BASES OF BELIEF:

AN EXAMINATION OF

CHRISTIANITY AS A DIVINE REVELATION BY THE LIGHT

OF RECOGNISED FACTS AND PRINCIPLES.

IN FOUR PARTS.

BY

EDWARD MIALL, M.P.

LONDON:

ARTHUR HALL, VIRTUE, AND CO.,

25, PATERNOSTER-ROW.

1-16-39 J.A.

1-10-39

PREFACE.

IN reading or listening to the objections to Christianity which rest upon purely intellectual grounds, there are probably thousands who, whilst unable to furnish a satisfactory reply, have felt the answer and have kept their faith. So, at least, it has been with the Author. It has long appeared to him that belief in the gospel rests ultimately upon deeper, surer, more incontestable principles than will admit of being hacked to pieces by the utmost force of speculative or critical investigation. The present volume is the result of an effort to reduce that into palpable shape which heretofore has been held in solution by most reflective minds

-to make visible what very many have felt to be present in them, but still without having assumed any definite form. If he has been successful in this attempt, then the argument which he has

elaborated will seem so obvious that every reader will fancy himself familiar with it, and the Writer will have done nothing more than merely put into words, and arrange in logical order, thoughts which all intelligent believers in the Christian revelation will instantly recognise as their own. And this, indeed, has been the sole object of his ambition to express what is in the mind of nearly every one, but what, until now, has been left unexpressed-so that when once enunciated, the propositions, so far from assuming an appearance of novelty, should rather elicit some such response as this, at least from men not yet wholly surrendered to disbelief, "Just so! that is what I always felt, although I have not been able to give distinct utterance to it!"

This is not, in any sense, a book of Evidences in support of Christianity, but a book on Evidences in relation to the question. The object has been to make out that the proof tendered on behalf of the gospel is of a kind which true philosophy is bound to accept. Of late, there has been a manifest disposition to pooh-pooh the labours of former

champions of the faith, as if they were utterly beside the mark, now that the human mind has made such wonderful advances in its mode of examining this and similar subjects. Certainly, the tone assumed by modern sceptics has not been that of self-diffidence and, perhaps, it will be seen that they who are most forward to take liberties with the name of philosophy, have been least careful to exemplify its spirit. But, be this as it may, the Author has appealed from speculative dogmatism, to undeniable facts and universally recognised principles, with a view to establish some Rules of Court, in accordance with which credible testimony should be heard. If he is right, the greater proportion of the evidences which have been arbitrarily rejected, of late, as impertinent, are restored to their former credit-and the conclusion at which we arrive is this, that former lines of argument had become obsolete merely because unsound criteria of judgment had been adopted.

Nor is the present volume to be regarded by any as an exposition of Christian doctrine. The main positions taken up by the Writer, and the