mistakes, and were not in all things guided by the Spirit, and I know not where I am. I see nothing certain nothing solid, nothing trustworthy in the foundations of my faith. A fog has descended on the Book of God, and enveloped every chapter in uncertainty ! Who shall decide when the writers of Scripture made mis- takes, and when they did not? How am I to know where inspiration ends, and where it begins ? What I think inspired, another may^Bnk uninspired ! The texts that I rest upon, may possibly have been put in by a slip of the pen ! The words and phrases that I love to feed upon, may possibly be weak earthly expres- sions, in writing which the author was left to his own private uninspired mind ! — The glory is departed from my Bible at this rate. A cold feeling of suspicion and doubt creeps over me as I read it. I am almost tempted to lay it down in flat despair. A partially inspired Bible is little better than no Bible a,t all. Give me the *' plenary verbal " theory, with all its difficulties, rather than this. I accept the difficulties of that theory, and humbly wait for their solution. But while I wait, I feel that I am standing on a rock.
I grant the existence of occasional difficulties, and apparent discrepa,ncies, in Scripture. They are trace- able, in some cases, I believe, to the errors of early transcribers; and in others to, our ignorance of explana- tory circumstances and minute links and details. To tell us that things cannot be explained, merely because we are not at present able to explain them,, is childish and absurd! "He that believeth shall not make haste." (Isa. xxviii. 16.) A true philosopher will never give up a sound theory, on account of a few difficulties. He will rather say^-^"- J can afford to wait. It wUl all he plain
Vlll PREFACE.
• one day." For my own part, I believe that the vvhole
Bible, as it came originally from the hands of the inspired writers, was verbally perfect and without flaw. I believe that the inspired writers were infallibly guided by the Holy Ghost, both in their selection of matter and their choice of words. I believe that even now, when we cannot explain alleged difficulties in Holy Scripture, the wisest course is to blame the interpreter and not the text, to suspect our own ignc^fhce to be in fault, and not any defect in God's Word. The theological system of modern days, which delights in magnifying the so-called mistakes of the Bible, in explaining away its miraculous narratives, and in making as littie as possible of its Divine character and supernatural element, is a system that I cannot away with. It seems to me to take a rock from beneath our feet, and plant us on a quicksand. It robs us of bread, and does not give us in its place so much as a stone.
Nothing, to my mind, is so unutterably painful as the patronizing tone of compassion which the modern advo cates of " partial inspiration" adopt in speaking of the writers of the Bible. They write and talk as if St. Paul and St. John, and their companions, were nothing better than well-meaning pious men, who on some points were greatly mistaken, and far below our enlightened age ! They speak with pity and contempt of that system of divinity which satisfied the master-builders and giants of the Church in by -gone days ! They tell us complacently that a new theology is needed for our age, and that a " freer handling" of the Bible, with pens untrammelled by the fetters which cumbered former interpreters, will produce, and is producing, wonderful results! I tho- roughly distrust these new theologians, however learned jind plausible they may be, and I expect the Church will