First of all,

paragraph in it in which there was not something either expressed or implied to which he was not able to give his full assent. the writer seemed to take for granted that part of the Old Testament was made up of mistakes, and that there was a morality sanctioned in it which could not be defended. Now, he did not believe either of these assumptions. He believed that every part of the Old Testament was from God, and that the morality sanctioned in it was in no respect essentially different from the morality sanctioned in the New Testament. The theory on which the writer seemed to proceed would leave them no authoritative Bible at all, and for this reason, if the Bible was partly made up of mistakes, where was the man who could tell them authoritatively where the part which was God's, and therefore infallible, ended, and where that which consists of mistakes began? The writer did not draw the line for them between the chaff and the wheat. If the writer were to attempt to do so he would not find even one other critic of his own school, or of any other school, who would draw the line at precisely the same point, and so each would have a different Bible, so that there would be as many Bibles as there were critics. Now, in regard to all the writers of the Old Testament, he believed that word was true: "Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost," and that the whole "law of the Lord was perfect" in this sense, that it was not partly made up of mistakes, but was all the infallible Word of God. As they all knew, the Old Testament Scriptures were the only Bible of the Saviour and His apostles, and there was no intimation given them either by Christ or His apostles that they found, as the writer of this paper had done, "mistakes and immoralities" in the Old Testament. On the contrary, they constantly quoted the Old Testament Scriptures as authoritative and infallible, and Christ, without excepting any portion of it, expressly assured them that "the Scripture cannot be broken." The whole impression left by His teaching and that of the apostles in regard to the Old Testament was that its writings in every part are the infallible truth of God. That being so, he did not see how they could maintain the infallible authority of the New Testament writers, if they denied the infallible authority of the Old Testament, more especially as the apostles classed their writings as on a level with the Old Testament Scriptures, telling them that in the New Testament also there are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other Scriptures. He regretted his time was up, as he had only just begun what he would have liked to say.

The Rev. Dr. CRAVEN (Philadelphia).-I echo the sentiment expressed by the brethren who have preceded me. With the vast

majority of the positions taken by Dr. Dods I thoroughly agree, and especially the last, that unbelief in the Church is the parent of unbelief in the world around us. But I cannot agree with the utterance that it is the duty of the Church to make it plain that faith in Christ is not bound up with faith in the infallibility of (the Old Testament) Scripture. On the contrary, I hold it to be the duty of the Church to set forth that our faith is bound up with the infallibility of the Old Testament. Our Lord and His apostles referred to the Scriptures of the Old Testament, as the Word of God, as infallible; and, if they be fallible, Christ and the apostles are fallible. It will not do to answer this question by saying that the Old Testament contains the Word of God as the block contains the statue. Our Lord referred to the writings of Moses, and to all the writings of Moses without exception, as the Word of God; and where is the man who, save he be inspired of God, can disintegrate that which is false from that which is true? Where is the man, where the church, that can bring forth the statue from the block? We must receive the whole Word of God. We are fallible as to our interpretation of the Scriptures. Injury has followed from the fact that the Church has endeavoured to hold as infallible her fallible interpretations. The book of nature and the book of Scripture proceed from the same being, and we must expect to find in them the same characteristics. In both, things essential to life lie upon the surface; in the book of nature it is evident that fire warms, that bread and water will support life. But beneath these, hidden under apparent phenomena, are truths which we must search for in order to bring them out. So in the word of life, the things essential to life lie on the surface-the existence of God, the sacrifice of Jesus, the necessity of faith in Him in order to salvation. But beyond these there are hidden truths, as in nature, not essential to spiritual life, which we must search for.

The Rev. Dr. CAVAN (Toronto).-I have no charge of unsoundness against any man of this Alliance, or against any brother sitting here. The Council would entirely go beyond its province if it assumed to sit in judgment in that way upon any one taking part in its proceedings. At the same time, it becomes our duty to speak out distinctly our sentiments in regard to great topics brought before us; because the Christian Church, and especially the brethren who have sent us here, wish to know what we really hold and are prepared to vindicate. I would advert to two topics in the essay under criticism (1) Belief in Christ; (2) Belief in a certain system of doctrine. In some sense I recognise the distinction as valid. Suppose the Church, for instance, formulates wrong doctrine, then the charge brought against it, that it has given occasion to unbelief, lies. Suppose, again, the Church has

formulated doctrine too extensively, not simply declaring the great central doctrines, but going into such a large and detailed exhibition of doctrine that the central truths are almost forgotten; then, I think, the charge would lie. But, if it is said that the Church is just to require belief in Christ, and not belief in doctrine, then I cannot understand the proposition. Faith, if true faith, is always an intelligent thing; it is not simply a blind instinct; not simply feeling, but intellect in union with feeling. As soon as you begin to speak about Christ, you put questions like these: Is He sinless? Is He human only? Is He human and Divine also? Has He by His death taken away our sins? Is He still sleeping in the tomb, or has He risen and ascended? Will He come again, or will He not? Our answer to every one of these questions is a proposition and a doctrine; and how it is possible for one to believe in Christ in the perfectly general and abstract way, without giving his assent to any of the doctrines about Christ, I am utterly at a loss to conceive. The other point is this, viz. that the Church, by the position which she has given to the Scriptures, and especially to the Old Testament, has given occasion for unbelief. In this regard I am concerned to vindicate the position of the great Reformed Church, and I am prepared to maintain that the Church, in declining to define inspiration, has, instead of being exposed to any charge, acted wisely. We all recognise the progressive character of revelation. That is my first proposition here, that the Divine truth has been revealed gradually until the complete exhibition of it in Jesus Christ. This, again, we all recognise, the imperfection—the relative imperfection-of certain laws which were given under the Old Testament dispensation. We recognise the fact that Old Testament Scripture presents to us a record of great sins and great errors. But surely inspiration is not implicated in the fact. The record is inspired: the sins and errors belong, of course, to the persons that are chargeable with them and guilty of them; and the Word of God is by no means compromised thereby. Making full allowance for this proposition, we can still affirm that "the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple."

