Inspiration and Interpretation Part 8

Very much is it to be feared however that the same gentleman has overlooked a consideration of at least equal importance; namely, the inevitable _inference_ from the discovery that the origin of the Bible is Divine. He informs us that,--"It will be a further a.s.sistance (!) in the consideration of this subject, to observe that the Interpretation of Scripture has _nothing to do with any opinion respecting its origin_."

(p. 350.) "The _meaning_ of Scripture," (he proceeds,) "is one thing: the _Inspiration_ of Scripture is another."--True. But when we find the Reverend Author insisting, again and again, that "it may be laid down that Scripture has _one_ meaning,--_the meaning which it had to the mind of the Prophet or Evangelist who first uttered, or wrote it_,"

(p. 378,)--we are constrained to remind him that, "To say that the Scriptures, and the things contained in them, can have no other or farther meaning than those persons thought or had, who first recited or wrote them; is evidently saying, _that those persons were the original, proper, and sole authors of those books_, i.e. THAT THEY ARE NOT INSPIRED[185]." So that, in point of fact, _the origin_ of Holy Scripture, so far from being a consideration of no importance, (as Mr.

Jowett supposes,) proves to be a consideration of the most vital importance of all. And _the Interpretation_ of Scripture, so far from having "_nothing to do_ with any opinion respecting its origin," is affected by it most materially, or rather depends upon it altogether!

On a review of all that goes before, it will, I think, appear plain to any person of sound understanding, that Professor Jowett's _a priori_ views respecting the Interpretation of Holy Scripture will not stand the test of exact reason. To suggest as he has done that the Bible is to be interpreted like any other book, on the plea that it _is_ like any other book, is to build upon a false foundation. His syllogism is the following:--

If the Bible is a book like any other book, the Bible is to be interpreted like any other book.

The Bible is a book like any other book.

Therefore,--

But it has been shewn that the learned Professor's minor premiss is false. It has been proved that the Bible is NOT a book like any other book.

Nay, I claim to have done _more_. I claim to have established the contradictory minor premiss. The syllogism therefore will henceforth stand as follows:--

If the Bible can be shewn to be a book like no other book, but entirely _sui generis_, and claiming to be the work of Inspiration,--then is it reasonable to expect that it will have to be interpreted like no other book, but entirely after a fas.h.i.+on of its own.

But the Bible _can_ be shewn to be a book like no other book; entirely _sui generis_; and claiming to be the work of Inspiration.

Therefore,--

$2.$ It remains however, now, to advance an important step.--Mr. Jowett, in a certain place, adopts a principle, the soundness of which I am able, happily, entirely to admit. "Interpret Scripture from itself,--like any other book about which we know almost nothing except what is derived from its pages." (p. 382.) "_Non nisi ex Scriptura Scripturam interpretari potes._" (p. 384.)

Scarcely has he made this important admission however, and enunciated his golden Canon of interpretation, when he hastens to nullify it. His very next words are,--"The meaning of the Canon is only this,--'That we cannot understand Scripture without becoming familiar (!) with it.'"

But, (begging the learned writer's pardon,) so far from _that_ being the whole of the meaning of the Canon, his gloss happens exactly to miss the only important point. The plain meaning of the words,--"Only out of the Scriptures can you explain the Scriptures,"--is obviously rather this:--'That in order _to interpret_ the Bible, our aim must be to _ascertain how the Bible interprets itself_.' In other words,--'Scripture must be made _its own Interpreter_.' More simply yet, in the Professor's own words, (from which, _more suo_, he has imperceptibly glided away,)--"_Interpret Scripture from itself._"

(p. 382.) ... How then does Scripture interpret Scripture? _That_ is the only question! for the answer to this question must be held to be decisive as to the other great question which Mr. Jowett raises in the present Essay,--namely, How are _we_ to interpret Scripture?

