i~~~~~C ir iY il S  
*6.               -liZ. ii
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LIBER LIBRORUM.








Ifiber  CZibrorum 
ITS
STRUCTURE, LIMITATIONS, AND PURPOSE.
A
FRIENDLY COMMUNICATION
TO
A RELUCTANT SCEPTIC.
NEW YORK:
CHARLES SCRIBNER & CO.
1867.








CONTENTS.
PAGE
PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION....   7
PREFACE..... 11
CHAP. INTRODUCTOIY CORRESPONDENCE.....  15
I. REVELATION AND INSPIRATION.....  49
II. THE EXTENT OF THE CLAIM.....  58
III. THE VERIFYING FACULTY......  76
IV. MANY AUTHORS, BUT ONE BOOB...        91
V. JEWISH HISTORY AND PROPHECY.           104
VI. THE NEW TESTAMENT...... 1 4
VII. THE CANON........ 128
VIII. DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.....                142
IX. INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE..... 172
X. THE MODERN PHARISEE......  185
XI. A POSTSCRIPT....                               198
NOTES.
A. EMINENT WITNESSES....                     211
B. BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION.                    214
C. NATIONAL ESTABLISHMENTS.....            217
D. CHURCH AUTHORITY....... 224
E. IDOLATRY OF THE BIBLE...,.. 230








PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.
THE author of LIBER LBmOR-uM firmly believes and
earnestly defends the Historic Reality and the Supernatural Origin of the Mosaic and Christian systems.
He also accepts the Incarnation, the Resurrection,
and the Redemptive work of Christ, and the other
important truths which these involve. In respect to
all these points, his position is decisive, and strongly
taken against the scepticism which is so fearfully
prevalent in both England and America, in the form
of an avowed rejection of these facts and truths, and
of a secret misgiving that they may perhaps be
outgrown, or set aside by the progress of modern
thinking.
He insists also upon the supreme authority of the
Scriptures in respect to all questions of religious
faith, and upon their permanent and indispensable
superiority above all other books, as composed by
men divinely aided and inspired. But he contends,




8      PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.
that to assert for them any higher authority or inspiration, is to claim for them more than they claim for
themselves, as well as to take a position that is both
untenable and damaging to the interests of Christianity.  To explain and vindicate what the author
believes to be the correct view of inspiration, is one
of the principal objects of this treatise. Ile has had
the sagacity to discern, and the courage to avow, that
the question of inspiration must be fairly met, and can
no longer be either safely or honestly thrust aside.
Dr. Arnold of Rugby wrote in 1835 of "the approaches to that momentous question, which involves
in it so great a shock to existing notions; the greatest, probably, that has ever been given since the discovery of the falsehood of the doctrine of the Pope's
infallibility. Yet it must come, and will end, in
spite of the fears and clamours of the weak and bigoted, in the higher exalting and more sure establishing
of Christian truth."  The author of LBER LIBRORUM
believes that the time for discussing this question has
fully come, and he discusses it like a brave and
honest man, by looking squarely in the face the difficulties which attend the traditional theories. IHe
does not, however, write for those whose hereditary
faith is as yet undisturbed, but for the'reluctant
sceptics' who find insuperable difficulties in accept



PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.        9
ing what they conceive to be the current views of
Christianity and the Scriptures.
His leading positions may be briefly characterised
by those which he opposes and rejects.
1. He opposes the "bibliolatry" which idolizes
the letter of the Scriptures as against the claims of
the Scriptures themselves, and the spirit of their
contents.
2. He opposes the pretensions of High Church
arrogance, and the pharisaism of sensuous ritualism.
3. He rejects also the narrowness of that theological dogmatism which reads every term and phrase
of its creed and catechism between the lines of the
Scriptures, and refuses to revise the traditions of
schools of theology by the aid of better methods of
interpretation.
It would be idle to expect that all the opinions
expressed in a volume written in such a spirit, and
with such aims, will or ought to satisfy every reader.
Some of these opinions are given as conjectures;
others are manifestly not well considered. Some of
the views of the writer, in respect to future retribution, will be generally set aside, as unsupported by
the testimony of the Scriptures. In respect to some
points the work betrays marks of haste, both in
thought and composition. But its spirit is earnest,
1*




10     PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.
honest, and Christian. It is believed that, as a whole
it is eminently adapted to relieve the difficulties of
the "reluctant sceptic," and that it will be welcomed by all those Christian believers who, in these
times of trial to their common faith, have full confidence that a frank recognition of the difficulties of
their argument is the only wise method of securing
for it a triumph. While the book is not, and does
not claim to be, an exhaustive argument for the
truth of Christianity, it has at least this merit, that
it successfully defends it against the ignorance and
weakness of many of its defenders.




PREF ACE.
WHATEVER may be the cause, it is but too certain
that in the present day, both at home and abroad,
multitudes of religious young men, who a few years
ago would have ranked as believers, are now, instead
of attaching themselves to the Church, silently but
rapidly becoming alienated from all Christian worship and communion.'The fact,' says a recent writer,' may be explained
as a passing fashion, or as the result of a certain
phase of opinion, but it is a fact. And its gravity
is heightened by the circumstance that we meet it in
men whose lives are pure, who exhibit least of the
worldly self-seeking spirit, who are among the most
thoughtful and cultivated. The conventional formulae of the indifference of the corrupt heart or of the
love of earthly things are wholly insufficient to ex
plain a state of mind than which none is fraught
with greater danger.'




12                  PREFACE.
This general unsettlement of religio's belief, it
is further remarked, has'grown from  within; the
outcome of it is a scepticism  reluctant rather than
aggressive, which in some of the best men is rapidly
passing the border of intellectual hesitation.'
The secret of the success which now attends publications intended to advance a-destructive criticism
is, that'they speak to men already'perplext in
faith, but pure in deeds,' who received with their'
first instruction in Christianity statements of doctrine
which, in the time of mature reflection, appear to
contradict the Divine instincts of justice, mercy, and
truth,-the image of God's own eternity in the heart
of man. These doctrines, taught as necessary inferences from, or as identical with the facts of Christianity, were once acquiesced in as the creed of
Christendom, but now, in not a few cases, repulsion
follows the attempt to read and understand them by
the light of reason and conscience.'*
That it may be very difficult to render service to
such persons without paining or perplexing timid
and anxious spirits is but too probable; but everything of a merely personal character ought surely
to be risked by Christians on behalf of men and
women who, even in their unbelief, have not cast
off the reverential feeling for Scripture which they
acquired in youth, and who are always willing to
allow that to a Bible training they mainly owe the
light and life in and by which they now see.
* Contemporary Review, art.'Indian Questions,' No. 1, p. 125.




PREFACE.                 13
The following Correspondence will perhaps serve
to explain the state of things to which reference has
been made, better than any merely general observations could do.
Mlarch 1867.








C ORRESPONDENCE.
(I.)
A LETTER.
MY DEAR,
Your request that I should lay frankly before you
my views regarding the Bible, and that I should state distinctly the particular difficulties which have led me to reject it,
is certainly a reasonable one. Yet I can scarcely enter on
the subject without pain; nor would I pursue it, did I not
feel rather desirous of explaining to you the true position of
a multitude of young men who are but too often maligned or
misunderstood.
Regarding myself, I need only say that you have known me
too long and too well to be in any danger of attributing my
unbelief to moral perversion.  My manner of life, from my
youth up, has been no secret to you, and I have consequently
little fear that you will so grossly misjudge me as to suppose
that I have any wish to escape obligation by cherishing seep
ticism, or any desire to justify lawlessness by denying Divine
Law. But I wish to say a word or two on this point for
others.
The unbelievers of the present day, so far, at least, as I have
come into contact with them, are not, as you seem to think,




16                 CORRESPONDENCE.
irreligious men. They are not mockers, neither do they sit in
the seat of the scornful. Hundreds of them are, at the present
hour,'wearying their souls to solve the problem how to conciliate the convictions to which the tendencies of the age have
borne them with respect for time-honoured institutions, and
tenderness for the faith of those whom they most love and
honour.'
You would be surprised to find how many of these have
been educated evangelically; how many of them are persons
of pure minds, generous, benevolent, and self-denying; how
willing many of them are to admit that to the Christian education they have received they owe everything they possess.
It is a mistake to imagine that all, or even the greater part,
of these persons either deny the truth of Christianity, or
shrink from avowing their conviction that Jesus Christ was
the greatest and best being that ever dwelt on earth. They do
not dispute that the Bible has, in many respects, a claim to be
regarded as the first of books. What they deny is, its Divine
character, its authority, its infallibility.  They are conscious
enough of the darkness which, apart from revelation, hangs
over the world in which they live, but they do not see evidence
that the Bible has removed that darkness. On the contrary,
the more the world advances on its way, and the greater the
extent of human knowledge, the deeper seems to them the
gloom and mystery which encompasses all things. Life and
Death they regard alike as unknown and unknowable. Shadows, in the view of some, fall even on the character of God. His
very existence is by such at times doubted. Whether, if
existent, He is benevolent or malignant, they think cannot be
proved. It is possible, they say, when in these moods, that
God is; possible that He is good; possible that after death,
life may be renewed; but nothing is certain.
-To affirm that men who are in this state of mind are unhappy is often, but not always, true; for the mind, like the
eye, can accustom itself to darkness as well as to light, and




A LETTER FROM  A SCEPTIC.                17
where absolute certainty cannot be obtained, the soul can
find rest even in a bare possibility.
Anything, they think, is better than a Gospel, so called,
which is in fact no gospel or good news at all, since it consigns
all but a fraction of the human race to irremediable sorrow;
which exaggerates human sin, and limits Divine mercy; which
throws no sunshine on the dark spots that rest upon humanity, and which brings no balln to those that need it most-the
slaves of evil, of ignorance, and of superstition.
As a rule, however, they have no wish to undermine the
faith of others, and no desire to deprive anyone of consolations which are dear to him. Their spirit is critical, but not
contemptuous; it is historic, not intolerant. They disbelieve
in miracles, but they have no disposition to laugh at those who
hold to them. That which is to believers a question of Life or
Death is to them a matter of pure indifference. Where others
are enthusiastic, they are calm and judicial.
To these men I adhere. Their number is much greater than
you think, and it is constantly increasing. They have their
faults without doubt, but in this respect they are only on a par
with their opponents.  They may sometimes forget what is
due to the cherished beliefs of wise and good men who have
inherited the opinions of a dead past, but the rudeness is not
wanton; it arises from the absence of reverence for what
others esteem to be Divine rather from any feeling of animosity. Forgive them this wrong, and believe me when I say
that whatever your opinion may be of any of us, our own conviction is that we are doing a good work, that we are striving
to establish the principle of freedom of enquiry, in opposition
to that of acquiescence in dogmas utterly at variance, as we
think, not only with the discoveries of science, but with the
first principles of morality.
We are ready to avow our belief that the Bible is responsible for the prevalence of the dogmas to which we object, and
therefore,'while we admit the good that is to be found in it,




1 8              CORRESPONDENCE.
while we neither altogether reject or despise its teachings, we
cannot allow it to be held in the estimation that has hitherto
been accorded to it, nor can we permit either it or anything
else to come between conscience and God.'
We think that the Bishop of Natal has demonstrated that
the Sacred Records, as they are called, are not, as a whole,
historical, and therefore that the moral and spiritual propositions contained in these books cannot be authoritative. When,
therefore, we find in Scripture actions recorded and commended which are immoral; commands given which are iniquitous;
and statutes ordained which are unjust; we put them aside
just as we should do if they were found in any other book.
We maintain that many things in the Bible are untrue, and
others morally wrong; among the latter we reckon the Mosaic
laws regarding slavery, and the instructions given for the extermination of whole tribes. We are amazed and confounded
when we discern that some of these things have been palliated in the writings of a man so great and good as was Dr.
Arnold, and that even Lord Macaulay should speak of the
Jews as specially selected by God to be'the ministers of His
vengeance, and specially commanded by Him to do many
things which, if done without His authority, would have been
atrocious crimes.' The principle which underlies this deinoralising process is, I need not say, more speciously, and therefore
more perniciously, laid down by Bishop Butler in his' Analogy.'
On the general question of inspiration, my own notion is
that it ought not to'be regarded as anything peculiar to the
past,, since we are all, in a certain sense, inspired. All truly
great men are unquestionably inspired men. On your own
showing, every Christian is inspired who is made a partaker
of the Holy Ghost. Do you not recognise this fact when you
plray,'Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration
of thy Holy Spirit?' Do you not affirm it when you claim for
the godly the promise of the Comforter-' He shall guide you




A LETTER FROM A SCEPTIC.                 19
into all truth?'  Can you, then, really believe that Biblical
inspiration is anything more or less than the combination in
the writers of the two fold gift-genius and piety? I myself
agree with Mr. F. W. Newman, when he says that only one
kind of inspiration can be admitted, namely, that of'an ordinary influence of the Divine Spirit on the hearts of men, which
quickens and strengthens their moral and spiritual powers, and
is accessible to all (in a certain stage of development) in some
proportion to their own faithfulness.' Of course, this is but
intuition, and, holding it, the value and importance of revelation in the Scriptures becomes very small indeed: but I cannot
help that.
Professor Strauss somewhat expresses my thought when he
says that'God has revealed Himself to mankind at all times
-in their' own minds, in the works of creation, in the history
of the nations, and, finally, in some particularly gifted men
whom He raised up as lawgivers and prophets, as teachers and
apostles. Such men have risen among all nations, but chiefly
amongst the Jews, who very early entertained the notion that
there is but one God, that He is the Almighty Creator of
heaven and earth, that He is not to be represented by any
image or likeness, that He is the Holy Lawgiver, the just
Ruler of the destinies of mankind. The religious writings of
the ancient Jewish nation being the only ones in which this
foundation of true religion is to be found so pure and strong
(for which reason even the New Testament relies on and
appeals to the Old in this respect) they are also holy to us; and
the books of Moses and Samuel, the Psalms, and the Prophets
are indispensable to our edification.'But they are not trustworthy as records of actual facts.
Several remarkable events undoubtedly happened to the Israelitish nations chiefly in the early period of their history; they
had escaped from  servitude in Egypt under strange circumstances, and after a long migration they had conquered the
land of Canaan in bloody wars. These occurrences, of course,




20                 CORRESPONDENCE.
continued to live in the mouths of the people from generation
to genieration. At length some pious Israelite, dwelling on
the Divine activity with regard to the departure from Egypt,
imagined it in the, form in which it stands, as if God had
ordered Moses in an oral conversation to deliver His peopleas if He had visibly, in the pillar of cloud and of fire, marched
before the army, and so forth. This, written down in after
times, is probably the real origin of the relations thereof in
those writings that are commonly called the books of Moses.'
In this way, that which is recorded in the Old Testament as'
supernatural may, I think, be accounted for.
So with the New Testament.'The first Christians naturally asked themselves'whence in Christ comes this clearness
of mind, this sublimity of spirit, this purity of heart which is
nowhere else to be found in any human being? He was not
produced by sinful seed, was their answer; He immediately
descended from God, the fountain of all light. This most
likely gave rise to the relations of His supernatural production
contained in the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke. As a
higher spirit He appeared to have come down upon this earth
for a~ short time; after His departure from it He seemed to
have returned to God, whence He came. This again gave rise
to the relations of His resurrection and ascension, and so
forth.''Christ will indeed come back to judge the world; only His
coming to judge us is not one that is always delayed from century to century, and never takes place; but the Lord passes
judgment every day, for He has given His spirit into our hearts
to judge us: punishing us when we are doing or coveting evil,
and rewarding us with peace and happiness when we are guided
and governed by it. And thus our inward judge-our conscience-purified and sharpened by the Spirit of Christ, is
adjudging and preparing to us already in this life reward or
punishment, happiness or sorrow, according to what we deserve.  This clearly indicates that also in a future life the




A LETTER FROM  A SCEPTIC.                 21
Divine Judge will assign to each of us that mansion in His
Father's house which he has made himself worthy of here on
earth.'
I grant that, in one sense, under this mode of treatment, the
Book goes, but in another it remains; remains'to be read
more intelligently than ever, not as the infallible Word of
God, which it is not, but the fallible word of man, which it
is; read as containing a record, not of what God said and did,
but of what the best minds in past ages thought God said and
did. Truth in this way develops.  The God of David is an
improvement on the God of the book of Joshua.  Isaiah's God
is not like the God of Moses or of Abraham.  The "Father"
revealed by Jesus is holier, wiser, and purer than them all.
Men will indeed have to give up the superstitions of other
days-the dogmas that were accepted on trust-the dreams
of dim ages past and gone; but thley will build on a surer
foundation-they will have a nearer and a dearer faith in One
who speaks to His faithful sons to-day; and they will build
their faith and hope on a better thing than an infallible book
(even though they could have it), for they will build on an
infallible God, who will give to all who seek Him the witness
of His own blessed Spirit that " now are we the sons of God."
Then we shall all see plainly that the Bible is our helper and
not our master; that it belongs to the experience and the
literature of the past; and that while we reverence and study
it, we are not to build all our hopes ulpon it, but that we are
to trust to the same God as David and Jesus trusted in, that
we may receive in the same way and to the same end, the
wisdom  that made them wise and the inspiration that made
them good. The Bible is a book of the past, and it necessarily
reflects the errors and the limited experience of the past.' 2
1 The opinions of Professor David Strauss, as embodied in his letter to the
Burgomaster Hlirzell, Professor Orelli, and Professor Hitzig, at Zurich, translated
and printed for general circulation as a tract.
2'The Light that Pains,' a tract printed for gratuitous distribution.




22                 CORRESPONDENCE.
But, apart from these views, many enquiries must be made
before I can accept the Bible. Take the four Gospels for instance. How am I to know who wrote them, or when they
were written? How am I to ascertain what means of knowledge the writers had, and whether or no they were eye-witnesses of what they record? If they were not, I must be told
how they got their information. These, and many similar
questions, which you good people never seem to trouble yourselves about, appear to me to be essential and imperatively to
require an answer.
Do not, however, suppose, I pray you, that, being in this
sceptical condition, I must of necessity be altogether destitute
of serious piety. By no means. I can, and do still occasionally, worship both in the Established Church and among
Nonconformists. What I agree with I unite in; what I dissent
from I leave unnoticed. My tastes lead me to prefer liturgical to free prayer, and I cannot but think that one day we
shall have forms for public devotion sufficiently aesthetic to
gratify the religious sentiment, without involving dogmas
which lead only to dispute. It certainly must be allowed that
Christianity, whether in all respects true or not in the shape
we have it, is eminently useful, highly consolatory to the
poor and dependent, a restraint on many which could be ill
spared, and an occasion of constant kindness and benevolent
activity.
Further, in the absence of individual conviction, Church
authority, if not pressed too far, offers many advantages.
Amid the restlessness and discomfort engendered by profitless
enquiry, it is a satisfaction, in the absence of anything better,
to admit the fact that the Church represents the belief of centuries, whether those beliefs be accurate or not; and that confidence in her, whether well grounded or otherwise, at least
ensures quiet, by pacifying where it may not satisfy, and by
fostering habits the tendency of which must unquestionably be
favorable to domestic happiness, to social comfort, and to the




A LTE'TTER FROM A SCEPTIC.              23
interests of law and order among all classes in the commonwealth.
Such is my case. I have been perfectly frank with you in
stating it, and I cannot but hope that you will answer me
in a similar spirit.
Believe me to be,
Yours cordially,








(II.)
THE REPLY.
MY DEA  -,
You do me but justice when you express confidence that I shall not attribute the intellectual wanderings of
the son of my dearest friend to moral causes. I have no right
to do this in any case. It is deeply to be regretted that believers should so often be harsh in their judgments of those
who, while honest and respectful in their treatment of Scripture, are unable to arrive at settled convictions regarding its
authority. Be assured that the highest faith is not favorable
either to bigotry or uncharitableness. Confidence in the Bible,
when it arises from supposed triumph in argument, or from a
blind and hereditary acceptance of its claim, is, I am quite
aware, but too often accompanied by an unloving and selfrighteous feeling toward unbelievers; but this fault is rarely
found among persons who feel and acknowledge that their joy,
in truth, is the result of a subjective experience of its value,
derived from the seurce and fountain of all truth. And for
obvious reasons. The faith which is subjective carries with it
that sense of certainty which alone gives repose to the spirita repose favorable alike to humility and respect for the consciences of others, and every way out of harmony with either
anger or arrogance. Only such a faith is, properly speaking,
Divine; for'the light in which a man can no longer call man
"master'" is light in which he can no longer desire to-lbe
called "master." He who has this'faith will rarely venture
to say when and how, and to what extent, his brother man is
rebellious to light and guilty in respect of unbelief; will rarely
2




26                 CORRESPONDENCE.
attempt to decide as to who is leaning to his own understanding, or who receiving the Kingdom of God as a little child.' 1
And now you must allow me to say that I think you have
taken far too favourable a view of a class who seem to me anything but models for sincere and serious enquirers. Honest
doubt, honestly dealt with, is, I believe, injurious to no one;
but doubt encouraged and indulged soon becomes a habit of
the mind, and a very unwholesome one too, not unfrequently
weakening, and sometimes destroying the very capacity for
estimating moral evidence. It is by no means rare to meet
with doubters who are so unreasonable in relation to their
difficulties that, in dealing with them, one is more tempted to
question the healthiness of the brain than the integrity of the
purpose. It is'the fool' who says in his heart'there is no
God.'
Some men of this stamp whom I have known were obviously
under the influence of an intense and morbid egotism, and
others were so completely in bondage to a sense of the ludicrous that they seemed absolutely incapable of dealing with
anything seriously, which could, by a little perverted ingenuity, be made to look grotesque. Few sceptics, I think, are
distinguished by the possession of a robust and well-balanced
intellect. I doubt not that among these persons are to be
found many who may fairly claim to be regarded with the
greatest consideration and respect. But this is not the case
with all. As among believers are to be seen weak minds as
well as strong ones; bad men as well as good men; persons
who are able to give a sound reason for the hope that is in
them, as well as persons who can give no reason at all: so
among unbelievers there are not a few who but too plainly
indicate that self-complacency and conceit have had very
much to do with their doubts, while others are as clearly the
victims of pride and a rebellious will-persons who are ob1 Thoughts on Revelation, with Special Reference to the Present Time. By
John McLeod Campbell.




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                  27
viously destitute of all reverence, and perhaps it is not too
much to say disbelievers alike in truth and goodness. All this
may surely be allowed, without disputing for a moment what
you have advanced in favour of your friends.
In relation to your own difficulties, it will only be possible,
in a brief letter like this, to glance generally at some considerations which you seem to me to have overlooked.
Your views- of inspiration are of course not mine. I certainly regard Biblical inspiration-for I here speak of that
only-as something very different fiom either genius or piety,
whether single or combined. I do not think it at all akin to
what we sometimes call the inspiration of the poet, of the
painter, of the sculptor, or of the musician. I am far, indeed,
from disputing that the Giver of every good and perfect gift
may justly be regarded as endowing men of genius with all
that distinguishes them friom their fellows, but when I speak
of Holy Scripture as inspired I use' the word in a much higher
sense than this. I regard that book-so far as it is Godbreathed at all-as inspired in such an exceptional way as to
remove its revelations altogether out of the rank, even of the
highest of merely human compositions.
I admit, indeed, that you would have good ground for
maintaining the continuance of inspiration amongst us, if your
application of the text quoted was a right one. But it is not
so. It is a very serious and mischievous mistake to apply the
words,' He shall guide you into all truth,' to every believer.
To do so, except in a very limited sense, is, in my judgment, to
destroy the broadest distinction that can be pointed out
between  inspired  and uninspired communications.  I am
always ashamed at the arrogance-however disguised as
humility-which is implied when good men say, as many do,
tile Holy Spirit has taught me this or that; God fulfils His
promise, and guides me into all truth;' when they ought to
say,'God has revealed in the Bible all truth needful for my
salvation from evil, and for my spiritual growth. Just as I




28                 CORRESPONDENCE.
come to that book in a right spirit, free from pride and prejudice, from selfishness and sectarianism; not governed by inferior motives, not moved by the desire that such or such an
opinion of mine may be confirmed by Scripture, but only
anxious to know what the Book says; in other words, just so
far as I am purified by the Spirit of God, and my will is
brought into harmony with the Divine will, shall I attain wisdom. On the other hand, just in proportion as I come to the
written word under the influence of evil, of self-will, of bigotry,
or of given theological systems, shall I be liable to delusion
and darkness. That which was promised to the Apostles was
not, in the same sense, promised to me. The Lord led them
into all truth, by direot revelation, that they might be the
instructors of the Church in all ages. The Lord will lead me
into all truth, only by the subjection of my will-by giving me
instructors of the Church in all ages. The Lord will lead nce
into all truth, only by the subjection of my will-by giving me
a loving, candid, and fearless spirit; by purifying and elevating my moral nature, and by bringing me in this state of liind
into heartfelt contact with the revelations of Scripture.'
These are my views; and I wish ybu to believe that, in
holding them, I am anything but insensible to the difficulties
which embarrass us, in presenting what may be regarded by
men in general as satisfactory proof of niany things that we
often take for granted, such as miracles, the authorship and
authenticity of the four Gospels, the formation of the canon,
and much beside. I hope, before long, to lay before you some
thoughts by which you will see how  these things present
themselves to my own mind.
I am, I confess, greatly astonished to find that you should
be able, with the aimount of natural good sense you possess,
to accept Strauss's ideological theory, and to content yourself
with the assumption that from somrle unknown cause or other
-for a special revelation is denied-the Jews, although every
way inferior in general culture to the surrounding nations,
were, even in the very earliest times, immeasurably before
others in the knowledge of God; so much so, that the writers




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                  29
of the New Testament properly'rely upon affd appeal' to
them in this respect; nay, that we ourselves, with equal propriety, regard some portions at least of Jewish literature as'holy and indispensable to edification.' We believers say so
too, and our reasons for thus judging-whatever they may be
worth-are before the world.  But what are yours? The
books themselves, according to your view, while professing to
be historical, are really not so; the writers, whoever they
might be, are confessedly untrustworthy, for while they
broadly and repeatedly assert that such and such things are
facts, they, in reality, only imagined them. What these'pious
Israelites' assert to have received directly from  God they
really invented in order to account for things they could not
otherwise explain. When they affirm in the most unmistakeable terms that certain miraculous occurrences took place, such
as the presence of the pillar of cloud and the passage of the
Red Sea, they only' imagined the Divine activity,' and wrote
as if the events. had actually transpired; this, you say, is the
real origin of the relations given in the writings commonly
called the Books of Moses. In like manner the narratives of
the New Testament are but evolutions of human thought,
utterly untrue if presented as facts, yet true as relations of
what'the best minds in past ages thought God said and did.'
The theory further supposes that when these early intuitions
took shape, and were by somebody or other formed into a
book, and ultimately accepted as national annals, the compilers
or inventors gained their end by moulding the whole into a
history the very reverse of what might reasonably have been
expected on the supposition that the object was to present
documents likely to be pleasing. For what is this Jewish history as we have it, whether true or false, but a record of early
degradation, of continued ingratitude, of perversity, obstinacy,
and crime? Of the early judges one (Ehud) is represented as
an assassin; another (Abimelech), the son of a concubine, is
said to have murdered all his family, and to have been cruel




30                CORRESPONDENCE.
enough on one occasion to have burnt alive about a thousand
helpless captives, men and women; a third (Jephthah) in civil
strife slays above 40,000 of his countrymen; a fourth (Samson) is but a half-civilized giant; and the state of the country
generally is at one period morally degraded to such an extent
that one entire tribe-Benjamin-had to be all but extirpated.
Again, what an unsatisfactory history is that of Saul! What
dark stains rest on David! What a sad ending is that of
Solomon! What a catalogue of sins and idolatries defaces the
glory of succeeding monarchs!  Granting, for the sake of
argument, that Ezra and his scribes, instead of finding the
records said to have been discovered, invented them, this, at
least, follows: that such a history, if not felt to be as true as
it was humiliating, would certainly have excited popular indignation and been rejected at once.
I am bound, however, to suppose that you really believe the
narratives of Scripture to be inventions, and that you also
believe in their utility and in the piety of the men who set
them afloat, for you say you do; but I could not have accepted
such a statement on any authority short of your own. For
what does it involve? Certainly this-that falsehoods are not
only innocent but usefill,'absolutely edifying;' that men may
be, at one and the same time, untrustworthy and yet'pious;'
that'the best minds in past ages' were justified in putting
forth what they had only thought, as what they had seen and
heard; in affirming that their subjective feelings were actual
and objective facts. I am quite willing to admit that a supernatural revelation has its difficulties; but were those difficulties ten times greater or more numerous than they are,
they would not approach the contradictions which are inseparable from  the theory you have adopted.  Talk about
the moral difficulties of the Bible, why they shrink into absolute insignificance when compared with an hypothesis which
annihilates all distinction between right and wrong, truth and
falsehood, giving, in fact, to falsehood the moral power of
truth, to wrong-doing the efficacy of that which is right.




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                    31
You will perhaps say this is not fair; that it is surely possible for a man to idealize honestly, and, more than this, to
present ideal thought to himself and to others with all the
vividness and force of objective reality, without thereby
becoming either a cheat or a charlatan.  I admit that such a
case is possible, but not in relation to the narratives of Scripture.  Ali. Renan has been attempting this feat very lately, in
relation to the Resurrection, and never was there a more
signal failure. Facts, as has been well said,'will not bend to
this process.' There never were narratives less ideal or more
straightforward in their reality; they might have been purposely framed to contracst with professed accounts of visions,
and to exclude the possibility of their being confounded with
such accounts. The recitals show little care to satisfy our
curiosity, or to avoid the appearance of inconsistency in detail; but nothing can be more removed from vagueness and
hesitation than their definite, positive statements. It is not
criticism, but mere arbitrary license, to say that these facts
stand for fancies. The very notion is trifling and incredible.
We may disbelieve if we will; but to endeavour to make out
that plain assertions are visions, is but to take refuge in the
most unlikely of guesses.'
There is no fact in history more certain than that Jesus
Christ appeared in Judea at the time He is said to have done,
that He was crucified, that He was believed by His disciples
to have risen from the dead, that'many professing to have
been original witnesses of that event and of the Christian
miracles generally, passed their lives in labours, dangers, and
sufferings voluntarily undergone in attestation of the accounts
which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their belief
of the truth of those accounts.'2 May I not add, and call you
and your friends as witnesses, that motives connected with
these beliefs have in all ages elevated and ennobled those who
1 Saturday Review, art. on Renan's Des Ap6tres.
2 Paley's Evidence, motto to cap. ii.-ix.




32               CORRESPONDENCE.
have received them into their hearts with simplicity and love?
The theory of Strauss is absolutely worthless.
And now for your assertion that in the Bible may be found
commands which are immoral and iniquitous, such as those
which direct the massacre of the Canaanites and sanction
cruelty to slaves.
Let us take first the slaughter of the Canaanites. What I
have to show, according to you, is that since God did command the destruction of these people, He was right in doing
so. To'this, however; I demur. In accepting the Pentateuch
as historically true, I am simply bound to show, first, that the
assertion of a Divine command to the Israelites to take possession of Canaan by force, is inseparable from  the rest of the
narrative; and then to state the limitations under which, as
I imagine, such phrases as IThe Lord said' or'The Lord
spake' ought to be received.
I do not myself think Lord Macaulay's way of putting the
matter, although a very common, is a right one. I see no
evidence either that the Jews were (except in an indirect and
limited sense)'the ministers of God's vengeance,' or thaf they
had a commission to extirpate the nations of Canaan. Least
of all can I admit that they were'specially commanded by
God to do many things which, if done.without His authority,
would have been atrocious crimes.' Right and wrong are not
different things in God and man, nor can even the Divine
Being rightfully do to-day what He Himself declared to be
wrong yesterday, for right is always and eternally right.
The argument that such or such a proceeding appears to us,
when judged by the light of the Gospel, to be unjust, cruel, or
any way wrong, is a very sound one for doubting whether God
ever sanctioned it —a powerful reason for demanding good
evidence that He did so; but it reaches no further. If it can
be satisfactorily shown that God did really conmmand this or
that thing to be done, we must bow in silence; unless, indeed,
we mean, with our limited faculties, and still more limited




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                 33
knowledge, to set ourselves up as wiser or better than our
Maker. I cannot, however, admit for a moment that, whether
commanded by God or not, the conquest of Canaan by the
Israelites was in itself an atrocious crime, except on the theory
which neither you nor I hold to, that war for purposes of conquest is, under all circumnstcances, criminal.
But the question for our consideration is: Did God, in very
deed, command the massacre of the Canaanites?  A prior
question of course arises, which is this: When God communicates His will to man, does He do it in such a way as not only
to render mistake as to the command itself impossible, but
also to secure infallibility as to the means employed in its
execution?
To neither of these questions can an absolutely affirmative
reply be given. Admnitting-which we certainly must, if we
hold to the Book —that God spake unto Moses, Joshua, and
Samuel, intelligibly, whether revealing His character, or commanding certain things to be done, we are nevertheless altogether in the dark as to the mode in which this was accomplished,  We cannot get beyond the Apostolic statement, that
the same God who hath'in these latter days spoken unto us
by His Son,' did' at sundry times and in divers manners speak
unto the fathers by the prophets' (Heb. i. 1).
But, accepting this statement, what follows? Why clearly
this: that as a true apprehension of the message of' the Son'
is made dependent on the state of the heart of each individual
to whom it comes, so must it be with every message God gives
or sends to the children of men. Eminently is this the case
when the communication relates to anything that has to be
done by man. Paul had to withstand Peter as a man to be
blamed in relation to the particular course he was pursuing in
doing God's work. Moses, in fulfilling a Divine command,
sinned grievously; nor is there the slightest reason to suppose
that any servant of God is, or ever was, free from liability to
error in executing the Divine will, if pride or ambition, or
2*




34                 CORRIESPOXDENCE.
selfish passion in any form, mingles with the work. Before,
therefore, we' charge God foolishly' with sanctioning wrong,
let us be quite sure that He commanded the thing to be done
in the way it was.
The ordinary impression seems to be that a constant and
direct intercourse went on between the early rulers of the Jews
and their Heavenly King, under which error was impossible;
that every act of the government was directed and regulated
by intimations from above; that the judges or governors of
Israel were but the passive recipients of Divine instructions;
that the obedience rendered was therefore, to a great extent,
mechanical, leaving little, if any, place for the judgment of the
statesman. Something like this is commonly held by persons
who, without much reflection, think and speak of the people
of Israel as placed under a theocratic government. But such
a view of things cannot be sustained fiom Scripture.  On the
contrary, there can be no question as to the fact that intimations of the Divine will, as to what the Jews should do under
given circumstances, always left room for wisdom or folly in
the execution, for judgment or want of judgment in the ruler,
for partial or entire obedience in the people.
The distinctions commonly drawn  by Christian writers
between the old dispensation and the new, generally involve
error in the way of exaggerating differences. Lord Bacon
asserts broadly that'Prosperity is the blessing of the old Testament; but that adversity is the blessing of the New.' Archbishop Whately, annotating on this observation, remarks:'The distinguishing characteristic of the old covenant, of the
Mosaic Law, was, that it was enforced by a system of temporal
fre'wards and judgments, administered according to an extraordinary (miraculous) providence. The Israelites were promised
as the reward of obedience, long life, and health, and plentiful
harvests, and victory over their enemies. And the punishments threatened for disobedience were pestilence, famine,
defeat, and all kinds of temporal calamity. These were the




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                   35
rewards and punishments that formed the sanction of the Mosaic law. But the new covenant, the Gospel, held out as its
sanction, rewards and punishments in the next world, and
these only.'
Facts, however, do not bear out these statements, except with
many?imitations. Asaph was so perplexed by observing the
prosperity of the wicked in life, and their tranquillity in death,
contrasting, as he saw it did, with the frequent misfortunes of
the righteous, that he could get no peace until he went into
the house of God and meditated on their latter end (at the day
of judgment). And, on the other hand, certainly nothing can
be more true than your assertion that God is judging us all
every day, sometimes rewarding and sometimes inflicting punishinont, according to a man's obedience or disobedience.
The truth is, we commonly fall in this matter into a double
mistake. We are foolish enough to think that because the
action of God is not always obvious to us, He has now less to
do with the world's affairs than He once had. We exaggerate
the extent of His interference in former times, because it related
more than it does now to the outward and visible. We ought
to remember that at no time does God manifest Himself more
frequently or more directly than is needful, while at all times
He leaves us to apply the principles He has laid down to practical life, as a part of our probation, a course which of necessity
involves the possibility of error on our side.
The declaration,'The Lord said,''The Lord spake,' or
phrases of similar import, occur probably a hundred times in
the Pentateuch alone, and in by far the greater part of these
cases the words are used, not as asserting in each separate
case a direct and immediate Divine revelation, but as implying
the settled convictions of the speaker as to the Divine will.
They denote in these cases the application of Divine statements
to given circumstances, by good, but human and therefore
fallible, men. Further, we are strangely apt to forget that'the severity' of God is far more seen in His dealings with




36                 CORRESPONDENCE.
the chosen people than with their enemies. In the wilderness,
on one occasion, fourteen thousand die of plague, on account
of transgression. On another, many perish by the sword. On
a third, the earth opens and swallows up offenders. On a
fourth, fiery serpents are sent in punishment; while the frightful calamities brought upon Judea by the Roinans, to say
nothing of the previous overthrow of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans-all these events being distinctly put before us as judicial-involved miseries quite as great as any that the Canaanites suffered.
In relation to these nations, the assumption almost always
made is, that God commanded their entire extirpation on
account of their crimes. But this is not sustained by the
narrative. The commacncd is,'Thou shalt drive them out before
thee.... Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor
with their gods. They shall not dwell in thy land, lest they
make thee sin against Me.' (Exod. xxiii. 32-33.)'Ye shall
destroy their altars, break their images, and cut down their
groves: lest thou take of their daughters to thy sons, and go
a-whoring after their gods.' (Exod. xxxiv. 11-17.) The promise, renewed from time to time, is:'I will send hornets
before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite,
and the Hittite from before thee.' Again:'I will send an
angel before thee; and Iowill drive out the Canaanite.' (Exod.
xxxiii. 2.) Further, as a fact,'multitudes, of them did flee,
some into Africa, and others into Greece. Procopius says
they first retreated into Egypt, but gradually advanced into
Africa, where they built many cities.''  They were never
destroyed, except when their evil influence could not in any
other way be got rid of.
When the Israelitesfought, they naturally adopted the ordinary laws of war-the only laws which prevailed in their
time-and, in accordance therewith, they slew or made slaves'of their enemies. Had the Canaanites been the conquerors, they
would, in like manner, have slain or enslaved the Israelites.
1 Calmet, edited by Taylor.




