Scripture. Yes; but what authority has God given us to put Scripture into our intellectual alembic and distil its spirit or essence out of it? At least, what right have we to do so, and represent the product as Scriptural ?

I would uphold, then, the Articles in their plain, literal sense; but I would uphold them as part and parcel of the Prayer-book. Taken in connexion with the Prayerbook, they admirably serve the purpose of exhibiting the doctrinal aspect of God's truth, separated for a certain needful purpose, but still not in connexion with what God has joined with it.

In the next place, it has been suggested to me that some statements in the foregoing pages might be misconstrued as implying that I believe that a mere historical faith is what God requires. On the contrary, I believe that the only faith effectual to salvation is a realising faith.

I have said nothing whatsoever respecting the nature and efficacy of that faith in the soul which goes forth to meet and embrace the external facts or realities which God has placed before it for its acceptance. My object has been to determine what are the outward realities which God offers to the acceptance of our internal faith, not the nature of the faith which accepts them, and to this point I have carefully adhered.

Still it may be asked, Why have any other book besides the Bible? What need of any book in public worship to represent Scripture if you have Scripture itself?

To which we answer, that no body or sect of Christians in existence uses the Scriptures alone in public worship. The service of the Catholic Church is the only approach to such a thing. Above two-thirds of the Daily Service of the Church consists of extracts from Scripture.

The public services of the various Protestant sects con

sist of prayers supposed, in most cases, to be extempore and so assumed to be the composition of the minister, and on that account, of course, not Scripture itself, nor, of necessity, Scriptural, even though they may be full of Scripture phrases; to this is sometimes added the reading of portions of Scripture, the selection of which is also entirely in the hands of him who conducts the service; and the singing of metrical hymns from some book peculiar to the sect or congregation, and sermons. Having carefully ascertained not only the mode of performing Divine worship among the various sects of Dissenters, but also the nature and quality of the worship itself, I speak with confidence when I say that in no case is there anything approaching to a rule or method for bringing before the people of these sects the facts of Redemption as they are presented to us in the Scripture narrative.' The only fixed form or Liturgy of any of these sects is their hymnbook, in which the hymns are always arranged according to the leading features of the Calvinistic scheme, or according to the heads of individual Christian experience.

Of course this does not apply to certain congregations, espe cially among the Wesleyans and others, in which the Prayer-boog is partially used.

CHAPTER II.

CREED OF ST. ATHANASIUS.

THE objections taken, even by many sincere believers in the ever-blessed Trinity, to the Creed of St. Athanasius, are twofold.

First, it is supposed to make greater demands upon our faith than the other creeds.

Secondly, its damnatory clauses are assumed to be unwarrantably severe and uncharitable.

1st. This Creed is supposed to make greater demands apon our submissive faith than the other two creeds, especially than the Apostles'. It is undoubtedly longer, and contains more dogmatic assertions, and so unthinking persons suppose there must be, on this account, less certainty that all the statements contained in it can be proved from Scripture.

We have three creeds. The Apostles', which is the shortest, and expressed apparently in the most familiar terms. The Nicene Creed, which is, on one head, somewhat more diffuse; and the Creed we are now considering, which is certainly much longer, and contains terms, such as "Incomprehensible," "Incarnation," "confusion of substance," "unity of person," which require some little knowledge of the elements of Theology before they can be realised.

But which of these creeds is in reality the most difficult?

1 am supposing that we think of what we say in solemn worship; that we endeavour to gain as clear a notion as we can of the meaning of the words we use, and to what we commit ourselves by using them.

Now, if we weigh well the meaning of the words composing each clause of these three creeds; which, of course, all Christians who use them ought to do; then we shall find that the Apostles' Creed, simple as it seems, contains one statement which, as it is there expressed, is incomparably harder than anything in the Creed of St. Athanasius; and this is, that "Jesus Christ, God's only Son, our Lord, was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary."

For this statement, simple as it seems to those who repeat words without realising them, is a declaration, in very abrupt terms, of the greatest and deepest mystery of the faith; and it is a bare statement, accompanied by no explanation which may show us that this mystery, whilst it is above our reason, is yet in accordance with it.

It must, of course, be understood that in saying this, I am not saying one word in disparagement of such a formulary as the creed of our Baptism—God forbid. I am merely directing attention to a fact; and what I have said applies equally to the enunciation of the Incarnation, which we have in the first page of the New Testament.

There the Incarnation is revealed in terms equally abrupt and plain. "Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife; for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost." "A virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel."

Now the bare terms of the first chapter of St. Matthew require to be expanded, and their meaning put into other words, for if the Incarnation were set forth in no other

terms but these, we should be utterly in the dark about It we could form no conception respecting Its nature, and God's intention in bringing It about. But God has given to us, in the first chapter of St. John's Gospel, some insight into the mystery. There we find other words in which God has set forth this great truth, which enable us to form some conception of it. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father), full of grace and truth."

Now, to an unthinking person, these words in St. John would sound harder than the apparently more simple terms in St. Matthew, "That which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost;" whilst to a thinking person the words used by St. John would be the easier, because they give a more logical and intellectual view of the mystery, and answer a number of questions which must suggest themselves to the thinking mind in reading the first chapter of St. Matthew, to which the words used by that Evangelist suggest no answer.

So it is with the two creeds which we are comparing. The unthinking person sees less difficulty in the Apostles' Creed, simply because he gives himself no trouble about understanding the words which he uses; whereas the thoughtful person sees the value of the longer and more dogmatic Creed, because it gives him a logical view of the truth. It answers a thousand questions which the few simple words of the shorter creed suggest, but do not solve.

Take the words of the Apostles' Creed, "I believe in Jesus Christ, God's only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary."