Note 20 — Chapter II

St. Paul, in 1 Tim. i. 15, says, "Faithful is the saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief." This verse is of ancient and of very modern interest too. It shows that to the last St. Paul retained the keenest sense of his early wickedness. It is of present interest because it helps to correct a modern error. There are people who object to use the Litany and the Lord's Prayer because of the prayers for forgiveness of sins and the occurrence of such expressions as "Have mercy upon us, miserable sinners." Their argument is, that believers have been washed from all their sins, and therefore should not describe themselves as miserable sinners. St. Paul, however, saw no inconsistency between God's free forgiving love and his own humility in designating himself the chief of sinners. God may have cast all our sins behind His back; but, viewing the matter from the human side, it is well, nay, it is absolutely necessary, if spiritual pride is to be hindered in its rapid growth, for us to cherish a remembrance of the sins and backslidings of other days. The greatest saints, the richest spiritual teachers have ever felt the necessity of it. St. Augustine in his Confessions mingles perpetual reminiscences of his own wickedness with his assured sense of God's mercy. Hooker deals in his own profound style with such objection to the Litany in the Fifth Book of his Ecclesiastical Polity, ch. xlvii., where he writes, replying to the objection that the expressions of the Litany implying fear of God do not become God's saints: "The knowledge of our own unworthiness is not without belief in the merits of Christ. With that true fear which the one causeth there is coupled true boldness, and encouragement drawn from the other. The very silence which our own unworthiness putteth us unto doth itself make request for us, and that in the consequence of His grace. Looking inward we are stricken dumb, looking upward we speak and prevail. O happy mixture, wherein things contrary do so qualify and correct the danger of the other's excess, that neither boldness can make us presume as long as we are kept under with the sense of our own wretchedness; nor while we trust in the mercy of God through Jesus Christ, fear be able to tyrannise over us! As therefore our fear excludeth not that boldness which becometh saints; so if their familiarity with God (referring to his opponents) do not savour of this fear, it draweth too near that irreverent confidence wherewith true humility can never stand." Bishop Jeremy Taylor understood the bearing of St. Paul's view on personal religion. In his Holy Living, in the chapter on Humility, he teaches those who seek that grace thus: "Every day call to mind some one of thy foulest sins, or the most shameful of thy disgraces, or the indiscreetest of thy actions, or anything that did then most trouble thee, and apply it to the present swelling of thy spirit and opinion, and it may help to allay it."