Inspiration and Interpretation Part 6

When the spirit of the Age comes into collision with the spirit of the Gospel, the result is sometimes (as in the earliest centuries,) portentous;--sometimes, (as in the last,) simply deplorable and grievous. The battle which seems to be at present waging is of a different nature. Physical Science has undertaken the perilous task of hardening herself against the G.o.d of Nature. We shall probably see this unnatural strife prolonged for many years to come;--to be succeeded by some fresh form of irreligion. Somewhat thus, I apprehend, will it be to the end: and the men of every age will in those conflicts find their best probation; and it will still be the office of the Creator, in this way to separate the Light from the Darkness,--until the dawn of the everlasting Morning!

It is not proposed to enter into the Rationalism of the last century, therefore; or to inquire into the causes of the barren lifeless shape into which Theology then, for the most part, threw itself. I have never made that department of Ecclesiastical History my study: and _who_ does not turn away from what is joyless and dreary, to greener meadows, and more fertile fields? It shall only be remarked that when the _Credibility_ of Religion is the thing generally denied, _Evidences_ will of necessity be the form which much of the Theological writing of the Day will a.s.sume. Let it not be imagined for an instant that one is the apologist of what Mr. Pattison has characterized as "an age of Light without Love." (p. 254.) But I insist that the theological picture of the last century is incomplete, until attention has been called to the many redeeming features which it presents, and which are all of a re-a.s.suring kind.

Thus, in the department of sacred scholars.h.i.+p, _who_ can forgot that our learned John Mill, in 1707, gave to the world that famous edition of the New Testament which bears his name, after thirty years of patient toil?

Who can forget our obligations in Hebrew, to Kennicott? (1718-1783.) Humphrey Hody's great work on the Text, and older Versions of Holy Scripture, was published in 1705.--Bingham's immortal 'Origines' began to appear in 1708; and William Cave lived till 1714.

In the same connexion should be mentioned Bp. Gibson, who died in 1748, and Humphrey Prideaux, whose 'Connexion' is dated 1715. Poc.o.c.ke died on the eve of the commencement of the last century (1691); but so great a name casts a bright beam through the darkness which Mr. Pattison describes so forcibly. Archbishop Wake died in 1737. Warton, the author of 'Anglia Sacra,' died at the age of 35 in 1695.

Survey next the field of Divinity, properly so called; and in the face of Mr. Pattison's rash statement that "we have no cla.s.sical Theology since 1660," (p. 265,) take notice that Bp. Bull, one of the greatest Divines which the Church of CHRIST ever bred, did not begin to write until 1669, and lived to the year 1709. This was the man, remember, who received the thanks of the whole Gallican Church for his 'Judicium Ecclesiae Catholicae,' (i.e. his learned a.s.sertion of our SAVIOUR'S G.o.dhead[138];)--the man whose writings would have won him the reverence and affection of Athanasius and Augustine and Basil, had he lived in their day; for he had a mind like theirs. Bp. Pearson did not die till 1686. Bp. Beveridge wrote till his death in 1707. Fell, the learned editor of Cyprian, died in 1686: Stillingfleet lived till 1699. Wall's History of Infant Baptism appeared in 1705. Wheatly, who led the way in liturgical inquiry, was alive till 1742; and Bp. Patrick was a prolific writer till his death in 1707. May we not also claim the excellent and learned Grabe as altogether one of ourselves?

Such names do not require special comment. They are their own best eulogium, and present a high t.i.tle to their country's grat.i.tude. The name of Prebendary Lowth, (the author of an excellent commentary on the prophets,) reminds us that there was living till 1732 one who fully appreciated the calling of an Interpreter of G.o.d's Word[139]. Bishop Lowth his son, in his great work, (1753,) recovered the forgotten principle of Hebrew poetry. To convince ourselves what a spirit existed in some quarters, (notwithstanding the general spread of the very opinions which 'Essayists and Reviewers' have been so industriously reproducing in our own day,) it is only necessary to transcribe the t.i.tle-page of S. Parker's excellent 'Bibliotheca Biblica,' a Commentary on the Pentateuch, 1720-1735; 'gathered out of the genuine writings of Fathers, Ecclesiastical Historians, and Acts of Councils down to the year of our LORD 451, being that of the fourth General Council; and lower, as occasion may require.'--That learned man designed to achieve a Commentary on the whole Bible on the same laborious plan; but his labours and his life, (at the age of 50,) were brought to an end in 1730.--Dr. Waterland, born in 1683, and Dr. Jackson, born in 1686,--two great names!--died respectively in 1740 and 1763.--In 1778, appeared Dr.

