This confidence would be more reasonably entertained, if there had been any promise of preserving the purity of tradition; if there had been no admonitions to beware of these traditions; if we had not been solemnly instructed, that if even "an angel from heaven should preach any "other Gospel" than that which the apostles preached, he should "be accursed"." The Scriptures certainly afford no countenance to these traditions. To that part of the sacred Volume, which was not completed by the evangelical writings, our Saviour appealed, not only as to a testimony concerning himself, but as to a record of “eternal lifea:” and it was the advantage of Timothy, that from a child he had known the holy Scriptures, which were able to make him "wise unto salvation, through "faith which is in Christ Jesus"." The argument is so far from being weakened by the enlargement of these inspired records, that we are assured, that "all Scripture given by divine inspiration,” (and this

z Galat. i. 8.

a John v. 39. · b 2 Tim. iii. 15.

character certainly includes the New Testament not less than the Old,) “is profit"able for doctrine, for reproof, for cor"rection, for instruction in righteousness," not only in a subordinate, dependent, or auxiliary manner, but "that the man of "God may be perfect, throughly furnished "unto all good works." St. Luke wrote his Gospel, that Theophilus might "know "the certainty of those things in which he "had been instructedd;" and St. Paul judged it "safe" for the Philippians, that he should commit the subject of his Epistle to writing, and not leave them to the uncertainty of oral traditione. So likewise when St. John concluded the sacred history, and acknowledged that there were many other things "which Jesus did, the which if they should "be written every one, even the world itself "could not contain the books that should "be written;" he nevertheless declared that his testimony was true, and that he wrote these things that we " might believe "that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God,

c 2 Tim. iii. 16, 17.

d Luke i. 4.

e

Philip. iii. 1.

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"and that believing we might have life through his name." The book of the Apocalypse, which concludes the sacred Canon, denounces a heavy judgment upon any man who should enlarge or abridge what it contained.

It is true that the Scriptures have been and may be misinterpreted and misapplied; and what is there so perfect in the hands of man which is not liable to abuse? It is no valid objection, however, which is founded on St. Peter's censure of the misuse of the writings of St. Paul: "As our beloved "brother Paul also, according to the wis"dom given unto him, hath written unto

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you, as also in all his Epistles, speaking "in them of these things, in which are "some things hard to be understood, which "they that are unlearned and unstable

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wrest, as they do the other Scriptures, 66 unto their own destructionh." It is a natural and obvious conclusion from the

Apostle's judgment, that the other Scrip

f John xx. 30, 31. xxi. 24, 25. 8 Rev. xxii. 18, 19.

M

tures, as well as the Epistles of St. Paul, were at this time in the hands of the people, not withholden or suppressed in any secret depository, but so commonly promulgated, that, in their most difficult passages, the unstable and unlearned perverted them from their true sense and interpretation.

2. It is admitted that the tradition is in itself obscure; and from hence is inferred the necessity of an infallible interpreter, of the speaking "and teaching authority "of the successors of the Apostles," which,

resting on the commission given by our "Saviour to his Apostles," is the only security. This authority is inferred from the promises made to Peter, and is appropriated to the Church, or to the Bishops and Pastors of the Church, "either dis

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persed or convened in council'," convened under the sanction of the Bishop of Rome, or in their distributive state, not remonstrating against the decisions of those

i Delahogue, p. 506. xix.

k Berington, p. xvii. xviii. 1 Ibid. p. 145. Delahogue, p. 128. 134. 230. m Delahogue, p. 380. 381. 440.

councils. This authority is definitive" in matters of faith and morals, as is that also of the Pope under the similar acquiescence of the Bishops. Their judgments are irrevocable, irrefragable, and infallible; so that "the Catholic Church is the guide to

truth, the expounder of the Scriptures, " and the judge of controversy." Thus "the Church speaks definitively by the "voice of her councils," and "all Ca"tholics are obliged to adhere implicitly "to all decrees and canons, which the "Church, assembled in General Councils, "declares and delivers, and which the Pope "has confirmed"." In matters of discipline, whether essential or not essential to the constitution of the Church, its judgment is also infallible'; and the laws which

n Delahogue, p. 28. 45. 51. 88. 90. 111. 127. 196. 197. 198. 211. o Ibid. p. 152. p Ibid. p. 94. 146.

r

a Berington, p. 31. 112. I Gandolphy, vol. i. Troy, as quoted in The Dangers, &c.

t

s Dr.

Delahogue, p. 198. "Ecclesia jus habet sanciendi "articulos disciplinæ et ubi certo ac firmo decreto eos "proponit cum intentione omnes ecclesias obligandi non "potest errare eo sensu quod illa disciplina vel cum "doctrina fidei non consentiat, vel bonis moribus ad