possibility of finding any sure resting place, save in the word of God. Against the words of Basil and Epiphanius, we may place those of Justin Martyr and Jerome. Justin says, "If we will be safe in all things we must fly to the Scriptures, we must believe God only, and rest solely on his institutions, and not on men's traditions."* Jerome says, "Whereas Paul will have his own things to be kept, he will have no strange things added to them." Thus it is quickly seen, that if we refer any question to the judgment of the fathers, we are likely to get into a chaos of differing opinions, but with little chance of arriving at a final verdict. On the real value of what is called "Tradition," a late Romanist author, the Rev. D. O'Croly, lately parish priest of Ovens, near Cork, has written very sensibly. He says:

"Tradition, about which so much has been said and written, is a mere nonentity in religion. It is called the unwritten word, and may be denominated a sort of supplement to the New Testament. It is supposed to be a portion of revelation, which was not committed to writing, but continues to be delivered orally as at first; and has been transmitted in this manner from age to age, down to the present time. Now the great point to ascertain is, what this traditionary revelation contains, what dogmata it teaches; what precepts it inculcates; what particular maxims it recommends in contradistinction to the written word, or to the writings of the evangelists and apostles in the New Testament? Has the church, at any time during the eighteen centuries of her existence, placed before the world in a tangible shape, or in due form, this grand section of the revealed word? Has she ever ventured to define it either in whole or in part? She has done nothing of the kind. The apostles and evangelists did not mark it down; the first fathers followed the example of the apostles and evangelists, they slurred it over; their successors in like manner, passed it heedlessly by; councils that were as+On 2 Thessalonians.

*Dial. cum. Trypho.

sembled of every description, general and particular, took no notice of it, and thus has it travelled down to our days without shape or form,-a sort of spiritual essence, unheeded, unperceived, untouched, undefined, and undefinable; and this is to form an essential part of religion! Tradition is a mere figment, an empty name."*

Let us now, however, try to get a little closer to the practical question, and to ascertain, if possible, how the Romish rule of faith can be made actually available.

The Protestant offers something which is at least intelligible. He presents the written word of God, and avows his belief, that in that volume is contained all that is "necessary to salvation," so that "whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of faith."

The Romanist, not daring, in this Protestant country, to repudiate the Holy Scriptures, admits their authority and their value, but declares that an authoritative interpreter of their meaning is absolutely necessary, and that that interpreter, properly commissioned, is only to be found in his church. His rule of faith, therefore, is, Scripture and tradition conjointly; or, Scripture as interpreted by the church.

Instantly, then, the question suggests itself to a plain man, honestly seeking after truth ;-"Where is this Scripture and tradition conjoined" to be found? or where is that authoritative interpretation of the Scripture, which the church is said to be divinely commissioned to give?

Dr. Milner's main direction, to all seekers after salvation, is, to "hear the church, the divinely commissioned guardian and interpreter of the word of God." t "No sooner,' 99 says he, "will you have sacrificed your own wavering judgment, and have submitted to follow the guide whom your heavenly Father has provided for you, than you will feel a deep

*O'Croly's Inquiry, p. 41.

+ End of Controversy, p. 536.

The question, then, is, How is the inquirer to "hear the church," and to submit to the guide thus divinely provided? We shall not be told, that by merely joining the communion of the church, and submitting ourselves to her authority, we thereby become perfectly safe for time and eternity. This will hardly be insisted on, for every one must have become acquainted with persons who were devout and even servile followers of the religious ceremonies and requirements of the Romish church, and who were yet far from leading such lives as to encourage any one to consider them secure of heaven.

Hence it is clear, that to become a Roman Catholic does not of itself give the inquirer that which he needs, perfect security, and an assurance that he is secure. Thus he is driven once more to ask, Which is the safe, the unerring way, to the discovery of religious truth? If he is not to rely upon the Scripturesand these he is told will mislead him-on what is he to rely? He is told that he must "hear the church;" but where, he begs to know, is he to hear her? Does she speak through her ministers, and can he be sure that each of these ministers is so far divinely preserved from error, as to be actually incapable of misleading him? Only assure him of this, and he will feel that a great point is gained. He will then have reached a height from which all the important truths connected with salvation will be clearly discernible.