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                  37'But,' you will say,' the Lord, according to the Bible, commanded the slaughter of womnen and children.' This, however, is not as clear as at first sight it seems to be. The first
instance in which this practice occu'rs is in the case of the
Midianites, who had brought such grievous calamities on Israel
by seducing the people to idolatry and immorality, in order
that they might offend God. (Numb. xxv. 1-18 and xxxi. 16.)
Here they, in the first instance, slew only the kings of Midian
and their warriors. Moses, however, is wroth at this forbearance, and commands the execution of all the male children and
of all the women who were not virgins. That the great lawgiver was justified in so doing we have no right to assume.
His motive was doubtless the preservation of the people, but
he does not appear to have had any Divine sanction for this
severity. (Numb. xxxi. 14-20.) A little later we have a
recital of the general direction to' drive out' all the inhabitants, and to' destroy all their pictures and images,' but nothing is said about killing the people. (Numb. xxxiii. 52-56.)
This direction had, however, been exceeded by the Israelites,
for when Sihon, king of the Amorites, refused to let them
pass, they destroyed all they overcame, even the women and
the little ones. In thus acting, they but too plainly imitated
the habits of the nations by which they were surrounded.
Once embarked in this ruthless course, they pursued it in
the case of Og, king of Bashan, as well as with others. Moses
certainly approves this slaughter in his address at Horeb, giving as the reason the prevention of intermarriages, and consequent idolatry. (Deut. vii. 1-11 and xx. 16-18.)  Joshua follows the example at Jericho (Josh. vi. 21); at Ai (viii. 25);
at Lachish, at Debir, and in other places (x. 40). But it is
here to be remarked, that this course is only taken with those
tribes who came into battle. It is evident that the Canaanites
might have made peace if they would, for it is remarked,'There was not a city that made peace with the children of
Israel, save the inhabitants of Gibeon.'




38                  CORRESPONDENCE.
If Moses, in the address referred to, was infallible-if he
was but the mouthpiece of God in the directions he gives to
save alive of the seven nations'nothing that breathethll'-it
is clearly not for us to dispute the command; but if, as Dr.
Pye Smith has put it,'the sanction of the New Testament to
the inspiration of the Old extends only to' holy things,' and
that'to attach it to other things is to lose sight of its nature,
and to misapply its design,' it is at least an open question
whether this was the case.  That God was not pledged, so to
speak, to extirpate the Canaanites, although He supernaturally
assisted the Israelites in obtaining possession of the land, is
clear from the fact that the worc toas not done wherever it was
unnecessary.  Miraculous aid, indeed, appears to have been
withheld after the primary end-possession  of the landhad been attained.  We are distinctly told that the children
of Israel could Inot drive out the Jebusites.  (Josh. xv. 63.)
And, again,'The Lord was with Judah, and he (Judah) drave
out the inhabitants of the mountain; but could not drive out
the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron.'
(Judg. i. 19.) In other cases, when the Israelites became
strong enough to conquer, they not only refrained from slaughter, making the people tributary, and dwelling among them,
but intermarried, became idolatrous, and forsook the God of
their fathers. (Judg. iii. 5-7.) As a consequence of this apostasy, they became themselves, from time to time, slaves: first,
to the king of Mesopotamia (iii. 8), then to the Moabites (iii.
14), then to the Canaanites (iv. 2, 3), and then to the Midianites (vi. 1). During all these years, Israel enjoyed the Divine
help ohly at long intervals, and then providentially rather than
theocratically, since it was by the raising up of men as deliverers who were sometimes anything but good or godly.
You will perhaps say I have purposely omitted any notice
of a case which cannot be explained by the foregoing considerations, viz., that of the Amalekites destroyed by Saul under
the directions of Samuel.  (1 Sam. xv. 2, 3.)  The prophet




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                   39
here certainly claims to speak for God, when he says to Saul,'Go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have,
and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant
and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.' The command
appears to have been executed, except in so far as Agag himself was concerned and the cattle. For saving these, Saul is
rejected from being king over Israel (xv. 23).
The question arises, Did Samuel, in issuing this command,
act by the immediate direction of God, or was the order given
under an erroneous impression that in this act of destruction
he was but carrying out a Divine threatening, and justifiably
accomplishing a great work of retribution? Probably the latter. He believed, doubtless, that he was but uttering the
Divine Will when he said,'Hearken thou unto the voice of
the words of the Lord,' and yet it is anything but certain that
he was right in thus speaking. Hie was evidently not infallible
or quite free from secondary motives in what he did as the
representative of God, or he would not have appointed his sons
judges-men' who turned aside after' lucre, and took bribes,
and perverted judgment.' (1 Sam. viii. 3.) He was now old,
and if he erred in the one instance why should lhe not in the
other?  Besides, it is not a little remarkable that while he
tells Saul that God had, on account of this act of disobedience,
rejected him from being king, he had, before this occurrence,
deposed the son of Kish for offering sacrifice without authority
(xiii. 13, 14).
That there was not the same degree of personal superintendence, so to speak, on the part of the Divine Being over the
Israelites, after the making of the golden calf, as there had
been before, is evident from the word of the Lord to Moses on
that occasion:'Go, lead the people into the place of which I
have spoken unto thee: behold mine Angel' (as distinguished
from the more immediate presence of God which had hitherto
been enjoyed)'shall go before thee.' (Exod. xxxii. 34.) It
has been supposed by some that this was reversed on the inter



40                 CORRESPONDENCE.
cession of Moses (xxxiii. 12-17), but such does not appear to
have been the case. The'presence' of the Lord with the
angel is all that is promised.  The probability is, that, step by
step, the more immediate interference of God was exchanged
for ordinary providential government, as the people gradually
assumed the position and responsibilities of an organised nation. If this be true, the likelihood of the command to destroy
Amalek being given by Samuel rather than by God is greatly
increased.
It is clear enough that none of the judges were'perfect
before God.' Samson's conduct speaks for itself. Gideon kills
Zeba and Zalmunna, saying he would have saved them alive if
they had not killed his brothers. (Judges viii. 19.) Jephthah
and Gideon, Deborah and Barak, in like manner, are seen to
act in a spirit and under motives which are falr from being un-'
mixed. Samuel, like themn, was liable to err; nor does this
conclusion at all interfere with the apostolic declaration that' through faith' these very men'subdued kingdoms, wrought
riighteousness, obtained promises, and (figuratively) stopped
the mouths of lions.' (Heb. xi. 32.)  Great faith is not unfrequently accompanied, especially in warriors, by great defects
and grievous deficiencies.
By drawing a distinction, then, between what God clearly
commanded, and what men actually did, the difficulty created
by the massacre of the Canaanites in great measure vanishes;
the Jews cease to be'ministers of Divine vengeance,' and
crimes committed find no excuse in Divine commands. The
wickedness of the Canaanites might well justify their expulsion-a wickedness so great and so seductive, that, in order to
prevent its spread,'the Lord went before' both the children
of Lot and the children of Esau, driving out the offenders, just
as He did before the children of Israel. (Deut. ii. 21, 22.)
And now let us look at the question of slavery. As to its
permission at all it must be remembered that neither under




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                  41
the old covenant nor under the new, does God ever appear to
do more than establish principles, which, at the proper time,
and when men are somewhat prepared for change, are sure to
overthrow existing wrongs. Slavery, polygamy, the gladiatorial shows, feudalism, and many other evils, have all in turn
fallen by processes which were slow in operation, but sure as
to their result. The Israelites, it must be recollected, although
a chosen people, had been long slaves in Egypt, and when they
came out they were at best but a sort of half savage mob,
although wonderfully organized. The legislation both of the
wilderness and of the promised land is, in all cases, adapted
to the men as they then were, and to the world as it existed at
that time. The slaughter or the slavery of conquered tribes
was the rule everywhere. Tyranny and oppression of the
grossest kind was practised by every neighbouring people without restriction or rebuke.
The Israelite alone was under a law which required him to
defend the weak, and to carry out with more or less stringency
the great principle of love to all men. To what an extent he
failed to do this we know too well; but we are in no position
whatever fitting us to judge as to the merit or demerit of any
enactment intended, not for all time, but for a peculiar people,
and for these only at a particular period of their history. All
revelation is of necessity progressive.  It grows with the
growth of ages.  Wisdom always adapts itself to different
times and to different conditions of men. It is only so far as
the eye of the mind is opened by experience and discipline
that it can take in the truth which is presented to it.
It is easy to seize, as Dr. Colenso has done, upon a single
enactment, such as that recorded in Exodus (xxi. 21), where,
if, after a severe beating, the slave survived a day or two, the
master was to escape punishment, and, assutming it to be a
Divine Law, to enlarge on the cruelty it seems to sanction;
but in so doing some things are taken for granted, and other
things are forgotten. First, it by no means follows that be



42                 CORRESPONDENCE.
cause God governed Judea theocratically He is, so to speak, to
be made responsible for every enactment found in the laws of
Moses. A greater lawgiver than Moses, indeed, never arose;
a man more richly endowed with gifts and graces fitting him
for the precise work he had to do never lived; but these very
gifts prove that he was not.a mere passive recipient of Divine
instructions. He was left, without doubt, in many matters
of detail to judge and act as he saw best for the people he had
to govern.
A distinction is clearly drawn between the giving of the ten
commandments and the Mosaic Law generally.  Regarding
the first, it is said,'the Lord spake unto you out of the midst
of the fire.' He' declared unto you His commandments; and
He wrote them upon two tables of stone.' Regarding the last,'The Lord commanded mne at that time to teach you statutes
and judgments.' (Deut. iv. 12-14.)
Why, too, should we shut our eyes to the fact that'many
of the rites prescribed appear to have been taken from those
of the Egyptians? The linen garments of the priests, the
long hair of the Nazarites, the offering,of the first fruits, and
similar ordinances, betray an Egyptian origin. All were rejected that savoured of, or countenanced idolatry, or were
unsuitable to the national character and state of the Israelites.
The wisdom  of not introducing new rites and customs is
obvious. The people, rude and uncultivated as they were,
would have been reluctant to observe strange regulations.
They adhered with pertinacity to what they had learned and
seen. Hence we perceive the propriety of retaining as many
old ordinances and ceremonies as were adapted to the purpose
which God had in view by giving the Levitical law.'l
Further, it should be borne in mind that, by the very same
law that is pronounced so cruel, it was provided that if the
slave died under his master's hand the blood of the man should
surely be avenged. This was a provision which would tend
1 Davidson's Text of the Old Testament Considered, second ed. pp. 552-3.




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                   43
powerfully to check any rigour which was accompanied by
such a risk. As a fact, the Hebrew slave, whether reduced
to this condition by criminality, or bought with money of the
stranger, was incalculably better cared for than he would have
been among any other people. If a Hebrew, his servitude
terminated at the end of six years. (Exod. xxi. 2.) His master was admonished to treat him while in bondage' as an hired
servant,' and'not to rule over him with rigour.' (Lev. xxv.
39-48.) War captives, such as the Canaanites or others, as
well as those purchased from  foreign dealers, were protected
by statutes unknown elsewhere.  The loss of an eye or a
tooth was to be recompensed by giving the slave his liberty
(Exod. xxi. 26, 27), and his wilful murder entailed the same
punishment as in the case of a free man.  (Lev. xxiv. 17-22.)
On the whole, it can scarcely be disputed that slavery, as
Mr. Bevan suggests in his article in Smith's Dictionary, was
in the Mosaic law recognised mainly'with a view to mitigate
its hardships. In that phase of society which prevailed when
these laws were made,' he remarks,'slavery was commonly
the alternative of death in the case of all who were captured
in battle. A labouring class, in our sense of the word, was
almost unknown to the nations of antiquity; hired service was
regarded as incompatible with freedom; the slave, as a rule,
occupied the same social position as the servant or labourer
of modern times, though differing from  him  in regard to
political status.' There is nothing whatever in the Mosaic
laws relating to slavery, when candidly and comprehensively
considered, which in the slightest degree justifies doubt as to
the Pentateuch being what it professes to be-a true delineation of God's dealings with His ancient people.
And now let us pass on to other subjects.  As I have
already observed, I perfectly agree with you when you say
that the Lord judges us every day; but I am quite at a loss to
understand on what ground you can affirm that Christ'will
come back to judge the world,' since you neither believe that




44                CORRESPONDENCE.
God has appointed a day (a fixed time) for that purpose, or
that He who is to be the judge of men has been raised from
the dead. Denying the resurrection of Christ as an objective
fact, how can you hold that He will come back? Refusing to
accept what the Bible says as to the beginning of the world,
and rejecting also what it affirms regarding the end of it, it is
plain that in your view'all things continue as they were
from the beginning of the creation' (2 Pet. iii. 4, 5), and, for
anything you know to the contrary, will so continue for ever.
A comforting thought, truly, to anyone who contemplates the
sin and misery, the oppression and wrong, of which earth is
the theatre, anid a thought which is certainly not much alleviated by the possibility of improvement through material
agencies; for hitherto'progress' has brought with it almost
as many sorrows as joys, by no means perceptibly increasing
the sum of human happiness. Ah! my dear friend, hide it as
you may, unbelief is but another word for darkness and despair.
You continue to speak, I perceive, of the' witness of the
Spirit,' and about being a' son of God;' but how you can use
such terms, or arrive at any assurance that your faith and
hope, such as they are, rest on a good foundation, while abandoning Scripture, I am at a loss to imagine; for apart from
the Divine revelation which you reject, no ray. of light falls
upon our path. You may tell me that a blind man has, by
intuition, the same image on his eye of hill and dale, tree and
flower, sun and stars, that I have, but I cannot believe you.
I should insist that such a person must have once seen, or that
if not recollections, his supposed intuitions were but conceptions originating in the descriptions of others. So, until I find
a man brought up in the darkness of heathenism and altogether unacquainted with Scripture, possessing by immediate
revelation from God a sense of sonship, a witness of the Spirit,
and a faith and hope akin thereto, I must decline to admit that
the case you have put is other than a mere imagination.' To
affirm that each man at once, by internal illumination alone,




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                  45
attains a clear recognition of even elementary moral and
spiritual truth, is to ignore the laws according to which the
soul's activity is developed, and to contradict universal ex —
perience, which tells us that the great majority of mankind
are but in partial possession of this spiritual and moral truth,
and hold it, for the most part, in connection. with the most
prodigious and pernicious errors."
I must here, however, allow that you are to some extent
right in saying that the Gospel, as ordinarily preached, exaggerates human sin and limits Divine mercy. It exaggerates
evil however, only in so far as it abandons the record; only in
so far as it equalises transgression of all kinds, by measuring
the guilt of sin, not as God does, by the circumstances under
which it is committed-such as the ignorance or weakness
of the sinner —but by the glory of the Creator, and the dignity of the Divine Redeemer. It limits mercy only in so far
as it makes —without any Scriptural authority for so doingthe possibility of pardon to depend on conditions which can
only be fulfilled by the comparatively few who here become acquainted with the Gospel; only in so far as it teaclhes that the
redeeming love of the Saviour cannot be of any practical benefit except to the elect. The Bible is surely not responsible for
these or any other perversions, nor must the inferences of man
be confounded with the revelations of God.
My letter is unduly lengthening, but I cannot leave entirely
unnoticed your expectation —shall I not say hope? —that one
day we shall have'forms of public devotion sufficiently wsthetic
to gratify the religious sentiment, without involving dogmas
that lead only to dispute.' You will perhaps be surprised if I
tell you that I think this very possible. But, believe me, it
will only be when Christendom, so long apostate, has, in retribution for her abominations, become absolutely atheistic.
That a tendency of this kind manifests itself, from time to
time, in Rome, especially among the Jesuits, has been noticed
1 The Eclipse of Faith: a Visit to a Religious Sceptic, p. 297.




46                 CORRESPONDENCE.
by devout Catholics, and is regarded by them with grief and
anxiety.'It is well known,' says a CaRtholic writer (probably
belonging to the Eastern branch),'that the Jesuits assisted, or
rather guided the Pope, in bringing out the last dogma of the
immaculate conception of Mary.  They acted with foresight,
since they exalted the external veneration of the blessed
Virgin, which latter rests on Mary's justification and sanctification through the redeeming merits of Christ —and they were
thus enabled- to help on still further the externalising qof Christianity. Externalism is superficiality; superficiality is frivolity; frivolity means manageableness by a strong spirit and
will.' 1 What England has chiefly to dread in the present advancing love of ritualism  is the scepticism  it hides and the
frivolity it engenders and encourages; each, in its own way,
fatal to the civil liberty which arises out of religious individuality and its accompaniment-a claim that the supremacy of
conscience shall be acknowledged.
The medimval follies of Rome will not always be endured;
but her aesthetic worship, her ritualism, the'pillows' she has
in store for all doubters, the responsibilities she is willing to
assume, the charm of her ideal unity, her blandishments, and
pomp, and pride will last; and when these are separatedwhich they easily may be —from  any particular form of despotism; when the Christian element, in her identical with the
mediceval, is eliminated for ever; when the true piety that is
in her departs; and when she becomes, as she then willthe
embodiment of the spirit of the time -her priesthood intellectual, her splendour unexampled, and mankind everywhere
drunk with the wine of her fornication; then, I say, will her
mysterious influence survive change, and instead of being
weakened, will rule the world with greater power than ever.
Of her intolerance, for she will retain that, I say nothing;
on the predictions which shadow forth her ultimate ruin, I am
here silent; but I cannot help calling your attention to the
1 Overbeck on Catholic Orthodoxy.




REPLY TO THE DOUBTER.                  47
point where scepticism and ritualism meet; where popery and
infidelity fraternize, and will one day embrace each other.
Beware, I entreat you, of that ending.
The fault that saps the life
Is doubt half crushed, half veiled; the lip assent
Which finds no echo in the heart of hearts.
Far better is it to be restless, even to unhappiness, than to
be drugged.  Far better is it to be an honest unbeliever than
an hypocritical worshipper; for how can any worship be other
than simulated which disregards truth, the only pabulum  of
the soul; which, proceeding on the assumption that God cannot be known, finds in forms and ceremonies a place indeed for
a sensuous fancy, but none for the best affections of the soul;
which substitutes the sentimental for the heartfelt, and which,
in so doing, turns away man's noblest faculty-the imagination,'the chief connective link between the visible world and
the invisible-from its appointed task of spiritualising the senses,
to perform the ignoble drudgery of sensualising the spirit.'"
One word more, and I have done.  I do not dispute what
you say as to the utility of the Christian religion, whether
true or false; but I most firmly hold that we are not taught in
Scripture that faith in Christ is intended to be chiefly utilitarian, or that it is a system revealed for the improvement of
the present world.  The voice of God is,'Behold, I nmake all
things new.' Only as it finally accomplishes the reconstitution
of humanity in a state of purity and blessedness will the purpose of God in its introduction be fully and for ever answered.
Some points to which you have referred I have still left untouched, but I hope before long to be able to resume the
subject.
Believe me to be,
Yours very truly,
The following chapters may be regarded as having arisen
out of the foregoing correspondence.
I Archdeacon Hare's Mission of the Comforter.








LIBER LIBRORUM.
CHAPTER I.
REVELATION AND INSPIRATION.
MOST of us, in this country at least, profess to believe
in a Divine revelation embodied in an inspired book.
We may therefore perhaps, for our present purpose, be
allowed to assume not only that the Father of our
spirits can, if He will, communicate with the creatures
He has made, but that He actually has done so through
the agency of man; and, further, that these communications, whatever may be their value or extent, are
included in the book we call the Bible.
The point for consideration is, What is meant by this
assumption? What do we understand by Revelation,
and what by Inspiration? Is the book supposed to be
inspired infallible in its utterances?  If so, does this
infallibility extend to everything which is therein included? If not, how is the inspired to be distinguished
from the uninspired, the human from the Divine? These
are the questions which, in one form or other, continually present themselves for solution, and which the men
3




50               LIBER LBRORUJiM.
of this generation find themselves obliged to examine
afresh, and, if possible, to settle.
Such topics cannot, however, be disposed of lightly or
in few words, for they involve matters which must be
searched out honestly and without reserve, whether the
result be sadness or satisfaction. They are not mere
abstract enquiries. The Bible exists, and the very fact
of its existence, to say nothing of its history, renders it
imperative that its pretensions should be either sustained
or overthrown. The highest minds that have ever
appeared upon earth have reverently bowed before its
teachings, and the humblest have been upheld by its
consolations. If all alike have been deluded, the delusion is certainly the most remarkable that has ever
occurred in the history of our race.
Further, the Book must be treated by itself, and apart
altogether from any deductions that have been drawn
from its contents; for nothing can be clearer than that
Scripture is self-sustained and self-interpreting.
The Sacred Writings contain'a record of facts, and
make an immediate application of the facts, but they do
no more; life and not thought is the object to which.
they primarily minister, and so they minister (as no
other writings ever could do) to thought throeugh life.
They set forth a truth with simple distinctness, but do
not say how it is, or why it is.'" They are therefore
absolutely independent of all commentators, and must
not be mixed up with any inferences, or set of inferences,
deduced by theologians; with any series of propositions,
true or false; with any system of doctrine, however
Westcott on the Resurrection.




REVELATION AND INSPIIRATION.        51
apparently conclusive, which may at any time have
been framed from the record.
Nor should the Bible be regarded as the only channel
through which God speaks to man.
Nature is a revelation.'The heavens declare the
glory of God, and the firmament showeth His handywork.' Men are justly blameable who fail to discern
God, more or less, in His works.'For the invisible
things of Him, from the creation of the world are clearly
seen (being understood by the things that are made),
even His eternal power and Godhead.' The guilt of
Paganism, whether ancient or modern, is to be measured
by the extent to which every individual, in his love of
idolatry and its abominations, turns a deaf ear to the
teachings of the natural world regarding the one God.
The apostle Paul asserts this when he argues that blindness and perversity shut up the heathen in sin, and
necessitate a Redeemer; although he nowhere says, as
many persons affirm, that, remaining what they are
during life, they are shut out of the Divine compassion.
This conclusion, however common, is but a fallible, and
probably very inaccurate, human inference.
Family life, again, is a revelation. The ordinance of
parent and child reveals. God as the Father of spirits.
Our Lord recognizes this when He says,'If ye, being
evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children,
how much more shall your heavenly Father give the
Holy Spirit to them that ask Him.'
The Bible is pre-eminently such only in so far as it
makes God known to us; only in so far as it unveils the
Divine character, or discloses Divine designs; only in so
far as it casts light on what would otherwise be kept




52              LIBER LIBRORIM.
from us, because unattainable by the human mind apart
from this method of communication.
The precise extent of its teaching; the value of the
information it imparts; the limits within which the
Book may be regarded as infallible; and the process by
which what is Divine in it may be separated from that
which is human, will come under our notice in due time.
That it has a human aspect no one attempts to deny;
that it reveals chiefly'through the relations of ordinary
daily life;' that it comes to us'sometimes intermingled
with the private histories and varying fortunes of an
Eastern people,' is as certain as that it was given'at
sundry times and in divers manners;' but the Book is
not on these accounts the less a revelation, nor is it, as a
consequence, in any degree unadapted either to our
nature or necessities.
INSPIRATION is that process by which God, for an
end, not only communicates to certain men facts or
truths, the knowledge of which could not be attained in
any other way; but also the ability to teach to others,
without error or defect, the truths thus revealed. Inspiration, therefore, properly so called, implies both
reception and utterance, the capacity to receive, and the
power to communicate Divine truth authoritatively and
infallibly. That which is not infallibly true cannot be a
revelation from God. That which is not communicated
to man without any admixture of error cannot, properly
speaking, be the word of the Heavenly Father.
By an inspired MAN, then, we understand one who has
received, by a direct inbreathing of light and truth from
God, a message to others; a commission involving an
obligation, sometimes to speak, sometimes to write,




REVELATION AND INSPIRATION.          53
sometimes, under providential guidance, to record faithfully, although not always without liability to error, a
fact, or conversation, or discourse; sometimes, under
like conditions, to narrate a history; sometimes to compile and edit existing documents; sometimes, by direct
inspiration, to write letters; and sometimes to predict
future events.
In the execution of such tasks, infallibility will doubtless belong to all that has been directly revealed from
above; to all prediction founded thereupon, and to all
that is communicated by special command; but not by
any means of necessity to everything that has thus
providentially been preserved from oblivion.
The person so commissioned rmay thoroughly comprehend his own words, or he may have the depth of meaning involved in his utterances concealed from him. He
may, like Luke, write only because'many having taken
in hand to set forth in order a declaration of things
surely believed,' it'seemed good,' to him to write also;
or, like Daniel, he may record words respecting which
he is obliged to say,' Iheard, but I understood not.'
He may, like Paul on one occasion, feel that he speaks'by permission,' and not by commandment; or, like the
same apostle at another time, he may claim to express
himself'not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth,
but which the Holy Ghost teacheth.' He may speak
with authority, and demand audience as a messenger of
God; or he may beseech and entreat, as a fellow-sufferer,
that his words may be received with a loving heart,
since love alone moves him to utter them. He may be
altogether unconscious that he is writing for all time,
foreseeing the wants of all generations, and supplying




54               LIBER LIBRORUM.
the Church with spiritual nourishment for two thousand
years; or he may have some slight and dim intimation
that this is the case.
Let these things, however, be as they may, it is indisputable that, if inspired in this high sense, the man is
gifted with all that is requisite to enable him to execute
the Divine commission faithfully; which he can of course
only do by receiving from Him who gave it such light
as may be needful to enlighten others-such supernctural qguidance as may be required to preserve him from
important error. So far as the apostles were concerned,
this sort of help seems to have been directly promised
to them by the Saviour, when, speaking of'the Comforter' that was to come, He says,' He shall guide you
into all truth. He shall bring all things to your remnembrance whatsoever I have spoken unto you.'
The way in which this may be accomplished is no
concern of ours. To what extent such men unite with
the Divine revealer; how far they themselves accurately
understand that which they communicate to others; or
how far they are merely passive instruments in the
hands of God, it is impossible for us to know, nor is it
of any moment that we should have an opinion on the
subject. What we want to ascertain is, not how apostles or prophets received that which they have recorded,
but whether that which they say is their own or God's?
whether it is merely a human judgment, or a Divine and
therefore authoritative message?
A BooK is inspired, just to the extent that it contains
knowledge which has been supernaturally communicated
for ends which. could not otherwise have been attained.
If, as inll the case of the Bible, the communication has




REVELATION AND INSPIRATION.             55
been made to men who lived ages ago, the book, or
rather those portions of it which embody the divine
revelation, is authoritative and unquestionable only to
the extent that the original text has been preserved and
faithfully translated.
If it can be shown that the series of tracts which constitute the Bible-written, as it is admitted they have
been, by men living at different and far distant periods
-have, each and all of them, from first to last been thus
produced and preserved, then, as Mr. Burgon asserts,''every chapter, every verse, every word, every syllable
of it' may be regarded as'the direct utterance of the
Most High,' but not otherwise.  Dr. Carson, reviewing
a volume on the evidences by the late Daniel Wilson,
Bishop of Calcutta, takes this ground and says,'It
requires as much inspiration to tell what o'clock it is by
inspiration, as to reveal the Gospel itself.' If all Scripture, he adds, is given by inspiration,' the reference to
Paul's cloak requires as much inspiration as those passages that declare the way of salvation.'
This, however, is mere folly, since Paul obviously
neither needed nor enjoyed any help from above, either
in expressing his wish that the parchments should be
sent, or in any other matter relating to his personal
wants or wishes.  We may be well assured'the Divine
Being does not resort to miracle without occasion or beyond occasion.'
All this may freely be allowed without at all shaking
1 Inspiration and Interpretation: seven Sermons before the University of Oxford. By the Rev. J. W. Burgon, M. A., Fellow of
Oriel College. So, in effect, Gaussen, Haldane, Dr. Candlish, and
others.




E56             LIBER LIBRORUM.
the foundation on which we rest the assertion, that the
Bible is inspired in a sense exceptional enough to remove it out of the rank of even the highest of merely
human compositions. For if its teachings be only the
words of men so purified and morally elevated that
their instructions are weightier, more Godlike, more
profitable than those of other men; if they who speak
or write have not received that which they tell us is from
God, as a message to be delivered, they have' not been
inspired at all, in the only sense which ought to be
attached to that word when we connect it with Holy
Scripture.
It has already been said that we have nothing whatever to do with the modce in which inspired men may be
supposed to have received the Divine gift. Perhaps we
have as little concern with the precise form in which
they embody the thought that has been given them;
whether it be in prose or poetry, in narrative or in
epistle, in parable or in lengthened discourse. All that
we want to be assured of is, that certain teaching may
reasonably be confided in as Divine, and therefore infallible-that it is, in short, pure truth, without error or
alloy. If this assurance cannot be had, it is but folly
to attach the importance to the Bible we do, or to seek
guidance of men who lived and died eighteen hundred
years ago, rather than in the highest spiritual intuitions
of our own souls.
The great question then arises, whether the Divine
authority claimed in the Bible for prophets and apostles
should be extended to all that is recorded in Scripture;
whether we ought to affirm of' the Book'that it is from
first to last, a(1t in all parts,'the Word of God;' or




REVELATION AND INSPIRATION.           57
whether we should be content with the assertion that it
contains and embodies that Word. If the former view
be correct, it is infallible throughout. If the latter, its
infallibility must be limited to certain portions. We
shall find the enquiry both interesting and important.
Let us not be afraid of it.
For the present, it is assuemed that inspiration, and
therefore infallibility, does not belong to the entire
book; and, further, that a principle may be found by
the application of which that which is inspired may be
distinguished from that which is not.
3*




CHAPTER  II.
THE EXTENT OF THE CLAIM.
WE have now to enquire what, in relation to its inspiration, the Bible says of itself. Does it, or does it
not, affirm that everything contained in the volume as
it stands is inspired, and therefore infallible?
The first passage that will probably suggest itself in
this connection to most persons, is found in St. Paul's
second epistle to Timothy (iii. 16, 17):'All Scripture
is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for
doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in
righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect,
throughly furnished unto all good works.'  So the
words stand in our authorized version, and the text, as
is well known, is often claimed as positively asserting
that everything contained, whether in the Old Testament or in the New, is inspired of God.
But does the writer affirm this? Clearly, not at all;
for at the time Paul wrote, no such book as the New
Testament was in existence. He could therefore only
refer to the Old. Further, the words of the apostle as
given in our version are not the words he used. Paul
does not say that call Scripture (whatever may be included under that designation) is given by inspiration
or' God-breathed,' but that all Divinely inspired Scripture-all Scripture, that is, from  God-is also profit



THE EXTENT OF THE CLAIM.                 59
able. (See Alford, Ellicott, Adam Clarke, and Pye
Smith.)
The apostle had, in the preceding verse, been telling
his' son Timothy' that the Holy Scriptures, with which
he had been acquainted from his childhood, were able
to make him wise unto salvation through faith in Christ,
and he now adds,'All Scripture given by inspiration of
God is profitable for the perfection of character.'  To
suppose that he here means to affirm that the catalogue
of the Dukes of Edom, given us in the first book of
Chronicles, are to be placed side by side with the prophecies of Isaiah or the utterances of the Psalms, that
both are' God-breathed' and alike given' that the man
of God may be perfect,' surely savours far more of superstition than of piety.
Nor is this all.  For the supposition that the apostle
intended to say that all Scripture (meaning thereby all
that was then embodied in the Septuagint,from which
he habitually quotes) was given by inspiration of God,
is to make him assert the inspiration of the Apocrypha,
for there is every reason to suppose that some at least
of the books now known as apocryphal were, even in
his day, included in the Old Testament Scriptures.' It
1 The books thus found in the Septuagint version were not,
indeed, in the Hebrew text, nor in the canon acknowledged by the
Jews of Palestine; but'they were recognised by the Hellenistic
Jews, and, therefore, by the men with whom Paul came more immediately into contact.' In Clement of Alexandria, in Origen and
Athanasius, we find citations from the books of the present Apocrypha as'Scripture,''Divine Scripture,' and'Prophecy.' Augustine admitted several apocryphal books. It was reserved for the
age of the Reformation to stamp the word'apocrypha' with its




60                  LIBER LIBRORUMI.
is generally supposed that these books obtained a place
in the Greek Scriptures about one hundred and thirty
years before Christ.' The only copies of the Scriptures
in existence for the first three hundred years after Christ,
either among the Jews or Christians of Greece, Italy,
or Africa, contained these books without any mark of
distinction that we know  of.  Origen, at great length,
vindicates these parts of the Greek version,, asserting
that they were true and genuine, and made use of in
Greek among all the churches of the Gentiles, and that
we should not attend to the fraudulent comments of the
Jews, but take that only for true, in the Holy Scriptures, which the seventy had translated, for that this
only was confirmed by apostolic authority."  The absence of any list of inspired books in the writings of the
apostle, and the fact that he commonly quotes from the
Greek Septuagint without remark, certainly faOur'S the
opinion that St. Paul did not intend to say that every
writing then regalded as Scripture was inspired.
Other statements made by Paul, by his brother apostles, and by Christ Himself, confirm us in the propriety
present signification. (Rev. E. H. Plumptre, in Smith's Dictionary,
art.'Apocrypha.')'The absolute infallibility of the sacred books throughout was set
up by Protestantism as a counterpoise to the infallible authority
asserted and claimed by the Romish Church. Protestantism sought
to recover, by means of the outwardly authoritative and entire infallibility of books, what it had lost by rejecting inspired councils and
popish infallibility.' (Tholuck, quoted in Davidson's Introduction,
p. 372.)
K1 itto's Bib. Cycl. by Dr. Alexander; art.'Apocrypha,' by Dr.
Wright.




THE EXTENT OF THE CLAIM.             61
of limiting infallibility to portions of the Bible. The
following may be quoted:' Prophecy came not in old
time by the will of man; but holy men of God spake as
they were moved by the Holy Ghost' (2 Peter i. 21).' God who in sundry times and divers manners spake in
time past unto the fathers by the prophets' (Heb. i. 1).
Paul speaks of the faith of the Ephesians as' built on
the foundation of the apostles and prophets' (Eph. ii. 20).
It may not, indeed, be argued from these passages that
inspiration is to be confined to the writings of the
prophets; but it is surely worth notice. that in Scripture prophecy is specially marked out as given by
inspiration. Attach to the word'prophecy' the meaning it always has in the Bible, viz., not that of prediction merely, but all Divine utterances, and it is found to
be only another phrase for'the oracles of' God' (Romans iii. 2); for the'lively oracles' (Acts vii. 38); for
the holy writings (ypa'parakt  d;'ae) (Romans i. 2); for the
sacred letters (Tr Pupa yrpa/,U/ara) (2 Tim. iii. 15); and for' every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God'
(Matt. iv. 4).
That Holy Scripture is not unfrequently limited by
Christ Himself seems clear. He sometimes speaks of it
as if it were confined to'Moses and the prophets'
(Luke xvi. 29-31)-that is, to the revealed law of God
whether given by Moses or by later inspired teachers.
After the resurrection, we find Him  expounding as
Divine' all things written in the lecw of.oses, and in
the prophets, and in the Psalms concerning Himnself'
(Luke xxiv. 44); but in no part of the Lord's teaching
can there be found a word to justify the assertion that
everything contained in the Old Testament from




62               LIBER LIBRORUIM.
Genesis to Malachi ought to be regarded as equally
authoritative and infallible.
It has, indeed, been maintained that in the words
just quoted Christ refers to the three great divisions
under which, it is supposed, the Old Testament writings
were then classed. But there is no evidence whatever
of this. To speak of the law'of Moses, of the prophets, and of the Psalms, as containing predictions
regarding Hirnself, is surely a very different thing from
asserting that the law, the prophecies, and the remainder of the books are integral sections of a completed
whole. As reasonable would it be to affirm that Paul
taught this triple division of a complete volume, when
he tells us that he persuaded the Jews' concerning Jesus,
both out of the law of Moses and out of the prophets.'
The triple division is indeed'very ancient; but it is
difficult to say what were included under each of these
heads. There was no fixed and unalterable arrangement of the sacred books as that which is commonly
assumed anterior to the fifth century of the Christian
era.'1  To rest a claim  for the inspiration of the
entire volume on such a basis as this, is weakness
indeed. Equally unwise is it to conclude, without any
good reason for so doing, that every book must be
inspired from which Christ or His apostles quoted,
especially when it is remembered that non-quotation
from any book of Scripture is never regarded as fatal
to its authority, and while other books referred to, like
that of' Enoch,' are now unknown. Such passages as'Thou hast magnified Thy word above all Thy name'
evidently do not refer to the Bible as a book.
1 Kitto's Bib. Cycl., art.'Canon,' by Dr. Alexander.