Townson's admirable 'Discourses on the Gospels.' The author lived till 1792. Pious Bp. Horne (1730-1792) has left the best evidence of his ability as a Divine in the Introduction to his Commentary on the Psalms.

Jones of Nayland is found to have lived till 1800. Bp. Horsley, a great champion of orthodoxy of belief, as well as an excellent commentator, critic, and Sermon writer, lived till 1806. Not seven years have elapsed since there was to be seen among ourselves a venerable Divine, who was declared in 1838, by the chief promoter of the 'Tracts for the Times,'

to have "been reserved to report to a forgetful generation what was the Theology of their Fathers[140]." Martin Joseph Routh, died in 1854, after completing a century of years. In 1832 appeared his 'Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Opuscula.' His 'Reliquae Sacrae' had appeared in 1814.

The work was undertaken so far back as 1788. The last volume appeared in 1848, and concluded with a _Catena_ of authorities on the great question which was denied by the unbelievers of the last century, and _is_ denied by the 'Essayists and Reviewers' of this[141]. Here then was one who had borne steady witness in the Church of England to what is her genuine Catholic teaching from a period dating long before the birth of any one who was concerned with the 'Tracts for the Times.'

More ancient names present themselves as furnis.h.i.+ng exceptions to Mr.

Pattison's dreary sentence. From Abp. Potter and Leslie, down to Abp.

Laurence and Van Mildert,--how many might yet be specified! We have not hitherto mentioned Abp. Leighton, who died in 1684: Hickes, Johnson, and Brett, who survived respectively till 1715, 1725, and 1743: the truly apostolic Wilson, Bishop of Sodor and Man (1663-1755,)--a name, by the way, which deserves far more distinct and emphatic notice than can here be bestowed upon it; and Nelson, the pious author of 'Fasts and Festivals,' who died in 1715. We had good Iz. Walton, till 1683, and holy Ken till 1711. Richard Hele, author of 'Select Offices,' (which appeared in 1717,) is a name not forgotten in Heaven certainly, though little known on Earth; while Kettlewell and Scandret begin a Catena of which good Bishop Jolly would be only one of the later links. Meanwhile, the reader is requested to take notice that there were many other excellent Divines of the period under consideration, (as Long and Horbery;) men who made no great figure indeed, but who were evidently persons of great piety and sound judgment; while their learning puts that of 'Essayists and Reviewers' altogether to the blush.

But I have reserved for the last, a truly n.o.ble name,--which Mr.

Pattison, (with singular bad taste, to say no worse,) mentions only to disparage. I allude to Dr. Joseph Butler, Bishop of Durham; whose 'a.n.a.logy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Const.i.tution and Course of Nature,'--remains, at the end of a century, unanswerable as an Apology,--unrivalled as a text-book,--unexhausted as a mine of suggestive thought. It may be convenient for an 'Essayist and Reviewer'

to declare that "the merit of the a.n.a.logy lies in its want of originality." (p. 286.) There was not much originality perhaps in the remark that an apple falls to the ground. Whatever the faults of the a.n.a.logy, that work, under G.o.d, _saved the Church_. However "depressing to the soul" (p. 293.) of Mr. Pattison, it is nevertheless a book which will invigorate Faith, and brighten Hope, and comfort Charity herself,--long after the spot where he and I shall sleep has been forgotten: long after our very names will be hard to find.

