from active and personal inquiries into the foundations of their faith; and by giving an implicit credence to whatever the Roman Church pronounces to be the truth'. Should this book fall into the hands of any who have adopted that maxim for the rule of their own conduct as believers, its pages will of course afford them no help; nor can they take any interest in our pursuit, or its results. Whilst, however, I am aware, that until the previous question, (involving the grounds on which the Church of Rome builds her claim to be the sole, exclusive, and infallible teacher of Christians in all the doctrines of religion,) shall have been solved, many members of her body would throw aside, as preposterous, any treatise which professed to review the soundness of her instructions; I have been at the same time assured, that with many of her communion the case is far otherwise; and that instead of their being averse to all investigation, a calm, candid, and friendly, but still a free and unreserved inquiry into the disputed articles of their creed, is an object of their sincere desire. On this ground I trust some preliminary reflections upon the duty of proving all things, with a view of holding the more fast

1

It is sometimes curious to observe the language in which the teachers and doctors themselves profess their entire, unlimited, and implicit submission of all their doctrines, even in the most minute particulars, to the judgment and will of the authorities of Rome. Instances are of very frequent occurrence. Thus Joannes de Carthagena, a very voluminous writer of homilies, closes different parts of his work in these words, "These and all mine I willingly subject to the judgment of the Catholic Roman Church, ready, if there be written any thing in any way in the very least point contrary to her doctrine, to correct, amend, erase, and utterly abolish it." Hom. Cath. De Sacris Arcanis Deiparæ et Josephi. Paris, 1615. page

and sure what is good, may be considered as neither superfluous nor out of place.

But just as it would belong to another and a separate province to examine, at such length as its importance demands, the claims of the Church of Rome to be acknowledged as that universal interpreter of the word and will of God, from whose decisions there is no appeal; so would it evidently be incompatible with the nature of the present address, to dwell in any way corresponding with the magnitude and delicacy of the subject, on the duty, the responsibility, and the privilege of private judgment; on the dangers to which an unchastened exercise of it may expose both an individual, and the cause of Christian truth; or on the rules which sound wisdom and the analogy of faith may prescribe to us in the government of ourselves with respect to it. My remarks, therefore, on this subject will be as few and brief as I believe to be consistent with an acknowledgment of the principles upon which this work has been conducted.

The foundation then on which, to be safe and beneficial, the duty of private judgment, as we maintain, must be built, is very far indeed removed from that common and mischievous notion of it which would encourage us to draw immediate and crude deductions from holy Scripture, subject only to the control and the colouring of our own minds, responsible for nothing further than our own consciousness of an honest intention. Whilst we claim a release from that degrading yoke which neither are we nor were our fathers able to bear, we deprecate for ourselves and for our fellow-believers that licentiousness which in doctrine and practice tempts a man to follow merely what is right in his own eyes, uninfluenced by the example, the pre

cepts, and the authority of others, and owning no submissive allegiance to those laws which the wise and good have established for the benefit of the whole body. The freedom which we ask for ourselves, and desire to see imparted to all, is a rational liberty, tending to the good, not operating to the bane of its possessors; ministering to the general welfare, not to disorder and confusion. In the enjoyment of this liberty, or rather in the discharge of the duties and trusts which this liberty brings with it, we feel ourselves under an obligation to examine the foundations of our faith, to the very best of our abilities, according to our opportunities, and with the most faithful use of all the means afforded to us by its divine Author and finisher. Among those means, whilst we regard the holy Scriptures as paramount and supreme, we appeal to the witness and mind of the Church as secondary and subsidiary; a witness not at all competing with Scripture, never to be balanced against it; but competing with our own less able and less pure apprehension of Scripture. In ascertaining the testimony of this witness, we examine the sentiments and practice of the ancient teachers of the Church; not as infallible guides, not as uniformly holding all of them the same opinions, but as most valuable helps in our examination of the evidence of the Church, who is, after all, our appointed instructor in the truths of the Gospel,-fallible in her individual members and branches, yet the sure witness and keeper of Holy Writ, and our safest guide on earth to the mind and will of God. When we have once satisfied ourselves that a doctrine is founded on Scripture, we receive it with implicit faith, and maintain it as a sacred deposit, entrusted to our keeping, to be delivered down whole and entire without our adding

thereto what to us may seem needful, or taking away what we may think superfluous.

The state of the Christian thus employed, in acting for himself in a work peculiarly his own, is very far removed from the condition of one who labours in bondage, without any sense of liberty and responsibility, unconscious of the dignity of a free and accountable agent, and surrendering himself wholly to the control of a task-master. Equally is it distant from the conduct of one who indignantly casting off all regard for authority, and all deference to the opinions of others, boldly and proudly sets up his own will and pleasure as the only standard to which he will submit. For the model which we would adopt, as members of the Church, in our pursuit of Christian truth, we find a parallel and analogous case in a well-principled and well-disciplined son, with his way of life before him, exercising a large and liberal discretion in the choice of his pursuits; not fettered by peremptory paternal mandates, but ever voluntarily referring to those principles of moral obligation and of practical wisdom with which his mind has been imbued; shaping his course with modest diffidence in himself, and habitual deference to others older and wiser than himself, yet acting with the firmness and intrepidity of conscious rectitude of principle, and integrity of purpose; and under a constant sense of his responsibility, as well for his principles as for his conduct. Against the cogency of these maxims various objections have been urged from time to time. We have been told, that the exercise of private judgment in matters of religion, tends to foster errors of every diversity of character, and leads to heresy, scepticism, and infidelity: it is represented as rending the Church of Christ, and totally

subverting Christian unity, and snapping asunder at once the bond of peace. So also it has been often maintained, that the same cause robs individual Christians of that freedom from all disquietude and perplexity and anxious responsibility, that peace of mind, satisfaction, and content, which those personally enjoy who surrender themselves implicitly to a guide, whom they believe to be unerring and infallible.

For a moment let us pause to ascertain the soundness of such objections. And here anticipating, for argument's sake, the worst result, let us suppose that the exercise of individual inquiry and judgment (such as the best teachers in the Anglican Church are wont to inculcate) may lead in some cases even to professed infidelity; is it right and wise and justifiable to be driven by an abuse of God's gifts to denounce the legitimate and faithful employment of them? What human faculty? -Which among the most precious of the Almighty's blessings is not liable to perversion? What unquestionable moral duty can be found, which has not been transformed by man's waywardness into an instrument of evil? Nay, what doctrine of our holy faith has not the wickedness or the folly of unworthy men employed as a cloke for unrighteousness, and a vehicle for blasphemy? But by a consciousness of this liability in all things human, must we be tempted to suppress the truth? to disparage those moral duties? or to discountenance the cultivation of those gifts and faculties? Rather would not sound philosophy and Christian wisdom jointly enforce the necessity of improving the gifts zealously, of discharging the moral obligation to the full, and of maintaining the doctrine in all its integrity; but guarding withal, to the utmost of our power and watchfulness, against the abuses to which