TIHE EXTENT OF THE CLAIMT.          63
Specific assertions of inspiration are indeed not unfrequently put forth; but none of these apply to the
whole volume. The following may be cited:1. There is a claim on behalf of the Divine character
of the Mosaic tabernacle services, in the' words,' T/Le
H~oly Ghost this signifying' (Heb. ix. 8). Also a very
distinct one on behalf of the direct communications made
to Moses by God:'Have ye not read that which was
spokene unto you by God' (Matt. xxii. 31 referring to
Exod. iii. 6).
2. For the inspiration of the prophets who spake
beforehand of Christ:' Searching what or what manner
of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify' (1 Pet. i. 11). And again:' Prophecy came not
in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God
spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost' (2 Pet.
i. 21). And again:'Those things which God before
had showed by the mouth of all His prophets' (Acts
iii. 18).
3. For David:' Which the o7loly Ghost by the mouth
of -David spake' (Acts i. 16; iv. 25). For Isaiah:
I Well scpake the Holy Ghost by Esaias the prophet'
(Acts xxviii. 25). For Jeremiah:'Whereof the fHoly
Ghost said' (Heb. x. 15).
4. Under given circumstances for the apostles generally:'It is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost'
(Mark xiii. 11.) Paul makes it for himself, when he
commends the Thessalonians for receiving his teaching
not as his, but'as it is in truth the Word of God'
(1 Thess. ii. 13). Elsewhere he says,'We speak not
in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which
the HEoly Ghost teacheth' (1 Cor. ii. 13). John, in t]be




64               LIBER LIBRORUM.
Apocalypse, distinctly affirms that what he reveals was'sent and signified' to him by Christ (Rev. i. 1).
It is not of course pretended that only those writers
are inspired for whom this special claim is made; but
it is surely singular that while inspiration is affirmed
generally of prophets and apostles, and specially of
some, it is nowhere claimed either generally or specially for historians, or for the entire volume of Scripture. Everything, indeed, indicates that the claim of
inspiration, and therefore of infallibility, is limited to
those portions of the Bible which are revelations from
heaven, or essential to their comprehension.
Under the head, then, of inspired Scripture may be
classed all that we are told of God beyond what may be
gathered from His Works.and Providential government
of the world; all the information we have as to our future
destiny; every prophetic intimation; every elevating
and purifying truth which man could not otherwise
reach. From it may be excluded without irreverence
the merely historical, however true and ueseful; genealogies however important in their place; poems or
proverbs however wise, which are but expressions of
human experience; references to physical phenomena
ordinarily expressed in colloquial language; and all
acts or utterances which are not in accordance with the
spirit and temper of the Lord Jesus.  There are such in
the Old Testament; and as these, however needful to a
true delineation of men and times, are not in themselves
intended for our imitation, and have no tendency'to
make the man of God perfect,' it is not presumptuous
to say that, whatever may be their value, they are but
records of human infirmity. Nor is it any answer to




THE EXTENT OF THE CLAIM.            65
reply that from all these portions, a devout mind can
gain instruction, for by such a mind'sermons' may be
found'in stones;' but this does not make the stones
inspired.
The distinction is not a novel one; it has been urged
by some of the ablest and best divines the Church has
produced.'
We have said that inspiration, whether verbal or
otherwise, implies the power of communicating the
message received from God without error or mistake;
it may also be understood to include the ability to narrate exactly as they happened all occurrences and conversations in which absolute accuracy was requisite, and
to select, without failure of judgment, such written
memorials as it seemed good to Divine Providence to
perpetuate for the use of the Church.  But it by no
means follows that two inspired men must therefore
necessarily narrate events in the same words, or precisely in the same order; nor does such aid either involve the Divine sanction of every act thus recorded,
or give a character of Divine truthfulness to every history and genealogy that may be inserted. Further,
where communications such as those embodied in the
Bible, have been recorded by men who lived ages ago,
we must have some evidence that the books containing
them have been carefully preserved. This we certainly
have.
The preservation of the Old Testament by the Jew
-considering what it contains —through thousands
of years, obviously implies a Providential care of it,'See Appendix, Note A.'Eminent Witnesses.'




66               LIBER LIBRORUM.
scarcely less Divine than that which originally attended
its formation.  Accuracy in translation being within
the reach of human industry, has, for that reason, been
left to be secured by the unaided energies of man.
And this leads us to the consideration of certain facts
relating to the Bible, which plainly come under our
cognizance, and which certainly make against the sup-position that everything in the book is Divinely inspired, and therefore infallible, since they show that
the Bible has not been preserved from the accidents
which are inseparable from the transmission of ancient
documents through the ages. On the contrary, it is
certain that while, as a whole, the book has been
remarkably cared for, it contains, in matters comparatively unimportant, not a few errors and some positive
contradictions. These can only be accounted for on one
of two suppositions: either that thle writers were not
in these particulars Divinely inspired and so preserved
from the possibility of error, or that the Book itself has,
at a later period, been exposed sometimes to wilful interpolation, and sometimes to clerkly inaccuracy.
We take no notice here of alleged contradictions
between prophecies and their fulfilment, or of apparent
discrepancies in doctrine; for these, whether real or
unreal-and we think them, for the most part, unrealwould lead us on to debateable ground.  We wish
simply to deal with facts which no one can dispute;
and therefore only bring forward inaccuracies that are
obvious at a glance. The following instances will suffice
to show what is meant.'In the twenty-second chapter of the second book of
Chronicles "forty-two years " ought to be twenty-two.




THE EXTENT OF THE CLAIM.             67
This is evident when the passage is compared with the
second book of Kings (viii. 26). Again, in the second
book of Samuel (viii. 4), David is said to have taken
from  Hadadezer "seven hundred horsemen."  In the
first of Chronicles (xviii. 4) the number is said to have
been " seven thousand horsemen."  In the book of
Numbers, "those that died in the plague" (on account
of Baal Peor) are said to have been "twenty and fbur
thousand,"-while in the first of Corinthians (x. 8) it is
said, in relation to the same event, there fell in one day
th]ree and twenty thousand.'
With regard to the numbering of the people mistakes
are numerous. E. g.: According to Samuel (2 Sam.
xxiv. 9), Joab's report to David after the census is'eight hundred thousand' fighting men of Israel, and'five hundred thousand' of Judah.  In the first of
Chronicles (xxi. 5) the same report is said to have been'eleven hundred thousand' of Israel, and'four hundred
and seventy thousand' of Judah. In the first of Kings
(xv. 5) we are told that David (as monarch) never
deviated from the right'save in the matter of TUriah the
Hittite,' yet we know that he sinned in numbering the
people, and was punished for it. Further, in relation to
this very punishment, it is said in the second of Samuel
(xxiv. 13) that the prophet Gad came to David and
said to him,'Shall seven years of famine come unto
thee in thy land?' while in the first of Chronicles (xxi.
11-12) we read,' Thus saith the Lord, Choose thee either
three years of famine.' To keep to the same event-in
the second of Samuel (xxiv. 24) David, we are told,
paid for the threshing floor over which the plague
stopped'fifty shekels of silver.' In the first of Chron



68                LIBER LIBRORUM.
icles (xxi. 25) the price paid is said to have been' six
hundred shekels of gold.'
That some of these apparent contradictions may be
explained by the mistakes of transcribers as to letters
used to express numeral powers, or by the accidental
addition or omission of a cipher, is probable enough;
but let that be as it may, it is as certain that they exist,
as it is that they relate only to matters of detail, and
have no bearing whatever on moral or religious truth.
To deny these discrepancies, or to explain them away in
an unsatisfactory manner, is only to confirm unbelievers
in their incredulity.  To shut one's eyes to them is
mere stupiDlty. It is to say in effect that if we refuse
to see a fact we shall not come into collision with it,
which is simply as untrue as it is absurd. As the Bishop
of London has well remarked:'When laborious ingenuity has exerted itself to collect a whole store of such
difficulties, supposing them to be real, what on earth
does it signify?  They may quietly float away without
our being able to solve them, if we bear in mind the
acknowledged fact that there is a human element in
the Bible.'
They are, however, certainly fatal to those who assert
that'not only is the Word of God in the Bible, but the
Bible is itself, in the strictest and fullest sense, in every
particular of its contents, and in every expression which
it uses, the infallible word of the one living and true
God.' Just as, in like manner, the voice of the rocks
must eventually cover with confusion all who are unwise
enough to say that'the Bible could not reveal spiritual
truth infallibly, unless it were infallible also in all that
it says about physical truth; in other words, that all its




THE EXTENT OF TIHE CLAIM.            69
references to physical truths must be true, God being,
if without offence it may be thus spoken, responsible
for them.' This ground is taken by Mir. Burgon, Dr.
Candlish, and others.
But the fact is, Scripture nowhere puts forward any
such claim. If it did it would be a thing of'the letter'
rather than of' the spirit,' and the least flaw in expression would be fatal to its pretensions. Again, if inspiration were in the letter, it is not easy to see how the book
could be translated without being destroyed: whereas,
as a fact, it passes into every tongue, and is, when faithfully rendered, quite as much the Word of God in one
language as in another.  Further, the apostles not unfrequently quote the sense of a passage rather than its
exact words; in this, as in other ways, leaving the imzpression that the infallible Word of God is to be found
only in that body of doctrine, whether prophetic or
preceptive, which they had received from above; connected, indeed, but not to be confounded, with the history of their nation, the character of their literature, or
the experience of their lives.
On the other hand, to concede the fact that the sacred
writers were only inspired to teach -Divine truth, and
that in other matters they are left to their natural faculties as honest witnesses, far from weakening the cause
of' Scripture, goes directly to deprive the objector of
his most dangerous weapon.'The spiritual element in
Scripture-that is, everything in it which concerns our
relation to God and to eternity though combined with
other elements, is plainly cistinguishable from  them,
and wholly independent of them; and since the evidence of Christianity attaches infallibility only to the




70                LIBER LIBRORUIM.
spiritual element, the discovery of errors in the Bible
does not touch Christianity at all."
That the structure of the. Bible, the marvellous unity
which subsists between all its parts-the reverberation,
so to speak, of one great truth through all its pages,
from Genesis to the Apocalypse-affords strong ground
for believing that- its production, as a whole, is, in a certain sense, the work of the Divine mind, providentially
guiding each writer, compiler, or editor, to one great
end, we are far from disputing; but this fact, while it
most clearly and distinctly separates the Book from all
mere human compositions, and while it should guard us
against the folly implied in asserting that this or that
is superfluous, by no means proves that everything it
contains is divinely inspired, and therefore infallibly
true, or that in all its parts it is'profitable for doctrine,
for reproof, for correction, or for instruction in righteousness.'  The treasure is in earthen vessels in more
senses than one, and this simply because it is on the
whole best that it should be so.
Yet it should not be forgotten that while, as a rule,
truth revealed by God to man is to be found in the spirit
rather than in the letter, for Divine thoughts are always'Spirit and Life,' the literal cannot always be dispensed
with. The prophecies which declare at once the greatness and the lowliness of Messiah were evidently
intended to be understood literally, so many of them
having been literally fulfilled. A prophecy, indeed, can
scarcely be said to be fulfilled at all which is not, to
some extent at least, fulfilled to the letter. If God did
not literally' bring a flood of waters upon the earth to
1 Byrne's Donnellan Lectures before the University of Dublin.




THE EXTENT OF THE CLAIM.            71
destroy all flesh wherein is the breath of life from under
heaven,' the announcement that He would do so is
untrustworthy. But if He did, it is comparatively of
little consequence how the event was brought about, or
whether the waters did or did not cover the whole
earth.
Why, then, should we be so anxious regarding the
literal accuracy, for instance, of everything in the Pentateuch? Why should we be troubled if we find it
impossible to reconcile the two accounts of the creation
given in the first and second chapters of Genesis, and
therefore come to the conclusion that it is needless to
enquire whether they record the same event, or whether,
as some suppose, the former relates to a race that passed
away long before Adam was born? Why should we be
at all careful to decide whether the' six days' spoken
of mean six of our days, or whether they represent
periods of long or short duration? whether the narrative of the Fall is to be understood literally, or whether
it in any degree involves allegory or other figure of
speech?  Why should we  be concerned to know
whether by the term' Sons of God' in the sixth chapter,
the pious descendants of Seth are meant, or whether,
as the late Dr. Maitland has maintained in his'Eruvin,'
other intelligences, with whom we have now no possibility of contact, are intended? Why should we even
stop to enquire within what limits the entrance of
animals into the Ark is to be confined, or yet whether
the Flood itself overflowed the whole globe, or only
those portions of it which were then inhabited?
These questions are not unimportant. They all have
their place in Biblical criticism, and they have all been




72                LIBER LIBRORUM.
treated, if not invariably with wisdom, certainly with
abundant learning. But, settle them as we may, the
value of the document out of which they spring is
undiminished.  So far as any man's trust in the Bible
is concerned, it matters very little whether this or that
portion of the narrative is to be understood literally or
figuratively. The one sole question in which he is
interested is this, Can the record be depended upon?
is it essentially truthful?
Literality is certainly not in itself essential to truthfulness. The parables of the Lord are quite as true as
any other parts of His teaching; and figures of speech
may sometimes express truth in all its fulness and completeness, better than any simple and literal statements
could do.  The book of Genesis was not written for
Englishmen only, nor yet for the men of the nineteenth
century alone. It has no exclusive message to the practical, the scientific, the learned. It is addressed to men
of all ages, of all temperaments, in all the various stages
of civilization and of culture, and the problem to be
solved in producing a written account of the origin of
the world was this: How can the information be best
communicated so as to be equally adapted to the condition and necessities of each and all? It may be that
this could be effected only by divergence from the literal,
by the occasional use of a form of speech more likely to
convey a true impressionz than any plain, prosaic, matter
of fact statement could possibly do. Be this, however, as
it may, the value of the Bible is by no means dependent
on these things; and one scarcely knows which most to
wonder at-the malice which rejoices to declare that
the authority of Scripture is overthrown if a discrepancy




TH E EXTENT Ok' THE C(LAIM.         73
can be discovered, or the folly of those Christians who
seem to stake Divine revelation itself on the verbal
accuracy of either text or translation.
We ask not, then, whether the'bow' in heaven first
became visible after the Flood, or whether, as previously
existing, it was only appropriated as the token of the
covenant made with the earth; whether literally men
thought to build a tower that should reach unto heaven,
or whether the' city and tower' spoken of ought not
to be regarded as a symbolic expression of the fact that
a great ungodly centralisation was now attempted;
whether the confusion of tongues, although in the first
instance judicial and special, was, as to its perpetuation,
anything more or different from that tendency-perpetually manifested where no common centre exists, and
where communication is infrequent-to vary and corrupt
a language until it becomes absolutely unintelligible to
those who once in common terms expressed their wants
and wishes.
None of these questions need we care to have answered, simply because, as we have before said, the
truthfulness of the narrative does not depend on its
literality.o Expound these matters as we may, the record
still stands, the only record that can be regarded as
furnishing even a plausible account of the world's history
prior to the calling of Abram. And this is equally true
in relation to the entire [Pentateuch. What does it
matter whether Moses was directly inspired to write
all that is found therein, or whether lie was divinely
commissioned to condense and to correct fragmnents of
earlier documents, and to give shape to the memory of
traditions otherwise sure to pass away? What does it
4




74               LIBER LIBRORUM.
matter whether these writings were or were not at a
later period re-edited with additions? Of one thing we
may be quite sure, viz. that Moses did not write the
account of his own death.
What if many of the numbers given in Exodus
should, as Bishop Colenso asserts, be inaccurate? What
is to be gained by assertions or denials relative to
matters which have for ever passed out of the reach of
our verification? What if, here and there, a law should
seem to us strange and unaccountable; an event difficult
to comprehend; a statement to involve an apparent
contradiction? What has all this to do with the essential
value of the Book? Absolutely nothing; unless thereby
its truthfulness can be set aside.
If, indeed, Moses never existed, being only a myth;
if no deluge ever took place; if the children of Israel
were not led out of Egypt by the special interference of
God; if the supernatural element can be altogether
discharged, either as fraudulent imposture or mere
delusion: why then certainly the sooner this strange
book is buried the better.' If,' as has been observed
by an able writer in Fraser's Magazine,'the rules of
criticism require us to set aside, as fabulous or legendary,
the miraculous events related in the Bible, then the only
witnesses from whom we learn anything regarding God
as revealed to man are so entirely discredited that we
cannot trust anything they say. The Apostles' Creed
ought in this case to be reduced to the words, "I believe
that Jesus Christ was crucified under Pontius Pilate."
The rest of the history would become the domain of the
historical imagination.'
We now proceed to enquire whether any principle




TITE EXTENT OF THE CLAIM.          75
can be found by the application of which the inspired
in Scripture can be separated from the uninspired; and
further, whether intelligent and ordinarily educated
Christians do or do not possess aniy faculty by the use
of which they can exercise the discrimination needed.




CHAPTER III.
THE VERIFYING FACULTY.
WE now  approach that portion of our task which
demands of us a prinxciple, by the help of which we
may, without weakening faith in Scripture as a whole,
separate its parts, and distinguish between that which
is Divine and that which is human.
Such a principle will assuredly not be sought for in
vain, if it is recollected that all inspired Scripture is congruous; not only in the sense of being in itself suitable
and pertinent to the purpose for which it was given, but
also as being in harmony with all that is revealed of the
character of God. Further-and for this statement we
have inspired authority-that the congruity thus existing is capable of being discerned by every spiritual man
who is faithful to the light bestowed upon him.
If this be granted-and it is difficult to see how the
admission can be refused-we have at once a test by
which everything assumed to be inspired of God may
be tried without presumption, and with little probability
of mistake.
Before attempting to apply any such test, however, it
may be necessary to show that God intended that His
children should thus discriminate; that He has given
them all that is needful for the accomplishment of the




THE VERIFYING FACULTY.            77
work; and, further, that with regard to Scripture, He
has made the fulfilment of this duty no unimportant
part of their moral probation.
If, therefore, it be said, as it probably will, that any
attempt to draw a distinction between different parts of
the Bible-to separate the inspired from the uninspired,
the Divine from the human-renders the Book as a whole
useless to simple Christians, inasmuch as they can perceive no such differences, it is enough to reply that this
is not the fact, since that which was true of the oral, is
equally true of the written revelation.
The exhortation of the Apostle John to his converts,'Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits
whether they be of God,' supposes an ability in every
spiritually enlightened man, whether hearer or reader,
to discern between that which is of God and that which
is not.' Ye have an unction from the Holy One,' says
the aged saint, and in the power of this unction,'ye
(the poorest of the flock) know all things.' I myself,
he says-and if he, other inspired men also —' have
not written unto you because ye know not the truth,
but because ye know it. The anointing which ye have
received of Him abideth in you, and ye need not that
any man teach you' (1 John ii. 20 and 27).
We call this' the verifying faculty,' and regard it as
being neither more nor less than reason enlightened and
sanctZfied by the fHoly Spirit. To vilify reason, as so
many good but ill-instructed Christians do, is a folly
which would be unpardonable, if it did not commonly
arise from sheer ignorance or weakness of mind. As
Butler truly says,' Reason is the only faculty we have
wherewith to judge concerning anything, even revela



78               LIBER LIBRORUIM.
tion itself.' Its duty in relation to Scripture is to judge,' not whether it contains things different from what we
should have expected from a wise, just, and good Being,
but whether it contains things plainly contradictory to
wisdom, justice, or goodness'-in other words, to what
elsewhere God teaches us of Himself.
Of course all this goes on the assumption that Divine
teaching is addressed to men who have at least some
moral sympathy with its utterances; that the words of
God are spiritual words; that the sheep know the voice
of the Good Shepherd. In a limited sense, much of this
is true of every book the tendency of which is elevating.
All moral teaching worthy of the name addresses itself
to the consciousness of those to whom it speaks. Only
as it comes in contact with a prepared mind; only as it
proves an interpreter of floating and half-formed thought,
or is the expression of feelings before but partially recognised or understood, does any book of this kind produce permanent impressions, or prove of much real
value.
But this is true of the Bible in an altogether preeminent degree; for this book, whether it reveals new
truth, or whether it explains a man to himself, is, like
the sun in heaven, seen in its own light. Not that all
truth is in this way made plain to all persons; but that
everything essential to the growth in goodness of the
man who reads, is, by a mysterious affinity, recognised
and laid hold of for the soul's salvation from evil. The
softened heart responds to words which awake no echo
in other breasts. It is always so. The words of Him
who spake'as never man spake,' only elicited scorn
from the great mass of those who heard them uttered.




THE VERIFYING FACULTY.              79
The seed and the soil must be adapted to each other,
or there can be no living product. The spiritual faculty
may be dormant, the' God-consciousness' all but dead,
being completely overridden by' self-consciousness,' yet
the possession of it is always recognised.
It is, indeed, not a little singular that the very Book'that has had greater influence upon the world than all
others,' differs from all others in affirming the darkness
of the natural man-that man is spiritually dead, and
in making that statement the basis of all that it contains
respecting the past and present and future of mankind.
Still more singular is it, that almost all men feel the
truth of the statement, and bow before its declaration
that this is not their true life. There is a sense, therefore, in which almost all thoughtful men feel the worth
of the Bible; some of those not least who have most felt
themselves compelled to oppose it. For what book has
sounded so the depths of experience, or scaled like it
the highest pinnacles of thought?  What man has not
learnt through it better to know himself?'
The Old Testament is professedly the history of'a
peculiar people.'  Its prophecies and its revelations
were all but confined to them. The discourses of
Jesus, without any exclusion of the many, were, for
the most part, addressed to the few. The Epistles
were all written to persons acknowledging the' Divine
authority of the writers. Why, then, should it be
thought strange to hold that the same utterances, which
were originally addressed only to those who were more
or less capable of estimating their value, should still be
in harmony with the spiritual intuitions of those only
1 Man and his Dwelling-place: an Essay.




-80               LBER LBRORUM.
who are prepared to receive them with docility?'Unto
him that hath shall be given.' The knowledge of God
is not imparted to men as if it were evidence addressed
to the senses, nor can it be conveyed by any merely
logical process similar to the demonstrations of science.
No "moral truth can be understood until it is appreciated, and to be appreciated it mutst be practised.
That there is a Divine teacher of man's spirit, and
that it is possible for a man's spirit to have converse
with that teacher, is a truth which would remain true if
the Bible and all its revelations were to be annihilated;
but the recognition of this truth would still be of no
practical use to any man who was unwilling to listen
and obey. It matters not whether we call the special
faculty by which man attains to a knowledge of the
Divine, a spiritual gift or a verifying power; the fact
is the same; without it all is dark alike in the Bible
and in the highest intuitions of the soul. Tenets may
be drawn from Scriptu'e by any man, but living truths
only by prepared hearts. It is the forgetfulness or the
denial of this fact which renders so much that has been
written on' the verifying faculty' in man unsatisfactory;
since, according to the moral state of each individual,
does the application of the phrase in question embody a
great truth, or involve a pernicious error.' The conditions which are required for arriving at
the knrowledge of Divine truth are surely stern conditions! It is a straight and narrow way which leadeth
to life! There must be a continual waiting for light;
a distrust of our own assumptions; a readiness to be
detected in error, certain that God's meaning is infinitely larger than ours, and that other men may




THE VERIFYING FACULTY.              81
perceive an aspect of it which we do not perceive; a
belief that He is fulfilling His promise that all shall be
taught of Him in ways which we cannot imagine; a
dread of shutting out any trurth by our impatient notion
that it must contradict some other; a determination to
maintain what little has been given us in the hope of
its expansion, and never to contradict, if we understand
ever so little, what may have been given to another; a
resolution to hold the ground on which we stand, without judging him if he cannot yet see what this ground
is. Hard is it to form these habits of mind... I cannot help perceiving that this mind, the mind of the little
child, the mind which our Lord demands of us, has been
exhibited by many scientific men who have been censured and scorned by the religious world of their day,
and has been sadly deficient in their accusers."
Without spiritual insight, nothing is discerned which
takes hold of the spirit or influences the character.'Until this is received, truth itself is but an opinion to
the man who comes in contact with it. It does not
vitalise because it is not itself vital. It is only a human
judgment, and, whether true or false, has little if any
moral power in it. It is dead, being alone. Not until
opinion is transfigured-not until it quickens into life
-does it become a truth, and grow, and -bring forth
frtit.
But another consequence follows. Looked at in this
way it is of no moment that either the uninstructed or
the instructed man should be able to say regarding each
separate passage of Scripture, this is inspired, that is
1 The Claims of the Bible and of Science. By the Rev. F. D.
Maurice.
4*




82               LIBER LIBRORUM.
not. How can he indeed? The revelation itself is not
a thing apart from  daily life, but thtrough its various
relations; how, then, can any man undertake to separate
in each particular the supernatural element from the
natural which it irradiates and explains? To regard
anything of the kind as necessary either to confidence or
to edification is absurd; as absurd, in fact, as it is to
maintain that'we require an exercise of judgment upon
the written document before we can allow men to trust
in their King and Saviour.' Everyone knows that this
is not the fact; that in all time the multitude never
have, nor ever can enter upon any such enquiries; that
the masses must either believe in Christ directly as an
actual person related to them, and recognised by them
in their inmost souls, or they will not believe at all.
They listen to the announcement that Christ is their
Redeemer, and they believe the good news just in so fcar
as it finds a response in their own spiritual necessities
and consciousness. Into evidence about documents they
cannot enter.
And why should they? The analytical chemist, when
called upon to do so, separates the constituent parts of
the very atmosphere he breathes; but for all the practical purposes of life he well knows that such a process is
altogether needless. Forgetful of his science, he rejoices
in the free air of heaven just as the peasant does, and
thanks God for its vitality. So is it with, Scripture.
The critic may doubt or may be satisfied as to the precise place which such or such a passage ought or ought
not to occupy in relation to other portions of Holy Writ,
and there are times and seasons when such considerations are both proper and profitable. But he can scarcely




THE VEIRIFYING FACULTY.             83
be regarded as a wise man who, coming to the Bible for
strength or consolation, for instruction in righteousness,
or for help in the perfecting of his character, does anything else than open his heart to its divine teachings,
and rejoice like a little child in the sunshine it can shed
around his path.
If error were in the Bible cunningly interspersed with
truth, the case would be different. But it is not so.
The Book, as a whole and as it stands, is wholesome and
useful; each portion of it has its proper place, and is
adequate to fulfil its appointed end. Everything has
its purpose to fulfil and its object to accomplish, whether,
properly speaking, inspired or not. Nothing may be
despised, nothing pronounced superfluous.  But everything in the Book does not take hold alike on the heart
and conscience. It may be very interesting, as indeed
it is, to trace on the map the various journeyings of St.
Paul, or, the wanderings of the Children of Israel in the
wilderness; to note a hundred undesigned coincidences;
to study, and try to reconcile two apparently conflicting
genealogies; to examine into and to discuss the chronology, the geography, or the natural history of Palestine;
all this and much more may be done —and it is fitting
that in its timne and place it should be done —yet it may
be accomplished without the slightest moral or spiritual
benefit arising to the man who is thus occupied.
Real benefit can, in such cases, only be derived from
connecting the information thus acquired with living
truth found elsewhere; by gathering from such research
indirect evidence in favor of the Book itself, or pleasing
illustrations to be used in its exposition. But this is a
very different state of mind fiom that which is produced




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by a devout study of Moses and the prophets; of the
Psalms; of Isaiah; of the Sermon on the Mount; of the
discourses and prayers of our Lord with His apostles;
of the scenes of the Crucifixion; of the early history of
the Church as given in the Acts or in the Epistles; or
of the wondrous visions of the Apocalypse.  Criticism,
to the uncritical mind, seems in such cases to be an
impertinence.  The heart opens to the impression such
passages produce, as the flower opens to the sun or the
earth drinks in the rain of heaven.
Facts, whether past or present, correspond to this
view of things.
We have already seen that the first Christians were
ander the very same obligation to distinguish the voice
of God from  the voice of man that we are; and since
they were enabled to do so only by an endclowment coimmon to Christians of all time, and known as' the witness
of the spirit,' they were practically in the same position
as ourselves.  Even the most orthodox divines are constrained to admit that the Scriptures can only be received
on certain conditions, viz., that we are' satisfied that the
books themselves contain-nothing obviously incompatible with the ascription to their authors of the Divine
assistance, but on the contrary are in all respects favourable to the supposition.  We want to see,' says Dr.
Alexander,'that they are in harmony with each other;
that the statements they contain are credible; that the
doctrines they teach are not foolish, immoral, or selfcontradictory; that their authors really assumed to be
under the Divine direction in what they wrote, and
afforded competent proofs of this to those around them."
Kitto's Bib. Cycl., art.' Canon.'




THE VERIFYING FACULTY.              85
But all this clearly supposes the exercise of a verifying
faculty.
The facts of the present day, as they come under our
own observation, are all confirmatory. It is'the wise'
only who'understand.' The peasant is, in this respect,
often far before the philosopher. Everything depends
on the moral condition of the recipient. Who ever
knew a man under the dominant influence of pride able
either to comprehend or to estimate the moral dignity
of humility?  When was a supremely selfish man alive
to the duty of self-sacrifice?  Where do we find men
full of ignorance and conceit-to say nothing of spiritual
things-able to judtge the value of a great work of art,
or to pronounce on the inerits of some marvellous production. of science or of statesmanship?
But here a paradox appears. It is this. The light of
which we speak-the quickening and elevating power
in the strength of which we are to recognize the Divine
-is never attained except by spiritual culture effected
through the instrumentality of the revelation itself.
The Book to be recognized and obeyed must itself have
more or less educated the consciousness which is to
accept it. The word is'the sword of the Spirit,' and
the same Lord who says,' He that is of the truth heareth
My voice,' says also,'I am the Truth.' It follows, therefore, that before any man c an judge of truth, he must
receive'the truth,' believe in it, and be, more or less,
educated by it.
Yet, after all, this is not more paradoxical than the
kindred fact that before a man can judge as to the
merits of a great artist, he must, to some extent, be
educated by the artist; or, to take a wider illustration,




86               LIBER LIBRORUM.
that a man must himself become civilised before he can
perceive how great a blessing civilisation is.
That this way of looking at the matter makes the
evidence for the truth of the Bible mainly subjective
cannot be disputed; but nothing else in the present day
appears to have much hold on men. It may indeed
seriously be doubted whether it is now possible to bring
forward any evidence, in favour of miracles for instance,
which could reasonably be expected to satisfy an unconcerned spectator, and still less an opponent.
In the days of our Lord and His apostles, the miracle
was evidence that the teacher was from God. Now, the
doctrine must give probability to the miracle. The
mere fact that'wonders were wrought' by the apostles,
could this be demonstrated, would of itself avail little
to convince any man of the truth of what they taught.
Nor perhaps ought it to be otherwise. It is only when
coupled with other considerations, such as the character
of the Christian miracles, their simplicity, benevolence,
and unselfish ends, that the force of the argument
founded on them comes to be felt. Well and wisely has
it been remarked that'the entire series of miracles recorded by the Evangelists, consummated as they were
by the miracle of Christ's resurrection, occupy a place
of perpetual efficacy in relation separately to each of the
great purposes for which the Lord of Lile came amongst
us, viz. as Saviour of the world, as Redeemer of His
people, and as Conqueror in the world of spirits."  In
each of these particulars the miracles attest His mission,
and are in all respects congruous with His'teaching.
The observcation of these characteristics is the result of
Restoration of Belief, p. 265.




THE VERIFYING FACULTY.               87
the application of' the verifying faculty' to the miracles
of the New Testament generally.
Of all the miracles, however, the resurrection of Christ,
involving as it does our own rising again, is the one on
the fact of which most turns; for resurrection does not
signify existence elsewhere undcer different conditions-it
is the renewal of the old.  It is the reconstitution of
humanity, accompanied in each individual by a sense of
identity: with the remembrance of a past, as well as
the consciousness of a future. Everything in Christianity hangs on the resurrection of Christ.'It knows
Christ only as risen: the only reason of its own existence that it recognises is the resurrection. The only
claim the apostles set forth for preaching it is, that their
Master who was crucified was alive once more.' No
supposed delusion can account for this belief that Christ
rose fiom the dead.  If that which is asserted in Scripture regarding it be not true, the whole is a rank imposture.  Either there was a crucified and risen Christ
long before any part of the New Testament was written,
or the book that asserts this to have been the case is a
fraud.  The New Testament emphatically is based on
Christ, not Christ on it.
It may indeed be said that, in relation to miracle,
there is no room for the exercise of a verifying faculty,
since miracles are simply impossible, the laws of nature
being incapable of violation. If it be so, the laws of
nature are more powerful than their Creator, which is
simply absurd.
One thing, however, is quite certain-the admission
of the supernatural is essential to the acceptance of any
Divine revelation whatever; for revelation, if anything




88                LIBER LIBRORUM.
at all, is itself a miracle. Christianity being what it is,
and its announcements what they profess to be,'miracles
are necessary to the justification of such announcements,
which indeed, unless they are supernatural truths, are
the wildest delusions.' A man's faith in the Bible may
not indeed consciously rest on miracles, but it cannot be
a genuine faith unless he admits their reality, since, if
not true, the assertion of them discredits everything else
that the book contains.
Yet why should so much be said about miracles being violations of law? It is by no means so clear that
a miracle is a violation of law.' We ourselves,' says arecent writer,'formerly had no belief in miracles, because we saw no evidence of supernatural powers working in the natural world; but when asked if we had
ever seriously looked for any evidence of this kind, we
were obliged to confess we had not; and were astonished to find that, on seeking with a will, there was
abundant evidence in the history of humanity..... The
action of supernatural forces upon mind and matter is
necessarily as simple and as much in harmony with
general laws as the action of natural forces upon mind
and matter; the only difference being that the actors
in one case are inhabitants of this natural world, while,
in other cases, they are inhabitants of the supernatural
world.'Those who refuse to look for evidence of supernatural forces and phenomena, delude themselves and
their followers by a false play of words.  They very
properly refuse to credit stories about' arbitrary interferences with eternal laws of nature;" and then most
improperly presume not only to know which are and




THE VERIFYING FACULTY.               89
which are not eternal laws of nature, but also to affirm
that all miraculous and supernatural phenomena must
necessarily be "arbitrary interferences with  eternal
laws."'If a man kills a bird, or causes a tree to wither and
die by the aid of natural forces, it is not deemed an
arbitrary interference; but if Christ causes a barren fig
tree to wither and die by the aid of supernatural forces,
it is an arbitrary interference with eternal laws. If a
man is struck dead by lightning it is not an arbitrary
interference; but if Ananias fall dead at the feet of the
Apostle Peter it is an arbitrary interference and therefore incredible.  Such modes of reasoning engender
pestilent fallacies. It is well known that superior forces
can displace inferior forces without any arbitrary interference with immutable laws; and therefore the real
question to be examined is, the existence of supernatural
forces and phenomena, whether in accordance with
known or unknown laws."'
Yet even here discrimination, is needed.  If the
tendency of some minds is to universal scepticism in
relation to the supernatural, that of others is to the
credulous acceptance of almost everything professing
to be of this character. Hence the necessity for a verifying faculty in man, which, apart altogether from
ordinary investigation, should judge that which professes to be spiritual by a spiritual standard.'False
prophets,' says our Lord to His disciples' shall arise,
and shall show great signs and wonders; insomuch that,
if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect'
(Matt. xxiv. 24). St. John in the Apocalypse, too,
1 Philosophy of Religion. By Hugh Doherty, M. D.




90               LIBER LIBRORUM.
however obscurely, speaks of a time when'spirits of
devils' (demons) will go forth' working  miracles'
(Rev. xvi. 14). Again, he describes an apostate who
should'deceive them that dwell on the earth by the
means of those miracles which he had power to do'
(Rev. xiii. 14). The security against such deceivers is
not to be found in scepticism-for sceptics are often
singularly credulous, and commonly more or less superstitious-but in that verifying faculty which is by John
identified with the'anointing' Christians receive from
Him who abideth in them.
That, as a rule, mankind should be only too ready
to believe in the supernatural is not surprising.  The
great silence of God when oppression and wrong are
rampant in the earth, is often'a severe trial to the faith
even of the best. Hence the singular proneness of most
persons to judge hastily, and to interpret rashly both
providences and predictions. The human mind cannot
be bounded by time; it ever longs to pierce the invisible. Here, too, therefore, is to be found abundant
scope for the exercise of that spiritual insight which is
the true verifying faculty, as much when it restrains as
when it enlightens.




CHAPTER IV.
MANY AUTHORS, BUT ONE BOOK.
WE propose now to revert to a peculiarity of the
Bible which was incidentally referred to in a preceding
chapter, but not dwelt upon as it deserves to be, viz.,
the marvellous unity which subsists between its different parts.
Scripture, as we all know, is a collection of tracts,
the work of above thirty authors, who utter what they
have to say, not contemporaneously, but in succession,
and along a vast line of time, say 1,600 years. Yet, in
spite of this, we all feel it to be ONE BOOK. We do
so because, explain it as we may, we see, as Mr. De
Quincy says, that'all the writers combine to one end,
and lock, like parts of a great machine, into one system.'
On this peculiarity the argument has been foundedand it is a weighty one-that inasmuch as concert in
the writers was impossible, the unity in question places
the Bible in a position altogether distinct from that of
any other book; and seems at least to justify the assumption that its preparation under Divine direction is,
in some sense or other, and in a very high sense too, a
great fact.
We turn to the Book, then, in order to discover
whether that which has been asserted regarding its
unity amid diversity is true, or only a fancy.