Now this whole Inquiry has been conducted elsewhere; and will be found to extend from p. 144 to p. 160 of the present volume. It has been there established, by a sufficiently large induction of examples, that _the Bible is to be interpreted as no other book is, or can be interpreted_; and for the plain reason, that _the inspired Writers themselves_, (our LORD Himself at their head!) _interpret it after an altogether extraordinary fas.h.i.+on_. Mr. Jowett's statement at p. 339 that "the mystical interpretation of Scripture originated in the Alexandrian age," is simply false.

And in the course of this proof, (necessarily involved in it, in fact,) it has been incidentally shewn that the sense of Scripture is not, by any means, invariably _one_; and _that_ sense the most obvious to those who wrote, heard, or read it. It has been fully shewn that the office of the Interpreter is _not_, by any means, (as Mr. Jowett imagines,) "to recover the meaning of the words _as they first struck on the ears, or flashed before the eyes of those who heard or read them_." (p. 338.) The Reverend writer's repeated a.s.sertion that "we have no reason to attribute to the Prophet or Evangelist any second or hidden sense different from that which appears on the surface," (p. 380,) has been fully, and as it is hoped effectually refuted.

And here I might lay down my pen. For since, at the end of 74 pages, the Professor thus delivers himself, (in a kind of imitation of St. Paul's language[186],)--"Of what has been said, this is the sum,--That Scripture, _like other books_, has _one_ meaning, which has to be gathered from itself ... _without regard to a priori notions about its nature and origin_:" that, "It is to be interpreted _like other books_, with attention to the prevailing state of civilization and knowledge,"

and so forth; (p. 404;)--it must suffice to say that, having established the very opposite conclusion, I claim to have effectually answered his Essay; because I have overthrown what he admits to be "the sum" of it.

Let me be permitted however--before I proceed to review some other parts of his performance,--in the briefest manner, not so much to recapitulate, as to exhibit 'the sum' of what has been hitherto delivered on the other side; in somewhat different language, and as it were from a different point of view.

We are presented then, in the New Testament Scriptures, with the august spectacle of the Ancient of Days holding the entire volume of the Old Testament Scriptures in His Hands, _and interpreting it of Himself_. He, whose Life and Death are set forth in the Gospel;--whose Church's early fortunes are set forth historically in the Acts, while its future prospects are shadowed prophetically in the Apocalypse;--whose Doctrines, lastly, are explained in the twenty-one Epistles of St. Paul and St. Peter, St. James and St. John and St. Jude:--He, the Incarnate WORD, who was "in the beginning;" who "was with G.o.d," and who "was G.o.d:"--that same Almighty One, I repeat, is exhibited to us in the Gospel, repeatedly, holding the Volume of the Old Testament Scriptures in His Hands, and _explaining it of Himself. "To day is this Scripture fulfilled_ in your ears[187],"--was the solemn introductory sentence with which, in the Synagogue of Nazareth, (after closing the Book and giving it again to the Minister,) He prefaced His Sermon from the lxist chapter of Isaiah.--"Had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed Me: _for he wrote of Me_[188],"--"'O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the Prophets have spoken! Ought not CHRIST to have suffered these things, and to enter into His glory?' And _beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself_[189]."--"These are the words which I spake unto you, that all things must be fulfilled _which are written in the Law of Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning Me_[190]."

"CHRIST was before Moses. The Gospel was not made for the Law; but the Law was made for the Gospel. The Gospel is not based on the Law, but the Law is a shadow of the Gospel. In order to believe the Bible, we must look upward; and fix our eyes on JESUS CHRIST, sitting in Heavenly Glory, holding both Testaments in His Hand; sealing both Testaments with His seal; and delivering both Testaments as Divine Oracles, to the World. We must receive the _written Word_ from the Hands of the INCARNATE WORD[191]."

This august spectacle, let it be clearly stated,--(1) Establishes, beyond all power of contradiction, the intimate connexion which subsists between the Old and the New Testament; as well as the altogether unique relation which the one bears to the other:--(2) Invests either Testament with a degree of sacred importance and majestic grandeur which altogether makes the Bible _unlike "any other book_:"--(3) Proves that the Bible is to be interpreted as no other book ever was, or ever can be interpreted:--(4) Demonstrates that it has _more than a single meaning_:--and lastly, Convincingly shews that _G.o.d, and not Man, is its true Author_.

