2. It is believed by various members of the Church of England, and of other episcopal Churches, that the great body of the Church universal is authorized by God to teach, without fear of mistake, the essential doctrines of salvation; and that in such matters the individual Christian is bound to accept her teaching, as necessarily true. A distinction is drawn between this sentiment and the Romish doctrine, to the following effect; that Scripture is the only rule of faith, but that the Church is the divinely appointed guide to its right meaning. By some persons the Church is supposed to possess this infallible power, as being the witness to, and keeper of, the original doctrines of the Gospel as set forth in the preaching of the apostles, and handed down from age to age by an unbroken tradition. By some again, this tradition is imagined to include various truths, not exactly essential to salvation, but yet of great importance, not contained or clearly declared in the Bible itself. By others, the collective Church is believed to possess a power of interpretation which is beyond the reach of her members taken individually; and hence it is urged that her expositions of the written word, as set forth in Articles, Creeds, or Decrees of Councils, are

binding upon the conscience of the private Christian.

3. The great body of Protestants maintain, that the Church universal has no authority to demand belief in any interpretation of Scripture, which she cannot prove from Scripture itself to the private judgment and understanding of her members, whether such interpretation be founded upon a tradition derived from early ages, or be the result of the deliberations of the entire body of the clergy. In other words, they conceive that every man has a lawful right to try, if he shall please, the various doctrines which prevail in the nominally Christian world, by the agreement which to his own mind, candidly and fairly employed, they appear to have with the written word of God.

4. It is supposed by some persons, that the authority of the Church (whether they mean the universal Church, or the Church of which they are members, does not very clearly appear) is to be followed to a certain extent; that although the infallibility claimed by Rome is an unjustifiable assumption, yet the private believer is bound to obey the teaching of the Church to a certain degree. And this theory is believed to avoid the evils of all other systems, to pay due respect to

authority, and at the same time to give some power to the individual judgment.

5. Lastly, it is occasionally looked upon as abundant confirmation of the truth of any doctrine, that it was maintained by some or by all of the early writers of the Christian Church. What the Fathers believed, is by those who hold this opinion looked upon as necessarily true. It is assumed as a self-evident proposition, that those who lived either cotemporaneously with the apostles, or in the centuries immediately succeeding the apostolic age, were in possession of sources of information with respect to the doctrines originally taught by the inspired messengers of Christ, which are wholly beyond the reach of more modern believers. And consequently (it is urged) we are bound to submit our judgments to their declarations.

It must not, however, be supposed, that we shall invariably find these several sentiments entertained in precisely the same form and degree by those who maintain them. There are few who have such clear ideas on the question, as to have reduced their opinions to any one of these classes. Some hold them more, and some less. Many fancy that they receive two or three of the number at the same time. Many are so deceived

by the words in which the sentiments are clothed, and which they themselves employ in communicating their thoughts on the subject to others, that while they really entertain one of these principles, they continually uphold some other of them. Others, again, please themselves with the idea, that they hold some one of these theories in a modified degree, imagining that they thereby get rid of all the difficulties which they conceive to attach to it, when entertained in its fullest extent. It will, therefore, be right to premise a few observations, in order that we may see how far these sentiments really coincide with one another.

With regard to the Romish doctrine, it need only be observed, that it is a plain and intelligible proposition, and that the consequences which would follow upon its reception would be nearly such as its advocates themselves allege. If it should once be proved that the Church is by Christ's appointment infallible in the interpretation she attaches to Scripture, and that she is also in possession of certain other revealed truths, not recorded in the inspired volume, the only difficulty that remains, is the finding an answer to the questions, What is the Church? and what are the precise doctrines she teaches? When a

Romanist tells us, that the teaching of the Church is necessarily without error, and that it matters not whether or no we can find in the Bible the doctrines she inculcates, we know what he means. We understand the course he would have us

pursue. He communicates a simple, tangible idea. There is no confusion of thought. His principle is plain, and he lays it down clearly.

But very different is the nature of the ideas which we derive from the theory, that the Scriptures are the only rule of faith, while tradition is the authorized guide to their meaning. Here all is vague and undetermined. We cannot tell whether the principle is the same as that which recognizes the supreme authority of private judgment, or whether it really coincides with the Romanist doctrine. When it is said, that though Scripture is the rule of faith, yet the Church is the guide to the meaning of Scripture, and at the same time it is allowed that the Church is bound to prove her own interpretation correct, we can see no difference between this idea and that of the upholders of private judgment. If the Church be under an obligation to prove her assertions, we ask," to whose satisfaction is she to prove them?" Plainly, to the satisfaction of her individual members. But if it be said that the private