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The first sentence that meets the eye consists of ten
pregnant words:' In the beginning God created the
heavens and the earth;' words that involve an utter
denial of the Pagan doctrine of the eternity of matter,
and an equally positive denial of the Pantheistic theory
that God is but the soul of the universe. For they
affirm most positively: first, that in some far distant
period-how distant we know not-the world in which
we live had a beginning; and next, that He who created
it is altogether distinct from it, a personal God, endowed
with Almighty power and infinite wisdom.  On this
assertion all subsequent revelation clearly proceeds.
The successive stages of that wondrous process, by
which order sprang out of chaos, light out of darkness,
and sea and land, sun and moon, grass and herb, beast
and fowl, and finally man and woman, came into existence, is next brought under notice. Then follows the
story of the'Garden and the Fall; the expulsion from
Eden; the birth of Cain; the murder of Abel; the
longevity and rapid increase of mankind; the equally
rapid growth of wickedness; and, after abundant warning, the final destruction of a sinful race'in waters from
which Noah and his family are alone preserved.
Other records of the world's earliest history have we
none. The question is therefore an important one, Can
this be depended upon? The momentous point is, not
whether everything recorded is to be taken in its most
literal acceptation, for this, we have already seen, is not
essential to trustworthiness; but whether the narrative
can be depended upon in that higher sense which implies the truest impression that, under the circumstances,
could be produced on mankind as a whole. This is




MANY AUTHORS) BUT ONE BOOK.             93
essential. If a writer intentionally leaves a false impression, his work is fraudulent and worthless. Further,
if a narrative be in spirit untrue, nothing stable can be
built upon it; for what is any erection worth that rests
only on a quicksand? But —and to this attention should
be specially directed-the narrative before us is either a
foundation or it is nothing. All that follows evidently
rests upon it. Its essential accuracy is taken for granted
by every subsequent writer, and if the truthfulness of it
be even doubtful, the entire volume of revelation is
doubtful too.
Let us take, then, first, the seven brief chapters of
whose contents we have been speaking, and examine
them narrowly. In doing this it is scarcely possible to
fail in perceiving two leading elements: an historic element mingling with a didactic one; and a supernatural
element involving both miraculous occurrences and predictions relating to the future.
The first elenment (the historic) embraces the actual
narrative regarded as true, and equally true, whether
any portion of it be veiled in allegory or not, whether
it be a literal narrative, or only'an inspired psalm  of
creation.' The didactic associated with it, is involved in
passages such as those which deny the eternity of matter;
affirm the personality of the Creator; imply a day of
rest; or exhibit the probationary character of human
existence, as it appears in the test to which our first
parents were subjected, and in the great lesson involved
therein, that he who had just been created in the image
of God, and invested with power over every living thing,
must, before he could govern well, learn implicitly to
obey; in the relation established between man and




94               LIBER LIBRORUM.
woman; in the representation given us of the tempter,
viz., as an. animal only, endowed indeed with high intellect, but without a ruling conscience, without any
sense of duty, or anything corresponding to unselfish
affection; in the trial of obedience being found, not in
one great act of self-sacrifice, but in daily and hourly
resistance to temptation regarding an apparent trifle,
and this without being able to perceive the reason or the
usefulness of the self-denial demanded; in the retribution
which follows sin; in the conmmtnication of an evil
nature to descendants; in the institution of sacrifices,
bloody or unbloody; and in the final sweeping away of
the wicked from the earth they had filled with violence.
These are the great lessons which, embodied in the history, form what may be called the didactic element.
The second (the supernatural) is seen in the original
act of creation, in the temptation by a speaking serpent,
and in the desolations of the flood.
Now, as we advance, we shall have to notice how
these conrbined elements go to make up all that we
regard as sacred writings, whether directly inspired or
only providentially preserved; how they run through
each separate portion of the books, and how each of
these elements in particular connects itself with that
which has gone before. It will soon be obvious that
the value or worthlessness of all that is uttered depends
entirely on the truthfulness, or otherwise, of the basis
on which it rests.
We pass on, therefore, to the consideration of the
new world as it emerges from the waters. God remembers Noah; the windows of heaven are closed; the
waters subside; the Ark rests on Ararat, and its inmates




MANY AUTHORS) BUT ONE BOOK.           95
come forth. In process of time Ham is cursed and Shem
and Japheth blessed. Again mankind multiply; a great
empire springs into existence; language is confounded,
and nations, differing in speech, plant themselves in all
parts of the earth.
The elements already noticed reappear. The historic
runs through the whole, whether certain portions be
regarded as literal or figurative. The didactic mingling
therewith appears in the recognition of seven days as a
division of time; in the renewal of sacrifice; in the forbidding to eat anything while living; in the declaration
that whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his
blood be shed; in the command to be fruitful and multiply, sanctifying marriage; and in the drunkenness of
Noah, inculcating moderation and circumspection in the
use even of Divine gifts, The supernatural is seen in
the safety of the Ark and its inhabitants, and in the
preservation and distribution of the animals. The predictive, as a branch of the supernatural, appears in the
curse on Canaan, and in the blessing on his brethren.
Here, then, we have the second course of stones, so to
speak, needful to the formation of that great mystical
temple of truth, which is now rising from the ground;
and nothing can be more obvious than that this second
course rests upon, and dovetails into, the first.
The calling of Abram, that of him might be made a
great nation; the story of his wanderings; the history
of Isaac and Jacob; and the settlement in Egypt, bring
us to the close of the book of Genesis. Need it be said
that this gives us, in the form of history, the only account of patriarchal times that the world possesses?
And how wonderfully vivid and natural it is! What




96                 LIBER LIBRORUM.
light it throws on the early movements of mankind;
upon the birth of empires; upon the moral state of a
race living chiefly on traditions!  What pictures of a
nomadic life, not so very different from  that of the
modern Arab of the desert! ZWhat an insight into the
Egypt of antiquity! What a photograph of the world
as it was four thousand years ago!
In the didactic portion let us observe the character
and elevation of the teaching.  First, the danger as
well as sin of deceit and falsehood is exemplified in
Abram's duplicity both towards Pharaoh and the king
of Gerar; in Isaac's conduct under similar circumstances; in Jacob's dealings with Esau; and in Rebekah's treachery towards her husband. Let us observe,
too, how the sin in each case involves a cowardly distrust of God, and an attempt to justify the evil on the
ground that good would come of it, as if the Divine
purposes could either be forwarded or thwarted by
human firaud and deceit.
Next we may observe how the duty of unselfishness,
of yielding rather than striving evenl for a right, is
exemplified by Abraham  in his dealings with Lot, and
by Isaac with tihe herdmen of Gerar.  Then we have
the folly of worldliness exhibited in Lot's selection of a
dwelling-place, without regard to its moral atmosphere,
while the power of faith and the beauty of self-sacrifice
is seen in the offering of Isaac.l The spirit of a dignified' The offering' —i. e. the giving him up cheerfully to God either
for life or death. The word' offering' (olah), it has been suggested,
does not necessarily imply a'burnt offering,' as our translators
have it. And it is certainly worth notice that no command is given
to Abraham to slay his son, or to take with him wood, or fire, or




MANY AUTHORS, BUT ONE BOOK.                  97
liberality is manifested by Abraham in the purchase of
the field of Ephron the Hittite; his disinterestedness in
his conduct after the victory over the kings; and his
prudent forethought in the marriage of Isaac. The
odiousness of oppression comes out in the history of
Laban's transactions with Jacob; of cruelty in the conknife. Abraham, doubtless, inferred that God intended him to kill
his child, and he was ready for the sacrifice,'accounting that God
was able to raise him up even from the dead, from whence also he
received him in a figure.' But this does not prove that the inference was a right one. It certainly seems incredible that God should,
under any circumstances, or for any purpose, command Abraham to
imitate the heathen, and bid him do an act which He Himself subsequently pronounced an abomination (Deut. xii. 31). That the
patriarch was not permitted to carry out his intentions is only what
might have been expected; while the spirit of faith, obedience, and
self-sacrifice, which was involved in his willingness to resign Isaac,
was not the less approved and rewarded.
Another suggestion has been thrown out by Dean Stanley, viz.,
the possibility that the impression Abraham received that God
wished him to slay his son, although permitted and overruled, came
from Satan rather than from the Lord; that Satan's design was to
show, as in the case of Job, that there Was a limit beyond which
Abraham's faith and obedience would not go-the' result proving
the sincerity and the power of the godly man's faith., for the exercise
of which he was blessed of God more emphatically than ever. This
theory is supposed to find support from the fact that in the second
book of Samuel (xxiv. 1) the Lord is said to have moved David to
say,' Go, number Israel and Judah,' while the same act is in the first
book of Chronicles (xxi. 1) attributed to Satan:'And Satan stood
up against Israel, and provoked David to number Israel.' It is
every way uncandid and unworthy of a Christian man to assume
that either of these suppositions has originated in a sinful- unwillingness to receive Bible statements as they stand. Rather are they
occasioned by a holy fear of attributing to God a command to do anything which He Himself has pronounced evil.
5




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duct of Simeon and Levi toward the Shechemites.
The nobility of forgiveness is shown by Esau when he
meets his brother; the power of prayer in the intercession of Abram for Sodom, and in the mystic wrestle of
Jacob with the angel; and, finally, the retributive justice of God in the sorrows of Jacob, and in the distress
of Joseph's brethren when brought before his face in
Egypt. To say that this teaching is elevated is to say
little. To suppose that it is the work of any fraudulent
person, imposing upon the world a pretended revelation,
is simply extravagant and absurd.
The predictive element enlarges as we proceed. In
the covenant with Abraham; in the promise made to
him and to his descendants; in the various renewals of
the covenant; in the dying blessings of Isaac and Jacob;
in the childish dreams of Joseph about himself and his
brethren; and in his later prophecies regarding the
butler and the baker, and respecting the seven years'
famine, we see the same claim to the power of foreseeing
future events put forward, which we observed in the
earlier portion. The supernatural, in all its forms,
rather increases than diminishes.  The plaguing of
Pharaoh's house on account of Sarah; the appearance
and conversation of the angels at the door of Abram's
tent; the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah; the
smoking furnace and the burning lamp; the birth of
Isaac; the vision of Abimelech; the voice to Hagar;
Jacob's dream at -Haran; his vision of God's host; and,
above all, the marvellous separation of this one family
from all other peoples, are events which, if in any sense
true, are certainly supernatural.
Observe, too, how all these events grow naturally out




MANY AUTHORS, BUT ONE BOOK.          99
of those that had preceded them.  The tendency to
corruption after the deluge had been shown at Babel  it
had, as the nations multiplied, spread far and wide; it
was needful that this tendency should be corrected, for
there was a modified idolatry even in a family like
Lriban's, and atrocious wickedness had been manifested
in Sodom and Gomorrah.  The world was morally
sinking, yet it had not altogether sunk, for both Pharaoh
and Abimelech fear God; Melchisedek is a patriarchal
priest, before whom Abraham bows; and Joseph though
a prince of Egypt, recognises and serves the God of his
fathers.  The very wickedness that is committed by
the various members or connections of the chosen
family: the incest of Lot; the treacherous murder of
the Shechemites in revenge for the violence of the son
of Iamor; the sin of Reuben; the selling of Joseph by
his brethren; their falsehood to their father; the disobedience of Er and Onan; the wickedness of Judah,
and the folly of Tamar, all testify to a state of society
precisely such as might be anticipated on the supposition
that the world was exactly what it is stated to be. As
Cain and Abel were but types of classes of their descendants, so Shem and Ham continually repeat themselves in the best and in the worst of their race.  The
third course of stones, then, fits exactly to the second,
and must stand or fall with its predecessors.
We hasten on to the exodus of the chosen people; to
their wanderings through the desert; to the establishment of the ceremonial law; and to their settlement in
Canaan under the leadership of Joshua. This brings
us to the end of the Pentateuch. Is this also, we ask,
dependent upon the preceding? Assuredly it is. All




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the events narrated spring out of that which has gone
before, and cannot by any stretch of ingenuity be explained without it.
The same elements again appear. The historic,
whether the narrative in all its details is always accurate or not. The didactic, in the addition to the gre*t
moral principles laid down in formeroportions, of a code
of laws adapted to the particular necessities of a peculiar people. The predictive, in the song of blessing by
Moses, and in the utterances of Balaam. In a certain
sense, indeed, the entire ceremonial law, its sacrifices,
its washings, its symbolic worship, all involve a predictive element; for they all seem to point to something
better than themselves, which in due time should be
manifested on the earth. The supernatural is indeed
everywhere. The plagues of Egypt; the passage of
the Red Sea; the fall of the manna; the flight of
quails; the water gushing from the rock; the giving
of the law at Mount Sinai; the deaths of Dathan and
Abiram, and of Nadab and Abihu; the pillar of cloud
by day and of fire by night; the leprosy of Miriam;
the fiery serpents; the cure of the people; and the
burial of Moses by the Lord Himself: all these things
come before us, in a form which obliges us either to
regard them as supernatural events, or, for there is no
medium, as pure fictions-falsehoods imposed for truth
on the credulity of mankind; and if so, they are fatal
to the character of the entire book in which they are
found.
We have seen, then, that the Pentateuch, however
composed, is unquestionably a unity; that whether it is
to be invariably regarded as a literal record of events




MANY AUTHORS, BUT ONE BOOK.           101
or not, it is essentially historic; that its morality is of
the highest; its general truthfulness self-evident; its,
simplicity and beauty unrivalled; and, further, that it
everywhere -involves the supernatural. But there is
nothing that can make against the supposition that side,by side with certain distinct and positive Divine revelations, are found documents providentially selected and
edited, but not inspired. The predictive element, if
accepted at all, obliges us to admit the supernatural
process.which we call inspiration, and, in so doing, the
supernatural element generally. The narrative, on the
other hand, however historically true, need not for
many reasons be regarded as in all respects infallible.
Jewish history, notwithstanding its being found in the
Bible, is but history after all, and must be judged by a
very different standard from  that which belongs to
directly inspired communications.  We accept it, rather
in consequence of the connection in which it stands,
and the general character of the book in which it is
embodied, than on account of any direct proof we can
by possibility have of its entire accuracy.
But this is of little moment, so long as we feel confident that it is truthful, and can regard it, in that character, as a stable foundation for what follows. Short of
an absolute denial of the supernatural in all its forms,
which is simply to deny or to limit God, to refuse Him
the character of a free agent, and to cut Him off altogether from direct communication with the creatures
He has made, it is impossible to find any good or reasonable groufid for denying the general credibility of
the Pentateuch. But so long as we retain belief in a
God at all-that is to say, in a personal God, having a




102              LIBER LIBRORUM.
character, and therefore capable of being known and
loved-the possibility at least of the supernatural must
be admitted. On the other hand,'If Christianity be
true historically, its miracles included, and if indeed
" Christ rose from the dead according to the Scriptures,"
then the writings which bring such facts as these to our
knowledge will take a place of authority in our mind
and conscience which, practically, and as to their influence in determining our faith and our conduct, must be
very nearly the same, whatever may be the theory or the
opinion we adopt among the many that have been
advanced concerning inspiration.'"
That the later historic portions of the Bible are based
upon the Pentateuch, that they presuppose the authority
of the books of Moses, will probably not be disputed.
Joshua at Shechem recapitulates the leading events
therein related as the well-known national history of
the people he is addressing. Others in after times take
the same course. Not a hint of the possible untrust-worthiness of these traditions or documents is to be
found anywhere.  On the contrary, they are always
regarded as sacred, and they are preserved for the most
part with a veneration which sometimes degenerates
into superstition.
Equally obvious is it that the same characteristics
which belong to the earlier documents distinguish those
that follow. The message, whatever it may be, is
always identical in tone and spirit with that of the five
books. The voice of the one is the voice of the other.
The historic, the didactic, the predictive and the miraculous all in turn reappear, and as a rule under the same
1 The Restoration of Belief, p. 238.




MBAY AUTHORS, BUT ONE BOOK.       103
conditions. Nothing can be plainer than that, whether
true or false, the later documents are but the natural
and necessary outgrowth of those which have preceded
them.




CHAPTER V.
JEWISH HISTORY AND PROPHECY.
JEWISH history, although the history of a peculiarly
governed people, and therefore of times in which God
more obviously interfered with human affairs than He
now does, is, as has been already observed, but history
after all; and there is not a hint in Scripture which
should lead us to imagine that it was composed under
any other conditions than those which belong to the
historian everywhere, who seeks and finds providential
guidance in his work.
We. have a right, indeed, to suppose that the men
who, under a theocracy,' were officially called to write
or to edit the transactions of the nation, were truthful
men, honourable and honoured  by their countlrymen,
and endowed with high talent if not with special gifts'Under a theocracy.'-This phrase is often supposed to imply
more than it really does. The theocratic form of government under
which the Jews long lived by no means involved either a continual
mniraculous interference on their behalf, or preservation from any of
the errors to which mankind are liable. Rather was it such a presencc among them as admitted the possibility-whenever they were in
a right state of mind-of the will of God being ascertained on any
given question. When they neglected or ceased to care for Divine
direction it was obviously withheld. Scripture affords abundant
proof that even before the monarchy the people were often left to
their own devices.




JEWISH HISTORY AND PROPHECY.         105
from above. We know that some of them  were so.
Samuel, Nathan, Gad, Isaiah, and Jeremiah, although
sometimes historians, were also prophets, men richly
endowed with high moral and spiritual qualifications.
Of Iddo, Ahijah, and Shemaiah; of the men who wrote,
or compiled, or condensed from more extended records,
the books of the Kings and Chronicles, we know less.
But of this we are assured, that, whether accomplished
by Ezra or by any other hand, the grand outline we
have of the history of the ancient people is a com2pilation
from documents long since lost; drawn up doubtless
for religious ends and under the guidance of a wise
Providence, but never pretending to the character of a
Divine revelation. It is surely but wilfulness or folly
to give to these records, invaluable as they are, a
character which they themselves do not claim, or to say
of them, what has never been said of any other history,
that every particular must be infallibly true, or the entire document is false and worthless.
That some of these books embody Divine revelations
is clehr enough, if we accept as truthful the frequently
recurring declaration,'Thus saith the Lord,' or'TheLord said unto me,' phrases which, when connected
with direct communications from above, must certainly
be understood to imply that the speaker claims Divine
authority for what he is saying, and this not the less
because similar expressions are at other times not unfrequently used in a lower sense, viz. as indicating that the
writer or speaker believes himself to be uttering that
which is in accordance with the Divine will. Instances
of such use may be found in the address of Joshua
(xxiv. 2) where he is plainly recapitulating history, and
5*




106              LIBER LIBRORUM.
again in the speech of Jotham (Judg. ix. 6-8). David
also in speaking of Shimei exclaims,' The Lord hath
said unto him, Curse David' (2 Sam. xvi. 10), evidently
meaning the Lord permitted him thus to act. Some of
the books, indeed, such as those of Esther and of Ruth,
contain nothing which could not have been written
without special assistance by any competent person
acquainted with the facts; yet these books are essential
to the completeness of Scripture, and as such are greatly
to be prized. To insist that they are inspired adds
nothing to their value. It is but to maintain, what
every page of Holy Scripture contradicts, that God
works miraculously when ordinary agencies areevery
way adequate to the accomplishment of the end sought.
There is not, within the whole conmpass of Scripture,
a word to show that Jewish history is inspired in the
only sense in which that word ought to be used, viz. in
the sense of the writers having what they wrote supernaturally revealed to them, and their being, as a consequence, infallible. The marvellous fidelity with which
the faults and the crimes of the greatest and best'of the
kings are recorded, however humbling to the individual
whose life is described, or to Israel as a nation, certainly
indicates in the writers a subjection to truth and to God
perhaps nowhere else to be met with; but this is no evidence of Divine inspiration, inasmuch as that which
they were called upon to record was not the result of
any special Divine communication, but related to matters
within human cognizance, and therefore attainable by
care and industry.
We have said that' Jewish history, notwithstanding
its being found in the Bible, is but history after all"
Chap. iv. p. 101; and also chap. v. p. 104.




JEWISH HISTORY AND PROPHECY.         107
and, so far as the facts themselves are concerned, this is
true. It must not, however, be forgotten that the annals
in question differ from all others in a particular which
frequently involves the presence of an inspired element.
They not only narrate facts —they reveal motives; they
sometimes assert that such or such a transaction took
place for reasons which could only be known to the
Searcher of Hearts; they profess at other times to tell
us authoritatively how such transactions were viewed by
God, and what relation they had to the secret history,
the sins or the follies of the actors.
In ordinary history these things are concealed. The
motives which have led a man to any given course of
conduct may, indeed, often be surmised, but they cannot
be known. The light in which a particular action is
viewed by the Divine Being may frequently be inferred
from what we know of His character; but inasmuch as
acquaintance with many circumstances connected with
its performance are almost always out of our reach, the
inference may be a wrong one. To God alone it belongs
to weigh spirits and to discern the thoughts and intents
of the heart. With Him, therefore, exclusively rests the
ability to form just judgments, or at least to be assured
that they are so.
In Jewish history no room is left for doubt of this
kind. There the most secret thoughts of a man are,
not always indeed, but oftentimes, unveiled; the most
plausible pretences are laid bare, and the most positive
decisions are given as to the moral quality of the transaction recorded. In such cases we are left in no uncertainty as to the view God takes of an action, or as to
the judgment He pronounces upon it.




108              LIBER LIBRORUJM.
All this, of course, implies that however human or
fallible the narrative itself may be, inspiration is more
or less diffused throughout every part of sacred history
which is intended to show forth the living God moving
and actingq for definite ends among the children of men.
But this is not all. These annals teach us much that
otherwise we could not know. They reveal to us the
great truth that not in Judea only, but in all the world,
God is ever present; that whether we discern His HIand
or not, His power, His wisdom, and His love are perpetually manifested in the lives both of nations and individuals; that a great Divine purpose runs through the
ages; that the Controller of all human affairs, however
apparently silent, is never absent from the world He
has created, never regardless of what is going on upon
its surface.
Without this light we should not have been able to
discern the Divine working in many cases where it is
now quite obvious to us; we should frequently have
failed to arrive at either wise or safe conclusions regarding many things that are now made plain; we should
perhaps have doubted altogether whether the Lord was
indeed ruling among the nations.
It is this diffused element in the Bible that gives to
the Book the importance it possesses. It is this breathing of the Divine-a peculiarity shared by none otherthat justifies the Regal demand it makes on the submission of men to its decisions. Nothing is more certain
than that if we study the Old Testament aright we shall
find —as Mr. Maurice well says in his dedication to Mr.
Erskine of a series of admirable sermons on the Prophets
and Kings, which he published about fifteen years ago




JEWISH HISTORY AND PROPHECY.          109
-that therein is to be read'an interpretation of some
of the greatest difficulties in history, and in the condition of the world around us.'
We must not omit to observe that there appears
throughout the history a spirit of prophecy which by no
mneans involves Divine inspiration, and which is quite
distinct from that power of predicting future events
which belonged to so many of the Hebrew seers. Deborah, Hannah, Saul, nay, whole schools of prophets, from
time to time appear upon the scene; some,'like the
wife of Lapidoth, who, in her song over Sisera, strangely
intermingling human passion with Divine thanksgiving,
expresses the popular feeling without much regard to
the propriety or impropriety of the sentiments uttered;
some, like the youthful warrior who chants his ode on
the dead Saul, apparently blind to the errors of the
departed king, and attributes to his hero qualities partaking far more of poetic license than of literal truthfulness;' some, like Hannah, rising out of rejoicings over
personal mercies into noble strains wherewith to reccunt
the goodness of Him,' who keepeth the feet of His saints,
breaketh in pieces His adversaries, and exalteth the horn
of his anointed;' others, like the crowd who gathered
about Ahab at Samaria and bade him go up to Ramoth
Gilead, are spoken of as filled with a lying spirit, prophesying for mere gain,'a crust of breadc;' sewing'pillows under the arm-holes' of the people, and deluding
them to their ruin. Here at least any inspiration from
above is out of the question.
Not so with other portions. As we advance we come
in contact with ruling men who, like Elijah, Elisha, and
other less known seers, are obviously the commissioned




110              LIBER LIRORUM.
servants of the Most High, bidden to speak before kings
and peoples in words not their own, but God's, and
called for the most part to seal their testimony with
their blood. By these the faults both of the people and
their rulers-their idolatries, their cruelties, their superstitions-are unsparingly exposed, and the calamities
that retributively followed their sins are always recognised as Divine judgments, and fulfilments of Mosaic
predictions such as those with which the book of Deuteronomy closes.
The constant theme of these men is,' To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith
the Lord. Wash you, make you clean; put away the
evil of your doings from before Mine eyes; cease to do
evil; learn to do well' (Isa. i. 11-17). Whenever ceremonial rites are put in the place of truth and duty they
refuse to be silent. Kings, priests, and people by turns
receive rebuke at their hands, in everything the true
prophet showing himself to be the messenger of God.' Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the
bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to
let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every
yoke?' (Isa. lviii. 5, 6.)
Further, there runs through the prophecies of these
men a long series of predictions, which can by no
alchemy whatever be interpreted otherwise than as
relating to a distant future and to a coming King under
whom the world should be happy. Nor is it easy to
sever this great monarch from'the seed of the woman'
that was to bruise the head of the serpent; from that
descendant of Abraham in whom' all the nations of the
earth' were to be blessed; or from the prophet whom




JEWISH HISTORY AND PROPHECY.         111
the Lord said unto Moses He would' raise up of his
brethren' like unto Him.
It is this, and the good time connected therewith,
which imparts so peculiar a tone and color to all Hebrew
prophecy.  It is this, as Dean Stanley truly says, that'gives to the Bible at large that hopeful, victorious,
triumphant character which distinguishes it from the
morose, querulous, narrow, and desponding spirit of so
much false religion ancient and modern. "To one far
off Divine event the whole creation moves."' That
event-the restoration and happiness of the race under
Messiah-is the ever-recurring theme of the Jewish
prophets.  With a striking prediction of the glorious
time when this'Sun of Righteousness shall rise with
healing in His wings' the last of the seers closes at
once his own message and the Old Testament.
Need it be said that such predictions if not' Godbreathed' are worse than useless. Professing to be, in
the highest sense, Divine, they are either truly so, or
else mere outbursts of frantic and fraudulent enthusiasm.
If the ftrmer, the very words are the words of holy men,
speaking'as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.' If
the latter, language has no terms strong enough wherewith to denounce such wicked and mischievous impostors.
These prophecies may occasionally be very obscure
or very coarse; they may at one time descend to a
familiarity that startles us, and at another rise to a sublimity that is actually overpowering; it may often be
exceedingly difficult to separate the voice which refers
to its own day, from that which points to a far distant
future: but whether clear or dark, whether familiar or
sublime, whether referring to the near or to the distant,




112              LIBER LIBRORUM.
they  stand  alone; as compositions unmatched; in
beauty without a rival; in purity unapproachable; at
once terrible and tender; often mystic and mournful,
yet ever redolent of joy and triumph.
The Psalms occupy a position of their own. The
Psalter is, as Tholuck says, the book from which'Piety,
whether Jewish or Christian, if genuine, has derived
more nourishment than from any other source. In the
greater portion of reformed churches they serve as
spiritual songs; the Catholic priest daily prays them in
his breviary; and, bound with many editions of the
New Testament, they form the book of devotion of
Protestants.  When our Lord instituted the Holy Supper, He sang psalms with His apostles. He testified to
His disciples that the traits of His fate were delineated
in the Psalms.  He referred His opponents to a prophetic psalm as inspired by the Holy Ghost. The extent
to which His humiliation and exaltation were, mirrorlike, beheld by Him in the Psalms- may be illustrated by
the fact that, even on the Cross, when expressing the
desertion of His soul, IHe used not His own words, but
adopted the language of His typical ancestor."
In this, as in other poetic books, all historic references
accord with previously recognised documents.   The
doctrine or ethics of the Psalms is in exact accordance
with that which had preceded them. Herder says,' There is no attribute, no perfection of God left unexpressed in the simplest and most powerful manner in
the Psalms and the Prophets.' Throughout indeed the
Old Testament the typical or prefigurative continually
appears,'every pious man who suffered for God's cause
1 Tholuck, Introd. to Comm. on the Psalms.




JEWISH HISTORY AND PROPHECY.            113
under the ancient economy, but triumphed at last, being
regarded as a type of what should be fulfilled in Christ;
just as the entire sacrificial institutions as well as other
phenomena have a like reference.'
But does it follow, if this typical character be admitted, that every book in which it is found must be
from first to last inspired of God? We cannot see why
this should be assumed. That the Bible, in consequence
of the-peculiarity of its structure; its mysterious unity;
the perpetual murmur of the Infinite which is ever issuing from its pages; in its revelations and in its reticence; in what it says and in what it withholds, is
singularly unlike any other book, cannot be disputed.
That the Divine breath animates it as a whole; that the
Divine mind has controlled its formation, just as the
same Divine mind controls and regulates all our affairs;
that just as each separate human life, while perfectly
free, is yet continually directed by an unseen hand (a
thread of the supernatural running through it), so this
written embodiment of the life of Humanity growing
through the ages, is moulded by One who has made it
what it is, is certain. But how this fact should be supposed to carry with it the infallibility of every utterance
in the sense of perfect accuracy as to dates and numbers, and absolute approval of every action recorded
which is.not distinctly disclaimed, it is assuredly difficult to see.
Paley justly observes,' This is to make Christianity
answerable with its life for the circumstantial truth of
each separate passage, the genuineness of every book,
and for the information, fidelity, and judgment of every
writer in it.'




CHAPTER VI.
THE NEW  TESTAMENT.
THAT the New Testament opens upon us as a development of the Old can scarcely be denied by any honest
man. When John the Baptist appears, his message is,'Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand.' But no
one asks the question,'What kingdom?' because they
fully understood him to be speaking of that which had
so long formed the theme of prophetic anticipations.
Their views regarding this kingdom might be, as they
certainly were, in many respects very defective; for they
looked forward to it apart altogether from any moral or
spiritual change, and supposed that it would be'of the
earth and earthy.' Nevertheless, it was this gospel of
the kingdom, purified indeed from carnality, and connected with the resurrection, that the Apostles were
directed to preach, first to the Jew, and then to the
Gentile; themselves ever living by faith in the happy
expectation of the Redeemer's return, to'build again
the tabernacle of David, and to set it up, that the residue
(the rest or remainder) of men might seek after the
Lord' (Acts xv. 16-17).
Everywhere in the New Testament, directly or indirectly, the authority of the great lawgiver is recog



THE NEW  TESTAMENT.                 115
nised. Rites and institutes, circumcision1 and the sabbath, the passover and the feast of Tabernacles, all
commemorate events which, if they never occurred,
could not, by any possibility, have become national
memorials.   The legislation  of the land is in great
measure that of the wilderness; to honour Moses is to
every Jew living in apostolic days the first of duties;
to be a child of Abraham the highest of privileges. All
this of course supposes that, at that time, the Pentateuch
was regarded as historic, in the sense of being trustworthy.
Christ Himself distinctly declares that He came not
to  destroy the law  and the prophets, but to fulfil
them.  He always refers to the Old Testament, and
especially to the Pentateuch, as the recognised history
of the people.' Have you never read,' He asks, on one
occasion,'what God said to Moses at the bush?' On
another,' What did Moses command you?' On a third,'If ye believed Moses ye would believe on Me?'  The
Flood, the destruction of Sodom  and Gomorrah, the
falling of the manna, the giving of the law, the elevation of the brazen serpent, are each and all referred to
in the New Testament as well-known facts; and Noah,
Lot, Jonah, David, Job, Balak, Balaam, and others, are
mentioned as historical personages.''irceumcision.'-This, although peculiarly, was not exclusively
a Jewjsh rite. It has been found to prevail extensively both in
ancient and modern times. It is all but universal among Mfohammedans. It belonged to the Jew as to no other people, by its having
been appointed or adopted as a sign of the covenant God made with
Abraham. It was practised in Egypt, but not during the forty
years' sojourn in the wilderness (Josh. v. 5). —Smith's Dictionary.




116             LSEER LrBRORUM.
Stephen, in his defence, recapitulates-although, as we
have it, apparently not with perfect accuracy —Jewish
history. Paul, before Agrippa, insists that he was only
teaching the approach of what Moses and the prophets
had said should come. In his address to the Jews he
reminds them how God called them out of Egypt. In
his epistles he refers to the lowly origin of the nationto' the hole of the pit' out of which it was digged. He
reminds them how'the serpent beguiled Eve; how
Abraham met Melchisedek; how the law was given to
Moses; how they were baptised unto Moses in the cloud
and in the sea; how they lusted in the wilderness; how
they drank of the rock that was smitten; how, from
Abel downwards, the just had lived by faith. Peter, in
like manner, refers to the Deluge, to the conduct of Lot,
and to that of Balaam. John speaks of Cain and Abel.
James of Abraham. Jude of Sodom and Gomorrah;
while the imagery of the Apocalypse, when narrowly
examined, is found to be a curiously wrought piece of
Mosaic made up from the older prophets.
The same facts and doctrines everywhere reverberate.
The elements which combine in the New Testament are
precisely the same as those which characterise the Old.
The historic, mingling with the didactic, runs through
the Gospels, the Acts, and the Epistles. The predictive
is seen in the message of the angel to ~Mary; in the song
of Elizabeth; in the teachings of the Baptist; in the
sayings of the Lord, and in that wondrous prophecy
which concludes the book. The supernatural appears
in miracles without end, wrought, not only by Christ
and His apostles, but also by their more immediate
converts.




THE] NEW TESTAMENT.             117
Nor is the morality of the New Testament, as has
frequently been asserted, different from that of the Old.
The ancient commandment is but developed and spiritualised by the Lord Jesus. Nothing is superseded
but that which had been ordained or modified in order
to meet for a time the peculiar condition of a half
civilised people.  These ordinances, whether relatino
to slavery or divorce, to polygamy or concubinage, to
judicial retaliation, or to an exclusive nationality, being
temporary in character, and borne with for a time in
order to avoid greater evils, were to pale and pass away
before the higher light brought in by the Redeemer of
the world. But it is monstrous to speak, as some do,
of the God of Moses as being different or inferior to the
God of Isaiah, or of both suffering eclipse before the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
God is ONE, and —His character is One; but man varies
with circumstances; and according to those circumstances God deals with him; giving truth, like everything else, only as men are able to bear it, and adapting
His enactments to conditions under which higher forms
of law would be impracticable, and the attempt to
enforce them would only lead to greater mischiefs than
legislation could rectify.  In this sense the Mosaic
dispensation is a different dispensation from that of
Christ, its rules, promises, and system being different,
though the Author and the End of both dispensations
is the same.
Other elements, equally characteristic, might be
traced running through the whole volume, were it needful
to point them out. One in particular may be noticed,
viz., the greater favour shown to some above others. We




118              LIBER LIBRORIM.
are accustomed to call these preferences instances of
Divine sovereignty, simply because they exhibit to us
God acting in a way we do not quite understand, and
zoithout giving us anty 1reason for what He does. The
acceptance of Isaac and the rejection (though not
without a blessing) of Ishmael; the choice of Jacob
over Esau even before birth-though Esau has His
blessing too; the selection of Joseph to be ruler over
Egypt and the saviour of his family; of Judah, to be
eventually the governing tribe; the elevation of Saul;
the subsequent choice of David: these, and many other
instances, clearly indicate a great purpose running
through the ages, in which men are but the instruments
of higher power.
In the New Testament, this exercise of Divine sovereignty rises into a doctrine-that of election-and is
expounded as such, first by Christ and afterwards by
the great apostles of the Gentiles. Need it be observed
that, as a great fact of life, explain it as we may, the
giving to one, and withholding from another meets us at
every turn, whether we recognise the hand of God in it
or not.
Many other unities might be noticed. If in the Old
Testament as a fact Cain's offering is rejected because
he is hating his brother, in the New the doctrine is laid
down, man must first be reconciled unto his brother,
and then come and offer his gift. If in the Old Testament Abraham fights bravely for Lot, while Isaac
yields his rights rather than contend for them, the counterpart appears in the teaching of the later dispensation,
that while the man of God is not to strive, but to overcome evil by good, the soldier may remain in his calling,




THE NEW TESTAMENT.             119
and the magistrate is not to bear the sword in vain.
Under each dispensation the Jacobs with all their sins
and weaknesses are regarded as more godly than the
Esaus with their rude and manly virtues. The standard
is the same under both covenants; in each, however,
differing very widely from that which any uninspired
man would have laid down. W7hy a life of faith should
be accepted as covering so many faults —explicable
enough to the spiritual man-is an enigma which the
world never could, and, on its own principles, never can
explain.
Further, of all in the Bible that, properly speaking,
constitutes the Word of God, that is, the written Word,
whether found in the Old Testament or in the New,
Christ the incarnate Word is at once the centre and the
substance. In Him it is all embodied. Around Him
all that is written radiates. Some, indeed, have asserted
that, in a certain sense, He typifies the written Word;
that the human element in Scripture is to the Book
what human nature was to the Divine Logos; that in
the Word written, as in the Word made flesh, the human
and the Divine meet without any interference with
infallibility. But this can only be affirmed of those
portions of the Bible which really constitute Divine
revelation. In these, as in other parts, although in a very
different sense, there is a human element, but it is one
which in no way interferes with infallibility. In Jewish
history, however true or important it may be, nothing
is to be found corresponding to that union of the Divine
and human which was manifested in Christ.
But some will say, This is too general: come to particulars, and tell us plainly whether or no you regard




120              LIBER LIBRORUM.
the Gospels as inspired. If so, is it in whole or in part?
Further, state distinctly in what light you regard the
Acts, the Epistles, and the Apocalypse.
We see no reason to object to such a question, nor do
we imagine that, on the principles already laid down, a
straightforward reply is to be shunned. Everything in
the Gospels that properly constitutes a revelation is unquestionably inspired. The discourses of the Lord must
be regarded as in substance accurately reported, however words may vary, if we believe that, in accordance
with His promise, He supernaturally brought all things
that He had said to remembrance, so far as it was needful or desirable that His exact words should be recorded.  As a rule, however, it suffices for all practical
purposes, that the substance or rather the real purport
of what was spoken should stand for what was actually
said.
The facts, or what are stated to be such, are to be
received, like all similar statements, on the authority of.
witnesses, on'whose veracity, disinterestedness, and
good sense, not a shadow of doubt can rest. Surely,
then, we may approach the evangelical narratives with
at least as much respect as we show to ordinary writers.
Surely we are bound to peruse them with at least as
much candour as we are accustomed to exercise when
dealing with the productions of any honourable man,
whether living, or long since dead. *Yet how few sceptics are prepared to do this.
The miracles recorded, if not true narrations of what
actually took place, serve only to convidt the reporters
of being either credulous or fraudulent men, in which
case not a word they have written is worthy of a mo



THE NEW TESTAMENT.               121
ment's attention from any sensible person. To believe
this, however, in the face of statements so calm, unexcited, and well balanced as are those of the Gospels; to
associate either weakness or falsehood with men who
suffered and died in defence of truth as truth; who lived
above all the conventionalities of their day; who had
everything to gain by yielding to popular prejudices and
to authority in Church and State; who actually lost
everything, even life itself, by disregarding the wishes
and commands of the rulers: to believe that these men
were after all mere charlatans' certainly requires an
amount of credulity greater than has yet been manifested even by the most zealous upholder of lying
legends.
The genealogies inserted by Matthew and Luke,
copied in all probability from the public records, may,
for aught we can tell, be now quite incapable of reconciliation. Matthew, when quoting from the Old Testament, may only mean by the phrase'.then was fulfilled'
that then again became applicable the words of the
prophet.  What are sometimes termed'obscure and
incomprehensible prophecies' in the New Testament
may be mere allusions to passages in the prophetical
writings which, by accommodation, illustrate the events
narrated.'The writings of the Jewish prophets,' it
has been truly observed by Mr. Hartwell Horne,'were
the classics of the later Jews, and in subsequent ages
all their writers affected allusions to them.' Interpolations, although of small importance, may here or there
have crept into the text, and occasional discrepancies
I See some observations in the last chapter —' Postscript'-on objections to this dilemma.
6




122              LIBER LIBRORUM.
can unquestionably be pointed out. But all these things
become of little or no consequence, if, recognising the
existence of a human element, we keep in mind the
great purpose for which the Gospels were written.'These things are written that we may believe that
Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing
we might have life through His name.' He who knows
that this was the end for which the Gospels were given
may well feel assured that the means were adequate;
that the Giver would not suffer any error to find place
in them which could interfere with the attainment of
the end for which they were bestowed.'
The developments of doctrine put forth after Pentecost, by Paul and others, whether in the Acts or the
Epistles, their advices, commands, and exhortations,
rest on the same foundation, and may be subjected to
the same conditions as other portions of the New Testament. So far as they reveal they are inspired. So far
as they are inspired they are infallible. Here, too, however, the human element appears, as when Paul appends
to a letter, evidently written under Divine inspiration,
directions as to sending his cloak and parchments; or,
when he associates with authoritative advices regarding
Church matters, the counsel to Timothy,'Drink no
longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach's
sake and thine often infirmities.' And not in these
instances only. There is much in the Epistles of Paul
that is obviously personal, such as expressions of regard
for individuals, sometimes inserted on account of the
writer and sometimes on behalf of others, which can in
1 For further observations on the Gospels, see chap. vii.'The
Canon.'