Professor WATTS (Belfast), said:-We have heard Dr. Dods' estimate of the Old Testament Scriptures, and it is certainly not a very high one. He denies their infallibility. Let us hear what our Saviour's estimate was. In His great inaugural sermon on the Mount He is most emphatic in His testimony to their infallibility. “Think not that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass

from the law, till all be fulfilled." I care not whether this language be taken as figurative or as literal, the doctrine affirmed is the imperishable character of the Sacred Record in its minutest details as a Divine Revelation.

Again, when He is charged with blaspheming for claiming to be the Son of God, He defends Himself by an appeal to this same Old Testament, and founds His argument upon the infallibility of its smallest utterances. "Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods? If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the Scripture cannot be broken; say ye of Him whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?" Now mark the principle of our Lord's argument. He does not single out the clause, "I said, Ye are gods," and pronounce it upon His own authority infallible. No, He argues the infallibility of the clause from the infallibility of the record in which it is found. In His view all that was needed to establish the infallibility of any expression was that it was found in the Scripture. Surely it is manifest that our Saviour could not have argued thus if He had not regarded the entire Old Testament as infallibly inspired. But consider for a moment the matter and dimensions of this clause. Some will admit that the religious truths of the Bible are inspired, but that inspiration does not extend to anything else. Well, this clause, "I said, Ye are gods," is not a theological deliverance. It simply refers to a designation of civil magistrates, and indicates their dignity. Nevertheless, our Saviour assumes that it is a part of the one infallible record. Equally significant are the dimensions of this clause. It is a remarkably brief sentence. And besides, the pertinency of the reference to it depends upon the fact that it contains the term 'gods.' The inference from these facts is inevitable; and it is this, that in the estimate of Him who is the faithful and true witness, all that was recognised as Scripture in His day was inspired infallibly to its minutest expression, whether the subject-matter was sacred or secular, whether the theme was theological or civil. Such was Christ's opinion of that Old Testament assailed in the paper read by Dr. Dods before this Council.

The Rev. JOHN MEWAN (Edinburgh), said he thought they would want to hear the opinion of one or two of their Free Church brethren. Some of them had been a little pained that any jar to their proceedings should have come from a church which they loved. He would like the Council distinctly to understand that the paper to which they had listened, so far as his knowledge went-and it was a pretty extensive knowledge of the Free Church-did not touch any sympathetic chord in any large number of the people of that Church

in Scotland. Only a few years ago the Free Church made what many churches thought to be a great sacrifice in removing a most influential and learned man from her ranks, simply because it was believed throughout the church that he had held forth opinions that touched the question of the infallibility and inspiration of the Word of God. He trusted none of the churches represented here would adopt the advice of the writer of that paper who complained that the Church had not formulated a doctrine of revelation. If time permitted, it could be shown that they had a doctrine of revelation, that both Christ and the Apostle Paul had a doctrine of revelation; and they of the Reformed Church, and especially those holding the Westminster Confession had also a doctrine of revelation, namely, that the Scriptures, the Old and New Testaments, were all inspired of God and of infallible authority. He hoped the churches here represented would never cease to hold forth the full Gospel of Christ for the belief of man, and not any one truth, however important. On the general question he would say that among the present tendencies to be deprecated was one that he felt deeply-the tendency to make men infidels by ministers coming before the Church and declaring that they believed the whole Scriptures to be inspired of God, and after being so admitted, as ministers using their influence to undermine the very doctrine that they professed to teach. It was that that made men infidels.

The Rev. GEORGE SMITH (Swatow, China).-In one of the papers we were told that Christianity has yet to learn from comparative religions; as if these led up to Christianity, and Christianity was the highest development. I consider that view of Christianity an entire mistake. Whatever truth is in Buddhism and Mohammedanism, is there as disjecta membra which are not in their proper places. All the truth, moral and spiritual, in Mohammedanism and Buddhism, is already in the Bible far more clearly given, and in the right setting. If we want to get the purest idea of a Christian church, we must go back to Pentecost, and to the Scriptures. Buddhism and Mohammedanism and Confucianism are all antagonistic to Christ.

The Rev. H. LYND, Ballylaggan, Ireland (Reformed Presbyterian Church). When the Church makes herself the advocate of any wrong, or panders to any iniquity, she certainly does become responsible for much scepticism that may result. But when the writer of the paper we are discussing states that the Church is responsible for present scepticism, by holding to the infallibility of the Old Testament, I cannot help asking myself, Is he really serious? I do not disbelieve the Old Testament. I bought a note-book the other day, and tore out a leaf. In tearing out that one leaf I found that I had loosened the