No such pretension, however, will be put forward. If every individual minister of the church were divinely preserved from error, then it would follow that they must all maintain the same doctrines, and differences and discords must be unknown. But this is notoriously not the case, nor ever has been. One of their saints, Hilary, anathematizes, in his epistles now extant, Pope Liberius, the then "successor of St. Peter." At a later period, Platina, one of their own

* End of Controversy, p. 170.

writers, says, that "towards the close of the tenth, and beginning of the eleventh centuries, the chief object of the popes seemed to be, to reverse the decrees of their predecessors." The disputes of the Jesuits and Jansenists are matter of history, as well as the ecclesiastical censures incurred by Fenelon and Pascal, men of whose virtues they now are very ready to boast, but who, when living, were treated by the church of Rome as almost heretics. And, to come down to the present time, in the volume already quoted, lately published by Mr. O'Croly, he charges one of his brethren, another Roman Catholic priest, with having put forward "a disgusting farrago of falsehood, superstition, and blasphemy." Clearly, then, it is impossible that it should be seriously contended, now-a-days, that each individual priest is, of himself, a vessel of infallibility, and divinely preserved from holding or teaching error.

It was only a short time back that a resolution was advertised in various newspapers, which had been adopted at a public meeting of Roman Catholics, held at Birmingham, and which ran as follows:-"That although the Theology of Dens has been recently published in Ireland, and adopted by certain of the Irish prelates, as a guide to the ecclesiastical conferences held in their dioceses; yet the mere opinions of Dens, or any other individual theologian, form no part of Catholic faith." The same resolution further added, that certain sentiments put forth by Dens had been distinctly disclaimed by the Romish archbishop of Dublin. It would seem then, that we cannot even resort to a system of theology which has been put forth under the sanction of a conclave of Roman bishops, without falling in the way of errors which an archbishop is obliged to disclaim!

It will not, then, we apprehend, be questioned that, the priests, individually, are liable to err. In fact, it is never denied that some priests, some bishops, and even some popes, have actually preached and published dangerous heresies. Still, however, we shall be told, that the promise of God remains unshaken,

and that in the church as a whole, and with the great body of her pastors, the Holy Spirit constantly remains as a safeguard and a defence; and with them, consequently, error can find no abiding home.

The obvious rejoinder is, that it is still left in doubt, where the inquirer is to find this unerring rule. It is admitted, that it is not a mere adherence to the church that will confer on him this vast immunity. It is admitted, also, that with each individual priest, error may be found, for that other priests, and even bishops, nay, even popes themselves, have already erred. Where, then, is he to go to find this "church," this "great body of her ministers," with whom actual infallibility abides? Does the church exercise this divine gift for the benefit of her children, or not? and if she does, in what assembly, or in what record shall he find it? She is the divinely-empowered expounder of the Holy Scriptures, it is said;-has she then, during the fifteen hundred years of her existence, given her children an infallible commentary on the word of God? If so, surely that guide which the inquirer needs, and which, he is told, the mere books of the Old and New Testaments, uninterpreted, can never supply, is already provided.

But no!-this great work is still a desideratum. There is no comment which bears even the seal of the church's authoritative recommendation-much less is there any interpretation pretending to the least share of the church's collective infallibility.

Where, then, is the seeker after salvation to turn? Does any collective body exist, with whom Christ's presence, which the Romish writers claim, operates perceptibly and undeniably in purifying away every tendency to error?

'Here the difficulty rather increases than diminishes. Many of the general councils of the Romish church have occupied themselves in denying and refuting the decisions of former councils, and in anathematizing the "infallibles" of the preceding age. And as to the pope himself, his infallibility is the very point which has for centuries been disputed with the great