Let me turn from this ill.u.s.trious individual, to one whose very name is perhaps unknown. One loves to think that there are at all times plenty of good men, who are doing G.o.d'S work in the world, in quiet corners; but whose names do not perhaps rise to the surface and emerge into notice, throughout the whole of a long life. Conversely, how many must there be, the blessing of whose example and influence has extended down from the surface, (where perhaps it was acknowledged and appreciated by all,) until it made itself felt by the humblest units of a lowly country paris.h.!.+... The obscure village of Finmere, (in Oxfords.h.i.+re,) was so happy as to enjoy for its Rector, from 1734 to 1771, the Rev. Thomas Long, M.A.,--"a man," (says the Register,) "of the most exemplary piety and charity." He presented to the church twelve acres of land, "charging it with a yearly payment of fifteen s.h.i.+llings to the Clerk, _as a recompense to him for attending on the Fasts and Festivals_; and ordering sixpence to be deducted from the payment, for each time the Clerk failed to attend on those days,--unless let by sickness." About ten years ago, there was found in the hands of a labouring man at Finmere, a solitary copy of a printed "Lecture," by this individual, "addressed to the young persons" of the village, (1762,) which begins as follows:--"I have usually, once every three years, gone through a course of Lectures upon the Catechism; but considering my age and great infirmities, it is not very probable I should continue this practice any longer. I am willing therefore, as a small monument of my care and affection for you, to print the last of these Lectures," &c.... What heart so dull as not to admit that men like this, (and there were _many_ of them!) are quite good enough to redeem an age from indiscriminate opprobrium and unmitigated contempt?

Shall we omit, after this enumeration, to notice the singular fact that _Discipline_ still lingered on,--even the discipline of _public penance_,--until within the memory of aged persons yet living? Merchants in the city of London wore mourning during Lent, within the present century. It is only within the last thirty years that formulae expressive of reliance on the Divine blessing have been expunged from bills-of-lading, and similar printed doc.u.ments. In the beginning of the period discoursed of by Mr. Pattison, (viz. in the year 1714,) the excellent Robert Nelson, in "An Address to Persons of Quality and Estate," proposed as objects for the generosity of the affluent, such inst.i.tutions as the following:--"the creating of Charity Schools,"--of "Parochial Libraries in the meanly endowed Cures throughout England,"--of "a superior School for training up Schoolmasters and Schoolmistresses,"--and of "Colleges or Seminaries for the Candidates of Holy Orders." He suggested that there should be "Houses of Hospitality for entertaining Strangers;" "Suffragan Bishops, both at home and in the Western Plantations;" "Colleges for receiving Converts from Popery."

Some of Nelson's suggestions read like vaticinations. He points out the need of Ladies' Colleges,--of a Hospital for Incurables,--of Ragged Schools, (for what else is a school "for the distressed children called the _Black-guard_?"),--and of Houses of Mercy for the reception of penitent fallen women.--Is it right to speak of a century which could freely contemplate such works as these and carry into execution many of them[142], without some allusion to the leaven which was at work beneath the dry crust of Society? the living Catholic energy which neither the average dulness of the pulpit could quench, nor the lifeless morality which had been popularly subst.i.tuted for Divinity could destroy?

We are abundantly prepared therefore for Mr. Pattison's admission that "public opinion was throughout on the side of the defenders of Christianity:" (p. 313:)--that, "however a loose kind of Deism might be the tone of fas.h.i.+onable circles, it is clear that distinct disbelief of Christianity was by no means the general state of the public mind. The leaders of the Low-Church and Whig party were quite aware of this.

Notwithstanding the universal complaints of the High-Church party of the prevalence of infidelity, it is obvious that this mode of thinking was confined to a very small section of society." (p. 313.)

And surely it should not escape us that the peculiar form which unbelief a.s.sumed during the period under discussion, resulted in a benefit to the Church. "The eighteenth century," (says our author,) "enforced the truths of Natural Morality with a solidity of argument and variety of proof which they have not received since the Stoical epoch, if then."

(p. 296.) "The career of the Evidential School, its success and its failure, has enriched the history of Doctrine," not indeed "with a complete refutation of that method as an instrument of theological investigation," (p. 297,) (witness the immortal 'a.n.a.logy' of Bishop Butler!)--but, certainly with very precious experience. That age has bequeathed to the Church a vast body of controversial writing which she could ill afford to part with at the present day.

So far, we have little to complain of in Mr. Pattison's Essay, except on the side of omission. _But_ for the fatal circ.u.mstance of the company in which the learned writer comes abroad, and _the avowed purpose_ with which he is found there, a charitable construction might have been put upon most of the present performance. The following sentences, on the other hand, are _not_ excusable.