THE NEW TESTAMENT.             123
no reasonable sense be regarded as inspired. It is quite
otherwise, however, with his authoritative teaching.
Here he stands before us as the faithful exponent of the
Divine Spirit. The fact that a distinction is, in one
instance at least, drawn by Paul himself between speaking by commandment and giving counsel, marks the
conscientious integrity of the man, and stamps some
other portions not thus separated with an authority
which would not, under different circumstances, be so
clear.
Nor should the progressive character of the teaching
of the New Testament-harmonising as it does in this
particular too with the Old-be unnoticed. Like its
predecessor, it advances step by step as a communication from God. Christ, who is its Alpha and Omega,
not only claims to have received from the Father all
He taught, He distinctly states that what- He had thus
received He communicated to His apostles.'I have
given unto them the words which Thou gavest unto
Me.'
No statement can be more explicit or more authorita
tive; for it at one and the same time extends and limits
the Divine communication.
It extends it to what the apostles should teach after
their Lord's departure; and in so doing it assures us that
we may rely not only on what He taught them while in
the flesh, but on what He communicated to them after
He was risen and glorified. It is an endorsement, so to
speak, of that which was ultimately expanded and developed by them in their epistles to the Churches; it is
aqz authentication of that mysterious prediction which
concludes the whole.




124              LIBER LIBBORUM.
It limits Divine teaching to the men who received
what they taught directly from the Lord. It does more;
it limits them, to the expansion of that teaching. Hence
the substance of all they taught is involved in the words
of Christ.' All the great doctrinal features of the Epistles are found in germ in separate sayings of Christ. All
the main outlines of the Apocalypse are given us in
parables and sayings which trace the future history of
His kingdom.'
The New Testament thus becomes, like the Old, from
first to last a progressive unity. But with this difference.' There progress is interrupted, often languid, and sometimes so dubious as to seem like retrogression. RHere it
is rapid and unbroken. From the manger of Bethleheln
on earth, to the city of God coming down from heaven,
the great scheme of things unrolls before us without a
check, without a break.'
The Apocalypse, however obscure at present, or however much it may have been abused, is either Divinely
inspired in the very highest sense, or, as an eminent
sceptic has said, it is'the most worthless book that was
ever placed between covers.' But'Wisdom is justified
of her children.''I cannot doubt,' says the present
Archbishop of Dublin,'that a day will come when all
the significance of the Apocalypse will be apparent,
which hitherto it can scarcely be said to have been.
When the great drama is hastening, with even briefer
pauses, to its catastrophe; then, in one unlooked for
way or another, the veil will be lifted from this wondrous Book, and it will be found strength in the fires,
giving songs in the night, songs of joy and deliverance.'
This prophecy, regarded as a prediction of what will




THE NEW TESTAMENT.               125
surely one day come to pass, is, like the rest, bound up
with what has gone before.' The former Scriptures had
revealed the Lord Jesus Christ as the Saviour not only
of individual souls, but also of the "body," the Church.
The Apocalypse deals with this Church as a whole, and
presents it as a society, in which man is perfected, and
a kingdom, in which God is glorified. The sense of
sharing in a corporate existence, and in a history and
destinies larger than those which belong to us as individuals, tends to throw the mind fbrward upon a course
of things to come, through which this various history is
to run and these glorious destinies to be reached. When
present things in a measure disappoint us, we turn more
eagerly to the brighter future. Who does not feel in
reading the Epistles that some such sense of present
disappointment grows upon him, and that such dark
shadows are gathering on the scene, that a close like
that of the Apocalypse seems to have been demanded?''This book,' it has been well said,'teaches the doctrine
of a blessed consummation; of its cause, in the death of
Christ; of its history and of its nature; of the coming
and power of Him whom every eye shall see; of His
victory; of the judgment of evil; and of the great and
final restoration of all things. Here all the hopes of
humanity find at last their realisation-a perfect humanity-perfect, not only individually, but perfect in society.
It is the revelation of that which history leads us to
despair of; it is the restoration not only of the personal
but of the social life; it is the creation not only of the
man of God, but of the city of God. Here the revealed
course of redemption culminates, and the history of man
is closed; and here, in these last chapters of the Bible,




126               LIBER LIBRORUTI.
the unity of the whole Book is declared by the completion of the design'which has been developed in its pages,
and by the disclosure of the result to which all preceding
steps have tended."
While, however, the recognition of a human element
even in the New Testament must be allowed, and may
be so without compromising in any degree either the
authority of Scripture or the reverence due to it as our
guide through life, it is far otherwise with many modern
speculations relating thereto. If, as we have been told,
the Jewish element in the New Testament, that link
which connects it with the past, and without which it
would be isolated and unmeaning, is a delusion; if we
pretend, as some have done, that our Lord, when speaking of His'kingdom,' was but manifesting the effect of
Jewish culture, and was, so far, destitute of spiritual
understanding; if we deny the supernatural, and affirm
that the miracles were not real; if we are absurd enough
to imagine that the writers of the Gospels teach false.
hood'in all purity of intention;' that they narrate as
fact mere vague and floating traditions; that they only
tell us things'as they conceived of them;' that the
words of the Bible, notwithstanding their falsity, may
be regarded as true words, inasmuch as they express' the conceptions of the times, and the measure of knowledge or of faith to which every one of the writers had
in his degree attained:' then we had far better abandon
the Book at once; for if this be its character, it matters
little how soon it may fall into the neglect and contempt
it so richly deserves.
1 Bernard's Bampton Lectures on the Progress of Doctrine in the
New Testament. 1864.




THIE NEW TESTAMENT.           127
Having thus-however rapidly and imperfectlytraced the unity which, amid diversity, distinguishes
the various tracts of which the Bible is composed, let
us now briefly notice the process by which these treatises were finally brought together and regarded as one
book.




CHAPTER VII.
THE CANON.
THE question of the Canon-or what is'the schedule,
so to speak, which contains the books of Scripture'-is
a very different one from that of the inspiration of the
Bible.'The object of the Canon,' says Dr. Chalmers,' is simply to ascertain what are the actual books which
should be received into this collection of sacred writings.
We may allow a book to be canonical, and yet maintain
opinions of all sorts and varieties in regard to its inspiration.' It is important to keep this distinction in view.
The history of the formation of the canon of Scripture
is, without doubt, embarrassed by many difficulties.
That of the Old Testament we accept from the Jews.
When or how it was formed is doubtful. Popular opinion assigned to Ezra and the great synagogue the task
of collecting and promulgating the Scriptures, as part
of their work in organising the Jewish Church. Doubts,
however, have been thrown upon this belief   The
authority is merely traditional, and a tradition which
also regards Ezra as having'rewritten the whole of the
Old Testament from memory, the copies of which had
perished by neglect.' Still it is but reasonable to suppose that the people on their return from exile would
greatly desire an authoritative collection of their sacred
books, and that such should then be formed is the more




THE CANON.                  129
likely from the fact that the assistance of prophets could
at this time be obtained, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi being cotemporary with Ezra and Nehemiah.''The history of the canon of the New Testament presents a remarkable analogy to that of the Old. The
beginnings of both are obscure from the circumstances
under which they arose. Both grew silently under the
guidance of an inward instinct, rather than by the force
of external authority; both were connected with other
religious literature by a series of books which claimed a
partial and questionable authority; both gained definiteness in times of persecution.'2 In neither case is there
any reason whatever to believe that the work was accomplished under special Divine impulse or guidance.
But neither the value nor the trustworthiness of the
documents is lessened by the absence of inspired authority in their collection.
Each book must be judged by what it contains. Most
emphatically is this true of the Old Testament. As alike
canonical, the book of Judges and the prophecies of
Isaiah stand side by side, but it by no means thence
follows that the contents of each are equally divine.
The former we accept simply on the authority of Jewish
tradition, for of its composition we know nothing. The
book evidently embraces an historical period of about
350 ytars, and therefore, if not given by immediate
revelation from heaven, which there is not the least reason to suppose, it must have been compiled either from
written documents or oral tradition, or from both. In
See Kitto's Cyc., art.' Ezra.'
2 Art.'Canon,' in Dr. Smith's Dict. of the Bible, by the Rev. B. F.
Westcott.
6*




130              LIBEIR LIBRORtM.
any case the possibility at least of legendary exaggeration in some of the narratives must be admitted; unless
indeed we asszume (for doing which we have no authority whatever) that God absolutely prevented any such
admixture as inconsistent with the end for which the
book was written, viz., to show that the Israelites
brought upon themselves the calamities under which
they suffered by their apostasy and idolatry. The latter
(the prophecy of Isaiah) carries the evidence of its
divinity in its own bosom, and is every way congruous
with later revelations.
No such diversity, however, belongs to the books of
the New Testament. The four Gospels are, with good
renson, regarded as worthy of all acceptation, in the
character of authentic and credible documents. But it
is by no means easy to prove that they are so to the
satisfaction of an indifferent observer. The originals, in
all probability, perished at a very early period. No
autograph of any one of them, so far as appears, was in
existence when the canon of the New Testament was
completed; nor do we read of anyone who had ever seen
them. Further, it can scarcely be disputed that, for
many years, the Gospels were not generally known as
the productions of the men whose names they bear. It
was, without doubt, long before the written word occupied any position at all resembling that which it now
holds. Nor is this surprising. For, as the Gospel had
been at first proclaimed orally, a vivid tradition of this
teaching would naturally take the place of any book or
books in which it might be embodied. Indeed, for the
first hundred and fifty years, the apostolic writings,
although in separate circulation, do not seem to have




THE CANON.                  131
been regarded in any sense as forming one authoritative
book. The first catalogue of the books of Holy Scripture drawn up by any public body in the Christian
Church, which has come down to us, is that of the Council of Laodicea (A. D. 365). The application of the term
Bible to the collective volume of the sacred writings
cannot be traced above the fourth century. Chrysostom
adopts it in his second homily. He adds the word
divine, or, as we should now express it,'the Holy
Bible."
Yet it can scarcely be doubted that the genuineness
of these narratives rests upon evidence better than that
which establishes other ancient writings that are received
without question. They were all composed during the
first century; and it is highly probable that they were
all accepted as genuine before the close of the second.
Irenaeus, who suffered martyrdom A. D. 202, affirms this
to have been the case. The differences between the
first three Gospels and the fourth seem to find a natural
explanation in the fact that John, writing long after the
others, purposely abstained from recording anew what
was already known on the authority of his predecessors.
Whether or no the first three Gospels were compiled
from a common original, or whether, to some extent, the
writers copied from each other, matters little; each
Evangdlist gives us his own personal testimony as far as
it went; and if they had alike access tQdocuments supposed to be trustworthy, each, by the use he makes of
them, gives us his own personal testimony to the accuracy of such fragments. But all this is mere matter of
conjecture, and in itself comparatively unimportant.
Kitto's Cycl. of Bib. Lit., edited by Dr. Lindsay Alexander.




132              LIBER LIBRORUM.
Each gospel has its own features, though all conspire to
produce an harmonious whole.
The only important question is —How far may the
Gospels, as we have them, be relied upon as truthful
records? and the answer must, to a great extent, turn
upon the reception or rejection of the internal evidence
they offer on their own behalf; much of course depending upon our willingness to admit the possibility of
the supernatural, or our fixed determination, with or
without reason, to beg the entire question by refusing
to do other than relegate the miraculous to the domain
of fiction.
Let not this, however, be regarded as closing the
question; for other evidence is not altogether wanting.
The literary difficulties which, it is admitted, exist regarding the Gospels, have no place in relation to some
at le:ast of St. Paul's Epistle3. The genuineness and
authenticity of the Epistle to the Romans, and of the
two Epistles to the Corinthians, are not disputed; and
in thesn we have the most direct and unexceptional evidence to not a few of the statements given us in the
Gospels. The Death of Christ and His Resurrection
and Ascension, the writer asserts partly no doubt on the
testimony of others, but chiefly fiom what he believed
to be a direct communication fiom the Lord.
If Paul was not a deceiver-and that he was so
nobody pretends-the great facts on which the New
Testament turns are thoroughly endorsed by a man of
the clearest intellect and of the highest character; the
most disinterested of witnesses; the most richly endowed
of all who have professed the Christian faith. Nobody
can dispute-whatever may be deduced from the obser



THE CANON.                   133
vation-that the Christ of Paul and the Christ of the
Gospels are, in all respects, the same; that the miracles
of the one correspond to the miracles of the other; and
that the teaching, whether ethical or doctrinal, is identical in each. Add to this the consideration, already referred to, which Paley places at the head of so many of
his chapters, and it seems difficult to escape the conclusion that these occurrences could scarcely have been
better attested.'
Yet all this, we are well aware, will go for very little
with men in whom spiritual sensibility either slumbers
or has never been awakened.  There must be a correspondence of some kind between the giver and receiver
of a testimony; there must be a faculty in exercise for
the reception of truth, answering in some degree to the
truth presented, or no effect will be produced. If there
is nothing within a man which, being itself supernatural,
witnesses to Divine revelation, it is impossible to produce in such a mind any convictions relating thereto
which are worth having.
Two classes of persons commonly manifest a disposition to take advantage, for the furtherance of their own
designs, of admissions like those which we have felt
compelled to make, viz. the literary sceptic, and the
high churchman.  The first-the sceptic-tells us that,
on our own showing, he is justified in declining to place
any confidence in the Gospels, since we allow that he
can have no evidence that those now so called are true
copies of the original autographs. He argues that, as
there is not now extant any manuscript of earlier date
1 This point has recently been well put by an able writer in the
Saturday Review.




134              LIBER LrBRORUM.
than the fourth century, it is impossible to say how far
interpolation, subtraction, or addition may have been
carried. He affirms that, as we confess we have now
no means of knowing by what precise rule the books
supposed to be divinely inspired were distinguished
from merely human compositions, the supposed authority of the Gospels rests on precisely the same grounds as
the infallibility of the pope-that of popular tradition.
Finally, he makes the most he can of sundry rash statements found in books'on the evidences,' and so coneludes that he has successfully defended his unbelief.
The last-the high churchman-not only to a great
extent endorses the sceptic in his conclusions, but magnifies, in every possible way, supposed difficulties, in
order to prove thereby the necessity for Church authority.
It is difficult to estimate the amount of mischief that
has been done by good men who are bent upon showing
that' the history of the formation of the canon involves
little less than the history of the building of the Catholic Church.' Mr. Westcott would not, we suppose, for
a single moment place Paul and Ignatius on the same
level, and yet he classes them together in telling us that'the letters of Ignatius complete the history of one feature of Christianity;' that'the Epistle of St. Paul to the
Ephesians, his pastoral epistles, and the epistles of Clement and Ignatius, when taken together, mark an harmonious progression in the development of the idea of a
Church.' Ile allows, indeed, that the productions of
these fathers are'writings of which no exact type can
be found in the New Testament,' for'they exhibit a
spirit of order and organization foreign to the first stage




THE CANON.                  135
of Christian society;' but he does not see in this important admission any reason for the rejection of the letters.
Surely it must have occurred to him that since Ignatius
was a cotemporary of Pliny the younger, a perusal of
that eminent man's unquestioned letter to the Emperor
Trajan would alone be sufficient to show how different
was the character of early Christianity from that which
is presented in the so called Ignatian epistles.
Dr. Irons, in his'Bible and its Interpreters,' labours
to overthrow all confidence in Scripture, except in so
far as it is expounded by the Church, and read'in the
light of the creeds, the catechism, and the liturgy.' He
reg ards a' Book revelation' as' unreasonable in princi
ple,' forgetting that everything to which man attaches
importance he desires to have in writing; that all we
know of history comes down to us in books; that books
live when tradition dies, and that letters remain unchanged when institutions have altogether lost their
original character. And all this he does, simply that in
the apparent worthlessness of all other evidence, the
Church may lay claim to the absolute submission of
men, and teach them  to say in every difficulty-' We
know this to be so, because the Church has so told us;
by her we prove all things, for she has authority in controversies of the faith.'
Surely such writers might with advantage be reminded
that blind submission to authority, instead of being faith,
renders faith impossible, and that whenever such a claim
is thoroughly understood,'the deep instinct of our spir
itual being rises against it; rises as a spiritual instinct
of self-preservation against that entire disinheriting of
us as God's offspring to which it amounts."  Mlight'M'Leod Campbell: Thoughts on Revelation.




136              LIBER LIBRORUM.
they not well consider whether the very attempt to
throw men back upon the authority of'fathers' whose
writings have themselves reached us in most questionable shapes, and to make out that, if we accept the Gospels at all, it must be in reliance on the judgment or
supposed semi-inspiration of turbulent assemblies of
bishops, such as were those so graphically depicted by
ilean Stanley in his lectures on the Eastern Churchmen who but too often exhibited as much ignorance as
credulity; might they not, indeed, well consider whether
the very attempt to do this is not to betray the cause of
the Bible, in order to exalt the pretensions of the Church?
But it may be replied, Is not this after all the truth
of the matter? Is it not universally admitted that the
councils of Laodicea and Carthage are our authorities
for the New Testament canon? To a certain extent it
undoubtedly is so; but only in so far as these assemblies
may be regarded trustworthy witnesses to the fact that,
at a very early period, given documents were commonly
received as genuine. The all-important inquiry is, not
what the councils decided, but what reasons Christians
had, in that day, for accepting certain books and rejecting others. And the true answer will probably be found
partly in traditions, which were then comparatively
fresh; and partly in that' witness of the Spirit' to the
truths embodied in the accepted books, which has been
in all ages, and still is, the highest evidence to their
canonicity.
The apostle John, it is admitted, lived upwards of
thirty years after the production of every apostolic
writing, except his own apocalypse. It is surely, then,
not unreasonable to suppose that he was in possession,




THE CANON.                 137
before his death, of all inspired productions, or that he
was instructed as to which of them were intended for
the permanent guidance of the Church. We may naturally wonder that, under such circumstances, the apostle
did not furnish for publication a formal and complete
list of books which ought to be accepted; but we can
gather nothing from the omission to do so beyond this,
that so far as we can see, it was not on the whole
deemed desirable that the thing should be done. The
acquisition of truth is, in all its stages and relations,
probationary; and no unimportant element in that probation is the pains we take to collect evidence, and the
mode in which we deal with it when obtained.
Polycarp, who was a disciple of John, would, one
would think, be sure to receive from his aged teacher
such information as would enable him to decide what
writings then in circulation were or were not authoritative; and Irenaeus, who heard Polycarp preach, would,
in all probability, obtain from the martyr or from his
immediate friends information so likely to be regulative
of his teaching. From the time of Irena3us it is'generally admitted that the New Testament was composed'essentially of the same books as we receive at present,
and that they were regarded with the same reverence
as is now shown to them.'
If this be true, and there is no reason to doubt its
substantial accuracy, all that the councils would have
to do would be to verify these things and to act upon
them. This was done; but in doing it, and in publishing a catalogue of the books then held to be inspired,
these assemblies simply bore witness to the general
belief of the existing churches that such, and such only,




138             LIBER LIBRORIM.
ought to be accepted. This is evident from the fact
that some books were received into the canon later than
others, use and enquiry combining to give them in
course of time their proper place. Beyond this the
councils could do nothing; for the men who there met
could not personally know more about the matter than
we do. Like Christians of the present day, they were
not insensible to the internal evidence they found in
favour of the books they accepted, or to their accordance with the instincts of the new nature. But in this
particular they were but on a level with ourselves, as
we again are, in this respect, on a level with those who
spiritually lived on Scripture, long before its books were
catalogued or any council had decided on the canon.
Granting, then, as we readily may, that in the very
earliest controversies about disputed readings, we have
no evidence of any appeal having been made to apostolic originals; granting that'the full value of the
Divine gift' was not at first known, since'in the first
age the written word of the apostles occupied no
authoritative position above their spoken word, or the
vivid memory of their personal teaching;' admitting
that pretended gospels were, at one time, almost countless in number, we are still by no means driven either
to renounce the authority of Scripture or to fall back
upon the Church.
It is easy to say, How can I accept the Gospels we
have, unless I know the grounds on which they were
accepted and other writings of a similar character
rejected? But it is not sensible to do so. We do not
speak thus regarding such pretended gospels as are yet
extant. Why do we not ourselves accept the so called




THE CANON.                 139'Apocryphal New Testament,' with its gospel of the
infancy, its various epistles, its shepherd of Hermas, and
such like productions? Is any other reply needful than
this-They condemn themselves?  No reasonable person imagines for a moment that any one of these
writings can compete with those that are canonical.
There is scarcely room for a doubt or a question either
as to their authority or their value. Why may we not
then suppose that this was precisely the case with the
early churches? These judges give no reasons for their
decisions, simply because they never had a question
regarding the claims of other documents which even
admitted of serious discussion. The genuine. Gospels
carry their own evidence with them: they are seen to
be Divine by their own light. But this, of course, implies that true Christians have, by virtue of their Christianity, a gift of spiritual insight, in the light of which
they can separate the true from the false.
It is not surprising that many should be unprepared
to admit this; that they should demand objective evidence; that they should be altogether unable to estimate the force of that which is purely subjective; that
having themselves never received anything which the
Gospels reveal into their hearts, they should refuse to
do more than stand outside, and coolly weigh what is to
be said in favour of the authenticity and inspiration of
Scripture in scales of their own making, and apart
altogether from any considerations that are moral and
spiritual. While this is the case, such persons must
remain unsatisfied. The Bible always supposes the
existence in the man to whom it speaks of a spiritual
faculty having affinity with its revelations; and this
6*




140               LIBER LIBRORUM.
being the case, and ordained of God, it is vain to offer
evidence in favour either of the miracles of the New
Testament or of the authority of the Gospels to persons
who are as yet quite unprepared to estimate that Divine
love and condescension which underlies all.' My sheep,'
says Christ,'know My voice.' Only in!this way is it
given to men, as Mr. Tennyson says,
To feel, although no tongue can prove
That every cloud that spreads above
And veileth love, itself is love.
To the man who accepts the Bible because he recognises in it the Divine voice, the human authorship
becomes a matter of small importance. The Gospels
-would occupy precisely the same place in the estimation
of such a man as they now do, whatever amount of
doubt might be thrown on their literary composition.
It is certainly pleasant to feel assured that the Epistle
to the Romans, for instance, was written by Paul, but
it would scarcely be less valued if, like the Epistle to
the Hebrews, its authorship were uncertain.  To say,
therefore, that evidence of the authorship is essential to
confidence in the books; to affirm that if the Bible is not
infallibly accurate in every particular, it does not differ
from other writings; to insist that it ought not to be
received as a Divine revelation unless separate proof for
the infallibility of each distinct portion can be presented; to pretend that if an erroneous statement can be
discoverep in any part of the volume the worthlessness
of the whole is demonstrated: is simply to affirm that
under no conditions whatever shall its authority be
acknowledged; that any truth it may contain, if ac



THE CANON.                  141
cepted at all, must be accepted only because it is capable
of being proved true by other means; that nothing is
to be received as true merely because it is contained in
the Bible.
Yet the Book lives. And in spite of the admission
that authority, tradition, and literary evidence, all go,
more or less, to form or to build up our faith in it, it
remains true that, apart from all these things, learned
and ignorant alike'have hung over this Book as with
a strange fascination, ever since it was known to be put
together as a whole;' some dreading it, as if it were an
enemy, others loving it as the dearest and best of
friends; both not unfrequently being compelled to exclaim,'It tells me all things that ever I did. Is it not
fr~om God?' This is, probably, what Coleridge means
when he says,'The Bible findcs me in a way no other
book does. I do not so much find it, as I am found
of it.'
How much more satisfactory, say some men, it is to
rest our faith upon God than upon documents! Doubtless it is so; but before such a dictum can be accepted,
in the sense which these objectors put upon it, we must
be informed where and how any true knowledge of God
is to be obtained, if the documents in question are to
be either rejected or ignored? Let us, therefore, instead of yielding to dissatisfaction with the mode in
which God has been pleased to reveal Himself, now
apply that which has been advanced to what are generally regarded as difficulties in Scripture.




CHAPTER VIII.
DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.
DIFFICULTIES in Scripture are of various kinds; some
pertaining to the letter, and others to the spirit or sentiment expressed or implied. Those in the Pentateuch
which are supposed to involve statements that are unscientific, or otherwise inaccurate, may surely be disposed of by considerations already advanced, viz., that
Scripture was not written for the men of the nineteenth
century alone, but for persons altogether unacquainted
with our modern science; that some things recorded
probably involve to a limited extent figures of speech;
that infallibility in regard to minor matters is nowhere
claimed for the narratives in question.
It is difficult to see how any official record or narrative of well-known facts can be regarded as written
under Divine inspiration, without lowering the term to
an extent that altogether changes its signification;
unless indeed it is intended to imply thereby that the
writer has been miraculously preserved from error, and
also been enabled to correct any mistakes he may find
in the documents he copies, or from which he quotes.
This is of course to assert that Jewish history, in all its
most minute particulars is, so far as it is given in Scrips
ture, equivalent to a directly God-breathed communication, for nothing else can be infallible.




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.        143
Those who hold to this view are, however, obliged
to allow that the miracle they assert has not been prolonged through the ages, by the supernatural preservation of the Book thus composed from all the accidents
to which written records, however carefully guarded,
become in course of time liable. If the Book had been
thus preserved, it is impossible that errors such as those
already referred to' could have been found in it. But
if, as is evident, this has not been done; if it was not
needful, in order that the purposes of God should be
accomplished, that a perpetual miracle should be wrought
for the preservation of the document, it is hard to see
that a miracle should have been either wrought or required in order to enable honest and truth-loving men
who lived in the fear of God, to write with adequate
accuracy the well-known history of their people. All
the probabilities, therefore, if we bear in mind the established fact that God never works a miracle needlessly,
are in favour of the supposition that no such miracle
was wrought; in which case errors, where they exist,
must be attributed either to the original imperfection
of the writers, or to the carelessness or dishonesty of
later transcribers.
Difficulties, however, remain which cannot thus be
disposed of. These arise1. From the observation that certain transactionsattributed to judges or other distinguished personageswhich everyone would now admit to be immoral, are, in
Scripture, not only recorded without disapprobation,
but sometimes, as in the cases of Deborah and David,
made the subject of song and thanksgiving. The actions
Chap. ii.'The Extent of the Claim,' pp. 18, 19.




144               LIBER LIBRORITM.
of Jael, of Rahab, of Ehud, and of Samson are of this
character.
2. That certain practices, such as the putting to death
of the Canaanites, slavery, and polygamy —the latter
distinctly or implicitly condemned by Christ and His
apostles-are both tolerated and legislated for; while
other laws, such as those relating to witchcraft, indicate
nothing better than superstitious ignorance.
3. That the phrases,' Thus saith the Lord,' or'The
Lord said,' are sometimes used under circumstances that
seem to involve the Divine Being in acts which stand in
direct contradiction to His character as revealed to us
in Christ. The hanging of Saul's seven sons before the
Lord is a striking instance of this kind.
4. That some of the supposed miracles of the Old
Testament were wrought under circumstances which
seem to be, so far as we are able to form any judgment
on the subject, altogether unworthy of the Creator and
so far out of harmony with other displays of supernatural power.
5. That, even in the New Testament, doctrines are by
many supposed to be taught-such for instance as that
of election and the eternal sensitive torment of unbelievers —which are inconsistent with declarations found
elsewhere regarding God's love to His creatures and
His pitifulness to their infirmities; while other doctrines,
like that of the Trinity, appear to contradict the Divine
Unity.
6. That the general unintelligibility of Scripture,
which is manifested in incessant disputes and divisions
as to Uwhat the Book says, forbids the belief that it is a
message from God to man; since, if it had been, what



DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.          145
ever peculiarities might have distinguished it, the document itself would at least have been plain and unmistakeable.
To each of these points it is essential that attention
should be paid, if stumbling-blocks are to be removed
out of the way of honest and enquiring minds. We take
them up therefore in order; and in so doing observe1. That the treachery of Jael, the deceit of Rahab,
the assassination of Eglon by Ehud, and the savagery
of Samson, are simply recorded as historical facts. The
song of Deborah by no means carries with it any evidence that what Jael did had the Divine approval.
True, the poet who praises her was a prophetess, and
one raised up to judge Israel in a time of peculiar depression; but she was not on that account infallible
either in her conduct or utterances.  If Peter, the first
of apostles, had to be withstood, because even in seek.
ing to promote the faith of Christ he was to be blamed;
if John, in zeal for his Master's honour did, on one occasion at least, speak not knowing what spirit he was
of, why should we fear to admit that Deborah, on this
particular occasion, like David in some of his imprecatory psalms, manifests patriotism rather than piety, and,
carried away by natural enthusiasm, prophesies in a
spirit which is not Divine 9.''Most people,' says an able writer,''have felt some
perplexity at the commendation which the author of the
Epistle to the Hebrews bestows on such characters as
those of Samson and Jephthah, of Gideon and of Barak.
Certainly these men are not such as we should have
See Vaughan's Way to Rest, sect. iv. pp. 125, 126.
2 Art. on Dean Stanley's Jewish History, in Fraser's Magazine.
I




146              LrBER LIBtORiUM.
expected to find held up as patterns, enrolled in such
a band of faithful servants of God as Abraham, Isaac,
Moses, and Samuel: it scarcely accords with our theories of inspiration to read of the Spirit of the Lord
descending upon such a one as Samson with his vices
and his weaknesses, and prompting him to his wild acts
of vengeance on his own false friends and his country's
enemies; arming Gideon for the punishment of Succoth
and Peniel; or Jephthah for the wholesale slaughter of
the Ephraimites. Yet so speaks the sacred narrative, and
the inspired commentator is not afraid to acknowledge
these fierce patriots as lights of God's chosen people, as
those who' by faith subdued kingdoms, obtained promises, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies
of the aliens.' It isfor their faith they are commended,
and it may be truly said of them that the imperfection
of their characters, the disorder of their times, set forth
the more clearly the one redeeming element of trust in
God that lurked in each of them, aId through them
kept alive the national existence. These deeds must
surely be viewed by the light of their'own times and
their own race; they must be judged according to their
own code of morals, not by that which Christianity
has rendered as it were elementary to us. Like other
Orientals, they were profoundly indifferent as to the
choice of means when they had succeeded in persuading
themselves that the end to be obtained was the will of
God.'
Is it not possible, we may add, as Dean Stanley has
suggested, that the book in which these strange things
occur-that of the Judges-has been given to us'with
the express view of enforcing upon us the necessity




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.         147
which we are sometimes anxious to evade, of recognising the human, national, let us even add, barbarian
element which plays its part in the sacred history?'
Those who hold that God directed the Judges in
all that they did as rulers of the people, are of course
driven to assume that Jehovah commanded, or distinctly approved every one of the acts referred to, and
then rightly arguing that no deed can be immoral
which God justifies, they maintain all these acts to be
right. This course would be very reverential and praiseworthy were it quite certain that what they assum-e
is true. But what if it should not be? Surely the
strongest evidence ought to be forthcoming thatGod
did actually command these things to be done, and that
the book in which they are recorded was God-breathed,
before we are required to admit that the Divine Being
ever did or ever will command His children to do anything that He has Himself taught them to be wrong.
Yet this is just the very evidence that is wanting.
2. The difficulties supposed to arise out of the massacre of the Canaanites and the permission of slavery
have already been dealt with.' It is not therefore necessary to revert to them again. The permission of an
evil like polygamy, under the circumstances then prevailing, is not so very difficult to account for, if it be
recollected that in all His'dealings with the children of
Israel the Lord never disregarded the customs of the
time in which His people lived, or ever set aside any
surrounding influence which was not morally destructive
to them. The laws given from time to time were not
always ordained because they were abstractly the best,
See Correspondence,' Reply to the Doubter,' pp. 32, 33.




148             LI3BER LrBRORUM.
but as being the best they under the circumstances
could bear. Some of them were avowedly temporary,
and some-as the Sabbatic year for instance-appear to
have been rarely if ever carried out. In the wilderness,
where but little flesh was eaten, they were forbidden
to slay any animal for food except at the door of the
Tabernacle (Levit. xvii. 1-7). In Palestine, or rather
just befbre they entered it, this law was superseded by
a distinct permission to kill and eat flesh anywhere
(Deut. xii. 15-27). Polygamy and concubinage seem
to have been allowed only to prevent greater evils, just
as slavery, which existed universally, was, as we have
seen, in the interests of humanity, modified in Israel to
an extent unknown anywhere else.
Of the sorcery and witchcraft referred to in various
parts of Scripture we know little or nothing beyond
the fact that its practice was a crime punishable by
death.  Th/at, however, as Mr. De Quincey has well
observed,'does not argue any Scriptural recognition of
witchcraft as a possible offence. An imafginary crime
may imply a criminal intention that is not imaginary;
but also-which much more directly concerns the interests of a state —a criminal purpose that rests upon a
mere delusion may work by means that are felonious
for ends that are fatal.  At this moment we, the
English people, have laws, and severe ones, against
witchcraft, viz. in the West Indies; and indispensable
it is that we should. The Obeah man from Africa can
do no mischief to one of cs; the proud and enlightened
white man despises his arts; and for him, therefore,
these arts have no existence, for they work only through
strong preconceptions of their reality, and through trem



DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.          149
bling faith in their efficacy. But by that very agency
they are all-sufficient for the ruin of the poor credulous
negro, and he has perished by a languishing decay
thousands of times, under the knowledge that Obi had
been set for him. Justly, therefore, do our colonial
courts punish the Obeah sorcerer, who, though an impostor, is not the less a murderer.''Now, the Hebrew  witchcraft was probably even
worse than this; equally resting on delusions, it nevertheless equally worked for unlawful ends, and it worked
through idolatrous agencies, for all the spells, the rites,
the invocations, were pagan. The witchcraft of Judea,
therefore, must have kept up that connection with
idolatry which it was the unceasing effort of the Hebrew
polity to exterminate from the land.'  It must, however, be admitted that there is a mystery about all the
Satanic action referred to in the Bible, which we are as
yet unable to solve. That a belief in sorcery prevailed
among the Jews even in our Lord's time is evident friom
the Pharisees accusing Jesus of working His miracles
by the power of Beelzebub; and the very little we ourselves know about the invisible world, either of angels
or demons, may well restrain us from hasty dogmatism
on such a subject.
The folly and sin of our forefathers in burning supposed witches consisted not in the mere persuasion
-however destitute of reason-that sorcery was possible, but in their superstitious and selfish dread of evil
powers; their silly credulity; and their atrocious cruelty
towards those whom they ought to have pitied and
1 De Quincoy's Miscellanies, vol. viii.




150               LIBER LIBRORTM.
assisted. In order to disbelieve in witchcraft, it is not
necessary to become a Sadducee.
3. The question whether all that is attributed to God
in the Old Testament can confidently be asserted to
have been done by Him, is one that will be answered in
the affirmative or otherwise, according as we admit or
refuse to admit the possibility of interpolation; according to the interpretation we put upon the words'Thus
saith the Lord;'` according as we hold to, or abandon,
the plenary inspiration, and consequent infallibility of
every statement made in the Bible. It is surely, to say
the least of it, very improbable that when Saul in his
pride and rashness had on one occasion adjured the
people, saying,'Cursed be the man that eateth any food
until the evening that I may be avenged on mine enermies,' the Lord should not only withhold an answer
from the priest because Jonathan had ignorantly and
therefore innocently disobeyed, but fi)'st signify by the
lot that Jonathan should die for the sin, and then suffer
the people, in indignant defiance of the decision, to rescue him. Yet so it stands (1 Sam. xiv.), and, so standing, all bhut proclaims aloud that in some part of the
narrative there is error.
It is, as we have already said, perhaps impossible for
us to know how far a liability to mistake or to evade a
Divine communication, whether given by voice or vision,
was incurred by him  who received -it. But it may
safely be asserted that all the probabilities are, that not
only to the ancient prophet, but to everyone who received such intimations, a Divine message was always
probationary; and this in the sense that all action,
1 See Correspondence,'Reply to the Doubter,' pp. 35-39.




