tion of man, to "The new Teacher," "The Church of the Future," or by all that in us lies, we will, "Out of our own Bosom this lost world restore."* * Goethe. XIV. Protestantism and the Church. "But who shall now discern the Heavenly Bride? O Truth, thyself within my soul abide, Lead me through tangled ways, and be thyself my guide!" BAPTISTRY. E have unriddled man's destiny; or rather W. the God-man, "in whom dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead corporally," has given to us its complete solution; we have gazed upon his divine lineaments, and beheld in him the problem of life revealed and realized; we have in a few pages sketched the outlines of the Church of God; what we now have to do is, to seek and discover where and which is this Church, or if we are still to look for it in the future. What first claims our serious attention is the faith of the Church in which we were born and nurtured-the Protestant. Is the Protestant Church a true, kind and loving mother, from whose breasts her children can draw copious streams of truth and love? or, is she a stepmother, heartless, cold, and are her breasts of stone? What is Protestantism ? Protestantism courts free inquiry, and hails the disenthralled intellect of man with shouts of joy; and we on our side will meet it with earnest hearts, with minds bent upon pursuing the truth at all costs, and with brave resolves to embrace it, and be true to its behests lead where they may. What says Protestantism to the deep wants of man's heart? Our standard must be the truth. But what truth? The Protestant exclaims, the Gospels. We accept them; and he who meets with defeat must not forget who had the choice of weapons. Let us begin. How does Protestantism meet the want of a divine and unerring authority in matters of re ligion? in the question of man's destiny and true guidance ? Is not the simple raising of the question of an unerring authority a patent condemnation of Protestantism ? Does not the fundamental principle of Protestantism, the supremacy of private judgment, exclude all idea of an unerring authority in religion? We say the supremacy of private judgment, for although Protestants point us to the Bible, when asked for their authority in matters of religion, still it is always the Bible as interpreted by private judgment. The supremacy of private judgment was, and still continues to be, the generative and distinctive principle of Protestantism; to deny it would be to condemn the reformation from its incipient step. It was on this principle that the great reformer, Luther, took his stand at Worms, when he appealed to God and his own conscience in justification of his opinions and conduct. Protestantism points with pride to the attitude of Dr. Martin Luther, and makes it her glory and boast to have disenthralled man from all authority in religion, except his own private judgment. We do not wish to rob it of its glory. It is properly the glory of Protestantism. But it is on this ground we take it up, find fault with it, and condemn it. We condemn Protestantism, as insufficient to meet the wants of man's heart, as unable to satisfy the demands of man's intelligence, and as faithless in representing the authority of Christ. The heart condemns it, because the supreme want of the heart is peace. But this can only be gained by an unerring and divine authority upon which the heart can repose with feelings of perfect security. Protestantism denies all such authority, the heart therefore condemns it. Reason condemns it, because religion is not a system of opinions resting upon man's private judgment, but a body of revealed truths, adapted and necessary to the full development and perfection of man's intelligence and heart, and depending upon an unerring and divine authority. Luther's appeal, therefore, to his own private judgment at Worms, was a great |