"In the present day when a G.o.dless orthodoxy threatens, as in the fifteenth century, to extinguish religious thought (!) altogether, and nothing is allowed in the Church of England but the formulae of past thinkings, which have long lost all sense of any kind, (!) it may seem out of season to be bringing forward a misapplication of common-sense in a bygone age," (p. 297.)

The "orthodoxy" of the fifteenth century is something new to us. So is the prospect "in the present day," of an "extinction of religious thought,"--the result of "G.o.dless orthodoxy." The fault, or the misfortune of the Church of England then, is, that she retains "_the formulae of past thinkings, which have long lost all sense of any kind_." (p. 297.) If this does not mean the English _Book of Common Prayer_, what _does_ it mean? And if it _means_ the English Prayer-Book, how can Mr. Pattison retain his commission in the Church of England, and exclusively employ a Book which he presumes so to characterize?

But this is _ad hominem_. The learned writer proceeds:--"There are times and circ.u.mstances when religious ideas will be greatly benefited by being submitted to the rough and ready tests by which busy men try what comes in their way; by being made to stand their trial, and be fully canva.s.sed, _coram populo_. As Poetry is not for the critics, so Religion is not for the Theologians." (p. 297.)

No doubt. But does Mr. Pattison then really mean to tell us that the proper tribunal before which the Creeds, (for example,) of the Catholic Church,--our Communion and Baptismal offices,--the structure of our Calendar, and so forth,--should "_stand their trial_, and be _freely canva.s.sed_," is, "_coram populo_?" A "rough and ready test," this, of Truth, I grant; aye, a _very_ "rough" one. But was it ever,--can it ever be,--a _fair_ test? Let us hear Mr. Pattison out, on the subject of Religion:--

"When it is stiffened into phrases, and these phrases are declared to be objects of reverence but not of intelligence, it is on the way to become _a useless enc.u.mbrance; the rubbish of the past; blocking the road_.

Theology then retires into the position it occupies in the Church of Rome at present, an unmeaning frostwork of dogma, out of all relation to the actual history of Man." (pp. 297-8.)

It cannot be necessary to discuss such sentiments. With Mr. Pattison personally, I _will not_ condescend to discuss them,--until he has divested himself of that "useless enc.u.mbrance," and ceased to employ daily "that rubbish of the past," which yet the two letters he subjoins to his name indicate, in the most solemn manner, his reverence for; and which alone make him _Reverendus_.

But speaking to others,--speaking to _you_, my friends,--let me point out that "the tendencies of _irreligious_ thought in England, 1860-1861," are _indeed_ in a direction where the Prayer-Book is found to be _effectually_ "blocking up the road." (pp. 297-8.) Mr. Pattison is simply dreaming,--haunted by the phantoms of his own brain, and talking the language of the den,--when he complains that "the Philosophy, now petrified into tradition, may once have been a vital Faith; but now that" it is "withdrawn from public life," has ceased to be a "social influence." (p. 298.) And when he would exalt the last century at the expence of the present, (pp. 298-9,) he shews nothing so much as the morbid state of his own imagination,--the disordered condition of his own mind. He has blinded himself; and he will not or he cannot see in the healthier tone of our popular Divinity,--in the increased attention to the study of Holy Scripture,--in the impulse which Liturgical inquiries have received since Wheatly's useful volume appeared;--or again, in the immense number of Schools and Churches which have been recently built,--in the marvellous change for the better which has come over the Clergy of the Church of England within the present century,--in the vast development of our Colonial Episcopate within the last few years,--in the rapid increase of Inst.i.tutions connected more or less directly with the Church,--and I will add, in the conspicuous loyalty of the nation;--a practical refutation of his own injurious insinuations; a blessed earnest that G.o.d has _not_ forsaken us; and that we shall _yet_ be a blessing to the World! The people of England, I am persuaded, are in the main very sincerely attached to their Prayer-Book.

To them, it is not "a useless enc.u.mbrance, the rubbish of the past, blocking the road." Nay, there is a "rough and ready test" of what is the current temper of the age in things religious, to which I appeal with infinite satisfaction. I mean, _the general burst of execration with which "Essays and Reviews" have been received_, from one end of the kingdom to the other. _The censure of all the Bishops_, and of _both Houses of Convocation_; re-echoed, as it has been, through _all ranks of the community_, is a great fact;--a fact which I cordially recommend to Mr. Pattison's attention, when he would philosophize on the religious tendencies of his countrymen.

