New Testament; that it is a book containing in some way a divine revelation, in some way or other inspired, in some way likely to be a great help and comfort to our spiritual nature, and the best guide we can have for this life and towards the next. It is an expectation of all this, an expectation based on the testimony of mankind. So far it is a reasonable expectation. So far it is right and just to entertain it. It is the natural inheritance to which we were born, by being born Christians. To throw it away, or to try to throw it away, would be as though one should try to throw away the habits of civilization which he inherits by being born in a civilized community, and try to go back and start as a savage. It is neither more futile nor more foolish in the one case than in the other.

But, though this Christian prepossession is a perfectly legitimate one with which to begin, it is not a legitimate one in which to remain. It is our business, by the free action of our intellect, to change this general and vague expectation into a distinct opinion of one kind or another. Protestantism allows us to take our faith in the Bible from the Church, but not to take from the Church our opinions about the Bible. Faith may, and ought to be, received, but opinions are to be formed. An opinion or belief received from another man is his opinion, and not ours.

With regard to any other book this would be self-evident. For example, suppose that I have never read the play of Hamlet. I hear it universally spoken of as one of the greatest works of the human intellect. That naturally and properly creates in my mind the expectation of finding it so. It produces the general belief that it is a great work of genius. But suppose that, besides this general expectation, I should also accept from my neighbors their particular opinions concerning the play. I hear them say that it is more philosophical, but less dramatic, than Macbeth; that the character of Hamlet is overcharged with intellect, and

the like. If, now, I adopt and repeat these opinions, without having read the play, it is evident that I am only a parrot or an echo. It is evident that they are not my opinions at all, and that they indeed interfere with my having any opinions. Fifty thousand echoes of a voice leave us only one voice and fifty thousand echoes.

This distinction between faith and opinion, which we have already spoken of, is of the utmost practical importance. We may add here that, for want of it, intellectual people try to go to the study of the Bible without faith in the Bible, and religious people think they must accept all their opinions from others, and take them in ready made. It is not absolutely essential to have opinions; but if we do have them, they ought to be our own. Faith must be received, opinions must be formed.

All persons, therefore, ought to form opinions for themselves about the New Testament. They may bring to the work a faith in the New Testament, as being in some sense or other a revelation, as being written in some way or other by inspired men, as being somehow or other a holy book, the legitimate source of spiritual life, moral goodness, and inward peace.

§ 9. Conclusion. -If the views given in this chapter are reasonable, we shall conclude that Orthodoxy is right in maintaining the supreme excellence and value of the Christian Scriptures, but wrong in claiming for them infallible accuracy. It is right in saying that they are written by inspired men, but wrong in considering this inspiration a guarantee against all possible error or mistake. It is right in calling the Bible "The Holy Scripture," but wrong in denying to the scriptures of other religions some divine influx and some religious life. It is right in asking that the Bible be read with faith and expectation; wrong in demanding for it unreasoning, uncritical submission. Let reverence for its spirit and criticism of its letter go hand in hand; for

reverence and criticism, faith and reason, docility to great masters and freedom in seeking for ourselves, are antagonist, indeed, but not contradictory. They are not hostile, but helpful, though acting in opposite directions-like the opposition of the thumb and fingers in the human hand, which makes of it such a wonderful servant of the thought. They belong to the group of sisterly powers which the Creator has placed in the human soul-varied, complex, like and unlike.

"Facies non omnibus una,

Nec diversa tamen, qualis decet esse sororum."

CHAPTER VI.

ORTHODOX IDEA OF SIN, AS DEPRAVITY AND AS GUILT.

§ 1. The Question stated. — We now approach the orthodoxy of Orthodoxy-the system of sin and redemption, which constitutes its most essential character. The questions hitherto treated the natural and supernatural, miracles, the Scriptures belong to universal religion. On these points heretics and the Orthodox may agree. But the essence of heresy, in the eyes of an Orthodox man, is to vary from the standards of belief in regard to sin and salvation.

We commence with the subject of human sinfulness; in other words, with the character of man in relation to Orthodoxy. The theology of the East asked, "What is God?" and entered on its course from the specially theological side. It began with ontology, and proceeded to psychology. In this, Oriental theology followed in the path of Oriental philosophy. But Occidental theology, originating strictly with Augustine, followed the practical and experimental method of European thought, and, instead of asking, "What is God?" asked, instead, "What is man?"

We begin, therefore, with the great question, "What is man?" This is the radical question in practical, experimental theology, as the question, "What is God?" is the radical question in speculative theology. But we are now concerned in the theology of experience and of life. We are seeking for human wants. Knowing what man is, we can next ask what he needs.

§ 2. The four Moments or Characters of Evil. The Fall, Natural Depravity, Total Depravity, Inability.—Orthodoxy

answers the question, “What is man?" by saying, “Man is a sinner;" and this answer has these four moments: 1. Man was created at first righteous and good.

2. Man fell, in and with Adam, and became a sinner. 3. All now born are born totally corrupt and evil; 4. And are utterly disabled to all good, so as not to have the power of repenting, or even of wishing to repent.

First, that of THE FALL, or INHERITED EVIL.

Second, of Natural Depravity.

Third, of TOTAL DEPRAVITY.

Fourth, of INABILITY.

These points are fully stated in the following passage from the "Assembly's Confession of Faith," chap. 6:

"1. Our first parents, being seduced by the subtlety and temptation of Satan, sinned in eating the forbidden fruit. This their sin God was pleased, according to his wise and holy counsel, to permit; having purposed to order it to his own glory.

"2. By this sin they fell from their original righteousness, and communion with God; and so became dead in sin, and wholly defiled in all the faculties and parts of soul and body.

"3. They being the root of all mankind, the guilt of this sin was IMPUTED, and the same death in sin, and corrupted nature, CONVEYED, to all their posterity, descending from them by ordinary generation.

"4. From this original corruption, whereby we are utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil, do proceed all actual transgressions.

"5. This corruption of nature during this life doth remain in those that are regenerated; and although it be, through Christ, pardoned and mortified, yet both itself and all the motions thereof are truly and properly sin.

"6. Every sin, both original and actual, being a trans