inspiration which places Esther on a level with Isaiah, and represents Ecclesiastes as written by the same spirit as the noblest of the Psalms, and exalts a page of imprecations to the rank of the Sermon on the Mount, would make it very difficult to defend the ecclesiastical position. Marcion perceived a a true distinction; but taking as his key the fashionable Gnosticism, he gave it a wrong interpretation. In accordance with the line of argument here advanced, we may say that the Old Testament discloses the gradual unfolding of that spirit of life which found its full expression in Christ, and exhibits it working through imperfect human instruments, and even at times allying itself with passion and cruelty. Consequently it presents a larger admixture of the earthly and temporary than the New Testament, and a much greater variety in the spiritual impressiveness of different books. But if it contains much that belongs to an elementary stage of civilization, it abounds in passages which at once bring home to us truths that receive the sanction of the inward witness; and for some phases of religious feeling we find a richer expression in the Old Testament than in the New. Moreover, during the growth of the spiritual life in ourselves, the imper

ITS UNIQUE POSITION.

117

fect manifestations in the Old Testament often seem nearer to us.1 Our childhood wandered in imagination with the heroes of the olden time, who seemed so close to God; and in maturer years many who cannot soar to the heights of Paul and John, find their aspirations, their sorrows, and their trusts, made vocal in the Psalms. And so we can accept and be grateful for what comes home to us, and turn it into spiritual food, while we have no difficulty in rejecting that which does not commend itself to our riper Christian experience or our augmented knowledge.

Sufficient, perhaps, has now been said to explain why the Bible, though not cut off by a miraculous infallibility from other religious literature, must nevertheless continue to occupy a place by itself in the love and veneration of Christians. Creeds and confessions of faith, books of "Common Prayer," and collections

1 An interesting example is furnished by the remarks of Mr. Lock upon the value of Esther, quoted in Sanday, Bampton Lectures, p. 222 sq. I well remember my own early delight in the Book of Joshua, which, if it appealed to the combativeness of the boy, and contains much that is alien to the spirit of Christ, nevertheless taught lessons of courage and fidelity, in reliance upon the Power above us. If not with the sword of steel, yet with the sword of the spirit, we must all learn to fight, and do valiantly for truth and righteousness.

of hymns, may satisfy wants more or less widely felt; but they are all limited in use, and the Bible alone can be the universal book of Christendom. But this recognition of its solitary place in no way precludes the use in private, or on suitable public occasions, of the rich literature in prose or verse, which from age to age has expressed the living spirit of Christian devotion. I would that that literature were better known, and that we nourished and enlarged our inward life by words of truth or aspiration from every section of the Church. These, too, contain a word of God, and often speak with moving power to our souls; and flowing as they did direct from the spirit in some hour of high communion, they have something of the same pregnant simplicity of diction and depth of spiritual insight as we find in the Bible. Yet dear as they may become to us under the pressure of our individual needs, how often they are but aids to the study of the Bible, and, through the illumination which they shed upon some Biblical saying, enable us to see more clearly into the heart of Psalmist or Prophet or Apostle. How often, too, is their influence transient, exciting a vivid interest during some crisis of our lives, and then, through their want of universality,

retreating into a quiet memory of what they once accomplished for us. But to the Bible we turn with undiminished interest as life goes on, and, as we read it with more discriminating intelligence and larger sympathy, find in it continually fresh treasures of life and thought.

Finally, we must ask, is any authority left to it? Say what we will, the mass of men crave the support of some authority; all but the very strongest souls seek the support of something that lies outside of their own feeble, partial and isolated lives. Does the Bible afford this? We have seen that the artificial authority of an infallible standard is gone. But "the letter killeth," and we can only rejoice that the tables of stone are broken which forbade the free movement of intellect and conscience. "The spirit giveth life," and the law of that life is written "on fleshy tables of the heart." There is a natural authority which helps our weakness instead of cramping our strength. The highest authority is found when truths come straight to the soul, and receive that inward response without which religious truth is dead and useless. But this is deepened and confirmed by our veneration for Prophets and Apostles to whom the word of God came

with unequalled power, and who gave up their lives to the delivery of their message, and above all by our faith and love towards the great Teacher in whom that word became flesh. And there is a yet further authority, the witness which in all ages, in spite of corruptions of government and perversities of thought, the Church has borne to the great spiritual verities by which alone the soul of man can live; and the passages in the Bible which appeal to our hearts come to us laden with the reverence and faith of many generations, fragrant with the incense of innumerable prayers, and sealed with the blood of saints and martyrs, who found in them their strength, their joy, and their hope.