The age we live in, (Heaven knows!) has many drawbacks. _What_ age of the Church has _not_ had them? The fatal disposition which prevails to relax all the ancient safeguards,--the desire to tamper yet further with the Law of Marriage, and to desecrate the Christian Sabbath,--these are grievous features of the times; which may well occasion alarm and create perplexity. But nothing of the kind should ever make us despond; much less despair. There is One above "who is over all, G.o.d blessed for ever." Shall we not rather seek to employ these advantages which we have, with a single heart, a single eye to G.o.d'S glory; and leave the issue, with a generous confidence, to _Him_?... It was thus that the great philosophic Divine of the last century comforted himself, amid darker days than _we_ shall ever experience.

"As different ages have been distinguished by different sorts of particular errors and vices, the deplorable distinction of ours," (he said,) "is an avowed scorn of Religion in some, and a growing disregard to it in the generality." "It is impossible for me, my brethren,"--(Butler is still addressing the clergy of his Diocese, 1761,)--"to forbear lamenting with you the general decay of Religion in this nation; which is now observed by every one, and has been for some time the complaint of all serious persons. The influence of it is more and more wearing out of the minds of men;" while "the number of those who profess themselves unbelievers, increases, and with their number their zeal. Zeal, it is natural to ask,--for what? Why truly _for_ nothing, but _against_ everything that is sacred and good among us[143]." And yet, in days dark as those, Piety could suggest that "no Christian should possibly despair;" and Faith could a.s.sign as the reason of this blessed confidence,--"_For He who hath all power in Heaven and Earth, hath promised that He will be with us to the end of the world._"

It is time to dismiss Mr. Pattison's Essay. In doing so, I will not waste my time and yours by carping at the many errors of detail into which he has (not inexcusably) fallen. These are the accidents,--not the essence of his paper. The root of bitterness with the Author is, clearly enough, _the Theory of Religious Belief in the Church of England_. His concluding words shew this plainly. The sting of the Essay is in the tail:--

"In the Catholic theory the feebleness of Reason is met half-way, and made good by the authority of the Church. When the Protestants threw off this authority, they did not a.s.sign to Reason what they took from the Church, but to Scripture. Calvin did not shrink from saying that Scripture 'shone sufficiently by its own light.' As long as this could be kept to, the Protestant theory of belief was whole and sound. At least it was as sound as the Catholic. In both, Reason, aided by spiritual illumination, performs the subordinate function of recognising the supreme authority of the Church, and of the Bible, respectively.

Time, learned controversy, and abatement of zeal, drove the Protestants generally from the hardy but irrational a.s.sertion of Calvin. Every foot of ground that Scripture lost was gained by one or other of the three subst.i.tutes: Church-authority, the Spirit, or Reason. Church-authority was essayed by the Laudian divines, but was soon found untenable, for on that footing it was found impossible to justify the Reformation and the breach with Rome." [O shame!] "The SPIRIT then came into favour along with Independency. But it was still more quickly discovered that on such a basis only discord and disunion could be reared. There remained to be tried Common Reason, carefully distinguished from recondite learning, and not based on metaphysical a.s.sumptions. To apply this instrument to the contents of Revelation was the occupation of the early half of the eighteenth century; with what success has been seen. In the latter part of the century the same Common Reason was applied to the external evidences. But here the method fails in a first requisite,--universality; for even the shallowest array of historical proof requires some book-learning to apprehend."--(pp. 328-9.)

Now all this is discreditable to Mr. Pattison as a Philosopher and as a Divine. _When_ did Protestant England "throw off the authority" of the Church?--What are _Calvin's_ opinions to _her_?--How does 'Independency,' 'Rationalism,' or any other unsound principle, affect _us_? Look at our Prayer-Book. Is it not the same which it was from the beginning? The Sarum Use, reformed and revised, has been our unbroken heritage as Christian men, from the first. Essentially remodelled in the days of Edward VI., the recension of our "Laudian Divines" is, (by G.o.d'S great mercy!) still ours. What other teaching but that of _the Book of Common Prayer_, is, to this hour, the authoritative teaching of the Church of England? Why insinuate there has been vicissitude of Theory, where notoriously there has been none? Why imply that the storms which periodically sweep over the citadel of our Zion are effectual to remove the old foundations and to subst.i.tute new? What but a hollow heartless Scepticism _can_ be the result of such an abominable pa.s.sage as the foregoing?

