account of the hope that is in them even in the domain of science, and in firm trust in the justice of their cause, to stop the mouths of opponents and to repel their assaults" (p. 58).  But he goes on to intimate at once that all the "proofs" that the Christian can marshal are nevertheless insufficient to place the truth of Christianity beyond doubt (pp. 56 and 57):  and he elsewhere expresses his conviction of the secondary place of Apologetics sententiously, in the form that "Apologetics is the fruit, not the root of faith" (p. 24).  We cannot help believing there is some slight confusion here.  No one is in danger of believing that "the evidences" can produce "faith":  but neither can the presentation of Christ in the gospel produce "faith." "Faith" is the gift of God.  But it does not follow that the "faith" that God gives is not grounded in "the evidences."  Of course it is only the prepared heart that can fitly respond to the force of the "evidences," or "receive" the proclamation:  just as it is only the eye that can see, as Dr. Bavinck explains, to which the sun can reveal itself.  But this faith that the prepared heart yields -- is it yielded blindly and without reason, or is it yielded rationally and on the ground of sufficient reason? Does God the Holy Spirit work a blind and ungrounded faith in the heart?  What is supplied by the Holy Spirit in working faith in the heart surely is not a ready-made faith, rooted in nothing and clinging without reason to its object; nor yet new grounds of belief in the object presented; but just a new power to the heart to respond to the grounds of faith, sufficient in themselves, already present to the mind.  Our Reformed fathers did not overlook this:  they always posited the presence, in the production of faith, of the "argumentum, propter quod credo," as well as the "principium seu causa efficiens a quo ad credendum adducor."  From this point of view, the presence to the mind of the "grounds" of faith is just as essential as the creative operation of the Giver of faith itself.

Perhaps we should say even more.  The Holy Spirit does not produce faith without grounds.  But the "grounds" may and do produce a faith without that specific operation of the Holy Spirit by which alone saving faith can be created in the soul. In saying this we have the fullest support from Dr. Bavinck's own exposition.  He tells us that the rational arguments which are urged in favor of the truth of Christianity are of great use in silencing gainsayers.  How can they so operate if they are adapted to produce no conviction in the minds of the gainsayers?  He remarks again that these rational arguments can of themselves produce nothing more than "historical faith."  This is true.  But then "historical faith" is faith -- is a conviction of mind; and it is, as Dr. Bavinck elsewhere fully allows, of no little use in the world.  The truth therefore is that rational argumentation does, entirely apart from that specific operation of the Holy Ghost which produces saving faith, ground a genuine exercise of faith.  This operation of the Spirit is not necessary then to produce faith, but only to give to a faith which naturally grows out of the proper grounds of faith, that peculiar quality which makes it saving faith.

Perhaps we may make this clear by an illustration drawn from the specific instance of "faith in God."  Even as sinner, man cannot but believe in God:  the very devils believe -- and tremble.  But as sinner, man cannot have faith in God in the higher sense of humbly trusting in him.  Precisely what sin has done to man is to destroy the root of this trust by altering the relation to God in which man stands.  Man as sinner is, of course, just as truly and just as entirely dependent on God as he was in his unfallen state:  and because he is self-conscious he remains conscious of this, his relation of dependence on God; so long as he remains human he cannot escape the consciousness of dependence on God.  But this consciousness no longer bears the same character as in the unfallen state.  In the unfallen state consciousness of dependence on God took the "form" of glad and loving trust.  By destroying the natural relation that exists between God and his creature and instituting a new relation -- that proper to God and sinner -- sin has introduced a new factor into the functioning of all human powers.  The sinner instinctively and by his very nature, as he cannot help believing in God, in the intellectual sense, so cannot possibly exercise faith in God in the fiducial sense.  On the contrary, faith in this sense has been transformed into its opposite -- faith has passed into unfaith, trust to distrust. Faith now takes the "form" of fear and despair.  The reestablishment of it in the "form" of loving trust cannot be the work of the sinner himself.  It can result only from a radical change in the relation of the sinner to God, brought home to the sinner by that creative act of the Holy Ghost which we call the testimonium Spiritus Sancti.  Of course this restored "faith of trust" is not precisely the same thing as the "faith of trust" in unfallen man:  it differs from that as a forgiven sinner differs from one who has never sinned.  But this difference is not the important thing for our present purpose.  That is the outstanding fact that "faith in God" is natural to man, belongs to him in all his states alike, and rests throughout them all on its proper grounds.  What differs from state to state is the "form" taken by this faith-whether it is "formed" by trust or by fear.  It cannot be hopeless, therefore, to produce in the sinner that form of conviction we call faith, by the presentation of the evidence on which it rests.  What is hopeless is to produce by this evidence the "form" which faith takes in the regenerated sinner.  That comes only by the operation of the Spirit of God.  But faith without this is not therefore useless and of little worth.

It is a standing matter of surprise to us that the school which Dr. Bavinck so brilliantly represents should be tempted to make so little of Apologetics.  When we read, for instance, the really beautiful exposition which Dr. Kuyper has given us in his Encyclopaedia of Theology of the relation of sin and regeneration to science, we cannot understand why he does not magnify instead of minifying the value of Apologetics.  Perhaps the explanation is to be found in a tendency to make the contrast between the "two kinds of science"-that of nature and that of palingenesis -- too absolute.  There are "two kinds of men" -- men under the power of sin and men under the power of the palingenesis; and the product of their intellection will naturally give us "two kinds of science":  but the difference between the two is after all not properly described as a difference in kind -- gradus not mutant speciem.  For a critical estimate of Dr. Kuyper's view on this matter we should obviously take our start from an exact conception of the effects of sin on man.  Sin clearly has not destroyed or altered in its essential nature anyone of man's faculties, although (since it has affected homo totus et omnis) it has affected the operation of them all.  The depraved man neither reasons, nor feels, nor wills as he ought.  The products of his action as a scientific thinker cannot possibly escape this influence, though they are affected in different degrees and through different channels, as Dr. Kuyper lucidly points out, in the several "sciences," in accordance with the nature of their object.  Nevertheless there is question here rather of perfection than of kind of performance:  it is "science" that is produced by the sinful subject even though imperfect science -- falling away from the ideal, here, there, and elsewhere, on account of all sorts of deflecting influences, entering it at all points of the process. The science of sinful man is thus a substantive part of the abstract science produced by the ideal subject, the general human consciousness, though a less valuable part than it would be without sin.

Regeneration, now, is not in the first instance the removal of sin; the regenerated man remains a sinner.  It is only after his sanctification is completed that the contrast between him and the sinner can be thought to become absolute, and not till then could in any case the contrast between the intellection of the one and of the other become absolute.  Meanwhile the regenerated man remains a sinner:  no new faculties have been inserted into him by regeneration; and the old faculties common to man in all his states have been only measurably restored to their proper functioning.  He is in no position therefore to produce a science different in kind from that produced by sinful man:  the science of palingenesis is only a part of the science of sinful humanity, though no doubt its best part: and only along with it can it enter as a constituent part into that ideal science which the composite human subject is producing in its ceaseless effort to embrace in mental grasp the ideal object, that is to say, all that is.  Indeed, even if palingenesis had completed its work it may be doubted whether the contrast between the science produced by the two classes of men could be absolute.  Even sinful men and sinless men are alike fundamentally men; and being both men, they know fundamentally alike.  There is ideally but one science, the subject of which is the human spirit, and the object, all that is.  Meanwhile, as things are, the human spirit attains to this science only in part and by slow accretions and through many partial and erroneous constructions. Men work side by side at the common task, and the common edifice takes gradually fuller and truer outlines.  As Dr. Kuyper finely says himself (p. 151), in the conflict of perceptions and opinions those of the strongest energy and clearest thought finally prevail.  Why is not the palingenesis to be conceived simply as preparing those stronger and clearer spirits, whose thought shall finally prevail?  It is not a different kind of science that they are producing:  it is not even the same kind but as part of a different edifice of truth.  It is only the better scientific outlook, and the better scientific product, striving in conflict with the product of fellow workers to build itself into one edifice of truth, which rises slowly because of sin but surely because of palingenesis.

