was great disinclination for its alteration when the Authorised Version was introduced.

To Cranmer's succeeded in 1568 that known as the Bishops' Bible, which was founded on those of 1537 and 1539. In 1611, under James I., our present Bible was issued, translated out of the original tongues, and with the former translations diligently compared and revised." So that we are justified in stating our Authorised Version, as at present accepted, to be founded on the translation of William Tyndale published early in the English Reformation.

The Hebrew Canon of the Old Testament is accepted by our Church, in contradistinction to that corrupted one of the Church of Rome; and the right position of the Apocryphal Books, distinguished from the Canonical, is clearly defined by this Article.

We receive as Canonical those Books of the Old Testament authorised as the inspired Word of God and referred to by our Saviour and the Apostles. The Hebrew Canon of that day was identical with our own, and excluded the Apocrypha. Josephus in the first century mentions, speaking of the Apocrypha, "books written since Artaxerxes Longimanus had not the same credit as those before that time, because the succession of prophets had failed." Jerome, the translator and compiler of the Vulgate, in the fourth century attests the same. The modern Hebrew Canon remains unchanged.

The LXX in general use in the Early Church contained some of the Apocryphal Books, and the majority of them were decreed by the Council of Trent, in face of the above testimony to their want of Divine authority.

Our Church has reverted to the ancient Jewish Canon, as received and endorsed by our Lord Himself.

The inspiration of the Scriptures is not definitely asserted here, but, like the doctrine of the Trinity in those Scriptures, is taken for granted as an understood principle. The infallibility and authority of the written Word is insisted upon strongly by the whole tenor of the Articles, which are, moreover, careful to prove the soundness of their own doctrines by this test. These facts alone are significant.

It is, however, to no purpose that the great privilege of the free and open Bible was won for us at the Reformation, to no purpose that it is read in our churches and taught in our schools, unless we each individually make its daily and attentive study our chief business; and that not as being a mere chronicle of certain historical events, but as the revelation of the purpose and will of God towards us, made in Jesus Christ, and of our place and part in the world's salvation.

What the Bible rejects is heresy; what the Bible condemns is sin; what the Bible does not enforce is not necessary to salvation. The deception practised by the Church of the Middle Ages

was, that the Bible was for the priests: the truth proclaimed by the Church of the Reformation is, that the Bible is for the people.

"When Thy Word goeth forth, it giveth light and understanding unto the simple." "Oh, deliver me from the wrongful dealings of men; and so shall I keep Thy commandments.

ARTICLE VII.-" Of the Old Testament."

This Article is a combination of Articles vi. and xix. of the Forty-two of 1552, which ran as follows:

Article vi." The Old Testament is not to be put away as though it were contrary to the New, but to be kept still; for both in the Old and New Testaments everlasting life is offered to mankind by Christ, who is the only Mediator between God and man, being both God and Man. Wherefore they are not to be heard which feign that the old fathers did look only for transitory promises."

Article xix. "The Law, which was given of God by Moses, although it bind not Christian men as concerning the ceremonies and rites of the same, neither is it required that the civil precepts and orders of it should of necessity be received in any common weal; yet no man (be he never so perfect a Christian) is exempt and loose from the obedience of those Commandments which are called Moral. Wherefore they are not to be hearkened unto who

affirm that Holy Scripture is given only to the weak, and do boast themselves continually of the Spirit, of whom (they say) they have learned such things as they teach, although the same be most evidently repugnant to the Holy Scripture."

"Search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and they are they which testify of me." When our Lord spoke these words the New Testament was not written; He was therefore alluding to the writings of the Old. When the Old Testament was written He had not come as Man into the world; how therefore could those Scriptures be said to testify of Him?

"All Scripture is given by inspiration of God." Moses and the prophets did not write their own words, but "spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost;" and God had known from the foundation of the world the manner in which would be worked out His eternal purposes of redemption and salvation. But it was not His will to declare at once how His promises should be fulfilled; He saw in His wisdom that it was better men should for awhile be placed under a dispensation which gave them opportunity to prove if they could possibly gain righteousness by keeping a certain law; that having found by experience, as they inevitably must find, how impossible it is for fallen man to be just with God, they might confess their helpless condition, and be willing and ready to accept the righteousness of Christ when He came. "The law

This

was our schoolmaster, to bring us to Christ." is the reason superficial readers of the Bible assert the Old Testament to be contrary to the New. The three dispensations, Law, Prophets, and Gospel, have necessarily characteristic distinctions, but are all in harmony in their several positions in the system of God's dealing with man. "The law and the prophets were until John," who came declaring the Gospel dispensation at hand.

The Jews "thought they had eternal life" in the Scriptures, not because they testified of Christ, but because they themselves strictly adhered to the letter of Moses' law, to the total disregard of its spirit. (Like that party in our own Church, who, neglecting her true doctrine, think whoever keeps closest to the letter of her Rubrics to be the truest Churchman.) The prophetic writings they interpreted as referring to the re-establishment of the earthly kingdom to Israel, which should satisfy their pride and love of wealth; they would not understand their allusions to Him whose "kingdom was not of this world;" and therefore, " because they knew Him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets which are read every Sabbath-day, they have fulfilled them in condemning Him."”

Is our Article true in saying, "Both in the Old and New Testament everlasting life is offered to mankind by Christ, who is the only Mediator between God and man, being both God and Man"?

The Pentateuch, or five books of Moses, from