"Whoever will take the religious literature of the present day as a whole, and endeavour to make out clearly on what basis Revelation is supposed by it to rest, whether on Authority, on the Inward Light, on Reason, on self-evidencing Scripture, or on the combination of the four, or some of them, and in what proportions; would probably find that he had undertaken a perplexing but not altogether profitless inquiry."--(p. 329.) And so the Essay ends.

With a short comment on the proposed problem, I also shall conclude.

No one but a fool would set about the task which Mr. Pattison here proposes. The current "religious literature _of the day_" cannot be supposed, for an instant, to be an adequate exponent of the mind of the Church of England,--or of any other Church. Revelation rests, at this hour, on exactly the same basis on which it has always rested, and on which it will rest, to the end of time; let the age be faithful, or faithless,--learned or unlearned,--rationalizing or scientific,--sceptical or superst.i.tious,--or whatever else you will. And if I am asked to explain myself, I would humbly say,--(always submitting my own statements in such a matter to the judgment of the Bishops and Doctors of the Church of England,)--that we receive the Bible on the authority of _the Church_. The Church teaches us by the concurrent voices of many Fathers, Doctors, Saints, how to interpret the Bible; and convinces us that the three Creeds which she delivers to us as her own independent tradition, may be proved thereby; being in entire conformity with Holy Scripture, though not originally deduced from it.

"Self-evidencing" is hardly a correct epithet to bestow upon Scripture.

And yet, from the evidence which the New Testament supplies to the Old, and from the interpretation which it puts upon its teaching, we should not despair of proving the Truth of Revelation, to one who had neither darkened the inward Light, nor perverted his Reason.

In truth, however, it is idle thus to speculate. We have been born into the world during the nineteenth Century, whether we wish it or not. We have been nourished, (G.o.d be thanked!) in the bosom of the Christian Church, whether we would or no. The glory of the Gospel has informed our natural reason, and we cannot undo the blessed process, strive we as much as we will. The "inward Light," (as we call it,) is the lingering twilight of the Day of Creation, in the case of the heathen,--the reflected ray of the noontide of the Gospel, even in the case of the modern unbeliever. We cannot escape from these conditions of our being, although we may affect to ignore them, or pretend to turn our eyes the other way. _No_ help however is to be rejected. _No_ faculty of the soul need be denied the privilege of a.s.sisting to convince the doubting heart. The inward Light may not be disparagingly spoken of: for what if it should prove to be a ray sent down from the Father of Lights, to illumine the dark places of the soul? The aid of Reason is not to be excluded; for what is Faith but the highest dictate of the Reason?

Faith, (let us ever remember,) being opposed not to _Reason_, but to _Sight_!... And who for a moment supposes that we disparage the office of Reason, because we speak of the authority of the Church, in controversies of Faith? We simply proclaim the Church to be the appointed witness and keeper of Holy Writ; and when we are invited "_to make out clearly_ on what basis Revelation is supposed to rest,"

(p. 329,) we point,--where else _should_ we point?--unhesitatingly to _her_ unwavering witness from the beginning.

VII. The Essay which brings up the rear in this very guilty volume is from the pen of the "REV. BENJAMIN JOWETT, M.A., [Fellow and Tutor of Balliol College, and] Regius Professor of Greek in the University of Oxford,"--"a gentleman whose high personal character and general respectability seem to give a weight to his words, which a.s.suredly they do not carry of themselves[144]." His performance is ent.i.tled "ON THE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE:" being, in reality, nothing else but a laborious _denial of its Inspiration_.