Only in God's mind, of course, does science lie perfect -- the perfect comprehension of all that is, in its organic completeness.  In the mind of perfected humanity, the perfected ectypal science shall lie.  In the mind of sinful humanity struggling here below, there can lie only a broken reflection of the object, a reflection which is rather a deflection.  The great task of science lies in completing the edifice and correcting this deflection.  Sinful man cannot accomplish it.  But he makes the effort and attains his measure of success, a success that varies inversely with the rank of the sciences.  The intrusion of regeneration prepares man to build better, and ever more truly as the effects of regeneration increase intensively and extensively, until the end comes when the regenerated universe becomes the well- comprehended object of the science of the regenerated race.  Now it would seem a grave mistake to separate the men of the palingenesis from the race, a part of which they are, and which is itself the object of the palingenesis.  And no mistake could be greater than to lead them to decline to bring their principles into conflict with those of the unregenerate in the prosecution of the common task of man.  They will meet with dull opposition, with active scorn, with decisive rejection at the hands of the world:  but thereby they shall win their victory.  Just as the better science ever in the end secures its recognition, so palingenetic science, which is the better science, will certainly win its way to ultimate recognition.  And it is in this fact that the vindication of Apologetics lies.  Here too the "man of stronger and purer thought" -- even though that he has it is of God alone -- "will prevail in the end."  The task of the Christian is surely to continue hopefully to urge "his stronger and purer thought" in all its details on the attention of men.  It is not true that he cannot soundly prove his position.  It is not true that the arguments he urges are not sufficient to validate the Christian religion.  It is not even true that the minds of sinful men are inaccessible to his "evidences":  though, in the sense of the proverb, "convinced against their will they remain of the same opinion still."  On the contrary, men (all of whose minds are after all of the same essential structure with his own, though less illuminated than his) will not be able to resist or gainsay his determinations.  He must use and press the advantage that God has given him.  He must insist and insist again that his and not the opposing results shall be built into the slowly rising fabric of truth.  Thus will he serve, if not obviously his own generation, yet truly all the generations of men.

We are not, we repeat, absurdly arguing that Apologetics will of itself make a man a Christian.  But neither can it be said that the proclaimed gospel itself can do that. Only the Spirit of life can communicate life to a dead soul.  But we are arguing that Apologetics has its part to play in the Christianizing of the world:  and that this part is not a small part:  nor is it merely a subsidiary or a defensive part -- as if its one end were to protect an isolated body of Christians from annoyance from the great surrounding world.  It has a primary part to play and a conquering part.  The individual, to be sure, does not need to become a trained apologist first, and only after and as a result of that a Christian.  The individual is prone vastly to overestimate himself:  it ordinarily does not require the whole "body of evidences" to convince him.  But surely he does require that kind and amount of evidence which is requisite to convince him before he can really be convinced:  and faith, in all its forms, is a conviction of truth, founded as such, of course, on evidence.  And this kind and amount of the evidences constitutes "Apologetics" for him and performs the functions of Apologetics for him.  When we speak of Apologetics as a science, however, we have our eye not on the individual but on the thinking world.  In the face of the world, with its opposing points of view and its tremendous energy of thought and incredible fertility in attack and defense, Christianity must think through and organize its, not defense merely, but assault.  It has been placed in the world to reason its way to the dominion of the world.  And it is by reasoning its way that it has come to its kingship.  By reasoning it will gather to itself all its own.  And by reasoning it will put its enemies under its feet.