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.         151
whether on the mind or heart of man by the Spirit of
God, is still probationary-that is to say, capable of
being misunderstood, resisted, or absolutely rejected by
a proud or rebellious spirit. Faith and humility must
surely have found as much roolm for exercise then as
they now do; and if so, only by an unction from above
was the Divine message or warning understood or regarded.
Further, it must be borne in mind, that among the
Israelites, phrases implying a direct appeal to heaven
were commonly used when no such communications
really took place. Seeking an ordinary decision at law
is in this fway called enquiring of God. Moses says
(Exod. xviii. 15),'The people come unto me to enquire
of Godl.' The following verse explains to us in what
sense this phrase was used, for he adds,'I judge between one and another, and I do rnake them know the
statutes of God and His laws.' Moses, as a wise legislator and administrator, was undoubtedly in these cases
the re)eresezntative of God; but toxassume that because
this was the case every separate decision of his was
infallible, or that God, so to speak, was responsible for
all His servant did, is surely but an extravagance.
That Judea was governed theocratically, in a sense
altogether peculiar and exceptional, cannot reasonably
be doubted if Israelitish history be accepted as true.
The heathen nations around them might, as they did,
claim, like the Jew, to unite the secular and the religious in their government; they might boast, as they
sometimes were accustomed to do, of the power of their
gods, and of their intervention on their behalf; they
might resort to omens and auguries as a means of ascer



152              LIBER LIBORUM.
taining the will of superior divinities; but to Judea,
alone belonged the reality of which all these things were
but deceptive shadows. For them as a nation, and on
behalf of their national interests, God did at times unquestionably interfere, although, strange as it must
seem to us, the most marked interference seems often to
have had little or no corresponding effect on the minds
of the people.'The great mass of them went about
their daily occupations with probably neither more nor
less reference to the Divine Being than the masses of
the English people do at this day.' The more religious
few were then, as they ever have been, whether among
Jews or Gentiles, a small minority.
Bearing in mind these conditions-liability to error
arising from moral causes, on the part of the recipient,
and the possibility of interpolation-we may, I think,
safely and without irreverence, deny the authority of all
statements which assert that God ever did com'mand
any act which is obviously alien to His character as
revealed in Christ; and, further, that this may be done
without the slightest danger of thereby rejecting any
portion of inspired Scripture.
The sacrifice of Saul's seven sons (2 Sam. xxi. 8) certainly appears to be so contrary to all that God has
made known of Himself elsewhere, that it may well be
questioned whether this portion of the narrative is not
altogether an interpolation. The story, as it stands,
asserts that a three years' famine having distressed the
land, David enquired of the Lord in order to ascertain
the reason of so terrible a punishment; that the Lord
answered him by stating that it *as a judicial infliction
on account of Saul having at some period or other of




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.              153
his hist6ry, for we know not when, in his zeal for
Israel, sought to slay the Gibeonites (Josh. ix. 3-27).
In order to placate the Divine anger on account of
this evil design, on the part of the dead monarch, the
seven sons of Saul are said to have been hung up unto
the Lord in Gibeah, after which God was entreated for
the land.
The question is, not so much whether this act, whatever may be its character, actually took place, as whether
God did actually command or approve of it.' That it
is utterly unlike everything else recorded of Jehovah
is clear.  Which course,. then, is most reverent?  To
assume its truth, as divines generally do, and then confess our inability to judge of its rectitude-David having
sworn to Saul that when he reached the kingdom he
would not cut off his seed (1 Sam. xxiv. 20-22)-or to
question whether it may not be an interpolation? Of
course we cannot prove that it is so; but inasmuch as
no one doubts that so-me few passages of the New Testament have been thus wrongfully introduced, and therefore form no part of Scripture, it is at least possible that
such ma~cy have been the case with someportions of the Old.'The Rev. David Jas. Vaughan, in a sermon on'The Moral
Difficulties of the Bible,' suggests, regarding this transaction, that
David was probably deceived by the priest who answered as from
the Lord.' It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he slew
the Gibeonites.' That suspicion, he says,'is increased when we
remember that the priest, to whom David must have applied, would
be that Abiathar, who alone had escaped from the bloody massacre
of the priests at Nob, which Saul in a fit of brutal passion had commanded, and who would be sure to entertain feelings of the deepest
hatred, and a truly Oriental thirst for revenge against Saul and his
house.'




154              LIBER LIBRORUM.
That it is justifiable occasionally to resort to conjecture in Old Testament criticism can scarcely be denied.
Dr. Davidson's remarks on this head are both moderate
and judicious.'The step is,' he says,' sometimes uznavoidcable. In consequence of the paucity and youth of
all Hebrew manuscripts, the uncritical state in which
the oldest and best versions are found, and the comparative poverty of external evidence as a whole, added to
the great extent of the Old Testament books, and the
remote times from which they have been handed down,
the necessity of applying critical conjecture in the case
of the Old Testament becomes apparent. Yet it should
be used sparingly.  The only rule respecting its application is, when a pressing necessity arises let it be
adopted.' And surely no necessity can be greater than
that which presents itself when anything is attributed
to God that is contrary to the revelation He has made
of Himself in other parts of the written Word. Such is
the case before us.
Mr. Horne, indeed, tells us, in the' Critical Introduction,' that the corruption of the Old Testament by the
Jews was morally impossible.' But no assertion can be
more extravagant. That it has been subjected to at
least the same risks as the New Testament cannot be
doubted, and if interpolation can be proved to have
taken place in but a single instance in the one, it is by
no means improbable that it may have been effected
in the other. And this may be admitted without at
all either denying or undervaluing the remarkable care
which has been taken of the books as a whole, or their
providential preservation by God.
I Crit. Int., 3rd edition, vol. i. p. 11-7.




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.           15 5'How often the separate books were transcribed, or
with what degree of correctness, it is impossible to tell.
We cannot suppose that the Old Testament writings
were perfectly free from -alterations in the earliest times.
It is probable that they had been deteriorated even in
the interval between their origin and the completion of
the canon. All analogy confirms this supposition.' It
is granted that' the Palestinian Jews were very scrupulous in guarding the text from innovation; although it
is impossible that they could have preserved it from all
corruption.' It seems impossible to doubt that opportunities for interpolation would easily enough be found
between the times of Ezra and the destruction of Jerusalem, and it is inatter for thankfulness that' the oper itions of sacred criticism have proved that there is no
mraterial corruption in the Divine records; that all
doctrines and duties remain unaffected by its investigations; and that during the lapse of so many centuries,
the Holy Scriptures have been preserved in a surprising
degree of purity."
The passage now under notice (2 Sam. xxi. 8) has
every appearance of being interpolated for the purpose
of justifying the more zealous adherents of David in
having compassed the death of all claimants to his
throne who were likely to be troublesome, a practice
which then universally prevailed.  Be this as it may,
the transaction described is certainly out of harmony
with other parts of Divine revelation, and the act, if it
ever took place, was a direct violation of the oath by
which David had pledged himself to Saul to preserve
his children. The incident, as it stands, is quite un1 Kitto's Bib. Cycl. art.' Biblical Criticism.'




156              LIBER LIBRORtIM.
connected with any other part of Scripture, and its withdrawal does not affect any fact or doctrine elsewhere
stated. No one is bound to believe that, under the Old
Testament dispensation, God either commanded or approved any transaction the moral character of which
cannot be defended. Treachery, falsehood, or the indulgence of a revengeful spirit in any form, are not to be
regarded as approved by God because they may be narrated without disapprobation by the historian. That
they could be, would never have entered the mind of
any man, but for the supposed necessity of sustaining
the plenary inspiration of every part of the Bible.
The extermination of the Midianites, which has already
been noticed in connection with other remarks on the
massacre of the Canaanites,' appears at first sight to
have been marked by a peculiarly disgusting feature,
the sparing of the female children and virgins, since it
is commonly assumed by objectors that these were
reserved for prostitution. Very little reflection, however, will suffice to show that this was not the case.' The law prohibited an Israelite even from marrying a
captive without delays and previous formalities; and if
he afterwards divorced her, he was bound to set her at
liberty because he had humbled her (Deut. xxi. 10-14).
They were allowed to retain these Midianitish captives
only as slaves, educating them, when they did their
duty, in their families, and employing them as domestics,
because being yet uncorrupted they could do so without
moral danger.
The conduct of David towards the Ammonites (2
Sam. xii. 31) has been also represented as an act of
1 See Correspondence,' Reply to the Doubter,' p. 37,.




IFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.         157
diabolic cruelty, since he is said to have'put them
under saws, and under harrows of iron, and under axes
of iron, and made them pass through the brick-kiln.'
This charge vanishes when it is seen that the HTebrew
word translated'under,' means also'to.' The statement, properly rendered, is that he employed them as
slaves in sawing wood, working harrows (or perhaps
iron mines), and in making bricks.
The slaughter of the Amalekites, on the supposition
that it was commanded by God,' has been said to justify, or at least to furnish an apology for, religious persecution, since it seems to teach that the destruction by
man of those who are regarded as the enemies of God,
is pleasing in the Divine sight. But it really inculcates
no such lesson; for neither -Moses nor Joshua, nor
indeed any person mentioned with approbation in Scripture, ever made war on any nation on this ground,
beyond the borders of the promised land. They had
no commission to overthrow idolatry by the sword; no
command to destroy idolaters as such out of their own
land, and they never attempted to do it. The particular
tribes inhabiting Palestine who refused to depart, and
resisted in battle the armies of Israel, were indeed so
dealt with, but not the heathen generally. On the contrary, the prophets plead their cause along with that of
the widow and the fatherless, and one of them at least
looks forward with joy to the time when they shall be
in all respects equal with Israel (Ezek. xlvii. 22).
What, indeed, can be more touching than the declaration that the Lord loveth the stranger (the heathen) in
giving him food and raiment?'Love ye therefore,'
See Correspondence,'Reply to the Doubter,' pp. 38, 39..




158              LIBER LMRORUM.
He says,'the stranger: for ye were strangers in the
land of Egypt' (Deat. x. 19).
4. The fact that certain miracles are recorded in the
Old Testament of a character not in harmony with the
general principles that characterize the exercise of superhuman power in other cases, again suggests the possibility of interpolation. We say certain miracles, because,
as a rule, the miraculous in the Old Testament is marked
by precisely the same features as in the New. These
features are benevolence, dignity, and congruity with
all that is revealed of the character of God. There is
nothing theatrical about -them, no mere wonder-working,
nothing aimless and objectless, nothing monstrous or
prodigious. In each and all of them we see' the supernatural standing in relation to the Infinite,' and we are
awed rather than startled as we gaze. But it can
scarcely be said that this is true of all the miracles recorded in Jewish history. There are exceptional cases,
and in relation to these some doubt may well be entertained.
As we have just observed, the direct interferences of
God, whatever their object, whether visible or invisible,
whether accomplished through the agency of the elements, or by a power which left no sign, are all marked
be a majesty and dignity which stamps them as Divine.
For whatever we may say or think as to what would be
really involved in the shadow going back on the sundial of Ahaz; however ignorant we are as to whether
the overthrow of the walls of Jericho was or was not
occasioned by the agency of an earthquake; whether or
no the destruction of the Assyrian army was effected by
means of a deadly simoom, or literally by an angel of




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.        159
God; whether the speaking serpent in Eden was an
actual animal or but the embodiment of Satan; whether
the voice of the ass rebuking Balaam was actual speech
or only an utterance subjective to the prophet, matters
little, so long as we recognise in these things the supernatural interference of the Creator, and regard them as
equally supernatural with the appearance of the pillar
of cloud and of fire, the descent of God on Mount Sinai,
and the Resurrection of the Redeemer.
Most of us have, no doubt, always thought of the
passage of the Red Sea as having been effected calmly,
the waters quietly parting as Moses waved the rod.
Yet our faith is not endangered when we come to perceive that Dean Stanley is, in all probability, right, in
supposing that it took place amid a hurricane of wind;
the sea roaring as it was driven back, and the darkness
being lit up by streams of lightning. By taking this
view, we come to understand better than we otherwise
should the sublime words of David when he says,' The
waters saw Thee, O God, the waters saw Thee; they
were afraid: the depths also were troubled. The voice
of Thy thunder was in the heaven: the lightnings lightened the world: the earth trembled and shook. Thy
way is in the sea, and Thy path in the great waters,
and Thy footsteps are not known. Thou leddest thy
people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron'
(Ps. lxxvii. 18-20).
The real difficulty connected with some of the miracles recorded in the Old Testament is not their supposed supernatural character, but the circumstances
under which they are said to have been wrought. The
lofty command of Joshua, uttered amid the excitement




160               SBER LIBRORIrM.
of battle, and in the sight of Israel,'Sun stand thou
still upon Gibeon; and thou, AMoon, in the valley of
Ajalon,' followed as it is by the declaration that'the
sun stood still, and hasted not to go down about a whole
day,' is of this character, especially when the authority
for the statement is said to be the Book of Jasher, of
which we know nothing (Josh. x. 13). The difficulty
is not in the unscientific character of the language, for
that might be colloquial; nor yet in any miraculous
prolongation of light if God so willed it, but in the
tone of the whole transaction.
Again, certain miracles said to have been wrought by
Elisha, such as the healing of the waters of Jericho, at
the request of the men of thze city, so that dearth or
barrenness should not be there any more (2 Kings ii.
19-22); the cursing of those who mocked him, and the
consequent destruction of forty-two young men (not'little children') by two she-bears (2 Kings ii. 23-4);
the making iron to swim in order that one of the sons
of the prophets might secure a borrowed axe (2 Kings
vi. 5); and the return to life of a man accidentally cast
into the prophet's sepulchre when the corpse touched
Elisha's bones (2 Kings xiii. 21), have all of them a very
apocryphal appearance; inasmuch as, in each instance,
they are wrought for purposes which —reverently speaking and in the light of Scripture alone-seem to us to
be unworthy of Divine interference.  In one case the
miracle seems to be wrought merely to meet the wishes
of men apparently seeking only their own advantage;
in another to carry out what certainly looks like vindictive revenge for personal insult; in a third, to save
the cost of a small purchase; and in the last appa



DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.        161
rently for no object whatever beyond mere wonderworking.
Now, the question is, on what principle can these
stories about Elisha be rejected, if the second book of
Kings, in which they are found, is to be retained, and if
other statements contained therein regarding the same
prophet are to be believed? The answer seems to be,
Either by accepting the second book of Kings in its
true character-that of an historical record, but supposing it to have been composed by men who were
liable to accept floating traditions. without sufficient
discrimination-or that the work has been somewhat
with at a later period. The latter seems to be far the
more probable explanation. If any evidence can be
produced to show that the second book of Kings was,
as a matter of fact, written by men who were miraculously preserved from error, and further that no interpolation can by possibility have taken place, then of
course we are bound to accept all that is contained
therein, and to believe that-account for it as we may
-the great principles which dignify and sustain the
miracles of our Lord and His apostles were not adhered
to under the Old Testament dispensation.
But surely we ought not to come to such a conclusion either hastily or on insufficient grounds. The
test, be it remembered, by which these stories are to be
tried is the Word of God itself, not mere human opinion;
the ground of rejection is precisely the same as that on
which the story of Tobit and the fish, and of Bel and
the Dragon were originally pronounced untrustworthy.
Nothing, therefore, can be more unwarranted than the
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to know  better-that any exercise of the verifying
faculty in the present day must end in each man's
accepting or rejecting just as much of Scripture as may
suit him.
Such an assertion is unwarrantable: (1) Because, as
we have already said, the test applied is not human
but Divine. (2) Because, being such, its application
belongs only to those whose spirits have by Divine
grace been more or less brought into harmony with the
Divine Will.  (3) Because it is the principle-almost
the only ruling principle-on which any settlement of
the canon has ever proceeded. At the very earliest
period tradition no doubt had great weight, but as this
weakened by lapse of time the spiritual discernment,
of the Churches became paramount.  (4) Because it is,
in all respects, more to be depended upon than any mere
comparison of manuscripts would be, were they in
existence. We say mere comparison, because the rejection, for instance, of the text known as'the three
heavenly witnesses,' while partially justified by its absence from early manuscripts, is far more conclusively
supported by its own character. On the other hand,
the retention of the narrative of the woman taken in
adultery, although wanting in so many copies, is not
only justified by internal evidence, but also by the far
greater probability that such a narrative should have
been excluded, as dangerous, at a time when inflated
and exaggerated notions about virginity were prevalent,
than that it should have been interpolated under any
circumstances whatever.
In relation to the New Testament there is probably
but onle miracle that is fairly questionable-that of the




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.         163
supposed periodical descent of an angel into the pool of
Bethesda. And this is rejected by believing critics on
precisely the same grounds as those that have been
stated-its want of congruity with other miracles, and
its obvious improbability. It is incongruous, because a
standing miracle of this sort, wrought, apart from any
religious end, in a great city like Jerusalem, is altogether gunzlike anything else recorded. It is improbable,
because Josephus, who would only have been too proud
to boast of this mark of the Divine favour to the Jews,
makes no mention of it. The view taken of the matter
by many commentators is, that the angel referred to was
a messenger from the temple who at stated seasons
stirred up the blood received there from the sacrifices,
and that this was popularly supposed to possess healing
virtues.
The opinions of wise and good men, again, regarding
demoniacs are various, and so long as they do not limit
the power of God or explain away that which is written
they are innocent. The darkness at the Crucifixion,
objected to by Gibbon as asserting an eclipse which did
not then take place, Guizot, following Origen, shows to
be in all probability a preternatural darkness occasioned
in the atmosphere. But all these varieties of opinion entertained by men who in common hold to the essential
verity of Scripture as a.Divine revelation, only go to
show how frank and fearless has been the criticism to
which the Book has been subjected, and how willing
many Christians are in the strength of their faith to
deal with it without any unfair reserve.
5. The objection that doctrines are.taught in the
Bible which are inconsistent either with the justice or




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the love of God cannot be sustained. That such are
frequently inferredfrom the sacred text is true enough;
but these conclusions belong to the interpretation of the
Book by man, not to what it reveals as from God. It
has certainly yet to be proved that any doctrine of election bearing on the world to come, is to be found in the
Bible, that is different in principle from that which, as a
fact of life, obtains in the providential government of
God on earth, viz. the selection of some even before
birth to rank and wealth, while others are introduced
only to poverty and degradation.  The end-however
much it may be evaded or lost sight of on earth-being,
in both worlds, that by this means all may be benefited,
some by giving and some by receiving. The feiw are
favoured, only that by their loving self-sacrifice the
many may be more favoured. That it is often not so
now, is no evidence that it will not be so in'the new
earth wherein dwelleth righteousness.'
The dogma of the Eternal sensitive suffering of those
who are unconverted here, which has descended to- us
from the apostasy has, we firmly believe, no place in the
Word of God; it is, at the best, but a human and very
inaccurate theological inference.
Even on the doctrine of the Trinity-for the word
itself is not Scriptural —much has been said and written
which can find no sanction in the Bible.  Scripture
indeed bids us see in THE FATHER, the Eternal Will
creating and governing all things, Omnipotent, Omniscient, and Omnipresent; in THE WORD, God communicating with man, declaring the Divine Will to him and
becoming incarnate for his redemption; and in THE
HOLY SPIRIT eternal life and love working out the




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.          165
Divine designs whether in creation or redemption; but
it tells us also that these are ONE. There it leaves us;
for the nature or mode of an eternal triplicity in the
Divine nature is far beyond the comprehension of finite
minds. Nor is it too much to say that the progress
of truth has been greatly hindered by metaphysical distinctions, often utterly unmeaning, regarding the Divine
existence; as well as by expressions which, although
embodying more or less that which is true, are in themselves unauthorised.
To apply to Christ such terms as'Very God of very
God, begotten not made;' to speak of' God the Son and
God the Holy Ghost;' of'three persons but one God,'
and such like, however needful in scholastic controversy,
or whatever amount of truth they may embody, cannot
be justified by apostolic habits of thought and expression. These phrases too often occasion the very evil
they are intended to meet, and very frequently distress
and perplex tender souls by creating difficulties which
would otherwise never be felt. But' fools rush in where
angels fear to tread.'
Dr. Irons seems to imagine that the absence from
Scripture of such words as'Trinity,''Holy Orders,''Holy Sacrament,''Priest,' and such, like, is fatal to
those who regard the Bible as their only guide.'What,'
he says,'is to become of all these to the man whose
criticised Bible is his revelation?"  Whether or no
eternal punishment is taught in Scripture he admits has
been made'fairly debateable.'2  But one thought meets
all difficulty.'Him whom we ignorantly worship, the
Church declares unto us by her creeds, her sacraments,
1 The Bible and its Interpreters, p. 67.  2 Ibid. pp. 94, 96.




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and her hierarchy, and these things,' he holds,  come
into being quite apart from St. Matthew's Gospel, or
St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, or the Revelation of
St. John.' So broad is the distinction between the Bible
and Church authority; so needful is it to keep in mind
that in defending the one we have nothing to do with
any perplexities arising out of the other.
6. The last difficulty to be looked at is the supposed,unintelligibility of Scripture, shown by the division of
opinion to which it has given rise among those who
study it diligently and earnestly. This is, by far, the
most serious difficulty of all, and would indeed be fatal
to the pretensions of the book as containing a message
from  God to man, if it could also be shown that the
ccztse of the divisions in question is to be found in the
darkness of the document rather than in the prejudices
and worldly interests of its expositors. But this cannot
be done. No such diversity existed originally, and it
exists now only as a result of that great and disastrous
falling away which Paul.foresaw and predicted (2 Thess.
ii. 7).
To imagine, as so many do, that Romanism, or
Lutheranism, or Anglicanism, or any other particular
form of organised Christianity, embodies in itself this
evil thing is absurd. The'Mystery of Iniquity,' it is
clear enough, worked in apostolic days, as it has worked
ever since, viz. through the corruption of religion by
its association with secular advantages. Whether these
come in the shape of money, or of power, of popularity,
or of status matters little.' I know,' says Paul to the
elders of the Ephesians,'that after my departing shall
grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.          167
flock' (Acts xx. 29). Already, he says, there are many'who make a trafic, of the word,' for so Archbishop
Trench translates the second of Corinthians (ii. 17).'Beware,' he writes to the Colossians,'lest any nman
mncake booty of you, through philosophy'-scientific and
systematic theology so called (Col. ii. 8).'Woe untio
them,' exclaims Jude, for'they have run greedily after
the error of Balaam for reward' (v. 11).   Withdraw
thyself,' says Paul to Timothy, from  men of corrupt
minds who suppose that'gain is godlinless;' or rather,
according to Dr. Trench, that'godliness is lucre-a
means of getting gain' (1 Tim. vi. 5).
Very startling indeed is it to find that at so early a
period, and at a time when one would have thought
that persecution and death were the only rewards that
awaited the minister of Christ, the germ at least of
coming greed and ambition should have been traceable.
Yet so it was; teaching us at least this lesson, that no
outward circumstances, however apparently falvourable
to purity, can altogether hinder designing men fiom
usurping authority o.ver conscience, or getting gain out
of persons who are capable of being bribed by the
promise of ease.
But how, it will perhaps; be said, does this fact, if: it
be one, account for the all but endless diversity of
opinion which exists as to what the Bible really teaches?
— for this is the point with which we have now to deal.
The reply is obvious. Ecclesiastical bodies, whatever
may be their character-whether ruling a state or ruled
by it, whether established or voluntary, whether bond
or free-cannot exist without, in one form  or other,
requiring adherence to church authority in matters of




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faith. Some-as Episcopalians or Presbyterians-enforce by subscription that particular form of thought
which is embodied in" their articles or catechism. Some,
like the Wesleyans, require a more general but not less
stringent adherence to the writings of their great founder. Others, as Independents or Baptists, cast anchor on
Puritan ground. ALL, without exception, fix beforehand the great outline of belief, expressed or understood,
which must be accepted before any man can share the
privileges, or derive benefit from the emoluments which
belong to the church or congregation in which he may
desire to minister. As a rule, the preacher is specially
educated in and required to abide by the dogmas of the
particular sect for whose service he is intended. Differences are in this way perpetuated.
And here let us, once for all, decidedly protest against
the line of argument we are pursuing being construed
into an attack either on the creeds or the government of
the Church of England, or regarded as an assault on any
Church or body of ministers either in our own country
or elsewhere. This is not the place to carry on such a
warfare, were it either needful or desirable to do so.
But it is not. We are answering the objections of the
sceptic not to the Church but to the Bible; and if, in
doing so, we are compelled to separate the one from the
other, and in the interests of truth obliged to put aside
everything in the world, beyond the Book we have
undertaken to defend, this, instead of being matter of
complaint, should be cheerfully acquiesced in by those
who profess to regard every other interest as unimportant when brought into comparison with that of the Word
of God.




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.         169
The Church and the Bible have not always needed
separate defenders. It is granted by all parties —'by
the thoroughly evangelical Count de Gasparin, by the
liberal Neander, and by the Roman Catholic Mohler'that among the earliest disciples'there was not the
remotest desire to unravel the puzzles which afterwards
beset the theological world. There is in their child-like
faith an utter unconsciousness of them. With regard to
outward forms the apostles verged towards indifference.
They did not look on baptism as of great consequence;
and they regarded the observance of the eucharist as
binding on them, because it was a memorial instituted
by Him who was their life, and the object of intensest
love. In the administration of their communities there
ruled one great principle, viz., that each Chitistian man
was a king and a priest-that by the indwelling of
Christ's spirit within him he had become a free man in
the highest sense of the word. The organization of
churches under different office-bearers might proceed in
various ways, provided this principle were untouchedand in fact the offices in the church, if they might be
called offices, were not fixed, established modes of government, but wise methods of bringing every gift of the
church into active employment.'" If, therefore, it should
seem to any that we have reflected on modern Churches,
let it be borne in mind that we have done so unwillingly,
and only to remove occasions of stumbling out of the
way.
Our only anxiety is that in considering difficulties in
Scripture, men should not attribute to the Book that
1 Donaldson's History of Christian Literature and Doctrine, vol. i
pp. 50-52.
8




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which really does not belong to it. Forgetfulness of
this distinction has led a recent writer to maintainsurely without any good reason-that'the doctrines
which the great mass of Christians have ('cawn from the
Bible, for eighteen centuries, must either be what God
meant them to draw, or else He did not inspire the
Book. One thing or other, it is said, must hold-the
old sense of the old words, or else the admission that
they were not miraculously given by the Creator of the
human mind for its instruction.' All this of course proceeds on the supposition-favoured alike by believers and
by sceptics-that one of the greatest historical facts in
the world may be altogether ignored, viz., the existence
and influence of a departure from the faith, which, working unseen during the later portions of the apostolic age,
rapidly developed after the decease of the last member
of the sacred college into that'mystery of iniquity'
which culminated in Rome, and which has ever since
dominated over by far the largest portion of Christendom, flinging its shadow to this day, more or less, upon
all of us. To the surprising transformation wrought in
all lands by this undergrowth of error in the garden of
the Lord, Dean Stanley has beautifully alluded in his
introductory lecture on' Ecclesiastical History.'
It is, we are aware, commonly urged in extenuation
of our religious diversities that the differences of Christians as to doctrine are not so great as they seem; that
the confessions of the reformed of different countries
are, after all, very similar; that even Romanism maintains a body of truth which is common to all true believers; and there are those, we doubt not, who will
blame us for not having brought this fact forward as a




DIFFICULTIES IN THE BIBLE.         171
sufficient answer to the objection of the sceptic. We
cannot do so, because it does not satisfy our own mind.
The various Churches of Christendom are, as a fact,
united in opinion only so far as they have followed in
common the theological systems of Augustine or of
Anselm. The agreement, therefore, in question, so far
as it goes, is hereditary and traditional only, and not
the result of that humble but independent investigation
which is alone of value. That a common Christian Itlfe
underlies all sorts of opinions is true enough, but this is
not the point under consideration.




CHAPTER IX.
INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE.
WHETHER it be possible to separate the defence of the
Bible as a document from all considerations relative to
the mode in which the Book should be interpreted, may
be regarded as an open question. It is, however, not
easy to see how such a separation can be absolute, so
long as the view we take of the contents of Scripture
more or less biases our decision as to the Divine character of the record, or so long as our method of interpreting that record depends, to some extent at least, on
the opinion we form regarding its inspiration.
If the whole Book be inspired in that plenary sense
which excludes the possibility of error, interpretation,
as Dr. Chalmers somewhere says, clearly resolves itself
into mere questions of grammar. On the contrary, if
the supernatural character of the revelation be denied,
and the Book comes to be regarded simply as the expression of the combined genius and piety of the writers,
then its meaning will naturally be sought rather in the
light of its supposed correspondence with the highest
intuitions of the reader, than in any study of its grammatical construction. Further, if it is viewed only or
chiefly as a revelation of general principles, which are




INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE.         173
to be logically developed and arranged by divines
according to the order of their importance, then systematic theology, or the interpretation of the Church
springs into existence, and with it, in one form or other,
the assumption of authority.
The sense of uncertainty which, in the present day,
has come over so many devout and believing minds as
to the teaching of the Bible, is to be attributed partly,
no doubt, to the different conclusions of systematic
theologians, each system claiming to be sustained by
Scripture, and, therefore, to be positively true; partly
to fanciful expositions founded on the notion that Scripture is given us to be developed, and that hidden meanings are in this way to be brought out of it; and partly
to a particular kind of textual preaching, originating,
no doubt, in a somewhat superstitious view of verbal
inspiration, which demands that we should dwell on
every word of the text, as if the very syllables possessed
something like a magic power of their own. Any book
thus treated must necessarily soon be disencumbered
of all definite meaning, and its teaching be placed at
the mercy of its expositors. Such has in fact been the
experience of the past.'
But while Divine revelation can have but one true
meaning, nothing can be more certain than that, being
a message fi'om the Heavenly Father to His erring and
sinful creatures, it must have a power of adaptation to
each and all of them in particular, which, from the very
nature of the case, forbids any exhaustive or authoritative interpretation of its contents. It has been truly
said of Shakspeare that he was a'myriad-minded' man.
1 See Appendix, Note B.'Biblical Interpretation.'




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How much more may it be said of the Bible, that it is
a myriad-minded book. Perhaps it is not too much to
affirm that, being intended to find affinity with every
possible variety of thought and feeling; to adapt itself
to every man's separate idiosyncrasy; to reveal to each
just that particular phase or fobrm of truth which is
needful for him or her; which can alone be made practical and powerful for good to him or her; it is as impossible that it should have any one given and stereotyped
expression, as that it should teach to every man one
given and stereotyped lesson.
Yet, let it never be forgotten that this peculiarity by
no means interferes with the dcefiniteness of the message,
or in any way tends either to impair its explicitness, or
to necessitate an authorized interpretation.  For only
as Scripture is allowed to adapt itself to the peculiar
mental and moral condition of each individual, do its
words become' spirlit and life' to him, ruling his conduct
and reigning in his affections. Instead, therefore, of
finding an occasion of stumbling in the fact that diversities of view on many points, always have, and probably
always will characterise Christians, we might rather
discover in the wonderful adaptation of Divine teaching
to each, evidence of the source from which it comes.
For it is at once one, and yet diveirse; unchanging, and
yet endowed with a capacity of all but infinite fitness
to every variety of character.
Just as material light, although the same to all, is yet
different to persons of imperfect vision, suffering under
diverse forms of disease; so is spiritual illumination a
different thing to men in different stages of the divine
life, with varying intellectual powers, and, above all,




INTERPRiETTATION OF SCRIPTURE.       175
with conflicting wills, passions, and interests; and just
as it would be impossible so to temper the light of the
sun, that it should leave precisely the same impression
on every optic nerve, whether sound or otherwise, so is
it neither possible nor desirable that Divine truth should
come home to the man who is jaundiced by his prejudices, or drugged by his sins, precisely as it does to the
simple and righteous soul who desires to know, only
that he may love and obey.
Nevertheless, to repeat what we have just said, we
should greatly err if we argued from this peculiarity of
revelation that it had no one definite and true meaning;
that it had more than one; or that it ever was intended
to be handled as a nucleus, around which ingenious
illustration, varied reasoning, and imaginative eloquence
might gather, for the delectation, of a mixed crowd of
auditors. Nor do we less mistake when we seize upon
this or any other feature of Holy Scripture, either for
the purpose of excusing our divisions, or as a reason for
endeavoring after a false and deceptive unity, by requiring the acceptance of any given proposition, or series
of propositions, deduced by the skill of man from  the
statements of the Book. There is no real unity on earth,
whether in the natural or in the spiritual economy,
which does not consist in diversity.'Inspired teaching,' says Dr. Archer Butler,' explain
it as we may, appears comparatively indifferent to what
seems to us so peculiarly important-close logical connection, and the intellectual symmetry of doctrines.'
How much, he adds,' is sometimes conveyed by assumptions, such as inspiration alone can make without any
violation of the canons of reasoning!-,for with it alone




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assertion is argument.'  Had this truth been borne
in mind we should have escaped many a discussion on
fate and free will, and been content to know that while,
as creatures, we are necessarily dependent on God for
everything, we have yet free will enough to be capable,
under Divine teaching, of voluntarily choosing the good
and rejecting the evil; that life and death, sin and grace,
time and eternity, all bear on the grand result of this
voluntary choice; that as its accomplishment on earth,
in spite of all hindrances, in the hearts of some is the
present reward of the Redeemer's sufferings, its accomplishment hereafter on the many will be the final triumph
of Divine wisdom and love.
Traditional interpretation denies this. It allows, indeed, that,'as by the disobedience of one man the many
were made sinners, so, by the obedience of One shall
the many be made righteous;' that the world, though a
fallen, is a redeemed world; that Christ will eventually
destroy the works of the devil; that good is destined,
in the long run, to overcome evil; and that one day' every knee shall bow' to Him who is'King of kings,
and Lord of lords.' But it does so only under many
limitations. It is slow, if not unwilling, to admit even
the restoration of those who have here lived and died
without even hearing of a Saviour. It looks for a counterpoise to the losses of the past in the salvation of
infants, and in the possible prolongation of a millennial
period until the number of the saved shall exceed the
number of the lost; an arithmetical way of treating
human happiness and misery which has in all ages found
plenty of admirers, although anything less Godlike can




INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE.          177
scarcely be conceived. Divine revelation, however, is
not responsible for this perversity.
The Gospel, as Christ presents it, is, in one form or
other, good news not to the few only but to all men
without exception; to the heathen as well as to the
Christian; to the Jew in his impenitence; to the profligate in his sin; to the ignorant in his darkness; and to
the sceptic in his unbelief. Not a word intimates that
its entire value hangs either on the knowledge or on the
belief of it by those for whose benefit it was announced.
It is a declaration of what God will do; not of what lie
is willing to do if man permit. If it were not so,
human nature being what it is, and the world what it
always has been, the message would be, to by fyar the
greater portion of mankind, of no avail whatever; the
consolations it offers would be, to most persons, absolutely unreal, and the mission of Christ, instead of being
a redeeming one, would involve little more than the
ratification of a curse.
Yet the Gospel is not alike to all; for it has a special
object to accomplish as well as a general one.'God,
who is the Saviour of all men, is, we are distinctly told,
specially the Saviour of them  that believe' (1 Tim.
iv. 10).
The mode in which this double result will be accomplished is not fully explained to us, but the declaration
is not the less true on that account. Some things in
Divine revelation are written as with a sunbeam;'other
things are only hinted'at. Yet who shall dare to say
that the one is not as certain as the other?  As it is in
Nature, so is it in Scripture: some things are proclaimed
as from the mountain top; other things are only whis8*




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pered to the listening ear. The one arrests attention;
the other rewards it. Some things are needful to be
known for present guidance; other things are opened
up as a recompense to those who desire to gain a full
understanding of all the ways of God, so far as He may
please to let us become acquainted with them. Yet all
alike demand the scrutiny of the wise, and all alike
reward the diligence of the industrious.
That the Bible has a twofold purpose to accomplish
in the world is evident from its character. If in one
aspect it addresses itself to man as man everywhere, in
another it speaks only to a particular class of men, viz.,
to those who, knowing the voice of the Redeemer, have
received Him into their hearts, and believed on Him to
the saving of their souls.. To the one it announces,'Glad tidings of great joy, which shall be to all (the)
people.' Its note is,'On earth peace, good will toward
men.'' To the other it says,' Think not that I am come
to send peace on earth. I came not to send peace but a
sword.' 2
To the many it speaks not only of that silent abode
where the slave shall be free from his master, where the
wicked cease from troubling, and where the weary are
at rest; it points also to a world where'there shall be
neither sorrow nor any more pain.'  To the few it says,'All things are yours,' whether'life or death,' whether'things present or things to come,' all -are yours, for ye
are Christ's, and Christ is God's.4  To both it reveals a
day when reconciliation between God and man being
1 Luke ii. 10-14.' Rev. xxi. 4.
a Matt. x. 34.              4 1 Cor. iii. 21 and 22.




INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE.           179
perfected there shall be'new heavens and a new earth,
wherein dwelleth righteousness.''
To all it proclaims a Father, little recognised, but not
the less loving, who asks of every man the obedience
and affection which is so sinfully withheld; but to some
it speaks of an' earnest of the Spirit' already possessed,
and of a present heaven, enjoyed even on earth, although
accompanied by many sorrows, and oftentimes by great
tribulation.
These, always said to be'a little flock,' and'a peculiar people,' are spoken of as having received'power or
privilege to become the sons of God' in a special sense;
they are' born from  above,' born'not of blood nor of
the will of the flesh, but of God.' 2 Penitent and pardoned, they are declared to be even now'heirs of God,
and joint heirs with Christ;' they are styled' elect and
chosen;' they are said to be'predestinated from the
foundation of the world, that they might be holy and
without blame before God in love;' they are to'reign
in life;' tahey are to be'kings and priests to God and to
Christ for ever and ever.' Nor should it be forgotten
that it is to t/hese that the fearful warnings which are by
preachers generally applied to the ungodly are in the
text really addressed.  In all these cases the message is
emphatically to a class.
Broader distinctions than those referred  to  it is
scarcely possible to lay down. Confusions more disastrous than those which arise when these distinctions are
disregarded can scarcely be imagined.  Yet these con
fusions pervade Christian society, and are propagated
with untiring zeal both from the pulpit and the press.
1 2 Pet. iii. 13.      2 John i. 12, 13.




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The consequence is, that while some regard the offers
of the Gospel as addressed only to the elect, and others
look upon the glad tidings as finding adequate fulfilment
in the general improvement of society, in advancing
civilisation, and in material progress, most persons,
blending the two, reduce the high demands made upon
the Christian, as a man not of this world, to the level
of humanity in general, and regard them as imperative
only so far as they are workable in ordinary Christianised society.
The line drawn, however, in Scripture, is a very sharp
one and easily defined. On the one side of it stand not
only nominal believers, but the vast multitudes who, in
all past ages as now, have either never heard of Christ,
or heard of Him only in connection with superstitions
that have misled, assumptions that have disgusted, or
sectarianisms that have repelled. On the other side of
the line are to be found all, by whatever n:me they may
be known, who, having listened to the call to immediate
repentance and faith, have been led by the grace of God
earnestly to regard and honestly to obey it.
To both these classes a day of judgment is announced;
a day when each shall receive according to what he has
done in the body, whether it be good or bad, and therefore to all essentially a judgment of works. But not in
the same sense. Of the one we are told that they shall
not come into condemnation with the world. To the
faithful among them, though it be but in' few' things, is
to be committed'many things.' Reward bestowed will
be the recompense oftheir faith and steadfastness. Reward withheld will be the punishment of their negligence
and sin. Of the other it is said that they shall be judged




INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE.        181
every man according to his opportunities and actual
doings, some being beaten with'few stripes,' and some
with'many stripes.'
Of the finally reprobate we will not here speak. It
may be that there are men so depraved that they cannot
be saved from themselves and from their sins, without
the application of forces which are inconsistent with the
retention of that amount of moral freedom, apart from
which what we call character cannot exist-a possibility
which duly pondered may perhaps throw light on the'lake of fire' and' the second death.'
Such, as it appears to us, is the teaching of Scripture,
when regarded without reference to the dogmas of
Churches or of sects; and if, as we stated at the beginning of thlis chapter, the view we take of the contents of
the Bible more or less biases our decision as to the
Divine character of the record, it is not too much to ask
that the aspect of it now presented may be weighed
before it is rejected.
Corresponding to the twofold message we have indicated is the twofold form in which, as a fact, the Gospel
is constantly bearing upon mankind: viz., as an influence in society, alleviating human sorrow, modifying
institutions, quickening benevolence, and generally elevating public sentiment, and as a power from above,
transforming the individual believer, delivering him
from the dominion of evil, and making him to feel that,
like his Lord, he is but a pilgrim and a stranger here.
Recognised or unrecognised, these two forms of action
are constantly going on, sometimes separately embodied
with more or less distinctness in regularly organised
institutions, and sometimes blending in Churches of




182               LIBER LBRORUM.
various forms and character.  The onze, which has been
called that of multitudinism, would seem naturally to
belong to national establishments of religion; the other,
that of individualism, as naturally to nonconformity.
Nor can it be doubted that if each of these classes (as
religious ment —for we have here nothing to do with any
man's duty as a citizen) was to pursue its own calling of
God, regardless of everything else-if each could carry
out the distinctive principle it embodies without rivalry,
the measure of truth thus separately conserved would
be brought to bear upon the world with far more force
than it can be amid the strifes and ambitions which now
so frequently characterise both parties. If each has
indeed a religious idea to embody, each will of course
find its strength in the extent to which it realizes that
particular end to which its principles point. Rivalry,
leading to imitation, as it now so often does, can never
be of any real service to either, and still less to the
world at large.'
Rightly ordered, the one might teach us our obligations as a Christian people; the other, our privileges as
the children of God. The former, fulfilling the mission
of the Baptist, would call every man to repentance.
The latter, recognizing growth, would teach the sacredness of religious convictions, and hold up individueality
as the law of the spiritual life. The first, whether working through creeds and confessions, by the press or by
the pulpit, by authority or by oratorical appeal, would
seek to awaken, to rouse, and to guide. The last, recognising the fact that he who has become Christ's has, by
1 See Appendix, Note C.'National Establishments.'




INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE.       183
that affiance, been forever taken out of the hand of man,
would seek to cherish the spiritual independence of the
renewed soul, and teach that to no higher elevation can
any man reach than to that which he rises when he
becomes THE SCHOLAR OF GOD.
There may, however, still be. those who fail to see that
any particular interpretation of Scripture, whatever may
be its merits or demerits, can have very much to do with
the acceptance or rejection of the Book supposed to be
thus read or misread. The question, therefore, must be
dealt with as one of fact. Such persons must be content
to believe on testimony, whatever their own experience
may be, that in many cases interpretation has a great
deal to do with the acceptance or rejection of the document. The letter which has been prefixed to this volume
may be regarded as a witness. For there, as among men
generally, the Bible is clearly held responsible for dogmas which it does not teach, the Gospel being not unfrequently rejected because, among other things, it is
supposed to consign all but a mere fraction of the human
race to eternal wickedness and misery.
That such is not the fact can of course only be proved
by an appeal from man to God-from the commentary
to the text-from the traditions of the Church to the true
sayings of the Holy Ghost; but this, of course, involves
interpretation. Other evidence might be adduced, if it
were needful, to show that the connection between prevailing unbelief and ordinary orthodox theology is not
an imaginary one.  The late MIr. Isaac Taylor, than
whom no one has a better right to speak on this subject,
has distinctly avowed his conviction that the only efectual remedy for modern scepticism is to be found'in




184             LIBER LIBRORUM.
AN INTELLIGIBLE AND DEFENSIBLE PRINCIPLE OF BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION.'' Until this is obtained,' he says,' Christianity will be
found powerless against infidelity.' Those who have
watched the current of public opinion carefully and
closely, know well-much as they may dislike the conclusion or shrink from the avowal of it-that' the growing feeling that prevails, amid all the splendours of
advancing science, that this is but the night-time of the
soul,' can only be relieved by'a thorough and absolute
deliverance of the Bible from the trammels that have
been imposed upon it by polemical theology."'
The Restoration of Belief.




CHAPTER X.
THE MODERN PHARISEE.
BY the'Pharisee' is here meant the man who —like his
prototype of old-first attaches a superstitious importance to the letter of Scripture, and then adds to it a
crowd of theological inferences, sometimes based on the
authority of'fathers,' and sometimes developed on principles of interpretation which permit the expositor to
tread in the footsteps of those Jewish rabbis who made
mountains of meaning to hang on the plainest statements.
Pharisees-whatever may be their personal excellence
-are, in relation to the Bible, mainly ruled by old prejudices; they delight in whatever is fixed, whether by
authority or by the common opinion of Christians. They
insist that reverence for the past is commancdecd in Scripture, since we are told to'ask for the old paths;' that
submission to the opinions of the good is enforced, since
we are bidden to follow' the footsteps of the flock.' The
connection in which these passages may stand is with
such persons a matter of very little moment. To qllestion their applicability is but to indicate the unhallowed
consequences which flow from the exercise of private
judgment. To such men the plenary inspiration of the
Bible is the first article, if not the foundation of their




186'             LIBER LIBRORUM.
faith. With most of them the authority of the Church
to expound the volume is the complement of their belief.
That this idea, however expressed or embodied, carries with it not only the denial to revelation of its selfevidencing nature, as light coming from  God to man,
but also a casting away of the birthright of the Christian
as a child of the light, never seems to enter the minds
of these good men. They wonder that so many, whom
they cannot but regard as true followers of the Redeemer, should revolt against this'disinheriting' process. They cannot see that blind submission to authority, instead of being identical with faith and humility,
is a very different thing from either the one or the other.
They forget that the filial spirit is to trust the cFather,
not the stranger or even the brother. They forget that
to be childlike is not to be childish, and that Rome has
taught us there is no limit to the surrender that will be
demanded if once we yield to any man the right of discerning for us what is true and what is false.
Let us, however, inquire what can be said for the
theory-since it is nothing more-that the Bible from
Genesis to Revelation is inspired and infallible.
The latest, and in some respects the most elaborate,
defence of the infallibility of the Bible as a book will probably be found in a volume of sermons by Mr. Burgon,
preached before the University of Oxford soon after the
publication of'Essays and Reviews.' In reading that
work, as well as various other publications taking similar
ground, one is certainly startled to find not how much,
but how very little, can be advanced in favour either of
the verbal or plenary inspiration of Scripture. Everything important in the enquiry seems to be ass'umed.




THE MODERN PHARISEE.             187
The ground taken is,'The verbal inspiration of the
Bible is an axiom, a first truth from which all others
start.' The conclusions of those who advocate this
theory do not, of course, embrace either the denial of
various readings or the imperfections of translations, but
it is difficult to see how the admission of the one or the
performance of the other can be consistent with the
theory so much valued.
The form in which these views are commonly put is
something like this: Our Lord has said,'the Scripture
cannot be broken' (explained away-so Alford on
John x. 35), therefore everything in the volume called
by us the Bible is inspired and'infallible.' Or thus:'prophets and apostles claim, and justly, to deliver
God-breathed messages; therefore historians, whether
narrators of what they had seen or copyists from public
records, must necessarily possess the same Divine gift.'
Or again: Jesus prayed for HIis apostles, saying,'sanctify them by Thy truth, Thy word is truth;' therefore
everything regarded as Scripture in our Lord's time is
God's revealed truth. That the Septuagint then contained portions of the Apocrypha they do not think it
worth while to notice. That is one course of reasoning.
A second is this:' If the authorship of each book is
not accurately stated, the truthfulness of its contents
departs.' Mr. Burgon says,' If the son of Nun did not
write the book which goes under his name, then the
narrative is not authentic.' If any distinction be drawn
between the inspired and the uninspired in Scripture,
then everything belonging to the latter category must
be cast out. That which is stated may be perfectly
true; the man who records it may have been an ear or




188              LIBER LIBRORUM.
an eye witness of what he tells us; nevertheless, if he
has not been inspired in such a sense as to render any
inaccuracy impossible, his words are worthless.'We
refuse,' Mr. Burgon goes on to say,'to retain a single
passage which is not (in the highest sense) the Word of
God.' Not only must the message itself be inspired and
infallible, every accessory to it must, in' the same way,
be inspired also.  Refusing to allow  that a given
thought may be both truthfully and accurately expressed ill varying words, he says,' as for thoughts
being inspired without the words, you may as well talk
of a tune without notes or a sum without figures.'
These extravagancies, for such we cannot but think
them, are supposed to find support in reasonings like
these.' Admit the slightest difference as to the infallibility of different portions of the Bible and you make
every man a judge as to what be will receive and what
he will reject.' Such a man must'take a pen and cross
out every word he imagines to be uninspired, in which
case how can we know that he does not cross out texts
on which we rest our hopes?' Such is the second line
of argument.
But there is a third which amounts to this:' Christ and
His apostles quoted from the Old Testament, therefore
every part of the Book from which they quoted is certainly inspired.' Further, where Christ and His apostles
apptly Scripture, the text thus used must originally have
had hidden within it the particular truth it is used to
illustrate; e. g.'If Deuteronomy xxv. 4 has no reference to the Christian ministry, then the entire context
in two of St. Paul's Epistles (1 Corinthians ix. 9; 1 Timothy v. 18) must go at once.' Further still: if Paul




THE MODERN PHARISEE.                189
shows, as he does, that certain Scriptures may be applied
allegorically, all Scripture must have a depth of meaning
far beyond that which appears; in consequence, all of it
is inspired, and it is our duty to bring out hidden meanings from everything, whatever may be the end for
which it was primarily given.'Even mere catalogues
of names,' insists Mr. Burgon,'are full of edification,
the driest details full of God. The list of the dukes of
Edom  is as much inspired, and in the same sense, as
every other part.'' This is the third line of reasoning.
It is always difficult to state the views of an opponent in what he would consider a fair and full manner,
and it is quite possible that this has not been accomplished in the present instance. But if it be so, the
defect is unintentional.
Easy is it to understand how all this inconclusive discourse about inspiration may be to many pious persons
wonderfully attractive.  They will say it is such a
simple view, so  straightforward and reverential, so
humbling to man's reason, so needful for his guidance,
that to reject it is as dishonouring to God as it is indicative of human pride. Whether it be a true view or
not seems scarcely worthy of consideration.  To doubt
on such a matter is to sin.
The answer to such declamation is, however, obvious.
The view in question is a mere theory, and certainly not
the less so because the persons who hold it are continuually telling us they have no theory of inspiration-they
believe in it, and that is enough. The question is, why'Gaussen says of the entire Bible:'In its miraculous pages every
verse and word, without exception, even to a particle apparently the
most indifferent, must have been given of God.'




190              LIBER LIBRORUM.
do they believe in what is called the verbal inspiration
of Scripture? That the Word of God is embodied in
the Bible is here, at least, not disputed; that, as they put
it,'to impute blunders to the Holy Ghost is an impiety,'
cannot, surely, be denied; that'to bow before a Divine
statement without question becomes us as creatures far
better than stumbling at it,' every Christian must allow;
but does it thence follow that evesrything found within
the volume which contains God's word is as sacred and
as infallible as that word itself?  This is the real point
in question.
Many think otherwise; they cannot bring themselves
to believe that it is either safe or reverent to assume
without adequate evidence that anything is properly
speaking Divine which is contrary to what is elsewhere
revealed of God, anything which, when examined and
tested by the light Christ has given us, is incapable of
defence. Well may such persons ask,' Is it right to stake
the truthfulness of the Bible on the accuracy or otherwise of the account we have of its authorship, or, indeed,
on any literary question whatever? Is it either wise or
just to affirm that the exact substance of a statement, the
real purport of what may have been spoken, is not for
all practical purposes the same thing as the very words
which were actually uttered?' Too much is at issue to
render these enquiries other than of vital importance.
The question of hidden meanings is a more delicate
one to deal with, for if we must of necessity hold that
every text (those quoted by the Evangelist Matthew,
for instance) had in it originally the signification which
is there by accommodation implied; if the writer brings
each several passage from the Old Testament before us,




THE MIODERN PHARISEE.            191
not as an illustration, refulfilment, or reapplication of
what had occurred long before, not as an accommodation
in any sense, but simply as a development; if we are to
believe that the beautiful image of Rachel weeping for
her children was intended by him who first used it as a
mystic prophecy of the massacre at Bethlehem; if the
words of Hosea,' Out of Egypt have I called my son,'
embody a distinct prophecy of the flight of Joseph:
then it may readily be granted the Bible assumes a
character which obliges us to admit our utter incapacity
to understand even its plainest narratives.
Further, if we are bound to interpret the Old Testament generally, as St. Paul in some cases interprets it;
if we are to find in every historical personage a type of
Christ; if we are to say of each great event that is
recorded,'which thing is an allegory,' and to expound
accordingly: then, undoubtedly, we must regard every
part of the Bible without exception as inspired, infallible, and alas! it must be added, unintelligible. Nothing can be plainer than that, if this be the case, no
uninspired man is capable of interpreting the Bible; for
who would consent to be, in this respect, at the mercy
of one who, for aught we can tell, may be fanciful, ingenious, or weak? Under such methods Mr. Jowett is
right in saying,'we may shut our lexicons and draw
lots for the sense.' The Jewish rabbis, by following
such a course without the qualification required-infallible guidance-made, as our Lord Himself tells us,'the
word of God of none effect.' One of them, it is said,
actually professed to teach thirteen different methods of
expounding the plainest declarations.- Short of inspiration, it is obviously impossible that any man should be




192              LIBER LIBRORUIM.
qualified to interpret Scripture if he is to develop what
he assumes to be truth out of the Book, instead of being
content to accept what herfinds there.
The only answer to all this is THE CHURCH. God,
we are told, has provided for all difficulty by giving to
His Church-whether represented by popes or councils,
by fathers or by common consent, matters not-power
and authority to settle all disputed points, and to declare
to the people the true meaning of the written Word.
Mr. Burgon soon finds himself obliged to fall back
upon this doctrine.'God,' he says,'vouchsafes to His
Church effectual guidance. Want of faith in the Church
(by which he understands the Church of England) and
her ordinances is the first step in a soul's downward
progress.' To imagine oneself a disciple of Christ or
Paul, and so to disengage oneself from the history of
Christendom and the after-thoughts of theology is, he
thinks,'inordinate conceit.' The creeds, he assures us,
are older than Scripture. The doctrines of the Church
were not found in Scripture; they existed before it, and
are only proved by it. He speaks of these creeds as' coeval with Christianity itself,' and as bearing'a
solemn independent testimony from the very birthday
of Christianity.' He thinks it monstrous to suppose
that a man is either at liberty or able to gather his own
religion for himself out of the Bible. Nor are we, in
England, he says, thus left.'The book of Common
Prayer is a sufficient safeguard.'
Nor is he alone in this view. Another distinguished
man, although certainly of a very different school-Dr.
Rowland Williams-tells us that the Church is'an
inspired society;' that'the Prayer Book is constructed




THE MODERN PHARISEE.             193
on this idea;' and that the Bible, like the liturgy, is'the written voice of the congregation.' So strangely
do extremes sometimes meet.
It may not be unadvisable here to separate the germ
of truth which is found in these observations from the
mass of error by which it is surrounded. No one disputes that the Church (that is, a company of living
believers in Christ) was called into existence by the
Lord and His Apostles before the New Testament was
written; but it owes this existence to the word which
the Scriptures contain.'The word was antecedent to
the existence of the Church, as the cause is to the effect.
The twriting of that Word, and its reception when
written, were subsequent to the formation of the Church
(the Christian congregation of believers), but the writing only made permanent for future time the Word by
which the Church had been created; and the reception
of the writings only recognised them as the same Word
in its form of permanence. Thus, while the Church is
chronologically before the Bible, the Bible is potentially
before the Church; since the written Word, which is
the ground of faith to later generations, is one in origin,
authority, and substance with. the oral Word, which
was the ground of faith to the first generation of Christians.' 1
Of course, neither these facts nor any reasoning
founded thereon, will have weight with persons, and
they are many, who are determined, at all hazards, to
uphold ecclesiastical authority; still less with those
who tell us that the theological theories and peculiar
views of Paul and John-although worthy of respect
Bernard's Bampton Lectures.
9




194              LIBER LIBROUIM.
because worked out with much painful thought-are in
no respects revelation, or at all binding upon others.
For here again extremes meet. The Sceptic, classing
apostoli2 developments with those of a later age, necessarily plays kito the hands of those who maintain a
continual inspiration in the Church, and in so doing,
whatever he may intend, practically supports its claim
to an authority which, if not absolute, is paramount to
every other. Some ChGurch.men on the other hand, it
may be feared, by the arrogance they often manifest,
as well as by the unreasonableness of the pretensions
they put forth, drive thoughtful men into scepticism-a
result for which such persons care little, so long as the
esoteric unbelief is concealed by an exoteric respect for
ecclesiastics.
And here it is that Romanism harmonises with some
extreme forms of Anglicanism, to an extent that may
well prepare the way for reunion.  Articles, as we
have seen, can be easily explained away; Ritualistic
observances may be practised in common; misunderstandings may, without difficulty, be removed; all
obstacles, in short, may soon be got out of the way, if
only it is admitted that there is a perpetual inspiration
in the Church, carrying with it, of course, everything
that is necessarily connected therewith. For if, as this
theory supposes, theology is a science, and like other
sciences,.progressive; yet progress, as Dr. Dollinger
puts it,'not like that of chemistry-since there can be
no discovery of new facts, from which we are to induce
new laws; but a progress analogous to that of geometry
-since it consists in the gradual evolution of the fundamental ideas, the discovery of new relations involved




THE MODERN PHARISEE.             195
in them, and new spheres in which they are valid;' if,
we repeat, this be granted, everything is yielded; since
only authorised teachers, enjoying the perpetual inspiration assumed to be in the Church, can be fit to
evolve fundamental ideas, to discover new relations, or
to decide on the new spheres in which they are valid.
On this showing, the subjection of mankind everywhere
to an organised body of ecclesiastics is inevitable.'
Only let this great end be secured, and then, as Dr.
Pusey has told us,'there is no insurmountable obstacle
to the union of the Roman, Greek, and Anglican communions.' A submissive return to the authority of the
Church thus becomes our only chance of safety.' Dissent,' it is thought, would, under such circumstances,'undoubtedly break in pieces beneath the silent action
of universal attraction;' or, which is far more probable,
be broken up by the hammer of power.
Let us look these matters fairly in the face. The fundamental principle underlying all that agitates us in the
present day is, a claim, common alike to Roman and
Anglican, to an uninterrupted succession of the apostolate; to a teaching authority, akin to that of the apostles, exercised in interpreting the doctrine of Jesus
Christ; to the exclusive right of administering what are
called sacraments. Truly has it been insisted that when
the Church of England yields this, she yields all. For,'with a theory that so closely approximates to that of
Catholic orthodoxy; with a liturgy drawn exclusively
from Catholic sources; and with a catechism capable of
imbuing the minds of her children with the most Catholic apprehension of the two principal sacraments-Bap1 See Appendix. Note D.'Church Authority.'




196              LIBER LIBRORUM.
tism  and the Holy Eucharist-who can doubt the ultimate reunion of the Anglican Church with the rest of
Christendom?' Our choice, then, as we have been recently told, lies'(and lies only)' between a Christianity
organised, hierarchical, and dogmatic,' and that simple
dependence upon God alone, which, instead of producing-as some pretend( it does-' a sinful uncertainty of
mind,' really brings with it peace and joy in believing,
and a true rest in the Holy Ghost.
That extreme views on the inspiration of Scripture,
whether called plenary or verbal, when fearlessly and
logically carried out, invariably strengthen the hands of
the enemy is but too clear. They inevitably vest the
final decision as to what the Book says in man; its
value, therefore, is necessarily dependent on the existence and authority of an organised body called the
Church.
It may indeed be said, and truthfully, that among the
advocates of verbal inspiration and an infallible book,
may be found a multitude who expressly repudiate
Church authority.  Those who do so, however, commonly fall back upon what in reality amounts to the
same thing-the unquestioning acceptance, and, where
it is possible, the enforcement of an hereditary or traditional theology, sometimes expressed in catechisms or
other official documents, and sometimes in the more
stringent form of public opinion, controlling the sect to
which a man belongs. Such are the mischiefs which
inevitably spring from modern pharisaism, and its idolatry of the Bible.'
On the other hand, supposing all that has been ad1 See Appendix. Note E.'The Idolatry of the Bible.'




THE MODERN PHARISEE.            197
vanced to be true, and that the distinction drawn between the historical and the ethical portions of the Bible
is a just one-that some things, therefore, in Scripture
are not properly God-breathed communications-what
have we lost? By how much are we the poorer? What
consolations have fled? What pillar has been withdrawn
from the great spiritual edifice? To what extent, and
in what way, is the Bible less to us than it was before?
Surely it is hard to see that anything whatever has even
been impaired in worth.
But it may be replied, IWhat have we gained?'
Nothing, assuredly, in the way of compromise with the
unbeliever. Nothing which, in itself, is likely to render
either Christ or his Gospel less distasteful than it has
always been to the worldly and the profane. Something,
however, can scarcely fail to have been accomplished
towards strengthening the faith of a class who have had
their confidence in Divine truth shaken by assertions
which. will not beat close examination. Something, it
may be hoped, towards satisfying such persons that
instructed Christians do not believe that the Bible can
be explained away, or that criticism can, step by step,
undermine its revelations. Something, it may perhaps
be added, towards the comfort of hope in souls that have
stumbled at the word, not because of disobedience, but
because under that name they have confused the human
with the Divine.  Something, therefore, towards the
removal of perplexities from minds that have dwelt with
a morbid interest on difficulties for which revelation is
aot responsible, and which, if incapable of being altogether removed may, at least, be so diminished as to lose
their importance, and cease to have mischievous effects.




CHAPTER XI.
A POSTSCRIPT.
Two or three objections relative to matters discussed
in the foregoing pages having been made in the various
conversations which the author has had with intelligent
doubters and others, he refers to them here in order that
they may be taken for what they are worth. The first
has been put thus:-'You seem to think that the sceptic, while denying
the authority of the Gospels, is inconsistent enough to
give the evangelists credit for truly recording what appeared to them to be miraculous occurrences. This, however, is not the fact, since the unbeliever does not admit
for a moment that the narratives were written down by
eye-witnesses. Regarding the Gospels as having been
penned at least half a century after the events they profess to record, he holds that the writers, whoever they
might be, merely express the opinions of the day in
which they wrote respecting the facts; that the narratives they give are not properly speaking facts, but the
interpretations of a later age respecting the facts. He
considers that a halo of wonder and supernaturalism
grew arcound the history of Christianity in the early part
of the first century, and that this was reflected in the




A POSTSCRIPT.                199
writings of the evangelists. The dilemma, therefore, so
often put, that these writers were either deceived or
deceivers, he argues, falls to the ground.  They need
not, he says, have been either. The writers necessarily
put upon the evangelic history the coloring of the traditional sources from which it was derived; they could
not have done otherwise.  How many times, he exclaims, in the world's history has a mass of supernatural
belief groewn routnd a nucleus of the purest religious
idea! All religions are more or less cradled in such beliefs. Hence a man may deny the supernatural in the
Bible and yet be a good Christian after all. Christianity is an all-embracing reality; it has actually moulded
the whole civilisation of the modern world; it lives in
society, speaks in our laws, and breathes more or less in
the thoughts, feelings, and moral principles of every
good man, whatever may be his speculative difficulties.
Such an one cannot strip himself of Christianity if he
would; and, therefore, whatever you' may call him, he
is a Christian, for his nature has been moulded by
Christian influences.'
We reply:'Belief in the miracles of our Lord and
His disciples does not depend on the amount of evidence
which can be brought forward in support either of the
authorship of the Gospels or of the precise time when
they were composed. Christianity itself, apart altogether from the particular narratives in question, rests
on miracle. If Christ be not risen Christianity is a mere
delusion. On the other hand, if the Redeemer did rise
from the dead the supernatural is admitted.
To regard the statements of the evangelists-calm,
unexcited, colorless as they confessedly are-as mere




200              LIBER LIBRORUM.
representations of the excited thoughts and feelings of
a later age, tinged, or rather tainted, as in this case
they must be, by the traditional sources from which
they were derived, is, to say the very least of it, every
way improbable,'a most unlikely guess' at the best.
Nothing, indeed, strikes one more than the comparatively little effect which, according to the narrative, the
miracles appear to have produced beyond the limited
circles in which they were performed. So abundant
were they, so quietly were they wrought, so unpretending was the character of the worker, and so practically
benevolent His end and aim, that they scarcely seem to
have been regarded as wonders. The demand still was,'give us a sign,' as if signs in abundance were not
observable on every hand.
The fact that one great section of the Jews-the
Pharisees —regarded the entire national history as miraculous, and lived and died in constant expectation of
a supernatural deliverer; that another section-the Sadducees-denied the spiritual world altogether; and that
a third-the Iterodians-had become bound up with
the support of things as they then were, far from being
favourable to an easy credulity in relation to Christianity, must have wrought in an opposite direction. Those
who believed that their'own children' could miraculously cast out devils; Herod, who thought that John
the Baptist had risen from the dead, and the many who
considered Christ to be' Elias, or one of the prophets'
reappearing upon earth, were none of them men who,
like modern sceptics, would deny the supernatural altogether. Rather would they, as believers in the possibility of miracles, look the more narrowly into the




A POSTSCRIPT.               201
reality of those which were professedly wrought by
Jesus and His apostles.  That they did so, and found
themselves unable to do more than attribute what they
could not deny to the agency of Beelzebub, is evidence
that the lapse of half a century was not needed in order
to account for miraculous claims-that this element,
however it may be regarded, was certainly not an aftergrowth.
Had there been in our Lord's time a prevailing disbelief in miracles, and half a century later a revived
faith in them, there might be at least some plausible
ground for supposing that this element gathered in the
course of years around what was once only a religious
idea. But there is no pretext for such a conclusion.
Equally unreasonable is it to assumne that no record was
made of the facts by eye-witnesses, and at the time the
events occurred; that side by side with a large body of
persecuted believers, and with fixed institutions established as memorials of supposed facts, nothing should
exist relating thereto beyond dim, hazy, and untrustworthy traditions.
The absurdity of the notion that every man is a
Christian whose nature has, in spite of himself, been
moulded by Christian influences, whatever may be the
amount of his unbelief, is obvious, since on this showing, any'virtuous Jew or- heathen, who, from whatever
circumstance, has come under the soul-elevating power
of the ethical element in the New Testament, has a
claim to be embraced in the Christian fellowship, which,
if faith in the Redeemer be anything at all, is simply an
extravagance.
9*




202               LIBER LIBROBUMA.
The second objection taken is of a directly opposite
character, and may be expressed thus:-'It is not safe to allow that any sceptic can, in a true
sense, be religious. No man can, properly speaking, be
such who rejects the basis on which all practical virtue
rests.  No one can be good, so long as the root from
which his supposed goodness springs is itself but rottenness.'
To this sweeping refusal to allow any quarter to the
doubter, it may be replied that we have no right to
reject the testimony of Christian men who know such
persons well, and testify of some, at least, that their
lives are pure, their spirit unworldly, and their scepticism reluctant.  We have no right to assume that these
men ~reject Christ, or that the root from  which their
virtues spring is rottenness.  How much truth may be
doubted, or even denied, without spiritual death, it is
in many cases impossible for us to say; but we are
surely justified in believing that where men, though'perplext in faith, are pure in deeds,' where reverence for
Scripture has not been cast off, where difficulties relate
not so much to revealed facts as to human deductions
intermingled therewith, there is good reason for cherishing hopes which, at least- forbid us to denounce
without discrimination.
It must, however, be admitted that the union of principles which are pre-eminently Christian with the absolute rejection of Christ, is a feature peculiar to the
unbelief of the present day, and that it is one which
carries with it no common danger.  The recent appearance of a volume of essays, written by Englishmen of
high talent and standing,' avowedly for the purpose of




A POSTSCRIPT.                   203
advocating certain views derived from the writings of'
M. Comte,' is indeed a sign of the times, since Comte
not only held that the Roman Catholic system was the
only genuine form of Christianity, but proposes to'organise the education of the West by means of a body
or order, which can only rest as its prototype, the
Catholic system did, on a community of faith.''' The writers of the Essays generally regard Christian
influences as pernicious, and there is hardly an essay in
the volume which is free from attacks upon it; in some
of the essays they abound, and are supported by misrepresentations of Christian teaching. Everywhere the
quiet assumption is made that Christianity is a thing of
the past, doomed, and rapidly passing away.  Protestantism  M. Comte never spoke of but with a protest as
against a shapeless anarchical system, and he talks of
being preserved from it with an unction worthy of a
Romish zealot.'  And yet the book contains very much
that is good. The motto taken as the guide of all'The Essayists are Richard Congreve, M. A., late Fellow and
Tutor of Wadham College, Oxford; Frederick Harrison, M. A.,
Fellow and late Tutor of Wadham College, Oxford; E. S. Beesly,
M. A., of Wadham College, Oxford, Professor of History at University College, London; E. H. Pember, M. A., late Student of
Christ Church, Oxford; J. H. Bridges, NM. B., late Fellow of Oriel
College, Oxford; Charles A. Cookson, B. A., of Oriel College, Oxford; and Henry Dix Hutton, of Lincoln's Inn, Barrister-at-Law. In
the paragraphs inserted referring to the work, it has been thought
better to adopt the account given of it by the Rev. W. H. Fremantle,
Al. A., in the Cotomrap. Rev. (xii.) than to offer any anonymous criticism.  Mr. Fremantle's name and position furnish an adequate
guarantee for the truthfulness of his statements. The tide of the
book is'International Policy: Essays on the Foreign Relations of
England.' Chapman and Hall.




204                 LIBER LIBRORUM.
moral and political speculation is one which every true
Christian echoes from the bottom  of his heart-' Vivre
pour antrui.'' The constant reference is to a certain ultimate state
of human society which is believed to be approaching,
and of which the secret, though not explained, is supposed to be with the writers.' Into any details relating thereto, so far as they can be gathered, it is here
impossible to enter; but there is to be'a high priest
of humanity, who will be, more truly than any medieval pope, the only real head of the Western world;'
there are to be prayers, and priests, and sacraments, and
by these the whole world is to be regenerated.'Once,'
it is said,'let the reorganisation of the West be fairly
secure, and a noble proselytism  will become the principal collective occupation of the positive priesthood.'
A wild dream  this must of necessity appear to every
sensible man, and yet, if M. Comte's notions were mere
hypotheses, liable to all manner of changes by his followers, why should we be constantly reminded, in a
solemn manner, that we are in a state of transition, and
that some final state, which M. Comte's disciples know
of, is at hand to supersede the present'transitional
state, or state anarchy,' by which terms the present condition of Europe is constantly denoted?
1'The system of this book, (International Policy), says Mr. Harrison in the second essay (p. 152),' has already been stated in earlier
pages (Mr. Congreve's Essay, pp. 36 and 41); it implies the organisation of the West, upon a system of common moral and intellectual
principles, and on one uniform tone of public and private life; the
whole animated ind knit together by a common education and a
common body of intellectual teachers and guides. How far we are
from the realisation of this, it is not the part of this work to consider.'




A POSTSCRIPT.               205
Nor should it be unnoticed-although the authors of
the volume are probably quite unaware of the factthat writers on prophecy have, for the last thirty years,
amid no little scorn, been repeating their conviction
that the advent of some organisation of the kind anticipated is shadowed forth in the Apocalypse, and there
associated with bitter and bloody persecution, under
the headship of the last form of Antichrist.
Such, then, is one phase, and by no means an unimportant one, of the unbelief of the present day. Christianity scorned, and its missions derided, yet selfishness
condemned, duty made supreme, the whole of Western
Europe looked upon as one great commonwealth, with
common sympathies and objects, each nation desirous
of the good of the whole, rather than of its own, and all
combining to spread their common civilisation among
the other races of mankind.
With one thing it is impossible to help being struck,
viz., the singular change that has taken place in the
relative positions of Christianity and its opposite since
Robert Hall published his  celebrated sermon  on'Modern Infidelity.' Then scepticism was described as'essentially and infallibly a system of enervation, turpitude, and vice,' leading to'the frequent perpetration
of great crimes, and the total absence of great virtues.'
Nbow, the clergy are warned by this same school that'no religious organisation can long hold its ground in
popular esteem when confronted by a loftier morality
than its own.' Tien it was said of unbelief,' attention
to self is the spring of every movement and the motive
to which every action is referred.'.Now the motto
taken as a guide by them is'Vivre pour autrui,' and




2 06              LIBER LIBRORUM.
the principle kept continually in view,' The subordination of politics to morals.'
Then priests of all kinds, simpl)y as such, were hated.
Now an order so called is regarded as essential to the
regeneration of the world. Then Rome and unbelief
appeared to have little or nothing in common.  No)w,
whether consciously or unconsciously, they habitually
support and strengthen each other.  Thien unbelievers
alleged it to be a grievous defect in the morality of the
Gospel, that it neglected to inculcate patriotism, and the
Christian advocate had to urge that it was wise in God' to decline the express inculcation of a principle so liable
to degenerate into excess.'  Now we are told our great
object should be'to bring into political relations the
spirit of unselfishness,' and to regard love of country as
a great evil when it conflicts with the love of the human
race.
And yet, in spite of all these differences, the old
hatred to Christianity prevails, and greatly should we
err if we concluded that any essential change had
actually taken place.  It still remains certain  that'whenever the religious feeling or instinct in man
works freely, without an historical revelation, it must
beget a system of priestcraft; an intellectual priesthood it may be, but inevitably one more intolerant,
exclusive, and oppressive than any other with which
the world has ever been cursed."
The third objection, different from  either of the preceding, will, it is to be feared, be a popular one. It
runs thus: -' Why meddle at all with this difficult and dangerous
See Maurice's Lectures on the Religions of the World.




