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he adds,' But God hath revealed them to us, by his Spirit.' Rev. i. 1; Gal. i. 12; Ephes. ii. 5; 1 Cor. ii. 9, 10*."

To say with Dr. Priestley, that the Apostles committed mistakes, both in their narrations and in their reasonings, is to suppose our Lord and his Apostles to have attested certain works as inspired records, which were in part human compositions; to imagine the writers of the Old and New Testaments to have superadded to the dictates of the Spirit some inventions of their own, and passed the compound on the world as being all the result of genuine inspiration. How then should men know when to rely on such jugglers, and when to distrust them? Their inventions would impeach the character of the whole; and men would be called on to BELIEVE, if they would be saved, without knowing what to believe. Reason then would be the ultimate judge, as to what was revelation and what was human fancy; but different men would form different judgments; endless disputes and uncertainty would prevail; and the object of revelation, which was to supply that wherein reason is defective and fallible, would be frustrated.

If the inspiration of Scripture be admitted, in regard to the subject matter, it may seem of

* Dick on Inspiration.

inferior moment to contend for the inspiration of the words; but if it be considered that mistakes in expression might often alter the substance of the communication, and that unlearned writers might debase noble sentiments by defective phraseology; that Christ promised to his disciples, a Spirit who should give them, in the hour of their pleading, what they should speak (Matt. x. 19, 20; Luke, xii. 11, 12); that St. Paul declares himself and the other Apostles to have spoken, "not in the WORDS which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost taught” (1 Cor. ii. 13); a declaration, which may apply to their writings as well as to their discourses; we shall believe the language of Scripture to proceed immediately from God as well as the subject matter. The possibility of inaccuracy would have created suspicion of error; and fallible reason would have been called in to decide upon revelation. God, staking salvation upon belief, would be careful to transmit his truths, through a channel in which they should be quite secure from pollution. And should any one object that the style is not uniform; we reply, that the Holy Ghost might act with different degrees of influence on distinct agents. In fine, with regard to both matter and style, the meanness of the writers, on Socinian principles, ought to be a sufficient evidence of inspiration for God would have chosen men of abilities and

literature as the scribes, had he designed to leave them to their unaided powers.

In regard to the objections to the inspiration of the sacred volume, their weakness is sufficiently exposed by their trivial nature. "One evangelist makes the cock crow twice, and another once :" as if two cock-crowings did not include one. St. Matthew makes a mother ask a favour for her sons: St. Mark says, the sons and the mother asked it jointly: as if the sons might not kneek while the mother preferred the petition. To all such pettyfogging, special pleading cavils, the remark of Paley is applicable: that general coincidence and unimportant diversity is accepted even in a human court of justice as the strongest testimony. Minute agreement would excite suspicion of collusion. While, therefore, there is no contradiction, such minor differences, while they establish the authenticity of Scripture, impeach not its inspiration*. Again: The Pentateuch is falsely called the work of Moses, because the death of Moses is recorded in it. But consult Bishop Watson's valuable Apology for the Bible, in which a distinction is drawn between genuineness and authenticity; showing that a book may be authentic, that is, may relate true facts; though not genuine, that is, not wholly the work of the person whose name is at

• Paley's Evidences; Cooper's Four hundred Texts explained.

the head of it. But may not Moses be the genuine author up to that part where he could not any longer be the author? while a rider may have been attached to the papyrus by Joshua, stating the author's death? Is not this done every day? Do we not see it done in the Epistles, where a note is always annexed: "Written from Rome?" &c. &c.

Beside me, at this moment, lies the posthumous book, entitled, Sermons and Extracts on the Loss of Friends, compiled by the late Miss Grant. It is said, in the beginning, that the author died previous to the publication but does this render it less certain that the book was hers? It is not, however, our purpose here to enter into the question of authenticity, excepting so far as authenticity is connected with inspiration.

It has been asserted, that in the New Testament (for where the Jews were so careful as preservers and transcribers, this argument has not been ventured with reference to the Old), interpolations, alterations, additions, and erasures, have stolen in; but the earliest Fathers, even up to contemporaneousness with the Apostles, quote the Bible as it is now printed; besides which, the variety of Christian sects which appeared immediately after our Saviour's death, would be on the watch to prevent each other from introducing into the sacred books faults

of inadvertence, or errors favourable to particular opinions.

But not to

In order to impugn the inspiration of Scripture, a solitary passage, in which St. Paul adds to his judgment, the phrase, "I speak as a man," has been much insisted on. mention that this short expression admits of some other interpretations besides that of his being unaided in his opinion, we affirm, that, admitting this latter meaning, we do not see how a stronger proof could be given of inspiration in the general text of Scripture, than so particular a note set thus upon one sentence, as the fruit of human judgment only. Would you deny Southey's Thalaba to be a poem, because there is no poetry in his notes? Would you deny St. Paul to be inspired, because he has put a nota bene to one clause of a sentence, cautioning you that that alone is not inspired? This expression of St. Paul's, so far from raising a doubt of inspiration in Scripture, should set the question at rest for ever. It should lead us to conclude every syllable of the Bible to be inspired where such an asterisk does not occur.

An artful attempt has been made by the Socinian underminers of truth to compress the ministry of our Lord within a single year. Who does not see the drift of this trick?—It is to shake the credibility of the marvellous facts, by making it appear that the accounts of them

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