DR. J. H. MERLE D’AUBIGNE

After I had begun to preach Christ, I was so assailed and perplexed on coming into Germany by the sophisms of rationalism, that I was plunged into unutterable distress, and passed whole nights without sleeping, crying to God, or endeavouring by arguments and syllogisms without end to repel the attack and the adversary. In my perplexity I visited Dr. John F. Kleuker, a venerable divine at Kiel, who for forty years had been defending Christianity against the attacks of infidel theologians and philosophers. Before this admirable man I laid my doubts and difficulties for solution. Instead of solving them, Kleuker replied, “Were I to succeed in ridding you of these, others would soon rise up. There is a shorter, deeper, and more complete way of annihilating them. Let Christ be really to you the Son of God – the Saviour – the Author of eternal life. Only be firmly settled in this grace, and then these difficulties of detail will never stop you: the fight which proceeds from Christ will dispel all darkness.”

This advice, followed by a study with a pious fellow-traveller at an inn at Kiel, of the Apostle’s expression, “Now unto Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think,” relieved me from all my difficulties. After reading together this passage, we prayed over it. When I arose from my knees in that room at Kiel, I felt as if my wings were renewed as the wings of eagles. From that time forward I comprehended that my own syllogisms and arguments were of no avail; that Christ was able to do all by His power that worketh in me; and the habitual attitude of my soul was to be at the foot of the cross, crying to Him, “Here am I, bound hand and feet, unable to move, unable to do anything to get away from the enemy that oppresses me: do all Thyself: I know that Thou wilt do it; Thou wilt even do exceeding abundantly above all that I ask.” I was not disappointed. All my doubts were soon dispelled, and not only was I delivered from that inward anguish which, in the end, would have destroyed me had not God been faithful, but the Lord extended unto me peace like a river. If I relate these things, it is not as my own history alone, but that of many pious young men, who, in Germany and elsewhere, have been assailed by the raging waves of rationalism.

So end Dr. D’Aubigne’s own words.