It will of course be asked,--Then does Mr. Jowett take no notice at all of this vast and complicated problem? How does he treat of the relation between the Old Testament and the New?... He despatches the entire subject in the following pa.s.sage:--"The question," (he says,) "runs up into a more general one, 'the relation between the Old and New Testaments.' For the Old Testament _will receive a different meaning accordingly as it is explained from itself, or from the New_." (Very different certainly!) "In the first case,--a careful and conscientious study of each one for itself is all that is required." (That is to say, it will not be explained at all!) "In the second case,--_the types and ceremonies of the Law, perhaps the very facts and persons of the history_, WILL BE a.s.sUMED (!) to be predestined or made after a pattern corresponding to the things that were to be in the latter days."

(p. 370.) (And why not "_will be found_ to be replete with Christian meaning,--full of lofty spiritual significancy?"--the _proved_ marvellousness of their texture, the _revealed_ mysteriousness of their purpose, being an effectual refutation of all Mr. Jowett's _a priori_ notions!)

"And this question," (he proceeds,) "stirs up another question respecting the Interpretation of the Old Testament in the New. Is such Interpretation to be regarded as the meaning of the original text, or _an accommodation of it to the thoughts of other times_?" (Nay, but Reverend and learned Sir: "nothing so plain," as you justly observe, "that it may not be explained away;" (p. 359;) yet we cannot consent to have the sense of plain words thus clouded over at your mere bidding. It is now _our_ turn to declare that the Interpreter's "object is to read Scripture _like any other book_, with a real interest and not merely a conventional one." It is now _we_ who "want to be able to open our eyes, and see things as they truly are." (p. 338.) We simply pet.i.tion for leave to "_interpret Scripture like any other book, by the same rules of evidence and the same canons of criticism_." (p. 375.) And if this freedom be but conceded to us, there will be found to be no imaginable reason why the Interpretation of the Old Testament in the New,--(CHRIST Himself being the Majestic Speaker! our present edification and everlasting welfare being His gracious purpose!)--should not be strictly "regarded as _the meaning of the original text_." ... But let us hear the Professor out:--)

"Our object," (he says, and with this he dismisses the problem!)--"Our object is not to attempt here the determination of these questions; but to point out that they must be determined before any real progress can be made, or any agreement arrived at in the Interpretation of Scripture." (p. 370.) ... They must indeed. But can it be right in this slovenly, slippery style to s.h.i.+rk a discussion on the issue of which the whole question may be said to turn? especially on the part of one who scruples not to prejudge that issue, and straightway to apply it, (in a manner fatal to the Truth,) throughout all his hundred pages. Mr.

Jowett's method is ever to _a.s.sume_ what he ought to _prove_, and then either to be plaintive, or to sneer. "It is a _heathenish or Rabbinical fancy_:"--"Such complexity would place the Scriptures _below human compositions_ in general; for it would deprive them of the ordinary intelligibleness of human language" (p. 382):--&c.

"Is the Interpretation of the Old Testament in the New to be regarded as the _meaning of the original text_; or an _accommodation of it to the thoughts of other times_?" (p. 370.) This is Mr. Jowett's question; the question which it is "_not his object_ to attempt to determine;" but which I, on the contrary, have made it _my_ object to discuss in my VIth Sermon,--p. 183 to p. 220. Without troubling the reader however now to wade through those many pages, let me at least explain to him in a few words what Mr. Jowett's question really amounts to: namely this,--Do the Apostles and Evangelists, does our Blessed LORD Himself, when He professes to explain the mysterious significancy of the Old Testament,--_invariably,--in every instance,--misrepresent "the meaning of the original text_?" And the answer to this question I am content to await from any candid person of plain unsophisticated understanding. Is it credible, concerning the Divine expositions found in St. Matth. xxii.

31, 32,--xxii. 43-5,--xii. 39, 40,--xi. 10,--St. John viii. 17,18,--i.

52,--vi. 31, &c,--x. 34-5:--the Apostolic interpretations found in 1 Cor. ix. 9-11,--x. 1-6,--xv. 20,--Heb. ii. 5-9,--vii. 1-10,--Gal. iv.

21-31:--is it conceivable, I ask, that _not one_ of all these places should exhibit the actual '_meaning of the original text_?' And yet, (as Mr. Jowett himself is forced to admit,)--"If we attribute to the details of the Mosaical ritual a reference to the New Testament, or suppose the pa.s.sage of the Red Sea to be regarded not merely as a figure of Baptism, but as a preordained type;--_the principle is conceded_!" (p. 369.) "A little more or a little less of the method does not make the difference." (_Ibid._) In a word,--in such case, Mr. Jowett's Essay falls to the ground!... To proceed however.

$3.$ The case of Interpretation has not yet been fully set before the reader. Hitherto, we have merely traced the problem back to the fountain-head, and dealt with it simply as _a Scriptural question_. We have shewn what light is thrown upon _Interpretation_ by the volume of _Inspiration_. The subject has been treated in the same way in the Vth and VIth of my Sermons. But it will not be improper, in this place,--it is even indispensable,--to develope the problem a little more fully; and to explain that it is of much larger extent.

Now, there is a family resemblance in the method of all ancient expositions of Holy Scripture which vindicates for them, however remotely, a common origin. There is a resemblance in the general way of handling the Inspired Word which can only be satisfactorily explained by supposing that the remote type of all was the oral teaching of the Apostles themselves. In truth, is it credible that the early Christians would have been so forgetful of the discourses of the men who had seen the LORD, that no trace of it,--no tradition of so much as _the manner_ of it,--should have lingered on for a hundred years after the death of the last of the Apostles; down to the time when Origen, for example, was a young man?... It cannot possibly be!

(i.) "The things which thou hast heard of me among many witnesses,"

(writes the great Apostle to his son Timothy,) "the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also[192]." Provision is thus made by the aged Saint,--_in the last of his Epistles_,--for the transmission of his inspired teaching[193] to a second and a third generation. Now the words just quoted were written about the year 65, at which time Timothy was a young man. Unless we suppose that ALMIGHTY G.o.d curtailed the lives of the chief depositaries of His Word, Timothy will have lived on till A.D. 100; so that "faithful men" who died in the middle of the next century might have been trained and taught by him for many years. It follows, that the "faithful men" last spoken of will have been "able to teach others also," whose writings (if they wrote at all) would range from A.D. 190 to A.D. 210. Now, just such a writer is Hippolytus,--who is known to have been taught by that "faithful man"

Irenaeus[194],--to whom, as it happens, the deposit was "committed" by Polycarp,--who stood to St. John in the self-same relation as Timothy to St. Paul!

(ii.) Our SAVIOUR is repeatedly declared to have interpreted the Old Testament to His Disciples. For instance, to the two going to Emmaus, "beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, _He interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself_[195]." Moreover, before He left the world, He solemnly promised His Apostles that the HOLY GHOST, whom the FATHER should send in His Name, "should _teach them all things_, and _bring to their remembrance all things which He had spoken to them_[196]." Shall we believe that the Treasury of _Divine Inspiration_ thus opened by CHRIST Himself was straightway closed up by its human guardians, and at once forgotten? Shall we not rather believe that Cleopas and his companion, (for instance,) forthwith repeated their LORD'S words to every member of the Apostolic body, and to others also; that they were questioned again and again by adoring listeners, even to their extremest age; aye, and that they taxed their memories to the utmost in order to recal every little word, every particular of our SAVIOUR'S Divine utterance? It must be so! And the echo, the remote echo of that exposition, depend upon it! descended to a second, aye and to a third generation; yea, and has come down, faintly, and feebly it may be, but yet essentially and truly, even to ourselves!

