The True Kingdom of God

The soul in peace is the true kingdom of God. Such it is virtually asserted to be in the Scriptures; and such it is in fact. And, if this be the case, it is important to understand and appreciate an idea, which is interesting in itself, and is susceptible of applications which are not less so.

In saying that the soul is God’s kingdom, it should be kept in mind that the term KINGDOM is relative in its meaning.  It implies the idea of a governor, as well as of that which is governed. Accordingly, it is not only the place where the king dwells, but the place of the king's authority. It is not only the king's home, which is the original meaning of the term, but the place which the king rules over.

In a certain sense God rules everywhere. There is no place where he does not dwell. Nor is there any place which excludes his authority; He rules in hell as well as in heaven. He rules also over all earthly things; over things material as well as immaterial. He rules over all moral beings. He rules over men.

Undoubtedly there is an universal kingdom; — a kingdom including all things. But, ordinarily, when we speak of God's kingdom on earth, we mean his spiritual kingdom, — the kingdom of mind, and not of matter; the kingdom of hearts, and not of outward forms and localities. The divine throne, erected everywhere, is especially and emphatically erected in man's spirit. The soul of man, a fit subject for the divine administration, always is, when renovated, and always ought to be, God's kingdom. Hence the remarkable expression of the Savior: "THE KINGDOM OF GOD IS WITHIN YOU."

But in speaking of the human soul as a fit subject for the divine administration, and in saying that it ought to be God's kingdom, we imply, that, under certain circumstances, by doing or being what it ought not to do or ought not to be, it is not God's kingdom. And thus we come to our proposition.  It is the soul IN PEACE, (that peace which the Savior speaks of when he says, "Peace I leave with you,  my  peace I give unto you,") the soul in peace, and not under any other circumstances, which constitutes, in the truest and highest sense, the kingdom of God. "For thus saith the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, In returning and rest shall ye be saved. In quietness and confidence, [that is to say, in the quietness and peace of faith,]  shall be your strength." Isa. 30:15.

— edited from A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 8, Chapter 12.

Mutual Love as the Basis of Marriage and Family

Happiness must be the result of a divinely ordered and perfect constitution of things. It is true, as we have had frequent occasion to say, that love is, and must be, the life;  that is to say, the central and moving principle of such a divine constitution. But love is not necessarily free from sorrow; — although it must be admitted, that true happiness cannot exist without love. The love, which good men have to erring and fallen sinners, is necessarily more or less mixed with grief. This being the case, the question naturally arises, — When can a truly holy or love being be said to be a happy being; — not only happy, but enjoying happiness in the highest degree?  This is a question, which it is obviously necessary to solve, in ascertaining the true constitution of an order of moral beings. That is to say, it is necessary to answer the question, — Under what circumstances can the highest happiness be secured to such an order of beings? And the answer, as it seems to us, is this. A moral being is happy in the highest degree, when it meets with another being, constituted on the same principles of holy love; and meets with it under such circumstances as to behold the unspeakable beauty of its own benevolent nature reflected back upon itself in the mirror of the other's loving heart. Seeing itself in another, and therefore, feeling another in itself, it not only recognizes but realizes, by the necessities of its nature, the eternal law of unity. 

We Cannot Rightly Seperate Ourselves From God

All moral beings, whether men or angels, as they have a right to do only what is right, have no right to dislocate and remove themselves from under the divine will. The liberty they have of doing as they please undoubtedly gives them the power or enables them to do it: but the law of right, which prescribes in what manner their capability is to be exercised, forbids it. If it is not right for them to remove [themselves] from under God's will, then it is their duty to remain under it. As moral beings, they cannot do otherwise without a violation of morals. God's will is supreme over them physically or naturally, because their natural or physical life is wholly dependent upon it. It is supreme over them morally, because they cannot abdicate its supremacy without doing a wrong. The supremacy is secured in the one case by a physical necessity; in the other, by a moral necessity. The physical law subjects them to God as physical men; the moral law subjects them to God as moral men.

Accordingly, if we carry these principles into particulars, we shall find that, in no case whatever, can we separate ourselves from God rightly. In union alone, that union which is appropriate to the relation of superior and inferior, is there true life. And here, living, not by what we have originally, but by what is momentarily given us, if we need strength, the law of morals requires us to look for it where we can best obtain it. If we need wisdom, we cannot, without a violation of duty, seek it where it is not to be had, but must go to him, who alone has true wisdom. If we need love, which, more than anything else, is the true inspiration of the soul, we must go to him, who, in being himself LOVE, can supply us from the original fountain. And so in every other case. If it be true, as the apostle James asserts, that "every good gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights," then we can have nothing good which does not come from him. And, as the law of duty requires us to seek good in preference to evil, and as we can find the true good in God alone, it is not possible for us, in doing what we ought to do, to take any other position than that of humble recipients. And in that position, bound to submit to a higher guidance if that guidance will be best for us, God's will becomes morally supreme over us, and we can neither be in the right nor the good, except so far as we are in harmony with that blessed will.

— from A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 5, Chapter 3. 

God's Life in Humanity

From God all things come. To God, as the universal originator and governor, all things are in subjection. In ascertaining what God is, we necessarily ascertain the position and responsibilities of those beings that come from God, and are dependent on him. The life of his moral creatures, so far as it is a right and true life, is a reproduction, in a finite form, of the elements of his own life. "God created man in his own image. In the image of God created he him." (Genesis 1:27.) The Savior, in speaking of himself, in his incarnate state, says, "I am in the Father, and the Father in me." (John 13:11.) God, in carrying out and perfecting the great idea of a moral creation, subjects the infinity of his being to the limitations of humanity, and reproduces himself in the human soul. So that man's life may truly be described, as God's life in humanity.

Nor, in the strict sense of the terms, can any­ thing but the DIVINE LIFE, or the life of God in the soul, be called life. Those who have gone astray from God, just so far as they have lost the divine life, and have sunk into the natural life, are dead. Hence, the expressions of the apostle: — "And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins." (Ephesians 2:1.) The eternal vitality, the breath from the Infinite, the life of God in the soul, ceases to be in them. And being dead, by the absence of God as an indwelling principle, they must be recreated, or born again, by his restoration. It is not enough, that provision has been made, in the death of Christ, for man's forgiveness. Forgiveness, it is true, has its appropriate work. It cancels the iniquity of the past; but this is not all that is necessary. It is not without reason, that the learned Schlegel commences his profound work on the philosophy of history by saying, that "the most important subject, and the first problem of philosophy, is the restoration in man of the lost image of God." The immortal nature must be made anew, must be re-constituted, if we may so express it, on the principle of life linked with life, of the created sustained in the uncreated, in the bonds of divine union.

— A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 1, Chapter 1.