that by early oral, or traditional, instruction the way should be prepared for the reception of the mysteries of faith; that the Church should carry down the system, but the Scriptures should furnish all the proofs of the Christian doctrines; that tradition should supply the Christian with the arrangement, but the Bible with all the substance of divine truth?

(II.) It is most important that this point should not be misapprehended; it may appear perhaps to one, a truism,* to another, heresy; yet upon further

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Those who might be inclined to prejudge the following argument as simply unnecessary, are requested to consider whether the principle maintained in it is not both neglected in practice, and virtually denied in conversation, and in printed works enjoying a considerable popularity. The following extracts for instance have been taken from the fifth edition of Saurin's Sermons translated by Robinson, vol. III (preface.) "The religion of nature is not capable of establishment; the religion of Jesus Christ is not capable of establishment; if the "religion of any church be capable of establishment, it is not "analogous to that of Scripture or of nature." p. 11. "The “world and revelation, both the work of the same God, are "both constructed on the same principles; and were the book "of Scripture like that of nature laid open to universal inspec"tion, were all idea of temporal rewards and punishments "removed from the study of it, that would come to pass in the "moral world which has actually happened in the world of "human science, each capacity would find its own object, and "take its own quantum," p. 20. "I have sometimes imagined

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a pagan ship's crew in a vessel under sail in the wide ocean; "I have supposed no one on board ever heard of Christianity; "I have imagined a bird dropping a New Testament written in "their language on deck. I have imagined a fund of unedu"cated unsophisticated good sense in this company, and I have required of this little world answers to two questions: 1st, "What end does this book propose? answer, This book was "written that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son "of God, and that believing we might have life through His

consideration will be found, it is hoped, neither unreasonable, nor unscriptural, nor unimportant.

In the first place this opinion is not in the least connected with the errors of the Romanists, since it claims no independent authority for the traditions conveyed to us by the Church. Their error consisted in claiming an authority for tradition equal or even superior to that of the Scriptures themselves; they did not allow the possibility of their traditions being either fallible or corrupted-but we perceiving that tradition has often been corrupt, and must be by its nature liable to corruption, and therefore fallible, allow it no proper independent authority whatsoever.

*

We perceive that traditions may be contradictory to the Scriptures, and then we absolutely reject them; or they may be unsupported by the Scriptures, and then we allow them no further, than as they coincide with the dictates of reason; or they may be supported by the sacred writings, and then

"name."

p. 23. "I ask, 2ndly, What means does this book "authorize a foremast man who believes to employ to the rest?" &c., &c. "Should he oblige the cabin-boy to admit his expla"nation of the book, he would be unlike the God who requires "the boy to explain it to himself;" &c., &c., p. 24.

According to the theory of the Romanists, tradition, or, as they define it, the unwritten word of God, is of equal authority with the written word or the Scriptures; but in practice tradition often obtains with them an authority paramount to that of the Scriptures, as the Bp. of Llandaff has shewn in The Comparative View of the Churches of England and Rome, 2nd ed. p. 15. The reader is referred to this work for a full account of the ideas concerning the nature of tradition entertained by the Church of Rome both in former times and at the present day. See Comparative View, p. 12, 17, &c., and the authorities there cited.

we respect them as the original sentiments of the first believers-as derived indeed from the true and only authority. In this manner the outline of revealed truths, which we have now exhibited to us in the Apostles' Creed, has been of eminent service to Christians in tracing the system of their faith-and this, although the precise words of the Creed so called were perhaps for some time used by the Church of Aquileia alone: but not a single article in this, or any Creed, should we admit as our belief, unless supported by the authority of the Scriptures themselves.* Any uninterrupted tradition indeed of any given doctrine brings with it a reasonable presumption in its behalf; this it were most uncandid not to allow of this kind is the tradition of Christ's divinity, now at least proved by the labours of Bp. Bull and Bp. Horsley to have been uninterrupted. But even prior to the proof that any particular tradition is derived from a sacred and unquestionable authority, some slight, some faint presumption in its favour surely may be demanded, if the Church present it to our noticeand more than this is not claimed: it is only urged, that it was intended from the first, that we should receive from such traditions the rudiments of the faith, and with this aid continually approach the Scriptures to ascertain the truth of the traditions; or, to speak generally, that the Church should teach, and the Scriptures prove, the doctrines of Christianity.

Wide as this opinion is, however, of the fundamental error of the Church of Rome concerning the

* See Art. vi. and Homily.

authority of her traditions, it is more than probable that an excessive dread of the papal heresy has caused the just and legitimate use of traditional instruction to be continually overlooked by pious Protestants.

Because the Romanist has raised tradition to a level with inspired authorities, the Protestant has often neglected, or denied, its natural use and value. That great errors should produce their contraries has been indeed so constant an evil, that every prudent person feels it necessary to guard his own mind against such an effect: and it is matter of notoriety that, when the papal error respecting tradition was first refuted, the wildest notions sprung up on all sides in the opposite extreme. Hooker is obliged to apologize even for the use of the word tradition, though it were only in respect of indifferent customs or ceremonies;* and even if history had been silent, it might have been inferred from our thirty-fourth Article, that there had previously existed very wide deviations on this subject from the plainest dictates of common sense. But we are not concerned at present with any extreme opinions either of our own or former times there is an implied exclusion of assistance from any traditional instruction in such sentiments as the following, which many persons probably have heard from the lips of pious and sincere believers"that they allow that such or such a doctrine is "completely proved in the New Testament; but "that they must needs confess that, had they not "previously heard the doctrine stated, they should

Eccles. Polity, ii. p. 296. Oxford, 1793.

"scarcely have themselves collected it from the "sacred books." This is perhaps no uncommon feeling respecting more than one important doctrine, and then upon many minds the painful question will obtrude itself, "Could the All-wise have intended "that the doctrine, however true, or however "important, should thus be taught to His weak and "erring creatures ?"

To all this might we not fairly answer, True, our heavenly Father did not leave us exposed to so much difficulty; He did not intend that we should ordinarily thus be taught the Christian doctrines, but that, receiving the outline of them from the traditions of His Church, we should ascertain their truth by the unerring standard of His written word.

And it will be allowed by thoughtful members of the English Church, that it is a comparatively light and easy task to prove the important doctrines of our faith from Holy Writ, when once we have received them in a definite form with that presumption, how low soever, in their behalf, to which they are justly entitled, even because they have been handed down to us through the medium of the Church. With this guide before us, passages become often as clear as prophecies whose completion is known, which like those before the event would otherwise seem dark or contradictory. The parallel is more close than may at first sight appear; as the prophecies concerning the greatness of the Messiah's kingdom, apparently opposed to those which announced His humiliation and sufferings, were a stumbling-block to the Jews, although to Christians the true sense of both appears exceedingly simple and evident; so likewise are there