(iii.) And yet,--(for we would not willingly incur the charge of being fanciful in so solemn and important a matter,)--the great fact to be borne in mind, (and it is the great fact which nothing can ever set aside or weaken,) is, that for the first century at least of our aera, there existed within the Christian Church _the gift of Prophecy_; that is, of _Inspired Interpretation_[197]. The minds of the Apostles, CHRIST Himself "opened, _to understand the Scriptures_[198]." Can it be any matter of surprise that men so enlightened, when they had been miraculously endowed with the gift of tongues[199], and scattered over the face of the ancient civilized World, should have disseminated the same principles of Catholic Interpretation, as well as the same elements of Saving Truth? When this miraculous _gift_ ceased, its _results_ did not also come to an end. The fountain dried up, but the streams which it had sent forth yet "made glad the City of G.o.d." And by what possible logic can the teaching of the early Church be severed from its source?

It cannot be supposed for an instant that such a severance ever took place. The teaching of the Apostolic age was the immediate parent of the teaching of the earliest of the Fathers,--in whose Schools it is matter of history that those Patristic writers with whom we are most familiar, studied and became famous. Accordingly, we discover a method of Interpreting Holy Scripture strictly resembling that employed by our SAVIOUR and His Apostles, _in all the earliest Patristic writings_. As doc.u.ments increase, the evidence is multiplied; and at the end of two or three centuries after the death of St. John the Evangelist, voices are heard from Jerusalem and other parts of Palestine; from Antioch and from other parts of Syria; from the Eastern and the Western extremities of North Africa; from many regions of Asia Minor; from Constantinople and from Greece; from Rome, from Milan, and from other parts of Italy; from Cyprus and from Gaul;--all singing in unison; all singing the same heavenly song!... In what way but one is so extraordinary a phenomenon to be accounted for? Are we to believe that there was a general conspiracy of the East and the West, the North and the South, to interpret Holy Scripture in a certain way; and that way, the wrong way?

Enough has been said, it is thought, to shew that many of Mr. Jowett's remarks about the value of Patristic evidence are either futile or incorrect; or that they betray an entire misapprehension of the whole question, not to say a thorough want of appreciation of the claims of Antiquity. We do not yield to the 'Essayist and Reviewer' in veneration for the Inspired page; and trust that enough has been said to shew it.

Our eye, when we read Scripture, (like his,) "is fixed on the form of One like the Son of Man; or of the Prophet who was girded with a garment of camel's hair; or of the Apostle who had a thorn in the flesh."

(p. 338.) We are only unlike Mr. Jowett we fear in _this_,--that _we_ believe _ex animo_ that the first-named was the Eternal SON, "equal to the FATHER," and "of one substance with the FATHER[200]:" and further that St. Paul's fourteen Epistles are all _inspired writings_, in an entirely different sense from the Dialogues of Plato or the Tragedies of Sophocles. It follows, that however riveted our mental gaze may be on the awful forms which come before us in Holy Scripture,--as often as we con _the inspired record of the actions and of the sayings of those men_, we are constrained many a time to look upward, and to exclaim with the Psalmist, "Thy thoughts are very deep[201]!" And often if asked, "Understandest thou what thou readest?"--we must still answer with the Ethiopian, "How can I, except some man should guide me[202]?"

(iv.) To a.s.sume however that our defective knowledge "cannot be supplied by the _conjectures_ of Fathers or Divines," (p. 338,) is in some sort to beg the question at issue. To say of the student of Scripture that "the history of Christendom, and all the afterthoughts of Theology, _are nothing to him_:" (p. 338:) that "he has to imagine himself a disciple of CHRIST or Paul, and _to disengage himself from all that follows_:"

(_Ibid._:) is not the language of modesty, but of inordinate conceit. In Mr. Jowett it is in fact something infinitely worse; for he shews that his object thereby is to "obtain an unembarra.s.sed opportunity of applying all the resources of a so-called criticism to discredit and destroy the written record itself[203]."

