Tradition be strong enough to sustain the weight of an appeal, supposing, in matter of fact, it was not so employed by the early Church. Christ surely may give to each of His instruments its own place; He has vouchsafed us two informants in saving truth, both necessary, both at hand, Tradition for statement, Scripture for proof; and it is our part rather to thank Him for His bounty, than to choose one and reject the other. Let us be content to accept the canonicity of Scripture on faith.

Moreover this view of the subject rids us of all questions about the abstract sufficiency and perfection of Scripture, as a document of saving truth. Romanists sometimes ask us whether some one book, as the Gospel of St. John, would have been sufficient for salvation; and, if not, whether those of the Apostles' writings which happen to remain are sufficient, considering that some of them are undoubtedly lost. We may answer, that any one book of Scripture would be sufficient, provided none other were given us; that the whole Volume, as we have received it, is enough, because we have There is no abstract measure of what is sufficient. Faith cannot believe more than it is told. It is saving, if it believes that, be it little or great.

no more.

Lastly, it may be asked, if Scripture be, as has been above represented, but the document of appeal, and Catholic Tradition the authoritative teacher of Christians, how is it that our Articles say nothing

of Catholic Tradition, and limit Tradition to the subject-matter of Ceremonies and Rites which are not "in all places one or utterly like," " and may be changed according to the diversity of countries, times, and men's manners?" To which I answer by asking, in turn, why the Articles contain no recognition of the inspiration of Holy Scripture. In truth, we must take the Articles as we find them, they are not a system of theology on whatever view, but a protest against certain specific errors, existing at the time they were drawn up. There are, as all parties must confess, great truths not in the Articles.

LECTURE XII.

ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD OF OUR LORD'S TEACHING.

Of the two lines of proof offered in behalf of the sixth Article, which I discussed in my last Lecture, the one considered it to declare a doctrine, the other a fact; the one spoke as if Holy Scripture must contain, the other as if it happened to contain all necessary truth. Of these the former seems to me to come nearer to the real meaning of the Article, and also to the truth of the case, though the particular considerations commonly offered in proof are insufficient. Certainly, we cannot maintain the peculiar authority of the written word, on the ground of any antecedent necessity, that revelation should be written, or from the witness of Scripture itself, or from the parallel of the Jewish Law; yet there are probabilities nevertheless, which recommend the doctrine to our belief, even before going into the details of that historical testi

mony which I consider to be the proper evidence of it.

Let us see, then, what can be said on the primá facie view of the subject, in behalf of the notion that Scripture is on principle, and not only by accident, the sole Canon of our faith.

First, the New Testament is commonly called a testament or will. Indeed, the very circumstance that St. Paul calls the Gospel Revelation a Testament, and that Testaments are necessarily written, and that he parallels it to the Mosaic Testament, and that the Mosaic was written, prepares us to expect that the Gospel will be written also. And the name of Testament actually given to the sacred volume confirms this anticipation. It evidently is a mark of special honor; and it assigns a most significant purpose to the written Word, such as Tradition, however clearly Apostolical, cannot reach. Even granting Tradition and Scripture both to come from the Apostles, it does not therefore follow that their written Word was not, under God's over-ruling guidance, designed for a particular purpose, for which their Word unwritten was not designed.

Next, we learn from the testimony of the early Church, that Scripture and Scripture only is inspired. This explains how it may be called in an especial manner the Testament or Will of our Lord and Saviour. Scripture has a gift which Tradition has not; it is fixed, tangible, accessible, readily applicable, and besides all this perfectly true in all

its parts and relations; in a word, it is a sacred text. Tradition does not convey to us any form of words or of discourses, but things only; doctrine, that is, embodied in diversified language, which in all its varieties expresses the same ideas, but is avouched as literally Apostolic in none. It gives us little or nothing which can be argued from. We can argue only from a text; we can argue freely only from an inspired text. Thus Scripture is in itself specially fitted for that office which we assign it in our Article; to be a repository of manifold and various doctrine, a means of proof, a standard of appeal, an umpire and test between truth and falsehood in all emergencies. It thus becomes the nearest possible approach to the perpetual presence of the Apostles in the Church; whereas Tradition, being rather a collection of separate truths, facts, and usages, is wanting in flexibility and adaptation to the subtle questions and difficulties which from time to time arise. A new heresy, for instance, would be refuted by Tradition only negatively, on the very ground that it was new; but by Scripture positively, by the use of its text, and by suitable inferences from it.

Here, then, are two tokens that Scripture really is what we say it is. But now we proceed to a third peculiarity, to which more time shall be devoted.

Scripture alone contains what remains to us of our Lord's teaching. If there be a portion of