Mr. Jowett's quarrel is with the whole body of Commentators on the Bible,--ancient and modern; with the whole Church Catholic. He cannot endure the claim of that Book, (like its Divine object and Author,) to "a Name which is above every other Name." That Plato and Sophocles should be capable of but one method of Interpretation, and _that_ the literal,--while the Bible lays claim to a yet profounder meaning,--so distresses the Regius Professor of Greek, that he has appropriated to himself almost a quarter of the present volume, in order that he may cast laborious and systematic ridicule on the very supposition. Some parts of his method I propose presently to submit to _exactly the same "free handling" which he has himself applied to THE WORD OF G.o.d_. In the meantime, since it is my intention not only to demonstrate the worthlessness of the structure which Mr. Jowett has with so much perverse industry here built up, by an examination of some parts of it in detail, but also to pull down as much of the fabric as I am able within a small compa.s.s,--(the construction of something which it is hoped will prove more durable, being to be found in my IIIrd and IVth, Vth and VIth Sermons,)--I proceed at once to inspect the foundation-stone of his edifice; and briefly to demonstrate its absolute insecurity.

$1.$ Mr. Jowett's fundamental principle is expressed in the following brief precept: "_Interpret the Scripture like any other book._"

(p. 377.) To this favourite tune, (although he plays many intricate variations on it,) he invariably reverts in the end[145]. On this preliminary postulate therefore, which, at first sight, to a candid mind, seems fair enough, I proceed to remark as follows:--

Mr. Jowett's formula may be cheerfully and entirely accepted,--_apart from the sinister glosses which he immediately proceeds to put upon it_.

By all means "Interpret the Scripture like any other book." Let us see to what result this principle will conduct us. As for the formula itself, I take the liberty to a.s.sume that it _ought to mean_ somewhat as follows:--"Approach the volume of Holy Scripture with the same candour, and in the same unprejudiced spirit with which you would approach any other famous book of high antiquity. Study it with at least the same attention. Give at least equal heed to all its statements. Acquaint yourself at least as industriously with its method, and with its principle; employing and applying either, with at least equal fidelity, in its interpretation. Above all, beware of playing tricks with its plain language. Beware of suppressing any part of the evidence which it supplies as to its own meaning. Be truthful, and unprejudiced, and honest, and consistent, and logical, and exact throughout, in your work of Interpretation. 'INTERPRET SCRIPTURE LIKE ANY OTHER BOOK.'"

Now, (not to be tedious,) if _this_ were Mr. Jowett's principle, all further discussion would be at an end. The general question of the right method of interpreting the Bible would be easily settled; but it would be hopelessly settled--_against the Regius Professor of Greek_. As I have briefly shewn, (from p. 144 to p. 160 of the present volume,) our LORD and His Apostles openly and repeatedly claim for Scripture that very depth of meaning, that very extent of signification, which Mr.

Jowett so strenuously maintains that it does _not_ possess.--This great fact, he prudently takes no notice of. He simply ignores it. Either he has overlooked it, through inadvertency: or he has omitted it, as not perceiving its force and bearing on the question: or he has disingenuously kept it back. He must choose between these three suppositions. If he has overlooked the fact on which I lay so much stress,--he is a careless and incompetent reader. If he has failed to see its force and bearing on the question,--he is a weak and illogical thinker. If he has deliberately suppressed it, knowing its fatal power,--he is simply a dishonest man. To prevent offence, I may as well state freely that my entire conviction is that he is simply a weak and illogical person. My warrant for this opinion is especially the very sad performance of his now under consideration.

It is clear however that the paraphrase above hazarded does _not_ express Mr. Jowett's principle. "Interpret the Bible like any other book," means with him something else. And what it _does_ mean, the Reverend author does not suffer us to doubt. He shews that his meaning is, _Interpret the Bible like any other book_, FOR _it is like any other book_. I proceed to shew that this _is_ Mr. Jowett's meaning.

It becomes necessary however at once to introduce to the reader's notice the main inference which, (as already hinted,) flows from Mr. Jowett's favourite position. "_Interpret_ Scripture like any other book,"--he says. His business is with _the Interpretation_ of "the Jewish and Christian Scriptures;" and he begins by eagerly a.s.suring us,--and is strenuous in all that follows to make us believe,--(but simply on _a priori_ grounds!)--that "the true glory and note of Divinity in these, is _not_ that they have hidden, mysterious, or double meanings; but _a simple and universal one_, which is beyond them and will survive them."

(p. 332.) "Is it admitted," (he asks, at the end of many pages,) "that _the Scripture has one and only one true meaning_?" (p. 368.)

Let us hear what reasons the Reverend author of this seventh Essay is able to produce in support of his favourite opinion. He approaches the subject from a respectful distance:--