"True indeed it is, that more than any other subject of human knowledge, Biblical criticism has hung (_sic._) to the past;" (p. 340;) but the reason is also obvious. It is because, in the words of great Bishop Pearson, "Philosophia quotidie _progressu_, Theologia nisi _regressu_ non crescit[204]." "O ye who are devoting yourselves to the Divine Science of Theology," (he exclaims,) "and whose cheeks grow pale over the study of Holy Scripture above all; ye who either fill the venerable office of the Priesthood or intend it, and are hereafter to undertake the awful cure of souls:--rid yourselves of that itch of the present age, the love of novelty. Make it your business to inquire for that which was from the beginning. Resort for counsel to the fountain-head.

Have recourse to Antiquity. Return to the holy Fathers. Look back to the primitive Church. In the words of the Prophet,--'_Ask for the old paths_[205].'"

When therefore Mr. Jowett cla.s.ses together "the early Fathers, the Roman Catholic mystical writers, the Swiss and German Reformers, and the Nonconformist Divines," (p. 377,)--he either shews a most lamentable want of intellectual perspective, or a most perverse understanding. So jumbled into one confused heap, it may not be altogether untrue to say of Commentators generally, that "the words of Scripture suggest to them _their own thoughts or feelings_." (p. 377.) But when it is straightway added, "There is nothing in such a view derogatory to _the Saints and Doctors of former ages_," (_Ibid._,) we are constrained, (for the reasons already before the reader,) to remonstrate against so misleading and deceitful a way of putting the case. Mr. Jowett desires to be understood not to depreciate "the genius or learning of famous men of old," when he remarks "that _Aquinas or Bernard did not shake themselves free from the mystical method of the Patristic times_."

(_Ibid._) But with singular obtuseness, or with pitiful disingenuousness, he does his best by such words to shut out from view the real question at issue,--namely, _the exegetical value of Patristic Antiquity_. For the Church of England, when she appeals, (as she repeatedly does,) to "the Ancient Fathers," does not by any means intend such names as the Abbot of Clairvaux, who flourished in the middle of the twelfth century; or Thomas of Aquinum, who lived later into the thirteenth. It is the spirit of _the ante-Nicene age_ which she defers to; the Fathers of _the first four or five centuries_ to whose opinion she gives reverent attention; as her formularies abundantly shew.

Whether therefore Aquinas and Bernard were or were not able to "shake themselves free from the mystical method _of the Patristic times_,"

matters very little. The point to be observed is that _the Writers of the Patristic times_, as a matter of fact, "did not shake themselves _free from the mystical method of" CHRIST and His Apostles_!

Very far am I from denying that "any one who, instead of burying himself in the pages of the commentators, would learn the Sacred Writings by heart, and paraphrase them in English, will probably make a nearer approach to their true meaning than he would gather from any Commentary." Quite certain is it that "the true use of Interpretation is to get rid of interpretation, and leave us alone in company with the author." (p. 384.) But this is quite a distinct and different matter, as every person of unsophisticated understanding must perceive at once. The same thing will be found stated by myself, in a subsequent part of the present volume, at considerable length[206]; the qualifying condition having been introduced at p. 16. The truth is, a man can no more divest himself of the conditions of thought habitual to one familiar with his Prayer-Book, than he can withdraw himself from the atmosphere of light in which he moves. _Not_ the abuse of Commentators on Holy Scripture, but _the principle on which Holy Scripture itself is to be interpreted_,--is the real question at issue: the fundamental question which underlies this, being of course the vital one,--namely, _Is the Bible an inspired book, or not_?

Apart from what has been already urged concerning "the torrent of _Patristic_ Interpretation[207]" which flows down not so much from the fountain-head of Scripture, (wherein so many specimens of _Inspired_ Interpretation are preserved,) as from the fontal source of all Wisdom and Knowledge,--even the lips of the Incarnate WORD Himself;--apart from this, a very important Historical circ.u.mstance calls for notice in this place.

How did Christianity originate? how did it first establish a footing in the world? "The answer is, By the preaching of living men, who said they were commissioned by G.o.d to proclaim it. _That_ was the origin and first establishment of Christianity. There is indeed a vague and unreasoning notion prevalent that Christianity was _taken from the New Testament_.

