Sunday, August 5, 2012

George Eliot's Essay: Evangelical Teaching: Dr. Cumming

Take the time to read this and see if you don't recognize countless contemporary evangelical preachers in this.  Her attack on Dr. Cumming is timeless. Snippet:

George Eliot's Essay: Evangelical Teaching: Dr. Cumming: This leads us to mention another conspicuous characteristic of Dr. Cumming's teaching--the absence of genuine charity. It is true that he makes large profession of tolerance and liberality within a certain circle; he exhorts Christians to unity; he would have Churchmen fraternize with Dissenters, and exhorts these two branches of God's family to defer the settlement of their differences till the millennium. But the love thus taught is the love of the clan, which is the correlative of antagonism to the rest of mankind. It is not sympathy and helpfulness toward men as men, but toward men as Christians, and as Christians in the sense of a small minority. Dr. Cumming's religion may demand a tribute of love, but it gives a charter to hatred; it may enjoin charity, but it fosters all uncharitableness. If I believe that God tells me to love my enemies, but at the same time hates His own enemies and requires me to have one will with Him, which has the larger scope, love or hatred?

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