man claims to be the organ of God, when he sajs that God speaks through him, then his working of miracles is the testimony of God to the validity of his claims. And such testimony God gave to the mftillibility of the Apostles.
The above considerations are sufficient to show, that according to the Scriptui-es, inspired men were the organs, or mouth of God, in the sense that what they said and taught has the sanction and authority of God.
F. Inspiration extends equally to all Parts of Scripture.
This is the fourth element of the Church doctrine on this sub- ject. It means, first, that all the books of Scripture are equally inspired. All alike are infallible in what they teach. And sec- ondly, that inspiration extends to all the contents of these several books. It is not confined to moral and religious truths, but ex- tends to the statements of facts, whether scientific, historical, or geographical. It is not confined to those facts the importance of which is obvious, or which are involved in matters of doctrine. It extends to everything which any sacred writer asserts to be true.
This is proved, (1) Because it is involved in, or follows as a necessary consequence from, the proposition that the sacred writ- ers were the organs of God. If what they assert, God asserts, which, as has been shown, is the Scriptural idea of inspiration, their assertions must be free from error. (2.) Because our Lord ex- pressly says, " The Scripture cannot be broken " (John x. 35), i. e., it cannot err. (3.) Because Christ and his Apostles refer to all parts of the Scriptures, or to the whole volume, as the word of God. They make no distinction as to the authority of the Law, the Prophets, or the Hagiographa. They quote the Pentateuch, the historical books, the Psalms, and the Prophets, as all and equally the word of God. (4.) Because Christ and the writers of the New Testament refer to all classes of facts recorded in the Old Testament as infallibly true. Not only doctrinal facts, such as those of the creation and probation of man ; his apostasy ; the covenant with Abraham ; the giving the law upon Mount Sinai ; not only great historical facts, as the deluge, the deliverance of the people out of Egypt, the passage of the Red Sea, and the like ; but incidental circumstances, or facts of apparently minor impor- tance, as e. g. that Satan tempted our first i)arents in the form of a serpent ; that Moses lifted up a serpent in the wilderness ; that Elijah healed Naaman, the Syrian, and was sent to the widow in Sarepta ; that David ate *iie shew-bread in the temple ; and even
164 INTRODUCTION. [Ch. VI. — P. E. of Faith.
that great stumbling-block, that Jonah was three days in the whale's belly, are all referred to by our Lord and his Apostles with the sub- lime simplicity and confidence with which they are received by httle children. (5.) It lies in the very idea of the Bible, that God chose some men to write history ; some to indite psalms ; some to unfold the future ; some to teach doctrines. All were equally his organs, and each was infallible in his own sphere. As the princi- ple of vegetable life pervades the whole plant, the root, stem, and flower ; as the life of the body belongs as much to the feet as to the head, so the Spirit of God pervades the whole Scripture, and is not more in one part than in another. Some members of the body are more important than others ; and soine books of the Bible could be far better spared than others. There may be as great a difference between St. John's Gospel and the Book of Chronicles as between a man's brain and his hair ; nevertheless the life of the body is as truly in the hair as in the brain.
G. The Inspiration of the Scriptures extends to the Words.
1. This again is included in the infallibility which our Lord as- cribes to the Scriptures. A mere human report or record of a divine revelation must of necessity be not only fallible, but more or less erroneous.
2. The thoughts are in the words. The two are inseparable. If the words, priest, sacrifice, ransom, expiation, propitiation, puri- fication by blood, and the like, have no divine authority, then the doctrine which they embody has no such authority.
3. Christ and his Apostles argue from the very words of Scrip- ture. Our Lord says that David by the Spirit called the Messiah Lord, i. g., David used that word. It was in the use of a particular word, that Christ said (John x. 35), that the Scriptures cannot be broken. " If he call them gods unto whom the word of God came, and the Scripture cannot be broken," etc. The use of that word, therefore, according to Christ's view of the Scripture, was deter- mined by the Spirit of God. Paul, in Gal. iii. 16, lays stress on the fact, that in the promise made to Abraham, a word used is singular and not plural, " seed," " as of one," and not " seeds as of many." Constantly it is the very words of Scripture which are quoted as of divine authority.
4. The very form in which the doctrine of inspiration is taught in the Bible, assumes that the organs of God in the communication of his will were controlled by Him in the words which they used. *' I have put my words in thy mouth." (Jer. i. 9.) " It is not ye