The notion is historically untrue. Christianity was widely extended through the civilized world before the New Testament was written; and its several books were successively addressed to various bodies of Christian believers; to bodies, that is, who already possessed the faith of CHRIST in its integrity. When, indeed, G.o.d ceased to inspire persons to write these books, and when they were all collected together into what we call the New Testament, the existing Faith of the Church, derived from oral teaching, was tested by comparison with this Inspired Record. And it henceforth became the standing law of the Church that nothing should be received as necessary to Salvation, which could not stand that test. But still, though thus tested, (every article being proved by the New Testament,) Christianity is not taken from it; _for it existed before it_.

"What, then, was the Christianity which was thus established? Have we any record of it as it existed before the New Testament became the sole authoritative standard? I answer, we have. The Creeds of the Christian Church are the record of it. That is precisely what they purport to be: not doc.u.ments taken from the New Testament, but doc.u.ments transmitting to us the Faith as it was held from the beginning; the Faith as it was preached by inspired men, before the inspired men put forth any writings; the Faith once for all delivered to the Saints. Accordingly you will find that our Church in her viiith Article does not ground her affirmation that the Creeds ought to be 'thoroughly received and believed,' on the fact that they _were taken_ from the New Testament, (which they were _not_;) but on the fact that '_they may be proved by most certain warrants of Holy Scripture_.'"

It follows therefore from what has been said, that even if bad men could succeed in destroying the authority of the Bible as the Word of G.o.d, all could not be up with Christianity. There would _still_ remain to be dealt with the Faith as it exists in the world; the Faith held from the beginning; the Faith once delivered to the Saints. None of the a.s.saults on Holy Scripture can touch _that_; for it traces itself to an independent origin. The evil work, therefore, would have to be begun all over again. The special doctrines which are impugned in 'Essays and Reviews' do not stand or fall with the Inspiration or Interpretation of Scripture; but are stereotyped in the Faith of Christendom. "The Fall of Man, Original Sin, the Atonement, the Divinity of CHRIST, the Trinity, all have their place in the Faith held from the beginning. They are imbedded in the Creeds, and in that general scheme of Doctrine which circles round the Creeds, and is involved in them. Nay, curiously enough,--or rather I should say providentially,--the very point against which the attacks of this book are princ.i.p.ally directed, namely the Inspiration of the Old Testament, is in express terms a.s.serted there:--_the_ HOLY GHOST '_spake by the Prophets_[208].'"

It remains to shew the bearing of these remarks on Mr. Jowett's Essay.--With infinite perseverance, he dwells upon "the nude Scripture, the merest letter of the Sacred Volume, as if in it and in it alone, resided the entire Revelation of CHRIST, and all possible means of judging what that Revelation consists of: whereas this is very far indeed from being the case. Every single Book of the New Testament was written, as we have seen, to persons _already in possession of Christian Truth_. It is quite erroneous therefore, historically and notoriously erroneous, to suppose either that the Divine Inst.i.tution of the Church, or that its Doctrines, were literally founded upon the written words of Holy Scripture; or that they can impart no ill.u.s.tration nor help in the Interpretation of those written words.... The complete possession of the saving Truth belonged to the Christian Church not by degrees, nor in lapse of time, but from the first. Of that saving truth, thus taught and thus possessed, _the Apostles' Creed_, growing up as it did on every side of Christendom as the faithful record of the uniform oral teaching of the Apostles, is the true and precious historical monument[209]; and I venture to say that if any person claims to reject the Apostles'

Creed as an auxiliary, a great and invaluable auxiliary, in interpreting the writings of the Apostles, he shews himself to be very wanting indeed in appreciation of the comparative value of Historical Evidence, and of the true principles of Historical Philosophy.--And not the Apostles'

Creed only; but the whole history and tradition of the universal Church,--needing, no doubt, skill and discretion in its application,--supply, when applied with requisite skill and discretion, very valuable and real aid in interpreting Holy Scripture[210]."