admission of a want of all histoi'ical evidence of " common con- sent " is also involved, as before remarked, in their constant appeal to the authority of the Church. Wiiat the Church says is a mat- ter of faith, we, the traditionists affirm, are bound to believe, has always been a matter of faith. The passage from " Petrus 4 Soto," quoted above, puts the case very concisely : " Qusecunque credit, tenet et servat Romana ecclesia, et in Scripturis non habentur ilia ab Apostolls esse tradita." The argument amounts to this. The Church believes on the ground of common consent. The proof that a thing is a matter of common consent, and always has been, is that the Church now believes it.
Inadequacy of the Evidences of Consent.
The second objection to the argument of Romanists from com- mon consent in support of their traditions, is, that the evidence which they adduce of such consent is altogether inadequate. They appeal to the ancient creeds. But there was no creed generally adopted before the fourth century. No creed adopted before the eighth century contains any of the doctrines peculiar to the Church of Rome. Protestants all receive the doctrinal statements con- tained in what is called the Apostles' creed, and in those" of Chalce- don, and of Constantinople, adopted A. D. 681.
They appeal also to the decisions of councils. To this the same reply is made. There were no general councils before the fourth century. The first six ecumenical councils gave no doctrinal de- cisions from which Pi'otestants dissent. They, therefore, present no evidence of consent in those doctrines which are now peculiar to the Church of Rome.
They appeal again to the Avritings of the fathers. But to this Protestants object, —
First. That the writings of the apostolic fathers are too few to be taken as trustworthy representatives of the state of opinion m the Church for the first three hundred years. Ten or twenty viriters scattered over such a period cannot reasonably be assumed to speak the mind of the whole Church.
Secondly. The consent of these fathers, or of the half of them, cannot be adduced in favour of any doctrine in controversy between Protestants and Romanists.
Thirdly. Almost unanimous consent can be quoted in support of doctrines which Romanists and Protestants unite in rejecting. The Jewish doctrine of the millennium passed over in its grossest form to the early Christian Church. But that doctrine the Church ol RoTYiP is snecjallv zealous in denon.ncing.
126 INTRODUCTION. [Ch. V. — R. C. R. of Faith.
FourtWy. 'the consent of the fathers cannot be proved in sup- port of doctrines whicli Protestants and Romanists agree in accept- ing. Not that these doctrines did not then enter into the faith of the Church, but simply tliat they were not presented.
Fifthly. Such is the diversity of opinion among the fathers them- selves, such the vagueness of their doctrinal statements, and such the unsettled usus loquendi as to important words, that the author- ity of the fathers may be quoted on either side of any disputed doctrine. There is no view, for example, of the nature of the Lord's supper, which has ever been held in the Church, for which the authority of some early father cannot be adduced. And often the same father presents one view at one time, and another at a different time.
Sixthly. The writings of the fathers have been notoriously cor- rupted. It was a matter of great complaint in the early Chui'ch that spurious works were circulated ; and that genuine works were recklessly interpolated. Some of the most important works of the Greek fathers are extant only in a Latin translation. This is the case with the greater part of the works of Irenseus, translated by Rufinus, whom Jerome charges with the most shameless adultera- tion.
Another objection to the argument from consent is, that it is a Procrustean bed which may \)b extended or shortened at pleasure. In every Catena Patrum prepared to prove this consent in certain doctrines, it will be found that two or more writers in a century are cited as evincing the unanimous opinion of that century, while double or fourfold the number, of equally important writers, belong- ing to the same period, on the other side, are passed over in silence. There is no rule to guide in the application of this test, and no uniformity in the manner of its use.
While, therefore, it is admitted that there has been a stream of doctrine flowing down uninterruptedly from the days of the Apos- tles, it is denied, as a matter of fact, that there has been any unin- terrupted or general consent in any doctrine not cleai'ly revealed in the Sacred Scriptures ; and not even in reference to such clearly revealed doctrines, beyond the nari'ow limits of essential truths. And it is, moreover, denied that in any external, visible, organized Church, can the rule, quod semper, quod ah omnibus, be applied even to essential doctrines. The argument, therefore, of Roman- ists in favor of their peculiar doctrines, derived from general con- sent, is utterly untenable and fallacious. This is virtually admitted by the most zealous advocates of tradition. " Not only," says Pro-