faith; the latter is the supposition which the evidence adduced in the sixth chapter respecting the provision made by God for the preservation of his truth in the world, clearly tends to establish, and which is greatly confirmed by the additional considerations suggested in the present and the preceding chapters. It now only remains for us to inquire how far the writings of the Apostles themselves may furnish us with indications of the design The following passage, already referred to, from Keble's Sermon on Primitive Tradition, (3d ed. p. 25, 26.) contains a clear statement of this view. "There were instances, it seems, known to Irenæus, of true believers who did not as yet know any thing of the New Testament, yet were able to stop the mouths of heretics by merely avouching the ancient apostolical tradition. As was the condition, duty, and privileges of those faithful and simple men, such would have been those of the whole Christian world, had the inspired Scriptures either remained unwritten, or perished with so many other monuments of antiquity. Faith in those divine truths with which the church was originally entrusted would still have been required at the hands of Christian men; but the task of ascertaining those truths would have been far harder and more delicate. Now that it has pleased our gracious God to bestow on us, over and above, the use of His written word, can we be justified in slighting the original gift, on pretence of being able to do without it? Surely, in whatever respect any tradition is really apostolical, to think lightly of it must be the same kind of sin, as if those unlearned and remote Christians, of whom Irenæus speaks, had thought lightly of the New Testament when it came to be propounded to them. We see at once in what manner sincere reverence for God's truth would lead them to treat the portions of His written word, as they were brought successively under their notice. If we will be impartial, which they had in penning them; for if it can be proved that they were intended by them as safeguards of the truth, which they had previously preached by word of mouth, it will necessarily follow, considering the inspired character of the writers, that such design could not be otherwise than completely answered by their writings. If the Apostles, in adopting the practice of commit we cannot hide it from ourselves, that His unwritten word, IF IT CAN BE ANY HOW AUTHENTICATED, must necessarily demand the same reverence from us; and for exactly the same reason: because it is His word."-The clause distinguished above, IF IT CAN BE ANY HOW AUTHENTICATED, contains the whole of the matter in dispute. That the same reverence was due to the word of God from the lips of the Apostles, as to the word of God from their pens, is indisputable: but let it be remembered, that the word of God from the lips of the Apostles, "the unwritten word," was apostolic preaching, and not apostolic tradition; that between the preaching of the Apostles and the traditional account of that preaching, the theologian and the Christian is bound to make the same difference as judge and jury make between the evidence of an ear and eye-witness, and hear-say evidence, which latter is invariably, and most justly, put out of court; a deposition, proved to be the statement upon oath of the witness in question, (as the apostolic writings are proved to be the genuine productions of inspired men,) being the only substitute admitted in a court of justice, in the absence, or after the decease of the witness himself. Let it be understood, therefore, that if we repudiate tradition, as constituting together with Scripture "the joint rule of faith," it is not because we "slight the original gift" of the "unwritten" Gospel which the Apostles delivered by word of mouth, but because we believe, and are prepared to prove, that THE "WRITTEN "GOSPEL IS THE ONLY MEANS BY WHICH THE 66 UNWRITTEN "GOSPEL CAN BE AUTHENTICATED. ting their instructions to writing, had an eye to the permanency and the future purity of the Gospel previously promulgated by them, that fact must be conclusive as to the extent to which their instructions and directions were meant to be permanently preserved; as it cannot for a moment be argued that any provision made under the direction of God's Holy Spirit, could have proved incomplete, or could to any extent have fallen short of the purpose to which it was directed. That the present design of the apostolic writings was, not to convey instruction by this method to those whom they had not the opportunity of orally instructing, or on subjects which in their oral instructions had been omitted, or imperfectly treated; but that on the contrary, those writings were addressed to persons previously acquainted with the truths set forth in them, for the express purpose of strengthening and confirming those truths in their minds, and to secure them against oblivion or perversion, is so clearly apparent upon the very face of those writings, that it may seem needless to enter into any detail of evidence on this point. Still it may be desirable to make it apparent, especially with regard to the strictly doctrinal books of the New Testament, that they were composed on the assumption that the parties addressed were in full possession of Christian t truth. To begin with St. Paul, we find that he addresses the Epistle generally considered to be his first, in order of time, to men whom he had previously "exhorted, comforted, and charged," to "walk worthy of God, who had called them unto his kingdom and glory;" men to whom he himself gives this honourable testimony, that they had "received the word of God, which they had heard of him, not as the word of men, but, as it was in truth, the word of God;" men whom he beseeches and exhorts to "abound more and more" in walking aright and pleasing God, on the ground that they "knew what commandments he had given them by the Lord Jesus;" and that in his second Epistle he speaks of them as of men whom "God had from the beginning chosen to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth, whereunto He had called them by his" (the Apostle's) "Gospel." In his Epistle to the Galatians he refers throughout to "the Gospel which he had preached unto them," and which he "certifies them" was "not after man. "His first Epistle to the Corinthians opens with an expression of thanks to God "for the grace of God given them by Jesus Christ, that in every thing they were enriched by him, ▾ 1 Thess. iv. I, 2. * 1 Thess. ii. 11-13. * Gal. i. 8, 11. W a in all utterance, and in all knowledge, even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in them, so that they came behind in no gift ;" and in s the sequel, notwithstanding the just rebukes with which the Epistle abounds, he praises them for "holding fast the traditions, even as he had delivered them unto them;" he addresses them as those that are "the temple of God," and in whom "the Spirit of God dwelleth," and not only so, but as those that know that they are so; and, in his second Epistle, as men able to "examine themselves," and to "prove their own selves, whether they were in the faith;" nay, he goes the length of describing them as being themselves "his epistle, written in their hearts, known and read of all men," as being "manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ ministered by him, written not with ink, but WITH THE SPIRIT OF THE LIVING GOD; not in tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart." The Romans were, according to the testimony of St. Paul, at the time y 1 Cor. i. 47. C ε ὅτι, καθὼς παρέδωκα ὑμῖν, τὰς παραδόσεις κατέχετε. The word napádoris is used by the Apostle of his own instructions and directions to the churches only in this passage, and in 2 Thess. iii. 6, and ii. 15, from which latter passage it is evident, that the Apostle's doctrine is included under the term tradition. 1 Cor. iii. 16; comp. vi. 15, 19. a 1 Cor. xi. 2. 2 Cor. xiii. 5. d2 Cor. iii. 2, 3. |