Let it not be imagined that with all this we have done away with the "certainty of faith" as distinguished from "certainty of knowledge."  We have only opened the way to a proper appreciation of the difference between the two.  This difference is obviously the difference between faith and knowledge.  And the difference between faith and knowledge is not that knowledge rests on evidence and faith does not, or that knowledge rests on sufficient evidence and faith does not, or that knowledge rests on grounds objectively or universally valid and faith does not.  The difference is only that they rest on different kinds of evidence-knowledge on "sight" and faith on "testimony."  The whole question of a "certainty of faith" turns, therefore, simply on the question whether testimony is adapted to produce conviction in the human mind, and is capable of producing a conviction which is clear and firm -- a firma certaque persuasio.  If we judge that it is, we shall have no choice but to range alongside of the various forms of "certainty of knowledge," whether resting on sense-perception, immediate intuition, or rational demonstration, a "certainty of faith" also, resting on convincing testimony.  This "certainty of faith" has nothing in it particularly mysterious; it is no more "incommunicable than the "certainty of knowledge" and no more "subjective." Testimony that is "objectively" valid for the establishment of any fact should be "subjectively" valid to establish it in' the forum of any mind; and only such testimony should be valid to any mind whatever.  But a conviction grounded on testimony is obviously of a different variety from a conviction grounded on "sight" and will have characteristics of its own.  Chief among these is that in it the element of "trust," which is of course present in all forms of conviction (for knowledge itself rests on trust), is peculiarly prominent.  In this fact only, so far as we can see, lies whatever relative justification it is possible to give to the notion that the certainty of faith is of a "lower" order than the certainty of knowledge, and bears a "more subjective" character.  It does not appear, however, that either of these epithets is properly applied to it.  There seems to be no reason why -- if testimony is adapted to produce conviction at all -- the conviction produced by testimony may not be as strong and as "objectively valid" as that produced by "sight" itself; that is, why it should not rise into "certainty."  For "the certainty of faith" is obviously no more the product of faith than "the certainty of knowledge" is the product of knowledge.  Strictly speaking it is just that faith itself raised to its eminent degree.  No doubt, if by "certainty," "assurance," we mean the emotional accompaniments of the conviction -- the rest, confidence, comfort, happiness, we find in it -- it would be the product of faith; but so would the "certainty of knowledge" under such an understanding be the product of knowledge.  In itself, however, it is just the conviction itself, and its validity depends only on the validity of the testimony on which it is grounded.  If that testimony is really adequate to the establishment of the fact, the conviction founded on that testimony is as valid as any knowledge founded on "sight" can be. 

We have wandered far from our text in Dr. Bavinck's apparent subordination of the function of the "evidences" in assuring us of the truth of the Christian religion.  We should be sorry to be supposed in all this to be arraying ourselves polemically against his teaching.  We are not sure that he would not give a hearty assent to all -- or most -- of what we have urged.  The inherent interest and comparative novelty of the subject must be our excuse for taking so slight an occasion for such extended remarks.  We shall hope to atone for it by extreme brevity as to the other point as to which we have signalized doubt, viz., Dr. Bavinck's apparent assumption of the invariable or normal implication of "assurance of salvation" in the direct act of faith.  This is an old subject and one which has been much debated.  Its solution seems ultimately to turn on our conception of the object of faith.  If faith terminates on a proposition -- however precious -- it would seem necessary to look upon assurance as of its very essence. If it terminates rather on a person, this necessity is not apparent and the way lies open to treat assurance rather as a reflex of faith which mayor may not manifest itself.  All this is familiar ground. 

We must not close without emphasizing the delight we take in Dr. Bavinck's writings.  In them extensive learning, sound thinking, and profound religious feeling are smelted intimately together into a product of singular charm.  He has given us the most valuable treatise on Dogmatics written during the last quarter of a century -- a thoroughly wrought out treatise which we never consult without the keenest satisfaction and abundant profit.  And the lectures and brochures he from time to time presents an eager public are worthy of the best traditions of Reformed thought and Reformed eloquence.  Not least among them we esteem this excellent booklet on "the certitude of faith."

Endnotes

*From the Princeton Theological Review, Jan. 1903, pp. 138-148.  In his Opuscula, Vol. IX, Dr. Warfield notes that Dr. Bavinck "very graciously referred to" this review "in the second edition of his book."  It is hoped that the reader will not object to the repetition here of a few paragraphs found in the previous article; both articles are important in evaluating the "Princeton apologetic" as contrasted with the viewpoint of the Amsterdam school of thought represented by Drs. Kuyper and Bavinck.  See Jerusalem and Athens, 1971, edited by E. R. Geehan, pp. 154 ff., 275 ff., 420 ff., for the continuing interest in the issues raised here.

Scanned and Edited by Robert A. Lotzer on July 12, 2006.