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Holy Scripture and Modern Negations made to it, so far as it then existed, by Christ and His Apos tles. That the New Testament, the work of the Apostles and of apostolic men, does not stand on a lower level of inspiration and authority than the Old Testament, is, I think, hardly worth arguing. And in that sense, as a body of writings of Divine authority, the books of the Old and the New Testa ment were accepted by the Apostles and by the Church of the post-apostolic age. T Take the writings of any of the early Church fathers—1 have waded through them wearily as teacher of Church His tory—take Tertullian or Origen, or others, and you will find their words saturated with references to Scripture. ou wi find the Scriptures treated in precisely the same way as they are used in the Biblical literature of today; namely, as the ultimate authority on the matters of which they spea . really do the fathers an injustice in this comparison, for 1 find things said and written about the Holy Scriptures by teachers of the Church today which those early fat ers wou never have permitted themselves to utter. It has now e come fashionable among a class of religious teachers to spea disparagingly of or belittle the Holy Scriptures as an author itative rule of faith for the Church. The leading cause of this has undoubtedly been the trend which the criticism of the Ho y Scriptures has assumed during the last half century or more. By all means, let criticism have its rights. Let purely a - erary questions about the Bible receive full and fair discussion. Let the structure of books be impartially examined. If a reverent science has light to throw on the composition or authority or age of these books, let its voice be beard, this thing is of God we cannot overthrow it; if it be of man, or so far as it is of man, or so far as it comes in conflict with the reality of things in the Bible, it will come to naug as in my opinion a great deal of it is fast coming today through its own excesses. No fright, therefore, need be taken at the mere word, "Criticism.”
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