deep learning, both in the Scriptures and in the writings of Christian antiquity; they were framed, moreover, at a period which must have induced the most extreme caution and accuracy in the statements determined upon, when every expression must have been guarded, balanced, and limited, with an exactness of which none ever see the necessity in times of peace and religious rest. And yet, their actual meaning is, in many matters of almost vital moment, a still unsolved problem. They are claimed as justifying the most contradictory opinions, and every man wonders how his adversary can so distort and misconceive their drift as to make them harmonize with his own erroneous views.

Can we doubt, then, that the writers of the first ages of the Gospel, whose works we possess, might have wholly misunderstood that which they believed to be the unbroken tradition of the Catholic Church? Is their testimony to its doctrines of such weight as to justify us in substituting it for the interpretations of Scripture which to our own common sense appear to be necessarily true? Is the creed which is attributed to the early orthodox to be undoubtingly regarded as so correct a representation of the genuine apostolic faith, as to have a claim upon

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our reverence and obedience equal to that of the words of the apostles themselves? Rather must we have a pledge of some superhuman power of observation, penetration, and clearness of intellect, and sinless love of truth, characterising the early Fathers, before we ascribe to their representations of the unwritten doctrines of the Church a freedom from error which we know to be without parallel in all ages of mankind.

IV. The view bere maintained will be further evident from a consideration of the actual condition of the primitive Church in matters of exact, revealed doctrine. The nature of the case unites with the sacred Scriptures and with the writings of the period, in leading us to think that there was a vagueness and indeterminateness in the conceptions of the early Christians, on the subject of many of the Gospel mysteries, which would especially expose them to the risk of unintentional misrepresentation on the part of the most sincere believers. The religion of Christ was, in all probability, a thing of far less system and method for the first three centuries after its origin, than in after times, when once the unceasing absurdities of heresy had taught the truly orthodox that the unutterable revelations of Christ and his apostles must be described,

guarded, and limited, with an almost unfeeling and irreverential preciseness, in order that men might not err from the faith without perceiving that they were going astray. Unhappy experience had not then taught the piously disposed, that it was not sufficient for the preservation of the pure faith, even in their own minds, that the great doctrines of the Gospel should be regarded solely, or chiefly, with reference to their practical bearing upon the heart and lives of those who accepted them. Conscious in themselves that they were anxious to receive and obey in all their glorious, though unseen, fulness, the mysteries which God had made known to them, however obscure and dark to their own imaginations; and perceiving that the general bearing of the sacred writings harmonized with their faith, and with the state of mind and walk of life, which flowed directly from it as from a creating cause; the most holy and the most able among them saw not the necessity of that deep and patient criticism of the sacred text, which alone could bear up against the folly and the sin which not only influenced the sentiments of less devoted Christians than themselves, but also often struggled to regain the lost dominion in their own hearts. They were doubtless influ

enced and led by an error, which is ever common among pious minds, and which we must reverence even while we condemn it, the mistaken idea that the love with which the Christian heart glows towards its God and Saviour, is sufficient in itself to guard against the encroachments of doctrinal delusion. They knew not how the most devoted and single-minded among the fallen race, are ever in peril of being gradually seduced from the unspotted truth of Christ's faith, when their sentiments are not fortified by a distressing exactness of definition, repugnant to the feelings of the reverent and self-distrusting mind. They forgot the weakness and puny stature of their intellects, when left to the suggestions of pride, selfishness, and rashness, and to the plausibilities of other and less humble speculators. And, therefore, they were content rather to feel the truths of the Gospel, than to know them they were well aware, that the essence of Christ's religion lay not in rigid definitions, articles of faith, and unsatisfying descriptions of heavenly things; and that the believer who held the substance of the faith and its real fundamentals, though he could barely describe his sentiments to another person, was in a situation before God as acceptable as that

of the finished theologian, who has power to set forth his entire scheme of doctrine with a faultless accuracy of phraseology and precision of idea.

In all probability there were in the primitive Church few, if any, of those who are now termed divines; men who having deeply investigated the proofs of the articles of their faith, the objections which are urged against them, their influence upon the soul and the practice, and the perversions to which they are subject, are thereby equipped for the sad duties of controversy, and prepared to enter into the regions of error, with out risk of injury to their own pure faith. The state of mind of the entire body of believers in those first ages, was the same as that of the great majority of earnest, sincere Christians in our own day, who neither by their calling, their circumstances, or their inclination, have been led to examine closely into the precise character of the doctrines they believe. We know that at the present time the large body of the Christian laity, whose hearts and souls are truly devoted to God, receive the great truths of the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Resurrection, the

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* The remarkable influence obtained by the writings of Origen, while he was yet alive, is a strong testimony to the unsettled character of the faith of the Ante-Nicene Church.