A POSTSCRIPT.                207
subject?  True Christians, resting in implicit faith on
Scripture, can only be unsettled and injured by learning
that there is even room for a doubt regarding the absolute inspiration of any portion of the Bible. If there
is indeed a weak point in the arguments usually brought
forward to support either the plenary or verbal theory,
far better is it to throw a cloak over such a defect than
to unveil it before the world, however good may be the
intention. Belief in what the Bible contains is necessarily to most persons a prejudice, and the cases are
few in which this can be exchanged for a conviction.
Why then shake a prejudice which is so useful when
you are unable to ensure its being superseded by anything better?'To the sceptic you can do no good. His mind is
made up to reject a revelation which, if true, condemns
him. He will only argue from your admissions that if
it is lawful to draw any line between the inspired and
uninspired in Scripture, the whole question of its acceptance or rejection comes to be one of degree only. The
same criticism which you think justifies doubt in relation
to the narrative of the execution of Saul's seven sons,
carries him somewhat further, and if he ends in excluding
the story of the Resurrection itself, he has only to thank
you for the example.'
We reply: The ground here taken assumnes that it is
better for men to abide in error, if it can be made useful, than to arrive at truth if accompanied by possible
danger. It is the old distrust of the merely true as such,
and so far indicates want of confidence in Him who is
emphatically' the Truth.' Such is essentially the spirit
of Rome, for it proceeds on the supposition that men




208              LIBER LLBRORUM.
must, at all hazards, be led into what may be regarded
as the right path, whatever may be the means used.
The end sanctifies all. This course is an immoral one,
and cannot therefore be sustained. An unshaken faith
in God, in truth, and in uprightness can alone deliver us
from the wretched delusion involved in all such miserable
expedients.
That any true Christian is likely to have his confidence shaken by honest investigation is not to be
believed for a moment by anyone who really considers
what Divine trust is, and the grounds on which it rests,
That the hardened sceptic may be incapable of estimating the force of any reasoning which is presented to him
in fiaour of the authority of the Bible is likely enough.
But let us remember that the man thus spoken of was
not always unimpressible. There was, in all probability,
a time in his mental history, as there has been in that
of most of us, when the syren voice of the doubter was
listened to with a strange admixture of fear and wonder;
when its charm was found rather in the feeling of independence that it flattered than in the force of its suggestions; when a bold treatment would have been successful; when an opposite course-timidity, distrust denunciation-on the part of the believer proved fatal. It is
for men in this stage-and at the present moment they
are a countless multitude-that we now write. Should
they reflect on that which has been written it may
surely be expecte'd that to some the Book will be found
beneficial, a hope which we would on no account exchange for the plaudits of a world, however' religious'
that'-world' might call itself.
As for the pretence-for it is really nothing better



A POSTSCRIPT.              209
that to give up anything in the Bible is in effect to give
up all; that if a line is to be drawn anywhere its place
must be fixed by the caprice of the reader; it is enough
to observe that the real question is not how much or
how little may be regarded as human in Scripture, but
on what ground the distinction in question is proposed
to be made. Reason, it is granted, is not in itself adequate to judge as to what is or is not worthy of God.
Taste, caprice, preconceptions of any kind have nothing
whatever to do with the matter. If the rebuke to
Balaam or the deliverance of Jonah are to be rejected
because it seems incredible or grotesque that an ass
should speak or a whale disgorge its living burden, we
adopt a principle which certainly leads to the construction rather than to the reception of a Divine revelation.
But if, on the contrary, we confine ourselves to the test
of congruity; if we accept or reject only on the ground
of the harmony or want of harmony which a statement
has with other revelations, with all that God has taught
us whether by the servant or by the Son regarding His
own character and will; if we do this in dependence on
the teaching of that Spirit which, as an unction from the
Holy One, is given to' the lowly heart and pure;' if we
but follow the example of those early Christians who
tried the spirits whether they were of God or not, we
may be quite sure that the danger supposed is altogether
imnaginary, and that'the honest mind, calmly seeking
after God's truth in the spirit He approves, will not be
at a loss to make sufficient distinction between religious
or ethical truth and departments belonging to the natural and human.'
He who wishes to confound them will easily succeed




210               LIBERI LIBR6RUM.
in doing so; but' he who sincerely seeks to distinguish
the minor parts, in which the correctness of inspiration
does not necessarily lie, from the moral and religious
elements constituting revelation proper,' may do so
without difficulty.'The religious and theological element,' says Dr. Pye Smith,'or whatever contains religious truth, precept, or expectation, cannot but appear
perfectly distinct and manifest to any man who understands language, and is not previously determined to
pervert what is plainly before his eyes.'
One word more. Experience has taught us that, in
the present day, the rejection of the Bible is almost invariably followed by painful questionings, sometimes as
to the existence and sometimes as to the character of
God. Let us realise the fact that it can scarcely ever
be otherwise. Apart from Scripture, it is impossible to
know anything of the Creator which can assure us either
of His presence or His will; of His relation to us or of
our condition before HI-im. How important, then, is it
that the first beginnings of doubt should be honestly
dealt with! How foolish to think or speak of the acceptance or rejection of' the Book' as a light thing, so
long as we come under the influences which Christianity
has diffused over the globe. The truth or falsehood of
the Bible, its worth or its worthlessness, is the great
question of the day. It is not too much to affirm that
the life or death of modern society hangs upon the issue.




NOTES.
A. (Chap. ii. p. 65.)
EMINENT WITNESSES.
The following, among others, may be quoted:HOOKER.'As incredible praises given, unto men do often
abate and impair the credit of their deserved commendation,
so we must likewise take great heed, lest in attributing unto
Scripture more than it can have, the incredibility of that do
cause even those things which indeed it hath most abundantly
to be less esteemed.' 1
BAXTER (Richard).' Here I must tell you a great and needful truth, which ignorant Christians, fearing to confess, by
overdoing tempt men to infidelity. The Scripture is like a
man's body, where some parts are but for the preservation of
the rest, and may be maimed without death. The sense is
the soul of the Scripture, and the letters but the body or
vehicle.' 2
TILLOTSON (Archbishop).'If any man is of opinion that
Moses might write the history of those actions which he himself did, or was present at, witchout an immediate revelation
of them; or that Solomon, by his natural and acquired wisdom, might speak those wise sayings which are in his Proverbs;
or that the Evangelists might write what they heard and saw,
or what they had good assurance of from others, as St. Luke
tells us he did; or that St. Paul might write for his cloak and
1 Hooker, p. 274.        2 Wordsworth's Christian Institutes.




212                       NOTES.
parchment at Troas, and salute by name his friends and
brethren; or that he might advise Timothy to drink a little
wine, &c., without the immediate dictate of the Spirit of
God: he seems to have reason on his side.''
WARBURTON.'Thus we see the advantages resulting from
a PARTIAL INSPIRATION as here contended for and explained;
it answers all the ends of a Scripture universally and organically inspired, by producing an unerring rule of faith and
manners; and, besides, obviates all those objections to inspiration which arise from the too high notion of it, such as trifling
errors in circumstances of small importance.' 2
PALEY.' The books (of the Old Testament) were universally
read and received by the Jews of our Saviour's time.  He and
His apostles, in common with all other Jews, referred to them,
alluded to them, used them: yet, except where he expressly
ascribes a Divine authority to particular predictions, I do not
know that we can strictly draw any conclusion from the books
being so used and applied, besides the proof which it unquestionably is, of their notoriety and reception at that time.' I
SCOTT (Thomas).'By the Divine inspiration of the Holy
Scriptures, I mean such an immediate and complete discovery
by the Holy Spirit to the minds of the sacred penmen of those
things which could not have been otherwise known, and such an
effectual superintending as to those things which they might
be informed of by other means, as entirely to preserve them
from error in every particular which could in the least degree
affect any of the doctrines or commandments contained.' 4
WATSON (Bishop).'As to the apostles themselves, whenever they wrote or spoke concerning Christianity. that fund of
inspiration kept them  right.  But they were reasonable
creatures as well as inspired apostles, and therefore could
speak or write about common affairs as men that have the use
of their reason without any inspiration can easily do.' 5
1 Sermon 168, p. 449, fol.               4 Essays, p. 8.
2 Works, 4to, 1778, pp. 556, 557.         5 Tracts, p. 446.
8 Evidences of Christianity, p. 291.




EMINENT WITNESSES.                  213
TOMLrNE (Bishop).' They (the sacred penmen) were sometimes left to the common use of their faculties, and did not
upon every occasion stand in need of supernatural communication; but whenever and as far as the Divine assistance was
necessary it was always afforded.''
WHATELY (Archbishop).'In the first place we should bear
in mind what parts of the Bible are to be regarded as strictly
and properly bearing the character of revelation.  A great
part of it is historical; and though we believe the sacred historians to have been under the guidance of the Holy Spirit to
lead them into all necessary religious truth, to guard them
against any material error, and in some few cases, to inform
them of what could not be known by human means; yet, the
very nature of history is such that it would be unreasonable
to expect to find each single event that is narrated to be a
matter of high importance.' 2
HINDS (Bishop).'To RELIGIOUS instruction of whatever
kind is confined the Scriptural character of Scripture, the
agency of the HoLY SPIRIT. It is not, therefore, truth of all
kinds that the Bible was inspired to teach, but only such
truth as tends to religious edification; and the Bible is consequently infallible as regards this, and this alone.' 
SMITH (Dr. Pye).'I regard as inspired Scripture all that
refers to holy things, all that can bear the character of
"Oracles of God," and admit the rest as appendages of the
nature of private memoirs or public records, useful to the
antiquary and the philologist, but which belong not to the
rule of faith or the directory of practice. To this extent, and
this only, can I regard the sanction of the New Testament as
given to the inspiration of the Old. Inspiration belongs to
RELIGIOUS objects, and to attach it to other things is to lose
sight of its nature, and misapply its design.'' I can find no end of my anxiety, no rest for my faith, no
satisfaction for my understanding, till I embrace the senti1 Theology, pp. 21-2.                   2 Essays, p. 223.
S On the Inspiration of Scripture.




214                      NOTES.
ment that the qualities of sanctity and inspiration belong
only to the religious and theoretical element which is diffused
through the Old Testament; and that where this element is
absent-where there is nothing adapted to communicate
" doctrine, reproof, correction, or instruction in righteousness," nothing fitted to "make the man of God perfect,
thoroughly furnished unto every good work "-there we are
not called to acknowledge any inspiration, nor warranted to
assume it.' 1
Nine of these extracts are made from the' Defence of the
Rev. Rowland Williams, D. D., in the Arches Court of Canterbury, by James Fitzjames Stephen, M. A., of the Inner
Temple, Barrister-at-Law, Recorder of Newark-on-Trent.'
The three last are from'The Text of the Old Testament
Considered,' by Samuel Davidson, D. D.
B. (Chap. ix. p. 173.)
BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION.
A brief glance at the history of Biblical interpretation,
regarded as a science, will alone be sufficient to explain how
it is that the Sacred Volume has come to be regarded as indefinite in its teachings, and more or less unintelligible in its
utterances. Any book, treated as it has been, must necessarily
be stamped with that character.
The following sketch is abridged from an article on Interpretation, by Dr. Credner, found in Kitto's Biblical Cyclopedia, edited by Dr. W. L. Alexander of Edinburgh.
Three different modes of interpreting the Bible have at
different periods been adopted: the GRAMMATICAL, the ALLEGORICAL, and the DOGMATICAL.
The grammatical mode of interpretation simply investi1 Paper in Cong. Mag. (July, 1838), quoted from Davidson.




BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION.               215
gates the sense contained in the words of the Bible. The
allegorical maintains that the  words of Scripture  have,
besides their simple sense, another which is concealed as
behind a picture, and endeavours to find out this supposed
figurative sense. The dogmatical endeavours to explain the
Bible in harmony with the dogmas of the Church, following
the principle of analogia fdei.  The chief expedient adopted
in order to effect harmony of interpretation has been to consider certain articles of faith to be LEADING DOCTRINES, and
to regulate and define accordingly the sense of the Bible
wherever it appeared doubtful and uncertain.
When the principle of one general Catholic Church was
adopted, it was found difficult to select doctrines by the application of which to Biblical interpretation a perfect harmony
could be effected. Yet the toants of science powerfully demanded  a systematical arrangement of Biblical doctrines.
This sense of need led first of all to allegorical interpretation.
Origen argues-thus:'The Holy Scriptures inspired by God
form an harmonious whole, perfect in itself, without any defects and contradictions, and containing nothing that is insignificant and superfluous.  GrammatiQal interpretation leads to
obstacles and objections which are inadmissible. Now, since
the merely grammatical interpretation can neither remove nor
overcome these objections, we must seek for an expedient
beyond the boundaries of grammatical interpretation. The
allegorical offers this expedient, and consequently is above
the grammatical.'
Allegorical interpretation, however, it soon appeared, could
not be reduced to settled rules, since it necessarily depends
upon the greater or less influence of the imagination; so in process of time there gradually sprung up the dogmatical mode,
founded upon the interpretations of ecclesiastical teachers who
were recognised as orthodox in the Catholic Church. This
more and more supplanted the allegorical, which henceforward
was left to the wit and ingenuity of a few individuals.




21 6                     NOTES.
After the commencement of the fifth century, partly in consequence of the full development of the ecclesiastical system of
doctrines defined in all their parts, and partly by continually
increasing ignorance of the languages in which the Bible was
written, interpretation was confined to the mere collection of
explanations which had first been given by men whose ecclesiastical orthodoxy was regarded as unquestionable.
During the middle ages, however, allegorical interpretation
prevailed, chiefly because it gave satisfaction to sentiment, and
afforded occupation to free mental speculation.
When in the fifteenth century classical studies revived, grammatical interpretation, which, as a rule, goes hand in hand with
progress, again rose to honour. It was especially by this weapon that the domineering Catholic Church was combated at
the period of the Reformation; but as soon as the newlysprung-up Protestant Church had been dogmatically established,
it began to consider grammatical interpretation a dangerous
adversary of its own dogmas, and opposed it as much as did
the Roman Catholics themselves.  Allegorical interpretation,
therefore, in due time reappeared under the form of typical
and mystical theology, as it always does when the dogmatic
mode exercises an unnatural pressure.
Towards the beginning of the eighteenth century grammatical interpretation recovered its authority, and, in spite of
continual attacks, towards the conclusion of that century it
decidedly prevailed among German Protestants. During the
last thirty years, however, both Protestants and Roman Catholics have again curtailed its rights and invaded its province,
by promoting the opposing claims of dogmatical and mystical
interpretation.
The question really demanding a settlement is this: Whether
the rules and gifts which qualify a man for the right understanding of ordinary written language are, or are not, sufficient
for rightly understanding the Bible? Most Biblical interpreters
have declared such rules and gifts to be insufficient, because,




NATIONAL  ESTABLISHMENTS.              217
say they, the Bible, having been written under the direct
guidance of the Holy Ghost, is not to be measured by the
common rules which are applicable only to the lower sphere
of merely human thoughts and compositions.  The result has
been that interpretation has become, neither more nor less than
the art of understanding the Bible according to the particular
ecclesiastical system that may be in vogue at any given period.
But surely it will be allowed that if God has deemed it desirable to reveal His Will to mankind by means of intelligible
books, He must have intended that the contents of those books
should be discovered in accordance with those general laws
which are conducive to the right understanding of documents
in general. For if this were not the case, He would have
chosen insufficient and even contradictory means inadequate to
the purpose He had in view, which cannot be supposed.
The interpretation which, in spite of all ecclesiastical opposi*tion, ought to be adopted as the only tiue one, is unquestionably that which has in modern times been styled the HISTORmIOGRAMMATICAL. This appellation has been chosen because the
epithet grammatical seeins to be too narrow and too much
restricted to the mere verbal sense. It might be more correct
to style it simply the HiSTORICAL interpretation, since the word
historical comprehends everything that is requisite to be known
about the language, the turn of mind, and the individuality of
an author, so far as this knowledge is needful in order rightly
to understand his book.
C. (Chap. ix. p. 182.).
NATIONAL ESTABLISHMENTS.
Those-and they are possibly but few of the present generation-who have carefully read Coleridge's remarkable book'On the Constitution of the Church and State according to the
10




218&,                       NOTES.
idea of each,'  will be aware that the author attaches, and not
without reason, great importance to the distinction  therein
drawn between the National Church and the Church of Christ.'The Christian Church,' he says,'is a public and visible
community, having ministers of its own, whom the State can
neither constitute nor degrade, and whose maintenance among
Christians is as secure as the command of Christ can make it:
for " so bath the Lord ordained that they which preach the
Gospel should live of the Gospel " (1 Cor. ix. 14)....' It (the
Church of Christ) is the opposite to the world only, asking of
any particular State neither wages nor dignities, but demanding protection, that is, to be let alone.''The National Church is a public and visible community,
having ministers whom the nation, through the agency of a
constitution, hath created trustees of a reserved national fund,
upon fixed terms and with defined duties, and whom, in case of
breach of these terms or dereliction of those duties, the nation,
through the same agency, may discharge.'
This distinction, although not formally drawn, is clearly involved in the conflicting definitions given of'the Church' in
the nineteenth Article of the Anglican communion, and in the
work of its great defender,'the judicious Hooker.'
According to the Article (xix.),'The Church is a congregation of faithful men.' According to Hooker it is a mixed commnunity of faithful and unfaithful, comprehending the worst
as well as the best.'It is known,' he says,' by an external
profession of Christianity, without regard in any respect had
to the moral virtues or spiritual graces of any member of that
1 3rd Ed. Edited by Henry Nelson Coleridge, Esq. Pickering, 1839. This
little work-' the only work.' says the editor,' that I know or have ever heard
mentioned that even attempts a solution of the difficulty in which an ingenious
enemy of the Church of England may easily involve most of its modern defenders
-Mr. Coleridge prized highly. The saving distinctions,' he said,'are plainly
stated in it, and I am sure nothing is wanted to make them tell, but that some
kind friend should steal them from their obscure hiding-place, and just tumble
them down before the public as his own.' (Table Talk, p. 5.)




NATIONAL ESTABLISHMENTS.               219
body. Yea, although they may be impious idolators, wicked
heretics, imps and limbs of Satan.' The apparent contradiction
arises from the word'Church' being used in totally different
senses. By'the Church' the framer of the Article evidently
means the Episcopal communion. By the same phrase Hooker
as clearly understands the nation at large.
Why, then, should these two distinct institutions, the Episcopal Church and the Church of the nation, always be dealt
with as if they were one and identical?  Why should the State
not be able to exercise its right of legislating for the Church
of the nation without at the same time interfering with the
Christian liberty of the congregation of the faithful?  The
answer is obvious: Simply because these two having been once
one, we continue, in defiance of facts, to act on the theory that
the Episcopal Church is still the Church of the nation. We do
so partly, no doubt, fronm the difficulty of perceiving how, in
case of separation, the ministers of the nation could, if they
wished it, be also ministers of the Episcopal communion;
partly from the unwillingness of the clerical body, in spite of
unfavourable statistics, to consent, een, for liberty, to be regarded as anything less than the National Church.
To what extent these obstacles are capable of being overcome it is at present impossible to say; but the fact that, on
the one hand, hostile seceders, embracing at least half of those
who attend public worship at all, largely clanmour for a change;
that, on the other, demands hitherto unknown are now made
by multitudes of the Established Clergy to Rornmanise the
National Church at will; that a growing sense of the right of
every Christian communion to regulate its own doctrine and
discipline is pervading society; and yet that the English people, Protestant to the core, are as much as ever attached to
their ancestral form of worship: these things combined will
probably before long compel the enquiry whether or no it is
not possible so to separate the Episcopal Cllhurch from the
Church of the nation (or, as it should rather be expressed,




220                      NOTES.
from the Ncational Religious Institute, for such would not properly speaking be a Church) that the one, whether ritualistic
or otherwise, might enjoy all the liberty of a voluntary society,
and the other be rdlade acceptable to the multitudes who now
reject and despise it.
This is not the place to discuss details. But it may not be
amiss to say that the supposed difficulty of accomplishing such
a change is probably exaggerated. The basis on which the
separation in question might be effected is in some particulars
obvious enough. The Apostles' Creed, and such portions of
the Book of Common Prayer as are in harmony therewith,
would remain in use, while the Nicene and Athanasian Creeds,
the Offices, and the Communion Service would be appropriated
by the Episcopal Church. Baptisms, marriages, and funerals,
as more or less civil acts, might continue to be performed with
suitable offices by the national clerisy, those who were dissatisfied with what they would regard as' maimed rites' supplementing them by such additional services as they might deem
necessary. The recognition of Dissenting baptisms, the presence of the Registrar in a Nonconformist place of worship in
order to legalise a marriage, and quarrels about the right of
sepulture in parochial churchyards would then all be rendered
needless. That which is national would be treated nationally,
while that which properly belongs to Churches would be left
untouched by the State.
Parochial edifices would of course remain as public property
in the hands of the respective parishes to which they already
belong. The chapels-of-ease, the district churches, and all
private endowments would properly fall into thLe hands of the
Episcopal Church.  Parochial organisation would  be untouched.  In every parish throughout the kingdom  there
would still remain the'germ  of civilisation,' and in the'remotest villages -a nucleus round which the capabilities of the
place might crystallise and brighten.'
It is of course easy to multiply objections to any such




NATIONAL ESTABLISHMENTS.               221
scheme, and especially on the ground that it would practically
be found impossible so to recast the National Church as to
make either its teaching or its offices acceptable to everybody.
But this need not be attempted. The reconstruction would
of course proceed on recognised facts, such as that England
is a Protestant nation; that her laws and institutions are all
based on Christianity as revealed in the Bible; that, as a fact,
all but a very small number indeed of those who care about
religion at all agree in great leading principles and doctrines.
That under any arrangement some clergymen would, as
now, attach more importance to one class of religious thought
than another; that some would be Broad and others Evangelical; that there would still be room for forbearance with one
another can scarcely be doubted; but essentially no difficulties
would arise at all corresponding in importance to those which
now trouble us. We should at least be delivered from the
inconsistency of attempting by Parliamentary authority to
change or to modify the formularies of a-Church which, if
a Church at all, may well resist all pressure on the part of the
State to force its doctrine. The appointment of a clergyman,
whether vested as now in patrons or given to the parish, light
easily be ordered, and his removal, if needful, would be under
the jurisdiction of the courts of law.
Perhaps it is not too much to say that if the distinction here
urged had originally been recognised, the long struggle of
Puritanism for liberty of conscience would have been rendered
needless, and Dissent at the.present day might have been unknown. Supplementary fellowships of a voluntary character
would have supplied all deficiencies, and the Church, instead
of being the deadly antagonist of a multitude of sects, would
have been the fruitful mother of as many independent communities as the necessities of the case, whether arising from
spiritual needs or from changes of opinion, might in course of
time have required.
The error of the Reformers, or rather of those who yielded




222                     NOTES.
to their influence, was that they failed to see, or seeing disregarded, the fact that the great ecclesiastical system from which
they had broken off was at once a polity and a religion; that
if in one aspect it was a power having its centre at Rome, in
another it was a conviction having its root in the individual
conscience. Had they regarded this aright they would, as
statesmen, have dealt with Romanism somewhat differently.
Religion, as such, under whatever form, would have been let
alone. It would then have been perceived that Protestantism,
from its very nature, must necessarily increase individuality
of belief; and suitable provision having been made for the
development of this inevitable tendency, by absolute freedom
being secured to each and all to supplement what they felt to be
wanting by voluntary action, an institution would have sprung
into existence which would have proved, far more than any
national Church ever has or can do, a true bond of unity; at
once loyal to the monarch and acceptable to the people.
This result would have followed, simply because a provision
for social worship and public teaching, the want of men in
general, would in that case have been fully met. God would
have been recognised nationally without individual consciences
being interfered with; and everything pertaining to the peculiar religious convictions of each separate person-to his personal relations to God and duty, would have been left to be
met by that voluntary provision which men are always willing to make when the religious instinct has been thoroughly
awakened, and earnestness has taken the place of indifference.
Need it be observed that to a national clerisy chosen and
controlled as these would be, separated from any particular
Church, and therefore without a motive to proselytism, the
superintendence of the education of the nation might well be
entrusted.
To speak of embracing Wesleyans and other seceders in the
Church of England, by absorbing them, after they have built
so many thousands of places of worship, and when, by means




NATIONAL ESTABLISHIlMENTS.             22O
thereof, they can secure good incomes for their ministers, is
the most idle of dreams. A Protestant Church in a free
country like our own can never successfully imitate the Church
of Rome by uniting to herself different orders under control of
any kind. But sot can do what is far better. She can take
undei her wing all forms of devout thought. She can win
them to herself by the love of a large heart, and by the willing
recognition, nay the honouring, of an individuality which is
the offspring of freedom, the proof of earnestness, and the stability of all that is true and good.
The great error of the Church of England, regarded as a
national establishment, has been that she has never had faith
in herself; she has never had strength to believe in anything
better than mere outward conformity or professed unity of
opinion. But it cannot be the true policy of any national
Church thus to necessitate if not to promote secession.  On
the contrary, her voice should always be,'Obey conscience,
follow truth, but, if possible, abide with your brethren. We
may not be one in all points, but we can at least unite in common prayer and praise, and in a common recognition of the
Giver of every good and perfect gift.'
England swarms with Dissenters only because the Church
of England has never allowed any safety-valve for Christian
zeal or individual convictions. She may yet make herself
the Church of the nation if she will, but it must be by separating herself as an establishment alike firom the Episcopal
and from every other Church. How long that opportunity
may last none can say. In Ireland the time for so doing has
perhaps already past. Nothing in all probability will satisfy
a people whose public sentiment is formed by a priesthood
ever panting after pre-eminence, but possession of the revenues
of the Church, or, if this cannot be had, their secularisation.
Yet who does not feel that, if it were possible to devote these
funds to any religious service which could be accepted, as far
Cas it went, by Romanists as well as Protestants, how much




22                      NOTES.
better such a disposal of them would be than to employ them
in endowing rival Churches or in any work of a merely secular
character.
Those who may be disposed to meet these observations with
sarcasm or scorn, may well be reminded that the root-thought
on which they have proceeded belongs to a man who is universally admitted to have been one of the deepest thinkers of
his age; a man who was Conservative in his politics, and more
than usually attached to the Episcopal Church. Nor should
the hints he has offered be regarded as unworthy of consideration because intended to be worked out by others whenever a
time should arrive in which they would be listened to.
D. (Chap. x. p. 195.)
CHURCH  AUTHORITY.
The position and claim of the Church as a great teacher, and
as a guide to truth, cannot be separated from any fair enquiry
into the place which Scripture ought to occupy in the formation
of our beliefs. The existence or non-existence of an institution claiming the right sometimes of deciding what is truth,
and sometimes of supplementing that truth by tradition, cannot but be an important element in all investig;,t -lls bearing
upon the Bible.
Nor is the point at issue, as is generally supposed, merely
one of degree. The thing needing to be established is, not to
what extent any existing ecclesiastical body may or may not
have authority in controversies of faith; nor yet, whether or
no, any actual Church holds in its own bosom a deposit of
apostolic tradition; but whether any such body, having Divine
authority for its institution, exists in the world. For if it does,
nothing can be more obvious than that to its decisions, so far
as it is empowered to give them, it becomes all of us to bow.




CHURCH AUTHORITY.'                 225
Hitherto this great question has been treated rather with
reference to the extent of power claimed by any given Church,
than to the reality or non-reality of the existence of such an
organisation by Divine appointment. That authority of some
kind or other over opinions, as well as over conduct, is vested
in all Churches, however small or sectarian they may be,
seems everywhere to be taken for granted.
Of course, so long as it is understood that this claim merely
implies that, like secular associations, religious bodies may
justly fix the conditions on which any person shall be received
into, or retained in, their fellowship, no one has a right to dispute its propriety. But mlore than this is commonly meant;
since all alike imagine they have the Divine sanction for what
they do, and act accordingly. Leaders of sects may not indeed
ask to be regarded as successors of the apostles; they may, on
the contrary, energetically disclaim all such assumptions; and
yet they both may and do not unfrequently exercise the power
such a succession is supposed to confer, with far more stringency than those who put forward higher pretensions.
The question needing to'be settled is, whether or no Christ
and His apostles ever appointed successors, or ever gifted any
man or body of men with power or ability to decide for others
what ought or ought not to be believed.
Put in this way, the enquiry primarily, if not exclusively,
bears upon such ecclesiastical bodies as have formally demanded
the recognition of their right to settle controversies, by virtue
of a commission received from Christ.
The reasoning by which this claim has hitherto been sustained cannot but be regarded as in man yrespects very unsatisfactory. It is argued, that inasmuch as probably a quarter of
a century must have passed away before any Gospel or Epistle
was produced; that as those who at length did write tell us
for the most part that they were moved to do so by passing
circumstances; that as they had evidently no thought of leaving behind them any full confession of faith;, that since they
10*




22 6                     NOTES.
did not affirm in detail the doctrine of the Trinity, or expound
other mysteries; and since there is no trace of a collection of
apostolical writings, or of the formation of a New Testament
canon by John or any other influential Christian of the apostolic age, it could never be intended that men should take the
Scriptures alone as their rule of faith, or that they should seek
in them exclusively for a knowledge of God's revelation.
This view is supposed to find confirmation in the fact that
Paul bids Timothy commit to faithful men what he had' heard'
from apostolic lips, that they might teach others also, and that
he commands both the Corinthians and the Thessalonians to
hold fast' the traditions' they had been taught. These unwritten teachings, therefore, as handed down by the Church
are, it is asserted, essential to the securing of Christian doctrine in all its fulness, pure and certain through all generations.
Further, it is argued, that as Christianity was but an outgrowth of Judaism, the ancient priesthood had to be replaced
by the spiritual succession of duly-appointed instructors, and
that as the first Christians had received apostolic teaching
not as the word of man, but as the Word of God, a provision
was needed for securing to after-times a like repose in authority by the appointment of a living, ever-speaking tribunal open
and accessible to all.
Whether such authority is supposed to centre in an individual, as the Pope, or in a body like the Church, matters little.
The Romanist of course holds to the former; and in so doing
maintains that the first deposit of doctrine was intended to
have an organic growth, and to expand from its roots by a law
of inward necessity, and in a manner corresponding to the intellectual needs of believers in different ages. There was to
be, he says, a constant building up of doctrine as a progressive
development, a mapping out of its details, and an exhibition of
its full contents, secured and fixed by ecclesiastical decision,
and all was to be accomplished under the guidance of the
Paraclete, the teacher given to the Church.




CHURCH AUTHORITY.                  227
It is not needful to enquire how much of this is held only
by Romanists, how much belongs to Anglicanism, or how
much is involved in the action of every Nonconforming community. What we want to know is, whether the root-idea
has, or has not, any good foundation; whether there is really
any reason to believe that the provision spoken of was ever
made. The words of St. Paul, whether to Timothy or to the
Gentile churches, prove nothing, unless it can be shown that
the traditions he refers to were distinct from, or additional to,
what is now embodied in the Gospels and the Epistles. The
entire question is one of fact, one therefore respecting which
we can know nothing, beyond what is left on record in Scripture.
Now, there we find no trace of any teaching similar in
character to that which is supposed to be so essential. The
apostles do not merely tell people what they ought to believe,
as if that were enough; they do not even ask that anything
should be received, simply on their responsibility or authority.
St. Paul utterly disclaims any wish to have dominion over the
faith of his converts.'By faith' he says,'ye stand.''We
are but helpers of your joy.' To the Corinthians he writes,'I speak as unto wise men, judge ye what I say.' The Galatians he warns not only against men who might preach another Gospel, but against himself if he should ever be led to
do so. St. Peter exhorts elders' as also an elder.' St. John
directly appeals to his hearers as able to distinguish between
truth and falsehood. All the apostles, in short, seem to have
regarded themselves chiefly as witnesses of facts. When a
new one had to be chosen in place of Judas, the reason given
is, that he might be a witness with the rest of the resurrection. Everything they teach, is presented in the simplest form
possible. Nothing can be found at all corresponding to the
scholastic definitions of later times; nothing tending to indicate that such definitions would ever be desirable.
The evangelical narrative, as we have it, leaves quite a con



228                      NOTES.
trary impression to that which assumes the formal appointment of' a body of men as in any way inheritors of apostolic
powers or apostolic wisdom. The few believers are gathered
together in fellowships of the simplest character, that as'sheep among wolves,' they may exhort and strengthen one
another. Elders chosen from their midst are appointed over
them, and endowed with gifts fitting them, in the absence of
written documents, rightly to teach and govern these infant
communities.  They'break bread' together in memory of
their Lord, apparently without the intervention of any officer
of the Church. They possess, but they have no power of
communicating gifts, either of speech or healing. Even Philip,
the signally-honoured evangelist, cannot confer any of these
endowments on his converts. Everything indicates that with
the last man on whom the last of the apostles laid hands all
miraculous power in the Church ceased and determined, and
with that power all apostolic authority. Henceforward, true
Christians appear to be essentially on a level, alike members of
that royal priesthood of which Christ was the great Head and
High Priest, although differing in talent and in work. Not
from Scripture, certainly, can it be shown that Christ or His
apostles ever framed an organization in any respects corresponding to what we call THE CGnuucZR.
How, then, came such an institution into existence? For
nothing can be plainer than that about a hundred years after
the death of John it appears, although in anything but apostolic garb.  All is altered.'No other change,' says Dean
Stanley,'equally momentous has ever since affected its fortunes; yet none has ever been so silent and secret. The
Church has now become history, the history not of an isolated
commllunity or of isolated individuals, but of an organized
society, incorporated with the political systems of the world.'
Was this change, then, healthy development-the foreintended growth of the acorn into the oak? or was it corruption-the first signal indication of that new order of things




CHURCH AUTHORITY.                  229
which then so mysteriously manifested itself, at once as an evil
and a good: good in so far as it reared saints and subdued
Paganism in the Roman empire; evil in its later developments
culminating in the Papacy?  A satisfactory answer to this
question would solve-many difficulties.
Hard is it to believe that a Church which produced so many
Christian heroes, so many great and good men, should, in any
sense whatever, be worthily called a'Mystery of Iniquity.'
Harder still, however, is it to imagine, on a review  of the
superstitions encouraged and the persecutions carried on for
ages. by its ecclesiastical tribunals, literally drunk with the
blood of the saints; its Christianity so dead and morally
degraded that nothing but the inroads of an impostor like
Mahomet could cleanse the plains of Asia of the impurities it
had nurtured there; its only religion, a religion of sacraments,
under the guise of which the pastors of the Church had, as
Coleridge puts it,'gradually changed the life and light of the
Gospel into the very superstitions they were commissioned to
disperse, and thus paganized Christianity in order to christen
paganism.' Hard is it to see in such a Church anything but a
profound mystery of God, a mystery of spiritual evil, a mystery
of iniquity. Be this, however, as it may, nothing can certainly
be deduced either fiom its past or its present existence, or
from  the past or present history of any of the Reformed
Churches, which can for a moment sustain the assertion that
God has committed the development of doctrine or the power
of decision in cases of doubt to any body of men, however
earnest or good they may be, or however much they may have
accomplished in the spread of the Gospel, in the civilisation of
nations, or in the regions of benevolent activity.




230                      NOTES.
E. (Chap. x. p. 196.)
IDOLATRY  OF THE BIBLE.'Idolatry of the written Word expresseth itself in the holy
— but I call it unholy-nbtion, which they have taken up concerning inspiration, that the very words are inspired, and the
writers were but organs of voice for that Word.... And
in the same spirit they require of you at once to believe the
Boo/k as the Word of God, by one act of faith to adopt it, then
to read it and bow down before what you read. That is to
make the Book an idol, and then prostrate your soul unto it.
And by so doing, you shall make your soul a timorous creature
of superstition, or a blind worshipper of sounds and sentences;
but never a child of the Spirit of God. Such notions flow not
fiom orthodox doctrine which saith unto every man, Read -this
Word with what persuasion of its Divine authority you presently have, and affect not more than you really have, for that
is falsehood or superstition, which God abhorreth. Bring to it
the faculties of mind which you presently have, and peruse it
with the desire to be enlightened in the deep things which it
containeth, and the Spirit will open your soul to understand
it more and -more, and dispose your heart to receive it more
and more, and constrain your will to obey it more and more;
and as your soul grows into its confirmation more and more,
you will believe it more and more, and your faith in its inspiration will grow with your spiritual growth and strengthen
with your spiritual strength.'-The Idolatry of the Bible, by
the Rev. Edward Irving.
From an article on the Theology of Luther, by the Rev. Dr.
Dorner, Contemporary Review, No. xii.
(1.)' Holy Scripture, in its real message and purport, receives
its full credentials to the heart, by the illumination of the Spirit




IIOLATRY OF THE< BIBLE.               23 l
kindling in us a Divine assurance of the truth of this.message
-an assurance infinitely superior to any mere reliance on the
canon of the Church, and on the correctness of the Chlurch's
judgment with regard to Scripture.'
(2.)'Scripture can only be understood by a kindred mind
and spirit. That which is necessary to salvation is intelligible
to all who are spiritually disposed, and inequalities in mental
culture and philological skill are, in everything material, compensated by the perspicuity'of the Scripture.  The believer is
the instrument which Scripture creates for itself by means of
which to interpret itself.'
(3.)'The expounder is not to expound Scripture after the
standard of any human conception of its doctrine, be that
standard the Apostles' Creed, the regulac or ancldoia fidei, or
the teaching of the Church. lie who asserts such standard to
be necessary, denies the perspicuity of Scripture. The only
analogy for exposition is the principle that one scripture cannot contradict another.'
(4.)'Luther makes no difficulty in allowing, that in externals, not only Stephen, but the sacred writers themselves have
fallen into inaccuracies. The worth of the Old Testament is
not diminished in his eyes by the concession that several of its
pieces have been worked up by various hands. What matters
it, he asks, with reference to the Pentateuch, if Moses did not
write it?'
(5.)'Luther recognises in Scripture not merely something
Divine, but something hutnan. The German Reformer unquestionably draws a distinction between the word of God and the
Holy Scripture, not merely in the form, but also in the purport
of the message.'
(6.) Luther' awards to faith a right of judging the canon on
grounds not arbitrary, but objective and dogmatic; and quite
distinct firom any investigations of the genuineness and antiquity
of its parts.... The right of faith to judge and criticise
Scripture is, however, a negative right, reducing itself to the




232                      NOTES.
denial of canonical authority, to all that would contradict faith.
And as faith must agree with Scripture, this judgment of Scripture by faith reduces itself ultimately to a judgment of Scripture by itself. To the power of interpreting itself, which he
ascribes to Scripture, corresponds in his system the power of
Scripture to decide what is really Scripture.... The
process of combining faith with the word of God must be continuous; we must be always?reconciling Scripture and the
Christian consciousness, in order to obtain that full and undoubting certainty which consists in the union of the personal
and subjective with the objective word of God in Sc ipture.
Thus, the certainty and joy of faith is not suspended for
Luther by allowing criticism all its rights; nor, on the other
hand, does Scripture lose in value and authority by the emphasis he lays on faith, but rather gains in these respects, inasimuch as Scripture becomes an internal authority with which
faith cannot dispense.
THrE END.




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